We can only hope it’s better than 2014, right?

Robby Soave of Reason:

As the Campus Rape Narrative Unravels, Will Due Process Strike Back in 2015?

It was undoubtedly a year of heightened paranoia about rape on college campuses, with everyone from Lena Dunham to President Obama demanding immediate action to curtail a purported epidemic of sexual violence. But due to a string of embarrassments, 2014 ended on surprisingly sour note for illiberal activists conspiring to shunt aside due process in their zeal to eradicate an exaggerated and politicized problem.

Still, while the voices of reason—of fairness for accusers and the accused—scored some ideological victories this year, 2015 will likely present even more daunting challenges. Dark clouds loom on the horizon, according to several legal experts who are advocates for campus due process or involved in rape disputes. In particular, a wave of wrongheaded affirmative consent policies—which force students to adopt bizarre and limiting sexual consent customs—could sweep the nation.

“I would guess that affirmative-consent ordinances will become law in various municipalities governed by Democratic machines, like Chicago (as well as New York City),” wrote Hans Bader, a senior attorney at the Competitive Enterprise Institute and former Office for Civil Rights lawyer, in an email to Reason. “‘Affirmative consent’ is like quasi-religious catechism for the Democrats.”

In 2014, government policymakers seized upon a controversial statistic—that one-in-five women will become victims of sexual assault or attempted sexual assault while at college—like never before. Long had that number been part of certain feminist activists’ mantras, but last January, President Obama cited it in a memorandum establishing a task force to combat the campus rape crisis.