Jon Krakauer semi-exposes himself to criticism in Missoula, the target of his new book "Missoula: Rape and the Justice System in a College Town."

"Krakauer previously said he wasn't planning a tour or any other public appearances to promote the book, but he wanted to give critics in Missoula the chance to confront him."

Instead, he received an enthusiastic welcome and applause throughout his interview with University of Montana Journalism School Dean Larry Abramson before a standing-room only crowd of more than 550 people.

That warmth was shattered when a man who identified himself as Missoula attorney Thomas Dove made his way to the front of the room just as the interview ended, called Krakauer a liar, accused him of bias and of breaking the law by citing confidential documents in his book.

The crowd tried to shout down Dove, while a few others disappointed that Krakauer did not take questions from the audience demanded that Dove have his say. Krakauer started to answer Dove's questions, but eventually became exasperated and walked out of the room as the crowd became more hostile toward Dove.

So Krakauer purported to offer his critics in Missoula a chance to confront him, and he got a comfortable event to be staged somehow, through the auspices of the University of Montana, which has a big interest in shoring up its reputation. (The book is about things that happened to the university's students.) And a Missoula man shows up, prepared to confront Krakauer, but Krakauer takes no questions from the audience. When the man insists on speaking anyway, he seems like a heckler, and the huge Krakauer-friendly crowd tries to shout him down. But there are "a few others" present who, perhaps, felt burned that they showed up for what was purportedly going to be a confrontation with critics but turned out to be a well-cushioned platform for Krakauer. The "few others" and whatever they said were apparently enough to push Krakauer to start to answer, but somehow he "became exasperated." We're told the crowd got "hostile" to Dove, so I guess we're supposed to be satisfied that Dove really was a heckler and that the wisdom in numbers � "the crowd" vs. the "few others" � has determined that Krakauer was justified in walking out.

I want to see the transcript.

ADDED: There's some audio here. I learned that Dove was given a microphone, but then (for some reason) Dean Abrahamson cut things off. After that, Krakauer had some interaction with Dove but then walked out.

FINALLY: The commenter Carter Wood pointed to the video, and it's quite disturbing.



Dove isn't heckling. He has a microphone, and Krakauer endeavors to answer a few questions. Then the crowd takes up yelling and booing, perhaps to help Krakauer. Then Krakauer stomps over and snatches the mike out of Dove's hands. From the audience: a woman laughing, people booing, and a man saying "Get out of here!"

ALSO: To be fair, Dove was being boring. He had a sheaf of papers and took the liberty to read from them. That was after he'd gotten Krakauer to straight out admit he was biased and engaged in confirmation bias. That was a long enough turn for Dove, but he took advantage, like he was going to lead an inquest. That really wasn't going to work, but the way the crowd, the Dean, and the author shut him down made them all look awful. Stupid.

Emily Bazelon is critical of Jon Krakauer's book about campus rape.

A review in the NYT of "Missoula: Rape and the Justice System in a College Town":

The university had used the standard of �preponderance of the evidence� (or more likely than not) to find Johnson culpable, but the standard for a criminal conviction is higher � beyond a reasonable doubt.... Krakauer presents [the acquittal] not as a reflection of the differing evidentiary standard, and a jury�s best effort to resolve a difficult and confusing set of facts, but as a bitter failure of the adversarial process....

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Questioning Jon Krakauer's rape-on-campus book.

Last week, we were talking about Krakauer's book "Missoula: Rape and the Justice System in a College Town," which comes out on April 21st. My post was: "In the wake of Rolling Stone's 'Rape on Campus' debacle, we're about to get a rape-on-campus book by the best-selling author Jon Krakauer." I said:

... I don't know whether Krakauer and his editors got the chance to do anything to acknowledge Rolling Stone controversy or to prepare for the different kind of scrutiny this book will get, now that skepticism and fact-checking zeal is cranked up far beyond what Krakauer could have envisioned when he was doing his research and writing. He must have been expecting a reception similar to the initial reaction to the Rolling Stone article � high praise for shining a light on the terrible sexual brutality of college men and the inadequate response by college administrators who must start believing women and punishing men.

A reader sent me a link an article in the Montana Kaimin � the University of Montana student newspaper � titled "Krakauer sources a mystery":
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In the wake of Rolling Stone's "Rape on Campus" debacle, we're about to get a rape-on-campus book by the best-selling author Jon Krakauer.

Looking up the Amazon page for "Selfish, Shallow, and Self-Absorbed: Sixteen Writers on the Decision Not to Have Kids" � discussed in the previous post � and seeing that it ranked #4 on the "Gender Studies" list, I clicked through to see what was #1. It's "Missoula: Rape and the Justice System in a College Town," by Jon Krakauer (the very popular author (I've read "Into the Wild," "Into Thin Air," and "Under the Banner of Heaven")). The book comes out on April 21st, so it's too early to check it out, and I don't know whether Krakauer and his editors got the chance to do anything to acknowledge Rolling Stone controversy or to prepare for the different kind of scrutiny this book will get, now that skepticism and fact-checking zeal is cranked up far beyond what Krakauer could have envisioned when he was doing his research and writing. He must have been expecting a reception similar to the initial reaction to the Rolling Stone article � high praise for shining a light on the terrible sexual brutality of college men and the inadequate response by college administrators who must start believing women and punishing men.

I see that Krakauer has written an op-ed in advance of the book's release: "The bungled Rolling Stone rape article doesn�t change the fact that sexual assault is the most under-reported crime in the US/When someone is raped in this country, the rapist gets away with it more than 97 percent of the time." 

Make no mistake... Women sometimes lie about being raped. According to the most reliable peer-reviewed research, between two percent and 10 percent of rape reports are bogus. As one ponders this discomfiting information, though, it�s important to keep in mind what the flip side of these numbers reveal: Between 90 percent and 98 percent of rape allegations are true. Rape, moreover, is this country�s most underreported serious crime by a wide margin. Rigorous studies consistently indicate that at least 80 percent of rapes are never disclosed to law enforcement agencies or other authorities....

And it's important to keep in mind that statistics sometimes lie. Krakauer says those numbers come from studies that are "most reliable" and "rigorous," but I don't think that will satisfy people whose skepticism has been so recently roused by the Rolling Stone mess. At the Amazon page, Krakauer's book is described as a "dispassionate, carefully documented account" of "the searing experiences of several women in Missoula � the nights when they were raped; their fear and self-doubt in the aftermath; the way they were treated by the police, prosecutors, defense attorneys; the public vilification and private anguish; their bravery in pushing forward and what it cost them." Searing... but dispassionate? Is that even possible?