Florida Gulf Coast University fraternities unleashed their own version of the It’s On Us campaign aiming to end sexual assault on college campuses. The It’s On Us campaign was launched nationally by President Obama’s administration on Sept. 19.
The White House’s website states, “It’s On Us asks everyone — men and women across America — to make a personal commitment to step off the sidelines and be part of the solution to campus sexual assault.”
Sexual assault is recognized nationally as a serious problem on college campuses, and the severity of the issue seems to have heightened in recent years.
“An estimated one in five women has been sexually assaulted during her college years — one in five,” President Obama said during the unveiling speech. “Of those assaults, only 12 percent are reported, and of those reported assaults, only a fraction of the offenders are punished.”
Many celebrities were featured on the national It’s On Us website advocating the end of sexual assault including Jon Hamm, Olivia Munn, Lance Bass, Kerry Washington and many others.
Organizations such as Tumblr, BET, College Humor, NCAA and Newsweek have become partners of the national campaign.
A stigma has surrounded greek life for being a large proponent to sexual assault in the past, so members of the Interfraternity Council, Multicultural Greek Council and National Pan-Hellenic Council at FGCU decided to create a public service announcement advocating for eradication of sexual assault on college campuses.
Senior communications major Jordan Nation released the video on the FGCU IFC YouTube page on Oct. 3.
“Sexual assault awareness is something that is really important to me. We need to tell men not to rape instead of telling women not to be raped,” he said.
In the video, members of fraternities at FGCU stated facts about sexual assault and united in their opinion that sexual assault on college campuses needs to end with us shadowing the national campaign.
Junior business management major Nicholas De La Giustina was one of the students featured in the PSA.
“I am so happy that fraternities have been able to stand up and speak up against this important issue especially because there is a negative association with rape and fraternities,” he said.
Students at the university felt that the PSA made a compelling argument on a controversial issue that needs to be addressed.
“People tend to think of rape as a joking matter and it’s not funny, so this is important and it needs to be dealt with,” environmental engineering major Alexander Erlenbach said. “I don’t know how much of a problem it is on our university’s campus but it’s important to address the problem.”