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'Accused is guilty': Campus rape tribunals punish without proof, critics say

I don't really think so.

Granted I'm being a bit hyperbolic but still.

I would "care" if my brother were a drunken bum eating out of a garbage can on skid row, but I don't think we, as a nation, should be providing every drunken bum with 40 acres and a mule and arranging for every other material comfort they could possibly want.

I would "care" if my kid wasn't able to win an analyst internship at Goldman Sachs, but I don't think that Goldman should have to provide everyone who wants one with an internship.

Life is hard. It's harder if you're stupid. Getting so drunk that you black out and can't even remember whether or not you raped a girl is just...stupid.

Something tells me that this isn't the last hardship this kid is going to face in life as a consequence of his own poor decision making.
Why does it have to be one extreme or the other? No one that I am aware of is advocating mindlessly providing people with anything and everything "just because". We're just saying that penalties should be based on REAL instances of misdoing.
 
So is her word more trustworthy than his?

*yawn*

Once again I'll repeat the fact that the decision is supposed to be based on the preponderance of the facts - *ALL* of the facts, and not the handful that one side or the other prefers
 
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Which one seems more credible? By the other evidence gathered, and when all taken together, it would seem the one where she admitted it was consensual.

The response to that is "None of us really know because none of know exactly what all the evidence is"

What we know is what the accused claims in his lawsuit, what the accuser has said in public, and the minimal statements by the college itself. That may be all of it, or maybe not. Neither I, nor you, nor anyone else outside of the parties directly involved know so it's impossible for any of us to say if the schools decision was reasonable.
 
The response to that is "None of us really know because none of know exactly what all the evidence is"

What we know is what the accused claims in his lawsuit, what the accuser has said in public, and the minimal statements by the college itself. That may be all of it, or maybe not. Neither I, nor you, nor anyone else outside of the parties directly involved know so it's impossible for any of us to say if the schools decision was reasonable.
It stands to reason that each side would put forth their best case if airing in public. Hence, it's not unreasonable to believe that we have enough evidence to make a reasonable conclusion.
 
IOW, it's wrong for the school to believe the accuser based only on her accusation, but it's OK for you to believe the accussed based only on his accusation

Not only his words. The texts that she sent to the school counselor, the school counselors reply via texts and the texts that his male friend received from her and their resultant sexual encounter of her inviting him over.
 
It's a private business.

Actually no, its not a private business. It is a public institution for the simple fact that without the government giving them money they more than likely would not be around. Remember, they enacted this new system due to Obama & Co. sending out a letter to all the college's to do something about this sort of thing or they would loose funding.
 

Oh, bull.

Talk about a slanted article. Where the evidence "shows the sex was consensual." Yeah, really objective. What any evidence may or may not show is subjective, to be determined by a trier of fact. Apparently in that guy's case, the trier of fact determined that more like than not the rape occurred. The article doesn't state all the evidence or give the name or anything else about the case. It's a puff piece for guys to complain to each other about.

Besides, I just LOVE it when men scream "there's no evidence!" When, in fact, there is. A victim's statement IS evidence. As such, it is to be considered by the trier of fact. Is she lying? Maybe. The trier of fact can determine that. ALSO EVIDENCE is the testimony of the alleged perp, whose testimony is ALSO considered by the trier of fact.

Sounds like a whiney baby is upset because he got caught and held to judgment.

I assume, but don't know, that he could have chosen to be tried in criminal court, where the crime is judged on a "no reasonable doubt" basis. But the tribunal used apparently goes by the civil case law of "more probable than not." But apparently he wanted to go this route.

Still, waiting for almost 2 years to report something is a red flag. There could be reasons for that. The article doesn't say what reason she gave. I wonder if that part is true. But even if she was raped, waiting that long to report it sort of does away with any right to allege that later, unless there was a good reason for it. I can understand waiting a few days. But 21 months? Hmmmm. Makes me wonder why she repoted it at that time. If something happened.
 
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Didn't they learn anything from the situation at UVA?

