Opinion | What Makes Men in Groups Behave So Badly?

I keep thinking about an emoji posted in a group chat of more than 50 young men: a devil’s face ().And a text: “This is crazy work” — which I take to mean wild, out of bounds, outrageous.

These and other Snapchat messages written by members of Cornell University’s Chi Phi fraternity have provoked intense outrage on behalf of Jane Doe, who says she was sexually assaulted by seven men that night, because the misogyny on display is so transparent.“Free pussy”; “Like you can walk in and whip it out”; “Shop still open?” This, almost everyone agrees, is abhorrent behavior.

It is the language of rape culture.Why the devil emoji? I think the forbidden nature of sex with Jane Doe was part of the chat’s collective excitement.I see a tacit awareness that a severely intoxicated woman can’t consent to sex — and an insistence on going ahead anyway.

Then: a shared delight that the group of brothers is getting away with it, together.The men cheered: “I fucking love chi phi”; “CHI PHIII.” Masculinity is performed, proved and reveled in: You show yourself to be big men on campus by collectively preying on a vulnerable woman.Why do men in groups behave this way? What makes a man in front of an audience of other men offer up a woman like a piece of meat for consumption? Two of the men whom Jane Doe describes assaulting her that night were something like friends to her.

In the days after, they sent messages that appeared sympathetic and caring.“I’m so so sorry,” one texted.

Another wrote, “How’ve you been coping with the stress? You need anything?” These same men were the ones who advertised her body for the taking to their fraternity brothers.(All the men accused by Jane Doe have denied wrongdoing.)I am a professor at Cornell, and a few days ago I spoke to Diego Estrada, a former student of mine who served as the president of a fraternity on campus, graduated and was working as a live-in adviser at a different fraternity in fall 202...