I never thought I would tell this story. On January 8th, 2026, I was 18 years old and got sexually assaulted by two men at a club after being harassed all night. I kept removing a hand from my body, I spoke up, I yelled, and I was still ignored. I woke up the next day with bruises on my neck, arms, and legs because of how hard I was being grabbed. What stays with me is not only what those men did, but how many other people saw enough to know something was wrong and chose silence anyway.

That is why the Jane Doe case at Cornell hit me so hard. I cannot stop thinking about what it means when a survivor speaks up and the people around her, the people with power, the people who are supposed to protect students, fail her. It is never just the men who commit the assault. It is also the people who stand there, the systems that minimize it, and the institutions that make survivors feel like their pain is an inconvenience instead of an emergency. So many women are carrying stories like mine, and too many of us stay quiet because silence feels safer than being dismissed.

Cornell must do more than issue statements. The university must strengthen protections for survivors, create real accountability when students and organizations are connected to sexual violence, and make sure Title IX responses do not leave survivors feeling abandoned. Cornell should also require clear intervention and reporting expectations for student organizations and the adults responsible for overseeing campus safety and student conduct. If a university wants to call itself a community, then that community cannot keep protecting silence.

I am done pretending this is somebody else's problem. I am done watching people focus on exposing survivors while ignoring the people and systems that failed them. If you are tired of the silence too, please sign this petition and demand that Cornell protect survivors and act like our lives matter.