No one was found guilty of rape before a tribunal @ UVA, as far as I know. It didn't go through the evidence and guilty or innocent process. The one in the article (if such a case exists) did.
 
Oh yes! This is where we are at! Without actually knowing all the details of the cases presented, we just go off the words of those of the accused, "im innocent" (which just about every person accused of a crime ususally says...), but lets look beyond this article.
" Only between 8 percent and 37 percent of rapes ever lead to prosecution, according to research funded by the Department of Justice, and just 3 percent to 18 percent of sexual assaults lead to a conviction." Prosecutors Rarely Bring Charges In College Rape Cases

"The survey of six schools in Illinois and Indiana found that police investigated 171 reported sex crimes since fall 2005, with 12 resulting in arrests and four in convictions. Only one of the convictions stemmed from a student-on-student attack, the most common type of assault... The rate of arrests and convictions is far below the average for rapes reported nationally... An estimated 95 percent of college students who are victimized do not report sexual-related crimes to law enforcement, according to a study funded by the Justice Department." Campus sex assaults: - tribunedigital-chicagotribune

So you think the accused deserves no due process since there are "studies/reports" published by Huffpo. I am just trying to figure out what your point is.
 
So he's the one that got raped?

Pretty much. We had two guys that were roommates. One woke up to the other one performing an oral act to the others genitals. There was a fight and the one performing the act was convicted of sexual assault. They were both soldiers and the Army decided to let the civil authorities handle it because of the political ramifications.
 

Ahhhh, I found out more of the scoop. Just goes to show you (again) that Fox can't be trusted to give a fair and balanced report of a situation.

Apparently, Amhert College has had a sexual assault problem for a while. It culminated in 2011 with a reported victim's suicide, with a note stating that rapists are not held to account for what they've done, and how it damages a life. The college, in that instance, rendered an opinion in favor of the accused and against the supposed victim.

Part of the suicide note:

...the sexual assault was too much. There was no adequate form of preparation available for that and no repair afterwards. What began as an earnest effort to help on the part of Amherst, became an emotionless hand washing. In those places I should’ve received help, I saw none. I suppose there are many possible reasons for this. But in the end, I’m still here and so too is that night. I hold no ill will nor do I place an iota of blame upon my family. I blame a society that remains unwilling to address sexual assault and rape. One that pays some object form of lip service to the idea of sexual crimes while working its hardest to marginalize its victims. One where the first question a college president can pose to me, regarding my own assault is, “Have you handled your drinking problem?"
My story is far from exceptional in this regard. Every two minutes there is another victim. Ninety-seven percent of rapists will never spend a day in jail. 1 in every 6 woman in the US has been a victim of rape and one-in-33 men. Despite this, every awful myth about rape persists. Society will continue to blame women for the clothes they wear (despite hard evidence showing no link) and continue to say, “You shouldn’t have been there” when 73 percent of rapes are committed by non strangers and more than 50 percent take place within one mile of the victims home. (four in ten take place at their home) Sexual crime is viewed as inconsequential unless the fabled “dark alley with a gun” assault occurs and even then, women face the eternal, “why were you there? What were you wearing?” badgering.

So Amherst is trying to respond to a particular problem that is occurring at their college. Young men, aware of this, should keep their pants zipped up. Fair warning. Oh, and the kicker is: The victim who wrote the suicide note is a guy....Trey Martin. No need to hide your name, when you tell the truth.
 
I can see the point kinda went over your heads. My point was the article makes it sound like the beginning is here to start locking people up left and right without convictions or without enough evidence. But thats not true as presented by the data...

I noticed that many people did not get your point. That would lead me to believe that it didn't go over their heads so much as you presented information and had no conclusion or summary, thus you really didn't really make a point.
 
Oh, bull.

Talk about a slanted article. Where the evidence "shows the sex was consensual." Yeah, really objective. What any evidence may or may not show is subjective, to be determined by a trier of fact. Apparently in that guy's case, the trier of fact determined that more like than not the rape occurred. The article doesn't state all the evidence or give the name or anything else about the case. It's a puff piece for guys to complain to each other about.

