Slashdot Mirror
Dharun Ravi Trial: Hate Crime Or Stupidity?
theodp writes "After a 17-month wait, 20-year-old Dharun Ravi went on trial Friday for using a remote webcam to spy on an encounter between his roommate and another man in their Rutgers dorm room. The roommate, Tyler Clementi, killed himself days later, jumping off the George Washington Bridge and igniting a national conversation on cyberbullying and gay teen suicide. Ravi is charged with multiple counts of bias intimidation as a hate crime, invasion of privacy and hindering apprehension; he faces up to 10 years in prison and deportation. Defense lawyers on Friday argued that Ravi's actions were the mark of an ignorant teenager, not a hateful homophobe. 'He may be stupid at times,' said Ravi's lawyer. 'He's an 18-year-old boy, but he's certainly not a criminal.' The New Yorker recently offered an in-depth look at the case and the questions it raises. BTW, this might be a good time for Microsoft to retire that Hallway commercial ('Jason gets stranded in the hallway when his roommate is 'tutoring' lady friends in their dorm room. Luckily, with Windows 7, his laptop can now work like an HD DVR. So Jason can entertain himself while waiting. And waiting. Aaand waiting some more.')."
No question that commercial is moronic, but it doesn't have any relevance to the spying via webcam thing. Timothy's trying a bit too hard to find something to bash Microsoft about this time.
We need a new legal category, Asshole. Beyond Guilty or Not Guilty the Asshole standard would be added after guilt or innocence so we could find someone was Not Guilty but still an Asshole.
The "great" thing about hate crimes laws is that you can never have too many of them. There are so many minorities and victimized groups out there, and we can always use the media to create new ones. The perfect way to tack a few extra years onto a prison sentence and fatten the wallets of the prison industry's investors.
Palm trees and 8
But you gotta teach him that kinda spying isnt really cool bro, you are gonna have to teach him to give something back that's hard work, so there isnt a next time na i mean ?.
make him help his community, make him look after the kerb edges in his neighbourhood, make him realize doing good is usually easier than doing bad.
I was around when this happened. His main offense was not that he spied on his gay roommate, but that he posted the video on twitter.
I don't think that the action (suicide) is warranted by the crime (published observation). Don't get me wrong - it's a totally creepy thing to do, and it's not up to me to judge what motivates anyone, but if *that's* what it takes for you to commit suicide, well, then you've got other problems ahead of you.
Religion is what happens when nature strikes and groupthink goes wrong.
I've read a few articles about this, and it's clear that Ravi did invade upon Tyler's privacy, and should be punished for it. But I haven't seen any evidence presented that he bullied or intimidated Tyler, let alone did so for homophobic reasons. Either the prosecution is saving it for the trial, or the DA is trying to make an example with bullshit charges (probably to look tough on cyberbulling leading up to an election year).
Shhhhhhh! The politicians may add a law that says misanthropy is a hate crime. So any assault, battery, murder etc ... will get an extra charge of a "hate crime".
I know a guy who punched out someone who got nose to nose to him and was yelling obscenities at him. Long story short, for every punch that he landed, it was a separate assault and battery charge. He landed quite a few.
He "cut a deal" where he was charged with only one assault and battery.
With that mentality in the "justice" system, if you unloaded a clip of 9mm into someone, you'd be charged with 15 counts each of assault, battery, attempted murder, murder, homicide, disturbing the peace, discharging a weapon in city limits, etc .....
What does this have to news for nerds whatsoever? I'll tell you the answer: nothing.
Actually, many of us nerds were bullied in school. I, for one, was bullied and appreciate hearing society put some pressure on bullies. This very egregious example of bullying deserves the light of day.
PS: I don't reply to ACs.
18 years old != "boy", except in the colloquial sense.
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
Forget the sexual orientation issue for a moment. If one person can violate another person's privacy like Mr. Rhavi did, then any person (Google, etc.) can. We need laws to protect our privacy.
I think Ayn Rand would have gone absolutely (and impotently) batshit if somebody would have done this to her.
He posted the video of Tyler having gay sex on a website "for all to see and mock", and did (in fact) see and mock the video himself.
PS: I don't reply to ACs.
In what way is that commercial related to this story, and why was that included in the summary? Is it the fact that teenagers have sex? Or that people have roommates? Or that computers... exist?
Yeah, that's my take on it too; the invasion of privacy charges ought to be a slam-dunk, but the bias intimidation charges are there only because Tyler killed himself and Something Must Be Done.
Yup, I was bullied too. I'll wager a fair proportion of us were. There have been a number of examples over the last few years in North America of bullying leading to suicide. I've seen others who weren't just bullied, but were subject to campaigns of abuse and violence, and all the while school administrators turned away and let it happen.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
Knowing the US society at large is still quite homophobic, at least to a great part, do you REALLY think that outting a male making out with anotehr male has no homophobic connotation ? It would have gone nowwhere if it was two hetero, and chance is that the guy would not have published it or the hetere male would simply have garnered brownie point. But you have to be utterly blind to not see that outting homo male , was done with the intention of damage. It usually *always* is.
"What the fuck does this have to news for nerds whatsoever?"
It was a crime committed on the internet having to do with themes important to nerds, such a free speech and bullying. Have you been reading Slashdot long enough to remember the Hellmouth series? I assume you have not, because if you had you would instantly know why this is news for nerds.
