George Will on Controversy over his Column (C-SPAN)
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- Опубліковано 14 жов 2024
- In this excerpt from a C-SPAN Q&A interview (taped June 19, 2014), syndicated columnist George Will comments on the controversy surrounding the column he wrote on sexual assaults on college campuses. He responds to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch dropping his column.
Very glad to see a prominent columnist like Will taking exactly the right stand on this issue. I always respected Will, now I respect him even more.
His statistics are dubious? Um... if I recall correctly, he was using *their* statistics.
Is this a rare case of the sexual grievance industry owning up to their statistical shenanigans? Nope, thought not. It's more a "condemn first and don't bother asking questions later" thing.
These cases belong in the criminal justice system not in these silly little campus kangaroo courts. If sexual assault is a serious matter it should be treated seriously.
Why should any public institution circumvent the legal system, abandon due process, and administer its own justice without any right to appeal? After accusations are made, are school administrators really expected to fulfill the duties which police are actually trained and paid to perform? Who pays the price when they mess up?
Yeah, except that's not what happens. But nice strawman. The problem is that colleges ARE NOT forwarding sexual assault claims to police. How can police investigate assaults that they don't know are being committed?
jj
So... why aren't they then? Who's interests are they protecting, because there's a case that it could be a) the victim's, b) the perpetrator's, or c) their own institution's sterling reputation. So yeah, not forwarding relevant evidence or documents to actual authorities whose responsibility it is to conduct a proper investigation, hmm... strawman indeed.
Brendan Hodgens In the case of the alcohol or drugs the would be 'victim of the justice system' is also the perp AND the accused. There would be no incentive for anyone to go to the cops.
In the case of rape that's not the case. The accused is at a huge disadvantage of the same court mandated standards of evidence, testimony, jury trial, and sentencing are NOT adhered to.
ONE of the college students MIGHT want to go with the college's system. The other would want a fair trial in court.
Brendan Hodgens Well wait, I thought the problem was the sexual assaults, not the agency handling it. If there are sexual assaults they ought be treated as such. It's clear to me why colleges would want to do their own laundry but it's also clear to me why this is a bad idea.... just look at the military or the Catholic church for recent examples of shenanigans. Here's the thing about a rape, there generally is no witness, just the accused and the victim. Since we can rule out the accused testifying against himself, you have precious little time to collect important evidence that would incriminate him in a court of law, and college administrators aren't exactly the people who are going to be conducting those sort of exams. Hence the rapist gets off, or a false accusation results in a persons life getting seriously derailed.
George Will is right on! Listen to him.
I am a Liberal but I deeply respect George Will. I do not want to offend anyone because this is a very sensitive issue. Nonetheless, I believe that Mr. Will is correct when he says that crime must be handled by the criminal justice system. There will always be points on which Mr. Will and I disagree, but this man is a thinker and he is to be respected.
I am also a liberal democrat, and I couldn't agree more. Will has seen the light recently and changed teams. He hasn't changed his views, but this man has always had my respect. When the opposite of Conservatism came to office in 2017 (tRump of course), G-dub joined the right side (no pun) of history.
(Pam): "You obviously have no daughters."
(Wikipedia): "Will has three children-Victoria, Geoffrey, and Jonathan-with his first wife, Madeleine."
He named his firstborn son "Victoria"? Maybe Will took a lesson from Johnny Cash.
Mr. Will,
Thank you for sharing your analysis; both here as well as in your article with the Washington Post. I agree with your position that matters of serious criminality should be dealt with by our justice system rather than institutions of higher learning. Frankly, I find it shocking that the justice system would delegate such grave matters of legality to an institution that has no exigence for interpreting and adjudicating matters of U.S. law.
Furthermore, having studied mathematics in college, I can attest that the application of the statistics from the reports cited by the White House are factually erroneous (though grade school arithmetic would serve just fine). Not only were the statistics erroneous, in fact, but the article they cited should be considered dubious at best; having only surveyed women in 2 universities in the country.
