should be sympathy for Duke guys, not Rutgers girls

First of all, it would take all the energy and empathy I've ever owned to feel sorry for good-looking kids from Duke.

Secondly, they're going to be even richer than they already are after they're done suing Nifong ... or someone or something.

Thirdly, this isn't President Bush, Michael Jordan and George Clooney here. They're three guys most of the country has never heard of. Who the hell's going to care about them 10 years from now. Christ, most of the country can't recognize Dick Cheney and they're going to feel the taint of these kids?

Fourthly, I've never met any lax players but their reputations, almost across the board, are that of first-class dirtballs. More Stiffler than Chris Klein.

 

while the duke lacrosse team may not be full of choir boys, the rutgers women's basketball program isn't exactly setting a high moral bar, either. a couple years ago, rutgers forward shalicia hurns, who'd already been dismissed from two other schools for disciplinary reasons, was kicked off the team for tying up and threatening to kill her girlfriend.

a friend who spent a year (recently) as manager of a rutgers conference opponent said other women's teams dubbed the scarlett knights "slutgers" based on how they carried themselves on and off the court.

 

Asshole.

 

So much for dignified and courageous... :

 

I've never thought of the 'pheromone' argument before. That's an interesting one.

Ok, just messing (that is funny, though).

- - -

Kobe should have known better. That he didn't is a testament to how socially sheltered he had been both growing up and throughout his professional career.

But there wasn't any bloody t-shirt between my friend and the woman who he had an encounter with.

- - -

Here's what happened, in a nutshell: Everything consensual, but the girl ended up having, um, 'buyer's remorse' about the encounter. And my friend and she had a falling out after the fact.

So what happened? She began talking more and more with friends around her who were willing to play the 'Nifong' role, that is, 'yes, something did happen to you, etc.'

A couple of facts you should know: 1) I was friends with both people - guy and girl. I knew them both fairly well, their personalities, etc. 2) They had had amorous encounters before, completely consensual. This wasn't a one-time deal where there could be reasonable misunderstanding (a la Kobe). This was an existing intimate relationship.

This 'allegation' continued to grow and grow within our circle of friends until it started to leak out beyond our friends and started to damage this guy's reputation, seriously. After several months of discussions and hashing-out, things were 'resolved.' It was a very ugly situation, and after everything was taken care of, even some of the girl's female friends said that the 'allegee' had been acting mostly out of spite.

That was my first introduction to the power of this type of allegation against a guy. This is not a person who would do something to violate a woman, IMO, and these two had never had problems before.

- - -

I agree, it is very easy for a guy to try to slander a woman. And it is detestable. I know guys that go out of their way to do that, and they're scum.

Here's the difference: For a guy, you can get a criminal charge/trial and lose your job, public reputation and future financial and relationship prospects because of an accusation.

There is no equivalent 'slut' or 'tease' criminal charge for a girl. A guy can spread a rumor, for sure, but the cops aren't coming to question you about it.

Again, I am a HUGE supporter of equal rights and women's rights. I took women's studies courses in college, and you could say I have my 'sensitive new age guy' (SNAG) card, but there is an unbalance right now in how the system deals with these cases. The Duke case is a good example of this current phenomenon.

The solution is not, of course, we go back to unreported rapes. That is totally unacceptable, and unconscionable.

We also don't need to return to the bogus 'well, she was dressed sexy, so...' crap. I'm against all of that.

What I'm saying is that there are a lot of cases that fall in the middle, that do - unfortunately - involve alcohol, drugs, etc. Believe me, I don't get involved in those situations, but they do happen every night of the week, everywhere.

And my point is if you're a guy - same as if you're a girl (well, more so for a girl) - you better be thinking about what you're doing, or else you could be the next Duke guys. I've seen it with multiple males I know, and each time it was bogus, but each time it was damaging.

That's why I don't like what this girl and Nifong did. Believe me, I was ready to believe these guys did it. But they didn't, and it's a shame they've been put through this.

That's where I'm coming from.

 

Maybe this is a better way to cap what I was saying:


Jemele Hill and Jason Whitlock have written about that 'SuperHead' NBA groupie chick, Kim whatever.

There are plenty of female 'predators' out there, be they sexual or financial predators. Don't think they don't exist. They're there. And when I was running with the I-banking crowd, you saw a lot of them.

Some of those 'financial predator' women would drop whatever they could get on you to tie you down. Pregnancy? Yep. Bogus assault charge? Yep.

I'm certainly not impugning all women with this, but believe me, they exist. I've seen too many instances to pretend they don't. And like 'SuperHead' would attest, they figure out pretty quickly what 'means' are at their disposal. It's like a mugger sizing up his next mark.

So I say to guy friends: "Hey, be careful." Not in the same way I would say it to a female friend, but it still has to be said, IMO.

That's it.

 

What if you had a daughter who was a stripper dancing in front of a group of drunk college men?

If anybody put themselves in a bad position, it was her. Doesn't mean any woman who finds herself in that spot should deserve to get raped, just as a bunch of kids having a good time shouldn't get apathetic shrugs after getting charged with rape because, hey, they put themselves in that position.

 

Not that simple.

I'm with Rok on this one. I have a brother who, since he was a kid, wanted to be a teacher and coach. A girl in his class accused him of fondling her. He got fired. Charges were pressed against him.

Thankfully for him, the girl made another similar accusation at the school she transferred to. Then the authorities actually checked into my brother's situation like they should have to begin with. Two years earlier in another state she had made accusations that her gyno had touched her inappropriately but it went nowhere because the day she referred to she had seen a different doctor than the one she accused. She was written off as a nut. Turns out after grilling her parents that she had accused an uncle of the same thing five or six years earlier.

So the girl finally confesses she made up the charges against my brother for the attention. He still was out of a job. His reputation ruined forever. His name was in the paper (MY paper, although our last names don't match). There was no follow up story exonerating him, which still pisses me off. He's now in construction.

So, Rok, I hear ya loud and clear.

 

blonde -

Yep, that's the kind of thing I'm talking about.

Sorry for your brother, man. What a load of crap. I hope he's handled/handling it ok.

And you pointed out another good reason some girls do this: Attention.

It's not always for spite or financial reasons this stuff happens, sometimes it's just for attention.

And it happens because the way the system is set-up, it's easy for it to happen. That's a problem that has to be addressed, and remedied, so women can report real crimes AND guys don't have these problems.

We're just not there yet.

 

I've decided that this thread title really bugs me. Why is that if I have sympathy for the Rutgers girls, I can't have any for the Duke boys? What if I feel bad for both groups?

 

That's far too nuanced for we pee-brains, SC. We like our false choices.

Umm... get keef to rename the thread?

...start a 'sympathy for BOTH Rutgers girls and Duke boys thread?'


Honestly, I agree with you. Neither group asked for the negative attention it received, and both deserve sympathy, IMO.

 

Unrelated to Duke, a few college classes will never truly let you in on the insight of woman's struggles in this society.