"I haven't seen any evidence presented that he bullied or intimidated Tyler"
Well, you and I aren't jurors for this trial, but the evidence is (will be) that he posted a video of the kid having sex, on a public website. You haven't heard about that? I'm surprised to hear you say you haven't heard about that, seeing as how it's sort of the entire point of the story.
Pretty certain when he put the stream up he said something like "the faggot is doing it again" his motive was well established.
Also he asked fora new roommate cuz he didnt wanna room with a gay
I read the entire New Yorker feature, and it left me feeling sad for both of them. Yes Rhavi is an asshole, but I pity him too. The saddest part of the whole story is that had they just talked to each other a couple of times, the whole thing would have been avoided. - also, I think everyone on this board would benefit from reading that New Yorker article, the amount of digital records the author had access to is disturbing.
I cannot dispute that this guy is a complete asshole and should certainly be punished in someway. Deported at a minimum. Not so sure about prison though. I have a hard time believing he envisioned the room mate killing himself. Either way, he gets to live with that.
For me, the real question is fundamental. Why, in the modern "free" world does being outed as a homosexual cause one to prefer suicide rather than live with the shame?
As a society, would it not be better to address such a fundamental social problem than to simply treat the symptoms?
Color of Jason's eyes?
Beer bottle brown.
Too much rimming for that guy.
Actually, many of us nerds were bullied in school. I, for one, was bullied and appreciate hearing society put some pressure on bullies. This very egregious example of bullying deserves the light of day.
Perhaps you should lobby for an expansion of hate crimes laws, so that they cover "nerds" as well.
Palm trees and 8
Does it deserve 10 years in jail for spying on 2 guys kissing? I'm not even sure I would call this incident bullying. Possibly it could be, but it sounds more like someone was shocked and curious, like someone who comes across a juicy diary that shows entries to their friends. It sounds like something that probably deserves a punishment a little harsher than whatever a peeping tom gets, but less than you'd get for passing a non-consensually recorded sex tape around.
Oh ThorGod, please don't lie. Ravi didn't make any sex tapes, nor did he post any videos. Read the article before accusing people of such crimes.
You do have a good point, murder/manslaughter is a good example. Hate crime legislation is one of many examples of considering the offender's intent. some people who oppose hate crime legislation seem to be confused on this point.
I listen to both RIAA and non-RIAA stuff if I like the music, tangential business/politics nonwithstanding.
Reading through the New Yorker article and other accounts since the incident, it seems that Dharun Ravi's actions and tone were consistent with how kids interact with each other these days. Being jackasses online, boasting to his peers and just juvenile behavior. But isn't that reflected in popular culture (Reality TV, Tosh.0, TMZ, etc.)? He and Tyler did not communicate well, and I think those soft-skills are missing among today's youth. In a world of tweets, Facebook, blogs and other online communities, we also leave quite a trail... Maybe that's the biggest lesson here. Neither of them seemed to have a filter. Unprotected Twitter accounts, posting openly in webcam/porn/sex communities, bringing an older hookup back to the dorm... I think there needs to be more education about maintaining your online identity.
As to the case, it seems as though Tyler was troubled long before college. There was a mention of his fascination with the G.W. Bridge, as well as issues coming from a conservative family life. Maybe Ravi's actions had no influence on Clementi's suicide. There's a bit of immaturity on both sides as well. I think "sexiling" your roommate multiple times so early in the school year, is extremely disrespectful. That goes regardless of sexual orientation. I had roommates in college who brought questionable partners home for hookups. But we at least had an understanding, and it was certainly after we had a chance to get to know one another. But maybe Tyler was experimenting and taking advantage of his relative freedom? There's no harm in that, but it illustrates more about his home and family life than anything else.
The webcam angle also seems overblown. Dharun was most-likely venting about being booted from the room, but relishing the fact that the drama provided a attention/bragging opportunity. He may have also been trying to demonstrate his tech-prowess. But as the New Yorker article referenced, there was "no posting, no observed sex, and no closet."
Homophobic? Hate crime? I don't think so. I just think there was an extreme lack of respect and understanding between the two. But the case has been politicized and we'll have to see how it plays out...
Edmund White
http://flickr.com/ewwhite
There are two issues here. The most important is individual responsibility – should a person ever be held responsible for another's suicide? If you believe in individual rights and responsibilities (as do most in the West), you should surely be against this in all circumstances.
The other is homophobia. And here is seems that things are changing, fast. A recently published book finds that school students are now more likely to lose popularity by being homophobic than to gain it.
True, this was in the UK (the author says the US is "10 years" behind). But the study concerns high-school students. It is reasonable to expect that college students – especially in elite places like Rutgers – would be ahead in this trend of tolerance.
Homophobia has been a terrible plague but it seems at last to be fading. In our hurry to condemn it we should not forget that the alleged perpetrator has rights which need protecting too.
" Tyler Clementi's life is OVER. His family's life is DESTROYED."
Yeah, well, he was screwed up in the head.
If it wasn't this, it would be his double espresso wasn't prepared properly.
"Yes, he was perhaps overly sensitive---gay kids usually are, because it's still not easy to be gay."
No, he was just screwed up. He was 99% ready to off himself. This was just the other 1%. The final nudge. But like I said, it could be that somebody cut him off in traffic that would've been the final trigger.
