File this one under rejects: Geisy Arruda, Gender and Morality 101

The paper didn’t think this was publishable. I don’t often write satire, so I either laid it on too thick or not thick enough. I thought it was good, anyway.

Women are just so reckless — college gals like Geisy Arruda should learn to cover up, knowing that her male counterparts transform from mild-mannered men into beastly rapists-in-waiting when they get a sniff of a curvy blonde.

On Oct. 22, classmates of the 20-year-old tourism student at Sao Paulo’s Bandeirante University harassed, jeered and threatened her with rape when she showed up for class in a hot pink mini-dress.

According to Brazzil Magazine, about 20 female students followed her to the bathroom and attempted to force pants on her. Men trailed, trying to stick cellphone cameras up her skirt. Police officers finally showed up to subdue the ever-growing mob with pepper spray and extract a crying Arruda from a barricaded classroom, while the approximately 700-strong crowd shouted, “Puta! Puta! (Whore! Whore!)”

Then, the poor gal was informed she’d been expelled after the school took out a newspaper ad saying so. (She was reinstated Monday after a media and government uproar.) In contrast, several hecklers were suspended.

In case today’s lesson wasn’t clear, here it is from the university’s lawyer: “She always liked to provoke boys. The problem was not with her clothes, but the way she acts, talks, crosses her legs, and walks.”

I’ve heard that line directed at rape victims: What were you wearing? Why were you walking home alone? How much did you drink? Here’s a question: Does excessive thigh fill men with so much puritanical hysteria that mass rape seems like a reasonable response?

Brazil, like North America, is a hyper-sexualized culture. Though the media makes mention that Brazilian students dress modestly in jeans and tees, Brazil is still the land of Carnaval and G-strings, and skimpy dress is encouraged — that is, apparently, until someone actually does so; then she’s a “puta.”

Women can only take so much objectification before they become just things to ridicule, or — as was the case with a 15-year-old girl in Richmond, Calif., last month — just bodies to gang-rape in a school yard.

Arruda’s harrowing experience is a lesson: Men are not responsible for their actions, therefore women are.

So maybe it’s true what everyone says about university — the most worthwhile lessons are extra-curricular. No textbooks required; just a hot pink mini-dress.