Not that I'm gonna change anyone's mind who already thinks those messages are 'damning' but trying to carry on like everything is normal (and those are pretty normal college age texts/messages) is pretty common for rape victims. Not that that fact says her allegations are true, but it for sure isn't proof of her lying about anything.
They certainly don't paint Paul as a serial rapist.
Imagine having consensual sex with someone, it turns violent or they start doing things that you said not to do. They don't beat you within an inch of your life like rape happens in movies and on the news, but they violate you. They act like nothing bad happened the next day. There's no damning physical evidence, you're thinking maybe its not that big of a deal, you don't get a rape kit, you try to carry on because you think 'I didn't get raped, I can't get raped, I was having sex with someone I trust.' etc. Is it not rape because you took so long to realize what happened to you was wrong? Is it not rape because you didn't go right to the police, try to beat the person off of you, try to act like it wasn't a big deal afterwards? No of course not.
Even
if this does happen, you don't get to make up a story to try and tip the scales of preponderance of evidence. There can be any number of reasons for why she did and said the things that she did and said, but the facts show that he has been lying about great many things, repeatedly.
Now like I said before, that scenario being common doesn't mean that Sulkowicz's scenario is exactly that (and I'll refrain from my actual personal thoughts on the whole fracas), but jesus christ, seeing the comments about her messages make me ill. If you get raped you have to act a very specific way or else you're mostly fucked and so many people will never believe you.
As a society, we should not and cannot be allowed to punish people without evidence. If there is zero evidence that a crime has been committed (not even a preponderance of evidence), how can you justifiably punish the accused?
She repeatedly violated Columbia's own Title IX investigation policies and started a campaign of systematic harassment against the alleged rapist.
The FB comments, as Paul's lawyer editorializes, paint a picture of a girl who was head over heels for the guy and chose to destroy his life because he did not reciprocate her affection. And yes, it's pretty damning that she had a history of false rape allegations, that she had introduced anal play into their 'relationship' (despite having denied doing so), and that both of her character witnesses were full of shit.
As for the video, well, she's a performance artist. Just go do some research on the people she probably was learning about while in school and you'll see that she has company in what she does. Her subject is rape. She's going to be producing some fucked up shit.
It's a quite literal reenactment of her allegations of what occurred on the night in question.
I'm probably the last person anyone would accuse of being a rape apologist on this forum, but the handling of this case by Columbia has been a complete joke. Colleges have no business conducting rape investigations. They make a mockery of the entire system and do a gross disservice to victims everywhere by allowing this chicanery to persist.