I think it's relevant because the story played itself out on social media (Twitter, Facebook) and involved *scary* technology like webcams! Note how many people still use the term "videotape" in describing the events of this story...
Edmund White
http://flickr.com/ewwhite
I am sure that he didn't jump because he was videotaped by one asshole. It was most probably that he feared the reaction of others when it leaks... the reason was the homophobic society rather then one particular guy. I would say that the society's attitude killed him. What would be the label for the society then?
Well, I've got to get back to work. When I stop rowing, the slave ship just goes in circles.
There is clear evidence that the political correctness movement of society demands that when something that can be considered to be "hate" it must be so. There is no room for interpretation here - if we are going to criminalize hate then it must be done forcefully and completely with no options for wiggling out through supposed ignorance. This makes for a very uncomfortable legal environment for a lot of people, myself included. I believe the idea of a "hate crime" is nonsense and trying to enhance penalties for ordinary crimes because of "hate" being a factor is a bad idea. This clearly is delving into the area of trying to decide what people are thinking internally and externalizing it in some way. What does it matter what someone is thinking and why should we increase penalties for certain thoughts?
The legal system should not be considering thoughts but only actions. Unfortunately, that is not the direction we are going.
In the US today we have "protected classes". These are classes of people that must not be assailed in any way. Women are a protected class and any treatment of them that singles them out because of their gender is illegal today. Similarly, minorities are a protected class in this manner - if you treat an African-American male as an African-American, that is illegal. However, if you treat an African-American male as a male, well, that isn't a protected class. It can get pretty confusing.
The idea of a protected class apart from others is not how one builds an equal society but one where some are more equal than others. There is no condition that I can agree with that says minorities should receive treatment under the law that is different from anyone else. Especially because they are a member of a minority. The law should be minimizing the fact of their differences from the "rest of us" rather than attempting to maximize the differences.
It is somewhat an open question how much homosexuals are a protected class. There are some states having laws that offer blanket protected class status to homosexuals and make it illegal to consider sexual orientation in any manner or for any purpose. Other states have less clear laws and there may only be certain situations where sexual orientation is forbidden from being considered. For example, while many would consider it to be inappropriate for a gay male to be teaching a sexual education class to young girls. In some states it is illegal to bar them from this activity whereas in others it may actually be forbidden by law for them to do it. Very confusing, especially when you get into transsexuals. Court cases are beginning to pop up where it starts to become necessary to discuss what sort of anatomy the is present and what sort of anatomy is desired regardless of what is present.
In the US we are clearly moving into some very interesting territory, one that encompasses the outer edges of what consent can be considered to be. In the US we have been conditioning ourselves to think of unequal power relationships as bad between men and women. But when you get into sexual behaviors where one party is clearly dominant and the other (often permanently) submissive we are supposed to throw all that conditioning away and embrace "the new way". For a lot of people this is very difficult to absorb and they are going to consider unequal power relationships - where one party is clearly in control and the other just has to follow along and do what they are told - as a bad thing. The fact that the US has just gone through, and is still going through, efforts to establish women as equal to men with bra burning, effective birth control and significant changes in the legal framework makes it even more difficult.
you can't entirely stop abuse or pranks, how about making sure that behavior doesn't lead to suicide?
as for the Microsoft reference in TFS: maybe Dharun was also fed up with being sexiled (http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=sexiled)
I listen to both RIAA and non-RIAA stuff if I like the music, tangential business/politics nonwithstanding.
Its a hate crime. This guy obviously had something against him being Gay. No matter how his reasoning is wrapped, in the end its still Hate and Ignorance, plain and simple. Gays will always be a minority. Gays will always be a minority. Gays will always be a minority. There can be no equal Rights for Gays unless the Majority of Straits can empathizes with them as equals. Their lives and life styles -will always be- in the control of the strait majority. Try to imagine how that marginalization would warp your life. As long as there are those who marginalize Gays, there will be enough Hate for them to allow the average person to think it OK to destroy their lives. Human Empathy Test Fail = Human Rights Fail
So had he walked in in an intimate moment, that would have been an invasion of privacy as well?
Ezekiel 23:20
I figure Dharun should get lesser charges for taking and posting the video; that was dumb but the suicide seems like a unexpected result.
I listen to both RIAA and non-RIAA stuff if I like the music, tangential business/politics nonwithstanding.
I haven't seen any evidence presented that he bullied or intimidated Tyler, let alone did so for homophobic reasons. Either the prosecution is saving it for the trial, or the DA is trying to make an example with bullshit charges (probably to look tough on cyberbulling leading up to an election year).
Perps will often be charged with a core set of charges accompanied by any BS that can be loosely tied to the case but not proved. The BS is useful for scaring a plea and will ultimately be dropped as an incentive. The hate crime charge here appears to be BS from TFA. I predict a swift plea accompanied by a swifter deportation.
And the gay guy had filmed his ultra-Christian roommate's heterosexual encounter for the purpose of embarrassing him in the religious community, to the point he committed suicide, nobody would be talking about it as a hate crime.
Just sayin'
The faggots have the full force of our ultra-leftist tyrannical regime behind them... bet they enjoy it, too.
As a member of a minority myself, I've always felt that if someone ever assaulted or murdered me, what's more important is that I was assaulted or murdered not the reason why the asshole did it.
