I honestly don’t understand your point JOD. Let’s assume the story is true. The woman was assaulted far from campus before college (or during a break) by a guy who reminds her of a student on campus. She says that seeing this look alike student provokes anxiety in her. The school investigated and found this guy was not the rapist because he was not even in the location where is occurred and did not commit any acts of assault, harassment or other infractions of conduct code. Yet, because he looks like her assailant, he is barred from certain parts of campus, certain classes, certain activities and could be subject to disciplinary action if she runs into him if he is somewhere he is not supposed to be. You think the college would be within their rights to expel him? Or even to continue to bar him from going anywhere he wants to go or be subject to discipline? Why?
If you are assuming that he actually was the rapist, but nobody can prove it, that is a different story. But the information provided is that he is in fact innocent since he wasn’t even in the same state as the girl at the time of the incident. Thus, this is not one of those cases where he is not guilty due to insufficient evidence but where he is in fact completely innocent.
Or is your position that the college would not take this action unless there was more to the story?
Where do you get that he is not “completely innocent” of this particular act?
I have stated them as clearly as I can, yet some posters not only ignore what I did say, but insist on mischaracterizing others.
I think that sometimes, we have to recognize that difficult situations exist and everyone has to give a little, or sometimes, extend some compassion instead of squawking about our “rights” which aren’t as absolute and expansive as everyone wants to think, given we live in a large and complex society.
Sure, but some of us think the person with the problem is the one that has to do the adjusting. An innocent guy surely has the right to attend a school despite the unfortunate fact of having an appearance that bothers a classmate. Ugh.
I agree with you that if the school is private they can kick him out or restrict his movements around the campus. Why student A’s feelings are more important than student B’s feelings I still don’t know. And, it’s not very compassionate to limit a guy’s movements when he did nothing but look like to someone like someone else. In other words, nothing.That’s all.
I agree that the young man should have some compassion and should, to the extent he can, avoid being closely involved with her or her friends and even to leave an event because he might make her uncomfortable (but certainly no obligation to do so). However, I don’t think that means he should be barred from taking a class they both need to graduate on time or be disciplined if they are both in the library at the same time. He has as much of a right as the young woman does to be on campus.
The school and the student have a contract: the student pays his tuition and the school offers an education and living space as long as the student follows the rules. That education includes access to all areas of campus where others are allowed, use of the gym and other facilities, as well as being able to join in social or ECs. In this case, he has followed the rules and paid his bills so the contract should remain in force and the school would be in breach of that contract by barring him, for no good reason, from areas of the campus or certain activities. That is different from an owner of a private building saying you can’t come in because you upset me or my kid. The private owner has no contract. The student and college do.
“Same with finding him “completely innocent”. You don’t have any knowledge of how innocent he was or wasn’t.”
If you have knowledge that this student was, indeed, guilty of some kind of misdeed or harassment, please share it. Otherwise, we need to proceed with the hypothetical as is - the student has done nothing wrong, just happens to resemble a person who did do something wrong.
“I think that sometimes, we have to recognize that difficult situations exist and everyone has to give a little, or sometimes, extend some compassion instead of squawking about our “rights” which aren’t as absolute and expansive as everyone wants to think, given we live in a large and complex society.”
If I pay the tuition for Happy U, and my son is in good academic standing and has not broken any of the rules surrounding campus conduct (such as academic dishonesty, vandalism, theft, etc.), then he does have a right to use the full facilities of that campus.
I agree that a college can set “tighter” standards (for example, a college could say that they will expel anyone who is found drinking or smoking, or for that matter wears long hair or facial hair or shorts or short skirts, which a religiously-oriented school might do), but their standards are about BEHAVIOR and they are set BEFORE the fact and apply to everyone. They are known ahead of time, not capriciously decided upon.
That’s what the article says. What information do YOU have that the investigation had to do with anything else? Are you simply making an assumption? Do you have inside information about the actual case? Don’t be coy.
Are you serious? Are you seriously suggesting that a completely innocent individual should be expelled from a school because he happens to look like someone who harmed another student, and that he is being done a FAVOR if he is not? I’m sorry, but that is insane. The school, if it wishes to be truly compassionate, can offer the young woman as much and as effective therapy as they can. They can offer to let her take a leave of absence until he has graduated, if she genuinely can’t continue. But they cannot, ethically, punish HIM.