Damn him and his logic and mathematics! Feminists won't allow this outrageous display of reason over emotion!
Basically what's going on is that men will be guilty until proven innocent. I can just see triangle dramas ruin the lives of many young men in college nowadays. This is unconstitutional and moronic.
Where are George Will's statistics specifying the numbers of young men whose lives have been "permanently and seriously blighted" by false or overblown allegations of sexual assault or rape?
George Will asks the law to draw a distinction between sexual assault/ forcible rape and "date rape" when judging cases, and the Post-Dispatch dumps him. Good for George! to be hated by the Post-Dispatch should be considered a badge of honor.
Date rape is forcible rape. It's there in the word rape.
Michael Trice If a woman is forced after saying NO!, then you are correct. But if she says, "Stop it" in a sweet way after they are already half way there, it becomes a matter of He said, She said.
We are speaking about a situation when the woman is NOT being stalked, for rapes from stalking are obviously forcible rapes and should be prosecuted to the full extent of the law. But if two people are on a date, it is only rape all the time when the feminists want a cause celeb.
Disturbing. If she (or he) says stop at any point or any intonation, the partner needs to stop. Otherwise it becomes rape. Most rapes are by acquaintances and frequently by someone pushing to "get a little more" than the other person wants to do. That's rape. "He said, She said" has no bearing on whether it's rape.
Michael Trice Sensitive people might agree with you. But the Law should make a distinction between the two. And that is the point here. There are distinctions to be made within the law because there is an obvious difference between being raped by a stalker, gang raped by a gang of men vs. taking a tryst too far. The Law is not written and should not be written by law makers who have only taken courses in sensitivity training. Well let us say that laws were only written by people who have been to sensitivity seminars. There would still be a difference between being raped by stalkers vs. date rape. There are obvious distinctions.
What is the legal difference? Is there a difference between being robbed by a stranger and being robbed by someone you know? Sensitive has nothing to do with it. It's basic logic and application of law.
If these distinctions are obvious, can you explain a legal difference between them?
Also, it's not the argument he's making. The crux of his argument is that universities should hold these hearings to a criminal standard of proof and not a civil standard even though they are civil hearings.
Here is one reliable way to judge comments. If there are obscenities and threats, especially when not counterbalanced with any reasoning, that comment should count -1 towards the position intended to be supported. I see at least -3 below.
George Will is always ahead of the issues, he's the best political journalist in print.
The best domestic critic in America today......he's a bit wonky on foreign affairs but I guess you can't have everything.
George Will is the Lefts Kryptonite, the Garlic Necklace and Cross to the Lefts Vampirism, And they've been hunting for a long time for a reason to marginalize him and shut him up. If they can disable their enemies Cannon then they stand a better chance in the fight. But George Will is a massive Cannon that is impossible to silence. :- )
so its a crime to tell women to act responsibly?
Obviously, since feminism tell women that they deserve equal rights, but never mentions also having ti share responibilities, those are still just on men, so that feminist can play all day long the victim card and blame everything that goes wrong on men! What more can one expect from such a paranoid ideology?
yes it is tell the bitch to get back in the kitchen
Firstly, I just want to say that I greatly admire George Will. It’s obvious that his erudite perspectives on politics and society come from the heart and brain of a PhD from Princeton who has won the Pulitzer Prize for his WaPo column.
That said, I find that I don’t always agree with him. On this particular topic, it’s not just because I’m a Progressive Democrat, but also because I am a woman and a rape victim.
I was an 18YO when my *perpetrator* attacked me. He did so after my senior prom, (where he had *acted* like a congenial gentleman), but as he drove me home, he parked his car on a remote street, and aggressively, overwhelmingly assaulted me with his violent, brute force. He also took my virginity. I was in such a state of shock that I told NO ONE! It took years of therapy to enable me to even discuss this tragic experience.