Punish the offender under regular laws, there is no point in this kind of legislation other than the stack the deck in favor of the prosecution.
LK
"Hi. This is my friend, Jack Shit, and you don't know him." - Lord Kano
If the video showed a naked guy with a small penis, or a girl fucking a horrendously ugly guy, that could be every bit as embarrassing for the small-dicked man or the woman in question as this was for the homosexual man.
No, actually, and this goes to show how ignorant you are on GLBT issues.
GLBT individuals don't face "embarrassment." They have to face things like
"being disowned by their family"
"fired from their jobs"
"excommunication from their religious communities", and
"being a target of physical violence."
While we should work towards a society where GLBT people don't have to hide - it's still their choice when they come out and to whom.
You know what this was? This was kid who grew up in a country where being gay is illegal, who found himself living with a gay roommate, was really threatened/offended/bigoted, and decided to "out" the kid to get rid of him. Just spend a few minutes with Google - India's views on homosexuality are amongst the most hostile on the planet.
Please help metamoderate.
Rhavi's actions were stupid but his roommate commited violence against himself, not Rhavi. Rhavi's actions may have lead to a hate crime but I would think it would have to be proved that his intent was for his roommate to commit suicide in order to for Rhavi to be guilty. Then again this is Amerika in the 21st century and a thought crime may be equal or worse than a physical crime.
Why exactly does it matter who you commit a crime against? If you kill someone, then I don't think they should arbitrarily decide to put you in prison for a larger amount of time simply because of the color of the victim's skin (or something like that).
Just save the money, deport him and never let him back. Should be punishment enough. He have enough idiots here already to think we have any reason to let a proven one back.
But people, wake-up, Tyler Clementi's life is OVER. His family's life is DESTROYED.
I wonder why that is? Oh... because he committed suicide.
But who cares about freedom of speech? What if someone's feelings get hurt? Suicide is murder because someone said mean things to them before they killed themselves.
I was bullied, too. I'm still 100% against political correctness and am for freedom of speech.
Trolling.
Or you have never thought about what's it's like to be in an out-group over any topic at all, however trivial or important.
But at least neither of them was *black* because that would be a "generally deplorable" life choice, yes?
Rgds
Damon
http://m.earth.org.uk/
Wrong on all three counts (just read the New Yorker article linked in the summary):
1. There was no video stream, or even photos. He just tweeted that he'd seen his roommate with a man.
2. The tweet was "it's happening again" (the word "faggot" was never used, and in fact the worst term he'd used was "gay").
3. He didn't ask for a new roommate, quite the opposite: when approached by a dorm councilor after Clemens (the victim) asked to move, Dharun wrote him an email and said that he'd like him to say, although he understands why Clemens would want to move.
Obviously Dharun is a major asshole, but throughout this whole tragedy the impression I get is that he was more in it for the LOLZ and the gossip-value rather than homophobia or even anything personal against Clemens. It just looks like a teenager trying to boost his own social standing. It's obvious that something deeper must have driven Clemens to commit suicide, and this was perhaps just the catalyst (not even sure how much of that, because Clemens' IM transcripts with a close friend show that he wasn't all that bothered about it).
Next Tuesday the trial of 19-year-old Dharun Ravi opens. . . . If found guilty, Mr. Ravi could go to jail for ten years.
What did Dharun Ravi do? Well, he was a freshman roommate at Rutgers University with a chap named Tyler Clementi. Clementi was homosexual, and not a closeted one — he didn’t make much of a secret of it. Why would he? Our young people are taught from kindergarten on that “gay is just as good as straight,” that Heather has two mommies, that homosexuals should be “proud,” and so on. My local high school has a club for homosexual students. Anyone who’s embarrassed or ashamed about being homosexual hasn’t been paying attention for about thirty years. And in fact, Clementi wasn’t ashamed: in those first three weeks of his freshman year, he attended at least one meeting of the Rutgers students Bisexual, Gay, and Lesbian Alliance.
Well, a year last September, Dharun Ravi and another freshman, Molly Wei, used a webcam to secretly watch Clementi kissing a young man Clementi had picked up. After watching the video, Ravi gossiped about it on Twitter, quote: “I saw him making out with a dude. Yay.”
Three days after that, Clementi committed suicide by jumping from the George Washington Bridge. Whether this had any connection at all to the webcam incident, is not known. That Dharun Ravi thought his prank might drive Clementi to suicide is preposterous; that he intended that result is preposterosity squared.
The homosexualists were up in arms none the less, and every damn fool politician in New Jersey joined in the hue and cry. Chris Christie, who I think less of every time he opens his fat mouth, quote: “I don’t know how those two folks are going to sleep at night, knowing that they contributed to driving that young man to that alternative.” They don’t know that, Governor, and neither do you, and neither does anyone. They played a trivial prank; Clement killed himself; cause and effect are not obvious, certainly not established to any fair evidentiary standards.
