QM: Right, I have been wondering if an argument could be made that Janay Rice was infantilized. Why isn’t it up to her to decide whether punishment is warranted? I am guessing most here think there is a difference between rough-housing and domestic violence. But who gets to decide that? How do we know where to draw that line? Why do we generally agree women should be able to decide whether or not to report rape, but that society has an obligation to report and punish domestic violence?
eta: Same question, little different spin: Why doesn’t Janay Rice get to define that event for herself as domestic violence or not? If she doesn’t believe it is, is it?
Hanna, if you are able and willing to comment…
Do you find it believable he was punished so severely just based on one incident reported by wittnesses but denied by his girlfriend and explained as rough-housing? Assuming there is no video.
It is out of the norm because the kid is a kicker, who you usually don’t see getting in to trouble. But no, seeing one or two percent of a population of big time college football players getting into what appears to be minor scrapes with the law (obviously excepting the allegation of rape) is not unusual.
That would likely be prosecuted as battery, which is a whole different thing.
Because in a society based on the rule of law, no individual is or should be able to determine for themselves what is and what is not prosecutable. Such a standard would be unavoidably arbitrary. It is one of the many problems with the tribunal system.
All of this ignores the main question though, which is why is USC involved in the first place? From where does the college derive the right to act here?
Colleges suspend and expel students for all kinds of reasons. Why wouldn’t assault be a valid reason?
If there is video proof of someone setting fire to a dormitory, should the college have to wait for the police to investigate before expelling that student?
I am really not all that interested in the college tribunals though I always find Hanna’s and HarvestMoon’s posts on the subject informative and interesting.
From what I can tell the “no contact” order was issued during the investigation until they looked further into the matter. It was issued to him and he was not to contact her while the investigation was underway. They are currently still dating.
@Ohiodad51 – this is a very recent matter and there is little chance that the records would have been destroyed. All universities have record retention policies just like corporations do. The two schools I checked with a quick google search – University of Missouri and Swarthmore-- had records retention policies for these records of no less than 7 years.
The tennis coach’s son is not a mandatory reporter. And in the Grant Neal case Roosevelt Washington was not either in that particular case. He was the actual investigator charged with interviewing witnesses and coming to a conclusion. My point really is that with these last 2 cases we have been discussing, and in others, it appears there are now men joining the gaggle of “women’s studies” professors who are apparently circling campuses on their broomsticks looking for the next victim. Personally, I never bought into that theory as you well know and applaud these men for stepping up and calling it like they see it. I have always said this is a problem that has to be addressed by both women and men if we are to make any real progress.
@ahl you raise a very valid point. Yes colleges do suspend and expel students for all sorts of crimes including non-sexual assaults, drugs, racial harassment, vandalism and any other conduct code violation. They use the same hearing process and a preponderance of the evidence standard. They have no choice – they are charged with campus safety and can’t turn a bind eye when these things are reported. Ms. Katz is just one woman on campus and is free to do what she pleases at the end of the day. But that does not change the universities obligation to investigate and act accordingly when they find a violation.
Whether or not she was abused is for her to determine not someone else. Agree with zooser. Clearly she doesn’t consider herself a victim. So why did they punish him you have to ask yourself.
Am I understanding correctly that the University, like society, is governed by a set of rules (or laws) and so no individual is able to determine for themselves whether a case is or isn’t appropriate for the tribunal to judge? I have no idea whether the tribunals are arbitrary when judging sexual assault and rape cases, or any other cases. QuantMech seemed to me to demonstrate very persuasively in the Grant Neal case that the tribunal had no choice given the definition of rape.
I assume there is some university definition of assault. At this point we have no way to know whether what happened between Zoe and Matt met that definition.
What I find most interesting is control of the narrative. Is it really believable Matt was punished for the actions Zoe describes? I hope not.
I am not sure whether I think domestic violence victims should be protected from themselves. I know I’m not smart enough to make that determination, so I’m glad the law gives us some rules to follow. I’m willing to trust the law here.
eta: the idea this is women vs men has always seemed farfetched to me. And I’m a mom of sons.
Ray Tice is an NFL running back. It has nothing to do with colleges. I assume @alh is trying to make a point about ciokent football players.
