Tuesday, August 26, 2014

#WarOnWomen? Not Quite.

It's three mothers who have formed a new non-profit to ensure due process rights for those in the crazed sexual environment of higher education:
She and two other mothers who say their sons were falsely accused of sexual misconduct recently formed a national nonprofit organization called Families Advocating for Campus Equality to provide a support system for other families going through what they experienced and to bring awareness to what they call a “lack of fair and balanced safeguards within campus hearings.”

“When this happened to Caleb in 2010, I thought we were the only ones,” she said. “We felt very isolated. You feel afraid a lot. It’s very traumatic.”

Their goal is to ensure fairness and due process for all parties involved in allegations of sexual misconduct on college campuses. The group also hopes to help change the ways campuses respond to sexual assaults. When the issue of sexual misconduct on college campuses is addressed, rights of the accused are hardly, if ever, mentioned, said Warner Seefeld, who is president of the group.
Caleb was never even charged with a crime but was still kicked out of college.  How does that remotely seem reasonable?  Is this what feminism has become?  Because if it is, I want nothing more to do with it.

5 comments:

  1. While I agree with you, that this was both unfair and deserving of a lawsuit ... Didn't you recently write a post in which you supported CA legislation to make it easier to remove/fire teachers accused of sexual misconduct? Suspension pending conviction, sure ... but it seems like the same issue to me.

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  2. I don't support firing teachers *accused* of misconduct, although for practical reasons they might have to be removed from the classroom pending trial. I support making it easier to fire teachers for a number of reasons, not all of them felonies. Incompetence, for instance....

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  3. We don't disagree. But proof is needed first. And student achievement is not a good indicator ... too many random factors. VPs need to get theier butts in to class rooms more often, and stay long enough to actually observe teaching ...

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  4. We're dancing around the difference in our beliefs, though. Even if the administration does a great job of documentation, it can still take an undue amount of effort to fire someone who obviously should be fired. I support "due" process, I don't support "undue" process.

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  5. I don't know if we're dancing ... I support a fair process for every case. The delay is in the bureaucracy ... and just saying the severity of the accusation, in absence of a criminal charge, doesn't change anything. I'm all for slimming down the parameters ..but what teaching looks like need not , nor should it not, look the same. Sexual assault charge? Sure, get the person out of the classroom immediately -- but that person gets the same process. The real problem is that the process is maddeningly slow ... regardless of the charge.

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