(And nor will the trial attempt to establish such cause and effect. As the USA Today report notes: “Ravi is not charged with anything to do with the suicide.” A legal friend tells me that if the prosecution so much as mentions Clementi’s suicide, that would be grounds for a mistrial. The trial is not about the suicide, it’s about what Dharun Ravi did – see above.)
http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/291621/darkness-new-jersey-john-derbyshire
Read the timeline of events. Dharun Ravi was kicked out of his own room for the night so that Clementi could have gay sex with an older guy from off campus. Ravi then went to a female friend's room, Molly Wei, connected to his own laptop back in his room over iChat, and watched what was going on. Ravi posts the following message to his Twitter account: "Roommate asked for the room till midnight. I went into molly's room and turned on my webcam. I saw him making out with a dude. Yay." Molly has some of her female friends over to watch briefly. Soon after, Wei IMs her boyfriend, Austin Chung, regarding Clementi: "He's NICE but he's kissing a guy right now / like THEY WERE GROPING EACH OTHER EWWW."
Then Clementi does the whole thing again, two days later, with the same guy, again throwing his roommate out so he can have sex. Some of this gets seen on iChat, too. Clementi is already aware he was seen on iChat last time.
Where's the expectation of privacy here? Clementi made no effort to conceal what he was doing. Ravi, on the other hand, has a First Amendment right to comment on the situation.
Of course, there are things that people have no control of that get lumped into the hate crime category, and I realized that even as I wrote my post. There are many others that people do have control of. And I'm sure that we'll soon see (if it hasn't already happened) people charged with "hate crimes" because they took actions against someone who made the "lifestyle choice" of being a child molester.
If you want an unbiased society you have to have laws that apply equally to everyone. You only continue to breed hate and resentment by having laws and privileges that give one group an advantage over another.
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
The funny thing is if you read the majority of posts they are defending the 'bully' as doing nothing wrong. Why? Because in this case it appears the bully also has some nerdish qualities and was able to use a remote control something or other to spy. I wonder what this thread would have looked like if it were a member of the lacrosse team peering through a window with his dime a dozen cell phone cam at some people at a Linux users group.
The same thing is true of race. FTW
Race, sexuality, gender - none of these are binary in reality. Thus - you have to get into the MIND of the person commiting the crime. Did they THINK the person was a 'nerd'?
Thus - thoughtcrime.
What makes no sense cannot be understood.
The state exists to impose consequences that have been decided by your fellow human beings. What would be the point of it otherwise?
No, being gay is no more a "choice" than being black or female or having legs.
The problem is the widespread tolerance for various forms of smug in-group bigotry, and that making someone's like is unpleasant is just fine and dandy because they are in a minority, *just because* they are in a minority.
People are driven to despair because of the in-group's relentless nasty attitude to them being a geek or having the wrong accent or living on the wrong side of the tracks or being foreign or female or poor or adopted or so many things....
Hate crimes are about attempting to stop bigotry and prejudice whether malicious, or unthinking and generally stupid as this looks to me have been. It can be intolerable to be the butt of everyone's disapproval and the reason for others behaving towards you as they do is not necessarily apparent or important.
If you've always gone with the flow and been a fashionable well-off white middle-class male, and possibly supine and unoriginal, then you may never have been on the wrong side of "punished for being different". But that doesn't make your ignorance or smugness right, IMHO. Nor does it give you any legal rights to set out to intimidate and hurt others.
In fact, starting from the good US meme of "not truly succeeding until you've failed at least once" I'll suggest that you're not a real rounded human until you have found yourself on the wrong side of one of these idiocies for being different somehow, and overcome it.
Too bad one student seems to have been driven to his death rather than overcome it.
Rgds
Damon
http://m.earth.org.uk/
I think we can simply dispense with your insane viewpoints.
I'm extremely distressed to hear of a suicide in the Rutgers fraternity.
This represents a huge increase from the no suicide ever here in the United States.
I demand that we repatriate our Foxconn oversight delegation from Shenzhen, because we have a far greater suicide rate increase problem right here at home to investigate. Lest we become complacent and suffer for our lack of vision.
There is ZERO evidence that this kid had a general hatred of gays, persecuted gays, or otherwise was involved with "hate" speech of any kind.
As much as it will piss off the gay community, it IS legal to hate your roommate and to try to embarrass them.
The end result was sad and deplorable, but it's not the result of a "hate crime."
Had the roommate been some guy screwing around with this fellow's ex-girlfriend, and had he even posted videos of them on the internet, no one would be calling it a "hate crime."
The gay community needs to get over themselves. I'm starting to hate the gay community not because they're gay, but because they slam out stupid lawsuits like this that try to paint EVERYTHING as "hate crimes" when they're not. The gay community wanted us out of their bedrooms. Fine. They got their way. Now get the hell out of our court rooms.
I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
I think the biggest problem here is Dharun's refusal to accept a plea bargain:
A second offer was made in December: no jail time, an effort to protect him against deportation, and six hundred hours of community service.
It seems like a reasonable compromise. I wonder why he turned it down.
In Scotland we have three possible judgements - Guilty, Not Guilty and Not Proven.
The latter can basically be interpreted as "Not guilty - and don't let us catch you at it again!"
"We know damn well you did it, but we can't prove it", seems to be the interpretation most folk I knew in Scotland put on it.
Okay, so from what I gather from TFA, it seems Mr. Ravi did the digital equivalent of "walking in" on his roommate. You know, the occurrence that happens so often in meatspace that it's a common TV trope for comedic effect. If he had a "whoops, forgot my wallet!" moment, it would've been roughly the same breach of privacy. It's just not a good idea to do a Russian Unicorn while your roommate is out, hiking or otherwise. And while it seems no recording or posting to the internet took place, roommates do "walk in" with a camcorder (or cell phone in video mode) from time to time, just look on YouTube. I'm sorry, but when two people have the key to the same place, you have no expectation of absolute privacy.