Besides, I just LOVE it when men scream "there's no evidence!" When, in fact, there is. A victim's statement IS evidence. As such, it is to be considered by the trier of fact. Is she lying? Maybe. The trier of fact can determine that. ALSO EVIDENCE is the testimony of the alleged perp, whose testimony is ALSO considered by the trier of fact.

Sounds like a whiney baby is upset because he got caught and held to judgment.

I assume, but don't know, that he could have chosen to be tried in criminal court, where the crime is judged on a "no reasonable doubt" basis. But the tribunal used apparently goes by the civil case law of "more probable than not." But apparently he wanted to go this route.

Still, waiting for almost 2 years to report something is a red flag. There could be reasons for that. The article doesn't say what reason she gave. I wonder if that part is true. But even if she was raped, waiting that long to report it sort of does away with any right to allege that later, unless there was a good reason for it. I can understand waiting a few days. But 21 months? Hmmmm. Makes me wonder why she repoted it at that time. If something happened.

Your post is about as irrelevant as it gets. You've shown nothing, nothing at all. All you're doing is lashing out. Campus rape issues have existed for decades. But this is not the solution. They didn't even get the guilty party.
 
*yawn*

Once again I'll repeat the fact that the decision is supposed to be based on the preponderance of the facts - *ALL* of the facts, and not the handful that one side or the other prefers

um. Exactly???? All the facts. And was he punished using all the facts? Or was he expelled to save the headache of propagating rape culture?
 
Your post is about as irrelevant as it gets. You've shown nothing, nothing at all. All you're doing is lashing out. Campus rape issues have existed for decades. But this is not the solution. They didn't even get the guilty party.

Plan to deal with campus rape:

1) encourage safe habits (don't get passed out drunk or walk alone in dark areas or don't drink things you didn't see pourer).

2) access to rape kits and investigate claims swiftly...through the LEGAL system.

3) Offer counseling for FREE.

4) Encourage reporting.

5) And be PROACTIVE as campus police: seek out rape drugs and if certain organizations and parties are known to be guilty of this stuff...see if you can find out.

And also:

Regret is not rape. People who mix those up do a huge disservice to actual victims...looking at you Lena Dunham.
 
It stands to reason that each side would put forth their best case if airing in public. Hence, it's not unreasonable to believe that we have enough evidence to make a reasonable conclusion.

No, it stands to reason that the respondents would keep their arguments private until the trial in order to prevent the plaintiff from being forewarned and ready to counter those arguments. In addition, the school is prohibited by law from revealing details to the public
 
Neither of which is evidence of sexual misconduct.

Yes it is. If someone is accused of rape, then the fact that they had sex with the accuser is evidence (but not proof) of rape. In order to be convicted, the prosecution has to prove a number of elements of the crime, one of which is the fact that sexual activity had occurred.
 
Not only his words. The texts that she sent to the school counselor, the school counselors reply via texts and the texts that his male friend received from her and their resultant sexual encounter of her inviting him over.

IOW, the decision was not based only on an accusation which is what I've been saying
 
Yes it is. If someone is accused of rape, then the fact that they had sex with the accuser is evidence (but not proof) of rape. In order to be convicted, the prosecution has to prove a number of elements of the crime, one of which is the fact that sexual activity had occurred.

Meaning that sexually activity alone is NOT evidence of anything other than sexual activity.
 
um. Exactly???? All the facts. And was he punished using all the facts? Or was he expelled to save the headache of propagating rape culture?

Since neither of us know what facts the college considered, neither of us know the answers to your questions.
 
The topic is college disciplinary actions and they can be whatever the college wants them to be.

In reality, college disciplinary actions will be whatever keeps the federal government and its money lubricated.
 
In reality, college disciplinary actions will be whatever keeps the federal government and its money lubricated.

Yes and no. While the Feds do attach strings to the funding they give to colleges, colleges are free to reject that funding and the attached strings
 
Yes and no. While the Feds do attach strings to the funding they give to colleges, colleges are free to reject that funding and the attached strings
Yes, just like people are free to start their own refinery if they feel unfairly gouged by gas prices.
 
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