Vanderbilt University’s football program, which has been rocked over the past year by a gang rape trial involving four former players, unveiled their slogan for the upcoming season on Thursday morning.
They might want to workshop it a touch.
The tagline – We Don’t Need Your Permission! – was posted on the team’s official Twitter account but deleted shortly after.
Gone, but never forgotten. https://t.co/rmhQfKw6jm pic.twitter.com/sj3mqsE8x8
— Stephanie Haberman (@StephLauren) August 6, 2015
The tweet had been derided as ill-advised given the climate of sexual assault on college campuses nationwide, an epidemic felt nowhere more acutely than the Tennessee university, where four former Commodores players were accused of sexually assaulting a female classmate in a campus dormitory in 2013.
Brandon Vandenburg and Cory Batey were convicted of aggrivated rape in January, but released in June less than 24 hours after a Nashville judge declared a mistrial. (A second trial has been schedule for 30 November.)
Two other players, Brandon Banks and Jaborian McKenzie, are also accused and have yet to go to trial.
“We apologize for today’s tweet,” the team later said in a two-part statement via Twitter. “It’s not a comment about sexual assault. Sex without permission is always wrong and not accepted.”