More importantly, what is wrong with setting up a video camera to monitor where you're living? Maybe you think your nanny might be locking your kid(s) in their room and using your place for a casual encounter. Oh right, that happened in a movie too. Perhaps Mr. Ravi thought his roommate's fling might make off with some of his stuff, or maybe he wanted to make sure the guy wasn't bringing illegal drugs. Point being, there's plenty of good reason to want to know what's going on where you live, while you're not there.
As far as I'm concerned, this story could read exactly the same way if the roommate were straight. Plenty of gays get inadvertently outed or walked in on in college and don't need an exit bag as a result. Mr. Ravi should not suffer because his roommate likely had severe unaddressed psychological issues.
---
DRM is like antifreeze, to the MPAA/RIAA it's sweet, to the consumers it's poison.
This is the best suggestion you've had this entire thread. The answer is not to ease punishment for hate crimes but to legally recognize all groups who are persecuted for simply being.
blog
Or, you could just pass a law that says "we won't tolerate bullying" instead of having to qualify it with "we won't tolerate bullying of $FAVORED_GROUP."
But, as someone raised by an out-of-the-closet lesbian, I can assure you that being outed as gay has some pretty severe consequences in many parts of this country. The one year I attended a public school in Kentucky, as one example, I faced very real threats of violence because my mother was gay even though I myself am straight.
Granted, in some parts of the country, this has ceased to be an issue. In fact, some of my daughters' friends at school think it's `cool' to be gay. At one school attended by my eldest daughter, you might say that being bisexual was the new black.
But in a world where two thirds of the voting public in Ohio pass a state constitutional amendment banning not only gay marriage but also recognition of same sex civil unions, I can assure you that there are still many places in the US where being outed has very real, very significant, and oftentimes very brutal consequences.
Putting aside the question of whether this was intended as bullying or a hate crime whatever...
Regardles of motivation, it's still a crime to install a camera in somebody's place wihout permission. If the victim was female, you wouldn't see a lot of people defending the bastard.
The gay guy had no reason to commit suicide.
His reaction was that of a childish gutless idiot.
If public knowledge of a personal choice will lead
to such an extreme reaction on the part of the person
who is "outed", then the person should have thought
about all that before he decided to have a sex life which
involved such activity.
Sure, it was tasteless and wrong for his room mate to video
him. but that has NOTHING to do with the fact that the guy
killed himself, and trying to pin even a slight amount of blame
for the suicide on the guy who killed himself is pure BULLSHIT.
Sorry, but that's the truth and if you don't like it maybe
you should consider growing a pair of balls.
The suicide note that the police have not shown to the parents probably shows Tyler Clementi blaming his mother. She hasn't been open about the conversations she's had with him. He talked of being rejected by her. She seems to loathe her gay sons.
He showed her around the bridges. He committed suicide for her.
Things were different when I was in college - there wasn't any Internet, and the object of such pranks had the possibility of moving elsewhere and starting over with their life. Not so much so now...
I, for one, welcome any reason to send another dothead back to their curry stained shit hole continent.
Dharun and that girl who engineered this whole thing got a huge kick out of exposing the gay guy. It was his potential misery that fueled it. Have you heard the testimony about how they discussed their plans? They were hungry for this guy's pain. They are sociopaths, plain and simple.
Quite frankly nobody would go to this much trouble to do something that screwed up unless they really had it out for somebody. Dharun and that girl are homophobes and freaks. Nobody wants to destroy somebody's life "for kicks" unless they have a number of screws loose.
At the very least, you can say they have absolutely no sense of morality. I can't imagine what kind of parents or caretakers they might make in the future.
I was bullied, too. I'm still 100% against political correctness and am for freedom of speech.
This is the furthest thing from simple political incorrectness/speech.
PS: I don't reply to ACs.
I agree with the above. I read the article a few weeks ago and it was enlightening, if for nothing else then to see how social interactions have changed SO dramatically in just 10 or 20 years!
These two kids lived in the same dorm room for weeks. They had more interactions online, than face to face, despite both of them living in the same room! wow... They also went to great extents not to hide their privacy in any way. Especially tyler who had the same email address/handle for every single site he visited.
Kids today!
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This kind of puts the cart before the horse. It should be a crime before it can be a hate crime. I don't see how a motivation can make an act which is legal into an act which is illegal. Motivation can be considered as an aggravating factor in committing a crime, but the act has to be a crime to begin with. If all the guy did was post a video which he himself recorded while on his property, I don't see how that's illegal. The person who was videotaped was not a minor. Can it really be illegal to record persons in ones own domicile? And certainly if the recording wasn't illegal, then posting it wasn't illegal. So what's the crime? He was an ass? That's not in itself illegal. Nor should it be.
Any guest worker system is indistinguishable from indentured servitude.
The timing coincided with highly-publicized teen suicides and increased focus on (cyber) bullying.
