I think this is generally true of grand juries throughout the country, and is a dreadful perversion of the institution started under Henry II in the 12th century. It is one of the rights guaranteed in the 5th amendment to our constitution. It is supposed to be a check on the power of the Sovereign to accuse people for no good reason, but it has completely lost its effectiveness.

Over 90% of criminal cases are settled by plea bargains. For the vast majority of criminal cases, there is no petite jury, and essentially no judicial review. The entire burden of ensuring justice, fairness and equity lies almost entirely in the hands of the prosecutors. The people who suffer the most from abusive, ideological, incompetent or crazy prosecutors are the poor, mentally ill, immigrants and other minorities, and anyone who has difficulty adequately defending themselves.

I don’t think anybody in our society is benefited by prosecutorial misconduct, corruption or incompetence, all of which, I think, occur with some frequency. I witnessed what I considered to be a lot of such behavior. Rarely were the victims non-poor white boys, but those affected faced felony charges with prison terms covering the entire range from three years to life. It was a very serious business; very badly conducted, in my opinion.

It seems to me that the most significant raised in the Duke case is the excessive and unchecked power of prosecutors in the United States. Not the evils of underage drinking. In most European countries alcohol is “absolutely forbidden” to those under 16. Nor the evils of hiring strippers, which has gone on since the beginning of the human species, is practiced in almost every part of the world, and does not, I think, cause nearly as much harm as smoking.

But the unchecked power of prosecutors in the United States has grown steadily since Prohibition—almost 90 years, and shows every sign of continuing to get worse.

Bob

You say you weren’t - fine. I’m cool with that. Do me a favor and use a [ /sarc ] pseudo-tag or something next time, O.K.?

No. “Man as Protector” would be popular along wide swathes of the political spectrum, as you know.

The values I have in mind are more along the lines of “nobody is entitled to sex”, and “just because you really want sex doesn’t mean that you need it”, and “the intensity/urgency of sexual desire is not a justification for violating the rights of another person.”

Very few people want to hear any of that; men don’t want to hear it, because (many) men have been raised to believe that natural law is whatever they want or feel like. Many women don’t want to hear it, because it is the first step along a path of expecting self-control and self-restraint and a lot of women have thrown the patriarchal interpretation of those values out the window as oppressive.

Many men are quick to tell women not to do x,y, and z so they won’t get raped

And note how it’s always phrased as “get raped”. It’s something the woman causes to happen to herself, not something done by another person.

Ding, ding, ding. Julie wins the prize.

It is, mostly, men who rape. It is, mostly, men who have to take responsibility for this, and change it. This means internalizing some cultural values that are not popular anywhere on the political spectrum.

“I want Dr. King to know that I didn’t come to Selma to make his job difficult. I really did come thinking I could make it easier. If the white people realize what the alternative is, perhaps they will be more willing to hear Dr. King.”
– Malcolm X in a conversation with Mrs. Coretta Scott King.

The alternative to men working together to end the rape culture is political opportunists who will do what they can to flex their political muscles and “get tough” on crimes against women. Men can cut it out NOW, working together amongst themselves, or others will exploit the situation those men are failing to fix and “fix” it in ways that many men find objectionable.

I don’t think it’s inanity at all — these things happen because other things have happened. There is an interconnectedness betwee why 3 white students were falsely accused of rape and why that other woman was unable to have her safety and security respected. The statement is only “inane” if you don’t see the relationship between what happens on the one hand and what happens on the other. Is it “just”? No, but it is what happens when systematic injustice occurs, and it is what happens when people rush into solutions without full knowledge of the problems, or with ulterior motivations.

I went looking for the text of Malcolm X’s famous “the chickens are coming home to roost remark”, but couldn’t find it in the amount of free time I have for such things.

His comment was similarly not understood, and unless you weren’t hinting that there is a connection between these things — between “I’m going to advance myself by jumping on a bandwagon I do not understand and do not fully support” on the part of Nifong, and “We’re not going to take these women seriously, we’re not going to address their concerns, we’re not going to protect them from these crimes” — I don’t see your comment any less appropriate than his.

I was surprised that even Julie thought I might harbor such inanity. I wasn’t so much as addressing RonF or Robert, but that much larger audience that will most likely not post.