So when Mr Will reduces the cause of rape to a “sea of hormones and alcohol,” I don’t think he understands the gravity of what he’s saying. Also, when he says that ”touching” or “a mark” doesn’t prove sexual assault, I beg to differ. You cannot know a young woman’s background, whether she has been abused in her past, or even what kind of *touching* or *marks* are referenced! Touching her face is far different than touching her vaginal area. And marking her up with bruises is much different than accidentally scratching her hand. Geez! (FWIW, he does this as well, for instance, with his conservative view on “limited government regulations,” assuming that every person on Wall Street is going to abide by the same code of ethics! Holy cow! We’ve already seen what happens-as with the 2008 “Too Big To Fail” meltdown of our financial services industry-when there are no safeguards in place to restrain GREED!) How can he understand the minds of the young, entitled men who think they CAN do what they want to any young woman they date?! THAT’S AN INTRINSICALLY COLOSSAL PREMISE TO THIS ARGUMENT!
While I can fully appreciate that there is a minute fraction of men who are wrongfully accused of rape, and he is correct in saying that their futures are blighted by scandal, and the expenses both they incur and these universities incur (especially once the schools realize they were wrongfully accused)-ALL of these factors deserve a great deal of attention. Imho, all of these factors are just as heartbreaking as rape. NO ONE deserves to be wrongfully accused of an act that is as violent and reprehensible as rape!
Perhaps, in the end, young women would feel more confident about reporting rape if respected, erudite men like George Will would actually TALK with some young college women who were raped. Then, there would be less “she said, he said,” and far more substantial proof, like a rape kit, and an official report, and then, due process! It truly amazes me how often I read articles on a number of topics from authors who offer opinions on subjects for which they lack ANY experience, and they don’t even bother to gather authentic references from those who have the experiences. That’s what great writing-which includes an empathetic view (or two)-contains. 🤔
Duke's court settlement for the
Victims?
......
Were the young men whom the administration accused and convicted.
.......
A case study with the Justice system in educational institutions.
.........
Duke's mistakes cost....millions.
...
I guess if you were to take an overview of all my political opinions, you'd have to call me a liberal, though of course these labels are just catch-alls for opinions that happen to be seen together in people. But why is it that, in the mainstream, it seems to be more often the conservatives questioning this stuff?
I really like his bit toward the end on indignation being the default setting. Well spoken.
You can tell that he hates hearing his own voice explain the dumb things hes said.
The magical "1-in-5" statistic has already been debunked and discredited.
I could go on and on about how drastically wrong he is but that would waste too much more of my time on him.
Wow congrats, you just made me hate republican dickheads like you even more than I already did. Do you really think that any of what he says is true? I bet you also believe Todd Akin in saying that in cases of "legitimate rape" that the woman's body can shut down. And you're calling me stupid.
How about name one thing he is wrong about
In hind sight he was way off! It has become and probably has been for a while! Stop the myopic touching please!
If "this is your job", George, reporting that Rape is a sign of exaggeration with college girls, then may I suggest that you perhaps you find a REAL job, more to your dubious talents........!!! Hormones and alcohol......yeah , blame it on anything but what it is, ---sexual assault, not even having to do with sex as much as control and power. You are a reason WHY rape is so trivilized out there today. You obviously have no daughters, nor sisters, nor do you even care about females.
Try to stop hyperventilating and respond to his actual argument concerning due process, if you can.
Pam don't need no steeeeeeking due process! Them evil men is all she needs to know.
Both the way the issue is being handled and the amorphous way sexual assault is being defined is what truly trivializes the issue. As do those who shout sexism and bigotry rather than respond to a rational argument.
Thank you Pam for perfectly illustrating his point about the unfortunate side of removing "barriers to entry" in public discourse. You're right on time.
Because those men at Duke had all committed rape, right Pam? Because women don't lie about rape, ever, right Pam?
GM
George Will is an annoying elitist that throws out baseball references to pretend he is a 'man of the people'.