A few weeks ago they were girls celebrating their matric results. Now, as university freshers, they are the targets in a competitive "sex" game.“Deeply disturbing traditions” exist at universities, says Kathleen Dey, director of Rape Crisis in Cape Town.“Older male students intentionally target first-year girls for sex and then compare notes.”Professor Amanda Gouws, who chairs the sexual harassment advisory committee at the University of Stellenbosch, said: “Students have a competition of who they 'slept' with.“They see this as student fun but it is very demeaning and degrading for the woman students. It is a very serious issue.”Recent attacks on four UCT students have put university rape back under the spotlight and experts believe sexual violence at university is a “huge problem”.They say late-night clubbing and residence parties fuelled by alcohol and drugs make campus living high risk.“Drunk students who are raped are often blamed for their rape," said Dey.“The practice of buying a young female student a drink and feeling entitled to sex leaves young students vulnerable to being coerced by older peers.“Drink spiking is another issue that inhibits the victim’s ability to consent at all."Gouws said "naïve" first years were often targeted because the university environment was unfamiliar to them.A first-year UCT gender studies student outed her attacker on Facebook after being raped last November, in the midst of the #FeesMustFall uprising."Since the incident I have not been able to sleep. I have been severely affected," the 21-year-old said."I will not be silenced. The university has a history of silencing sexual assaults and rape cases. My intention was to bring the lens on patriarchy and rape being an issue of power dynamics."Most universities refused to provide statistics on rapes and sexual assaults. Stellenbosch said it had nine cases last year, of which six were rapes. Two incidents were reported at the University of Johannesburg.Jackie Dugard, director of the gender equity office at Wits University, said a number of students had reported rape and sexual assault to their offices.In responses to parliamentary questions in 2014, Higher Education Minister Blade Nzimande said 247 cases of sexual violence, domestic violence and rape had been reported at universities since 2012.A blog called UCT Survivors has had 11 posts since being launched 10 months ago. Many refer to incidents in residences.After news emerged on Friday of a fourth rape at Rhodes Memorial, creative writing MA student Dela Gwala posted: "So far the only solution brought forward to deal directly with incidents at Rhodes Memorial is to tell us to not go there after dark. But for protesting students they’re willing to bring in a paramilitary force."We can only live in hope for the day that the 'rights' of students who are also survivors of sexual violence are also upheld in such a seemingly impassioned way."A lecturer at the university posted last week about being stalked and harassed at UCT for two years when she was a student."I am stunned that this man continues to prowl the corridors of the institution after all the trauma he put me and several other young women through,” she said.“I really believe that the process at UCT is flawed and skewed in favour of protecting UCT and protecting perpetrators."Rashieda Khan, legal adviser and co-ordinator in the discrimination and harassment office at UCT, said allegations on the blog were made by students who had not used the office."To make generalised statements and allegations as if all cases were subject to slow response or no action is simply not correct in light of the services DISCHO has been offering over the last 14 years," she said...