Cyber-bullying is blown way out of proportion. People lived just fine without Facebook and Twitter accounts. We're not talking kerosene lamps and butter churns here - it really wasn't that long ago. The whole aspect of why it sucks to be bullied is not being able to escape the situation. When you're a kid going to public school and there's a handful of jerks who tease you every day - yeah, it wears on you and it's frustrating when the teachers/staff ignore the problem (or worse, blame you).
We really don't need more laws treating cyber-bullying as some special problem. If you're an unpopular person and being teased really bothers you, learn to use the privacy features or stay off the social networking sites. Hell, your life might even turn out the better for it.
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DRM is like antifreeze, to the MPAA/RIAA it's sweet, to the consumers it's poison.
irony? that's not irony, that's just you not knowing what irony is.
Bullshit. Moron. NEXT.
Equating walking in and deliberately using equipment in the room to spy on your roommate is just a terrible analogy. A more analogous analogy would be "peering through the window".
In the latter instance, the roommates privacy is being violated without him having any knowledge of the incident. In the 'walk in' scenario the roommate is aware and has been precluded to his entrance, even if just briefly.
MINORITY?!?!?!?!?! WTF?!
Castrate Ravi and then send him to Club Gitmo as a terrorist that way not trial is even required and his incarceration can be forever without any right to appeal. He may have been stupid but stupidity has consequences. Ravi is hereby ordered detained under the NDAA and related laws pursuant to the War on Terror(ism). Case closed. Time to get to the chicken BBQ before the noon sun peaks.
When you target someone with the intention of causing them harm, and, while committing that pre-meditated harm, they die (the method of death does not matter), you just committed murder-one. This has been held to be the case if you loan a car to someone who robs a store and an elderly patron has a heart attack at the robbery, the owner of the can can and will be found guilty of murder (that's not one that's happened yet, but an "innocent" car owner was charged with and convicted of robbery for loaning their car to someone who used if for that, and the rest of the chain has happened more than once).
Learn to love Alaska
No.
And before you ask, neither would have been stacking three crates of melons on a motorbike, or whatever unrelated bullshit you might come up with next.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
But as the New Yorker article referenced, there was "no posting, no observed sex, and no closet."
Are you saying (or they saying) that the make-out session wasn't posted/streamed online?
That is correct. It was not streamed publicly, recorded or posted anywhere. It'd be a different story if it ended up on YouTube... But nothing was recorded.
Edmund White
http://flickr.com/ewwhite
Ironic, isn't it?
I once had a roommate - a guy - who would bring women back to the dorm room for sex. WHILE I was sleeping in the bed across the room, 10 feet away. I'd wake up from the door opening, normally fall back asleep, but the female voices and the quiet moaning would keep me awake. Now, this happened multiple times. I'd have exams the next day, or whatever - I needed the sleep. One day, after several of these trysts, I woke up in the midst of their flagrante delicto and let them know that the party was over. The roommate was pissed at ME because I... I don't know... something like I "pretended to be asleep." Idiot. He was a tall handsome blond guy whose ass most people kissed, and as a result, quite narcissistic.
Anyway, I don't know the intimate details of this story, but if someone were not infrequently keeping me out of my dorm room with hookups, I'd be pretty effing pissed. However, I'd probably talk to the roommate about it, not set up a video camera and threaten to distribute / actually distribute the video.
A data point.
The whole roommates in college idea is just odd. Replace the shared room with two broom closets with beds in, and each individual can do as he pleases within the confines of his own closet (as long as he's not too loud).
I'd say it was manslaughter .
Also he asked fora new roommate cuz he didnt wanna room with a gay
You say that like it's a bad thing (well, he should have asked to move out himself, of course). If one is uncomfortable with a gay roommate they should part ways rather than power through. You should respect other people (their preferences, etc), but you certainly don't have to be comfortable living with them.
You know that you are allowed to discriminate by gender when searching for roommates (e.g., sharing common bathroom/kitchen/etc.) on craigslist? I assume that is similar.
You know what this was? This was kid who grew up in a country where being gay is illegal, who found himself living with a gay roommate, was really threatened/offended/bigoted, and decided to "out" the kid to get rid of him. Just spend a few minutes with Google - India's views on homosexuality are amongst the most hostile on the planet.
This is wrong in several ways. First, New Jersey is not a country. Second, being gay is not technically illegal in NJ, believe it or not. Seriously, did you not read the first 10 words of the article? i.e.:
Dharun Ravi grew up in Plainsboro, New Jersey, in a large, modern house with wide expanses of wood flooring and a swimming pool out back.
This is, of course, a show trial put on by the Gay Mafia.
OMG, I'm gay! How can I join?
Given that the two had no information as to Clementi's psychological instability, there's no way that Ravi and Wei could have reasonably believed that this prank might drive Clementi to kill himself, and therefore, to say that Clementi's suicide was an intended result is preposterous.
Nobody said it was the intended result. He's not charged in any way with his suicide... in fact if the prosecution mentions it, it will likely be a mistrial.
If anybody "shares blame" for Clementi's suicide, it's the "gay rights" advocates.
OMG! I feel so bad now.
The prosecutors (persecutors) in this case need to be shot to death. For allowing the case to go forward, the judge also needs to be killed.
Oh awesome! Don't you wish we live din North Korea or Iran, where they'd actually do that! I wish I could kill everyone who I disagreed with, boy wouldn't that be a wonderful world! And the best part is, I can see how you live in Christ's love and live the life of a Christian for saying those words. God loves you, and wishes He could kill those damn prosecutors and judge!