@HarvestMoon1 no, the tennis coach’s son is likely not a mandatory reporter, but the tennis coach likely is. Since your post to which I responded indicated that the tennis coach is the person who reported the kid, I assumed it was obvious to whom I was referring,
The point I would like to explore has nothing to do with football. I want to know whether we should allow women to define themselves as victims or not, as some have argued on this thread. Whether there is a line where we make the decision to perhaps infantilize them. When it might be justified to protect women who don’t think they need protecting.
Jonri said sometimes women protect men. I posted an example. It seemed an extreme example of a woman protecting her man, to me at least. I wonder what others think about it. I believe QM wonders as well.
Forty something years ago, I dated a few football players and they were all absolutely charming gentlemen. I am not prejudiced against football players. I just started googling about Matt Boermeester and all this stuff about his team came up. It isn’t unheard of for a player at that school to be reported for misconduct. I am trying to understand the background. It seems like they got a new coach recently. And some expect that coach to get control of things. I have no idea if any of that has anything to do with this case.
"However, the mere fact that an alleged victim of domestic abuse states that she wasn’t abused doesn’t mean she wasn’t. This is especially true when the conduct might prevent the alleged perpetrator from obtaining a big pay off. " jonri wrote
@alh, I agree with you that the issue raised by the woman in this instance is whether colleges “should allow women to define themselves” as victims.
One of the things I find fascinating about all of these issues is the very different way that colleges have been approaching that and similar questions differently than how the larger society reacts. I thought this was especially interesting here since it was a woman who complained, and essentially her argument is that the college’ actions had the opposite effect from their obvious intent.
@alh, as far as I can tell, none of the young men and women involved in those very sketchy incidents are Boormeester or Katz. Are you assuming some kind of guilt by association, because the men were all on the football team? Believe me, I am not a football fan and I have noted and deplore just as much as anyone else the degree of latitude allowed big sports athletes at many universities when it comes to sexual behavior. But even I think this is really, really unfair.
Consolation: We start with a news story that a football player’s girlfriend is defending him after he was unfairly suspended. According to her, others made a false or mistaken report and the university suspended him because of it, without listening to her explanations. On the face of it, it is really really unfair. Some people believe the university would be that unfair. Others think we don’t know everything that went on.
I can’t find anything other than her statements on this case. I can find there was another football player accused, and then cleared, of domestic assault a while back. I don’t know if that case has any impact on those judging this case. Obviously, it shouldn’t.
I don’t think there is much to say about this case. We could talk about football culture at that school, which I got kind of interested in during the course of the day. Or the title IX investigation. Or whether women get to define themselves as victims or not.
This case is a mystery. I am not assuming anything about it at all.
I am interested in your response to the Ray Rice case. Which is off topic, except to do with the issue of whether it is up to an individual woman whether she is a victim or not. Or whether society has an obligation to step in and sometimes protect those who don’t consider themselves victims.
I’m not arguing for one side or another. I assume it’s a continuum and sometimes it is clear the behavior is over the line. At present, society is moving a lot of lines, which is just kind of interesting to me. Affirmative consent is a line that is pretty new. Not everyone agrees with that line.
Domestic violence used to be fairly common. Marital rape is a new concept, and so on…
We need to go back to what the purpose of Title IX in the context of these cases. It’s purpose is not to protect women from themselves. It is a law enacted to prevent a hostile educational environment that can prevent women from pursuing an education. So under that law the schools have an obligation to investigate and pursue claims of sexual harassment or assault.
Secondarily all schools have codes of conduct which they enforce. Their obligation is not only to Ms.Katz but to all women and men on that campus to keep a safe environment. If they receive information that someone has been assaulted -sexually or otherwise – they have to investigate. There is no getting around that – these investigations will occur with or without the Dear Colleague Letter. And in some cases where the investigations bear fruit – there will always be hearings.
@Ohiodad51 – my point relative to the coach’s son was that it was a male who initiated the report. So this idea that it is women jumping to conclusions and targeting men hopefully will not be raised.
It’s hard to know what to believe. I’ve never thought universities were qualified to conduct investigations into these matters. Leave it to the police and the rest of the justice system to determine what happened, and then the schools can base their disciplinary action on the outcome.
I think a very apt comparison would be what we are told is going on in the tech world right now. That hostile environment toward women is what college administrations are charged with preventing on campuses under Title IX.