Many years ago, when we were in grad school, a friend of mine was assaulted by a young black man when walking home in the wee hours of the morning. Luckily he took fright at her loud screaming and ran off before accomplishing anything much and equally luckily he didn’t carry through on his threat to kill her if she didn’t shut up. After that, when we rode public transportation with a lot of young black men, she was visibly nervous and cowered, with her eyes darting to see if any of them was The One.
Are you telling me that the university should have ordered all black male students–and members of the public on their property–to stay away from her? Seriously???
If MY kid were subject to this treatment, I would sue the school for every cent in their endowment.
Halley is a respectable lawyer, as far as I know. We shouldn’t believe that she is making up the story out of whole cloth. But in the initial article she got the story about Anna at Hobart William Smith wrong in its details, and she might be omitting relevant details in the Oregon case as well.
There have got to be other details about the Oregon case. For example, we have to apply Fang’s Razor here: people are not complete idiots. The college didn’t initially investigate the guy because they thought he had a physical resemblance to a rapist, because they are not idiots, and looking like a rapist is not an accusation one can investigate. They investigated because they thought he WAS the rapist. While it must be awful to be falsely accused of rape, the college has to take rape accusations seriously, and investigate them, even if it’s unpleasant.
I also wonder whether the investigation vindicated the accused student in the way Halley claimed. I can’t defend the college’s actions, even if they suspect but can’t prove that he raped her, but at least I’d understand them better.
All I can say is, I’d be upset beyond belief if my son truly were treated this way simply because he reminded someone of the person who raped her. There would be no explanation that would ever make me feel it was acceptable. But as others have pointed out, we don’t really know if this is all that was at play here.
@Cardinal Fang, I agree that the school probably investigated him because she thought he actually was the rapist.
I don’t agree with the rest of your suppositions. JustoneDad shows that it is perfectly possible for someone to justify taking a completely unjust and harmful course of action against the innocent student in these circumstances. He has made it perfectly clear that he would either expel or seriously restrict a completely innocent MALE student in these circumstances.
I emphasize MALE, becuase I think that has a lot to do with JoD’s stance on this. What if–as I actually think is likely-- the male student was traumatized by being falsely accused of rape, by having his reputation ruined on campus, having people shy away from him and whisper about him, give him dirty looks on an hourly basis whenever he ventured out of his room, having his professors treat him with loathing, completely humiliated and violated by having his most intimate relationships investigated, and forever bearing a stigma in the minds of many who, like many CC posters on these topics seem to do, believe that there is no smoke without fire? Should she be instructed, on pain of punishment, to stay out of HIS way? If another girl who looks just like her shows up on campus, should THAT girl be restricted in her movements because seeing her causes him severe emotional pain?
It may be that the woman initially went to the school and said that she saw her rapist on campus, but made it clear the rape occurred a while ago and far from the campus. The school may then have investigated and determined that the guy could not have been her rapist because he could prove he was not in that location at that time. It seems the school went further and investigated his actions on campus. He was then also found to not have committed any acts of sexual assault on campus. The stay away order was still not lifted. That may have been an administrative thing, or the school was trying to support the student who was raped, without consideration of the impact on the guy. Halley doesn’t say he is complaining about being investigated (although she says it was an invasion of privacy), but that even once found innocent, he is still not free to go wherever he wants to.
The fundamental issue with this statement is it contains zero philosophical or intellectual qualifiers, as to the type of society.
Just because a society is large and complex, does not automatically confer that everything, which occurs within, is worthy of accomodation or that difficult issues are logically addressed.
Somethings are not deserving of accomodation and some attempted remedies are downright illogical and stupid. And, if a society bows in such cases, we essentially become an illogical, stupid, large and complex society. Not good, in my view.
The problem with “giving a little” is that there’s absolutely zero reason for the innocent student to give on anything at all. He did nothing wrong. He’s going about his daily business being a student and going to the library and football games and the cafeteria and whatever. Some other woman’s personal neuroses, as disabling as they may be, do not obligate him to do anything.
And being upset, or its cousin offended, does not obligate everyone else to bow down and make you un-upset or un-offended.
@Consolation, I said I think the college’s actions are indefensible whether they secretly think he’s the rapist or not. In either case, they have no business restricting his movements. They investigated, they didn’t find him guilty, that’s it.