Many men are quick to tell women not to do x,y, and z so they won’t get raped (don’t go to bars alone, don’t get drunk, don’t walk alone at night). These men are outwardly motivated by concern and protectionistic/paternalistic feelings. I want to know where these men are now, why aren’t they warning young men of the potential pit falls of delving into the sex trade? Why have no men come forward to say: these young men should have gone to a strip bar… everyone knows hiring two strippers for a private, all-male, barely out-of-adolescent, university affiliated crowd is a recipie for disaster.

So, instead of focusing on her falsely accusing these three men of rape, we should focus on their putting themselves in a position to be falsely accused of rape?

Yes, because they’re sluts who deserved it.

What’s not clear to me is whether Q Grrl really is arguing this, or is parodying the “lying bitch” brigade. If it’s parody, then I think it misses the target, because the people her remarks are directed towards (i.e., RonF and Robert) do not appear to regard rape complainants generally to be lying bitches or sluts who deserved it. They don’t even seem to regard this particular complainant to be a lying bitch. Rather, the prevailing view here seems to be that she’s mentally ill, not responsible for her actions, and deserving of our compassion not our condemnation.

If Q Grrl really is blaming the victims of these false accusations, then she’s a hypocrite.

No, Ron, I don’t support what she did. I just think smart boys like this would have seen it coming. I don’t feel sorry for them.

So, instead of focusing on her falsely accusing these three men of rape, we should focus on their putting themselves in a position to be falsely accused of rape?

(By the way, I apologize for mispelling your screen name in my last post)

The case against these three men was dismissed. I don’t see how that means that her police report was false. You would have to prove that in a court of law… oh, but the case was dismissed. She won’t have a chance to show how Nifong mislead her when she identified these men.

Guess we’ll never know.

She might get that chance in the unlikely event that one of the 3 accused men sues her or in the even more unlikely event that criminal charges are brought against her.

Uh, no, it’s not irrelevant. It’s very likely that these men were punished precisely because there’s a history of not taking these sorts of complaints seriously. My recollection is that Nifong did what he did in large part to prove that he was “serious” so that he could, again, if I’m remembering correctly, improve his odds of winning a state political position.

Had women’s complaints been taken seriously (… by the men who were in power all this time …), Nifong wouldn’t have had to prove anything, and those three students wouldn’t have been raked over the coals. Likewise, had women’s complaints of sexual abuse been taken seriously, those three students, and the rest of the men who organized that event, might have thought twice about everything that happened that evening involving women.

“Right. But her police report doesn’t name these three. She says she was assaulted. Nifong fucked up the chance to prove who did it. ”

Or whether or not anyone at all did.

“Which college was it recently that told a woman who had been raped by a fellow student that her request to have him removed from campus could not be accomodated?”

I don’t remember. But that’s irrelevant to this case. In response to your question - yes, these young men were punished. The fact that other people have been subjected to injustice does not diminish any other individual’s subjection to injustice.

yeah, those poor boys. Having to go through what women go through when sexually harrassed or raped. Tsk tsk tsk.

I have strongly mixed feelings about statements like this. I don’t think that two wrongs makes a right. I do hope that the three students learn something other than “they done me wrong!”. Like, maybe, something about power and how it’s abused, and how it’s important to get the right people under the spotlight from the start.

I’ve been following a lot of the work coming out of groups like the Innocence Project. I’m glad that DNA is being used more often, and especially that DNA databases are being constructed of known offenders. One thing, as I recall, that did happen is DNA was taken as part of the rape kit from when she went to the hospital. I’d like to know what’s being done to pursue any leads that DNA might produce, other than clearing those three men.

Sorry I just missed this little jewel. Actually we do. The charges were not just dismissed, the boys were declared INNOCENT.

Having their season cancelled, a season they might have won a national championship. Being thrown off the team. Being tossed out of school for a semester and their graduation delayed 1/2 a year. Having their friends and acquaintances and fellow students think they were rapists. Having undergone the stress of being booked for a felony they did not commit. Having to spend months being railroaded for a heinous and despicable crime they did not commit. Having to live with groups of people demonstrate and publish ads condemning them for things they didn’t do. Having to deal with the stress both they and their parents were going through all that time. Having this dominate their lives for all this time. Having to deal with this for the rest of their lives.

Which college was it recently that told a woman who had been raped by a fellow student that her request to have him removed from campus could not be accomodated?

yeah, those poor boys. Having to go through what women go through when sexually harrassed or raped. Tsk tsk tsk.

You would think there would be more public outcry against the men who *do* rape and how they make all men look guilty.