Just because the U.S. is a republic does not mean it is not a democracy. Democracy/republic are not mutually exclusive.
particularly if based on some generally deplorable choice they have made in their lives.
Regardless of the other things you mentioned, it's no longer a majority that believes being gay is wrong in America. So it is a minority deplorable "choice" now.
Just because the U.S. is a republic does not mean it is not a democracy. Democracy/republic are not mutually exclusive.
1. No one involved in the trial knows what was in Tyler's handwritten note. 2. No one knows what Tyler talked about with his mom during his last phone call.
This has been held to be the case if you loan a car to someone who robs a store and an elderly patron has a heart attack at the robbery, the owner of the can can and will be found guilty of murder (that's not one that's happened yet, but an "innocent" car owner was charged with and convicted of robbery for loaning their car to someone who used if for that, and the rest of the chain has happened more than once).
Well, I disagree with that.
This is the furthest thing from simple political incorrectness/speech.
Right. It's just blaming someone for someone else's suicide.
If I try to catch a girlfriend cheating on me and post the video all over the place to show what a slut she is, it's stupid, it's childish, and it's selfish.
If you are dumb enough to do this, then you have done it in a hateful way. I never known someone to do something against someone else without some type of payback being behind it, payback, and anger, words associated with ""hate"". This was a bad example you have set forth..
However you made the point of Ravi's not being hateful of gays.. I have not heard the facts from the case, but for some reason he thought it would be funny to do humiliate his roommate. He should be facing charges for this, it should be an example to other teens out there who go to far, it should become a slap in face, and make them think twice before they do stupid shit like this.
Whats even more stupid is it took the dude to commit suicide before anyone bothered to bring this kind of over the top behavior to the courts. Yes he is a teen and yes teens fuck up, or do stupid shit, and even more so when it comes to colleges and there idiot pranks, but Ravi's had to be aware that his roommate did not want to have it publicly known he was gay. It is pretty obvious he was trying to hide his sexual preference..
He hasn't heard about it because what you say didn't happen.
so basically the behavior was par for the course (at least in this day and age, for better or for worse). From your description it sounded like Tyler also communicated badly.
Thus, Dharun shouldn't get any special punishment?
I went to a university in my hometown, so I didn't move out, so I can't speak on those social politics.
I listen to both RIAA and non-RIAA stuff if I like the music, tangential business/politics nonwithstanding.
not a lifestyle
While child molesters generally get tarred and feathered, your post is ironic in that pedophiles are treated the same as child molesters, when they've done nothing wrong and didn't choose to be attracted to children. The majority of them will never have abused a child in their lives, just as the majority of straight adults aren't rapists, either. Yet pedophiles are the bottom of the totem pole, as you mention, and everybody can feel justified in hating every single one of them.
This young man only filmed what was going on in his own room. I doubt that there was malicious intent but even if there were malicious intentions the act of suicide is 100% upon the person who kills himself. I see no crime at all in this. We take all people as being the same and the fact that someone is unusually fragile or under social pressure does not go back to a party that simply activates and already broken person. The gay guy could as easily have been proud and boastful about being gay as humiliated or embarrassed. These days it is like if you win a tennis match and the other player can't handle the loss and kills himself it is somehow your fault for winning the game. It just makes no sense at all.
> Defense lawyers on Friday argued that Ravi's actions were the mark of an ignorant teenager, not a hateful homophobe.
Homophobia, and more broadly, hate, are both marks of ignorance. His age is not relevant. He was 18 when he did it. Lock him up and throw away the key. Case closed, nothing to see here, move along. Save your bleeding heart for someone who deserves it.
This shouldn't have needed to go beyond university punishment. The university housing should have handled this. Unfortunately, this blew up because he left too big of an online trail.
Edmund White
http://flickr.com/ewwhite
Didn't we learn from Law and Order, this is typical of a Judge with a political view/Agenda and the DA making the defendant sweat.
-- It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it. -- Aristotle
The Gay Mafia?
really? Are you THAT retarded?
Oh wait, misunderstanding of Sodom and the story it teaches (hints, its not about buggery, no matter what your sunday school taught you) kind of gives that away.
Yeah, more like 'News for Fagets'.
The point is that when something like that happens, people "disagree" but don't complain/petition. But if it's about gays or atheists or some other allowably hated minority, and people complain quite loudly, and petitions and such do get formed.
Learn to love Alaska
As long as you dont Act out your bigotry. Leave it to your own house, mkay?
Idiot. We aren't talking about mere disagreement. We're talking about agents of the State committing violence against someone for the "crime" of turning on a webcam.
No, we aren't talking about any agent of the State committing violence by the act of a court prosecution. If that's the case then every court case is an agent of the State committing violence.
And if you didn't catch the irony, the judge and prosecutor shouldn't be killed even if they are wrong. And the "crime" wasn't a "crime" in quotes, it was an actual crime of which most everyone here seems to agree with. They don't agree with the degree of punishment nor the bias intimidation accusation (and neither do I), but they tend to agree that Ravi did indeed commit a crime by turning on the webcam and publishing another citizen's private, intimate moments.
Just because the U.S. is a republic does not mean it is not a democracy. Democracy/republic are not mutually exclusive.
That ad is just so damn depressing :-(
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel