cixelsyd

Happy Thanksgiving! (Now, how many of you thought this would be some ominous drum corps breaking news about to drop?)

This year, it would not be much better if they were in their previous home area.

A SoundSport group a few years back had their open-class application vetoed over a social media post criticizing two DCI corps (and arguably, former DCI corps at that point). What will the penalty be for a corps whose representative causes DCI to be named as a co-defendant in a lawsuit?

Guardsmen moved from Mt. Prospect to Schaumburg/Hoffman Estates.

I think Sky Ryders and Southwind (twice) count as significant relocations. Two Texas corps also deserve honorable mention. Genesis moved from along the Rio Grande to San Antonio, then to Austin. Guardians have triangulated between the San Antonio, Houston and DFW areas.

Okay, that narrows down the timing. But I need a shower after seeing that blog...

He was percussion caption head and "assistant director" in 1982, but Doc Santo was still corps director that year.

I do not see the connection. Sexual abuse does not make money for a drum corps, nor does it win trophies. Is your subsequent post what you really meant?

We have quite a bit of common ground.

GH was still marching Crossmen in 1978. 1979 was his first year on Garfield drum staff. 1983 was his first year as corps director. I do not know precisely when the leadership transition occurred. It was announced in a press release in a DCW issue mailed on January 17th, 1983, which also mentions a corps camp held the weekend of December 31 through January 2. The annual corps awards banquet was held during this camp.

So this subsystem can only punish people/institutions that have money? Those who have few assets (or can shield those assets) can carry on with impunity.

Bad people. More bad people. ... by bad people. ... where now, the institution also stands accused, and must defend itself. And mind you, this is arguably not the same institution. There are the name changes, relocations and reorganizations. More importantly, the new institution has member safety provisions as an improvement over the old organization. And most importantly, the bad people were removed. It remains to be seen how these changes will play out in the adjudication of this case. (And as unlikely as it seems to me presently, it is also possible that new evidence could demonstrate institutional culpability that I am not aware of.) This raises other interesting implications. If the verdict is that the institution must pay for the sins of its fathers, how does that impact other institutions with similar history? Will they still be as motivated to improve policies and safeguarding? Or will the Shadow response be the only acceptable outcome? (Background: Shadow, an open-class corps from Wisconsin, discovered they had a groomer on their staff for years. Upon discovery, they removed him from staff, shut down the corps "for a year", and ultimately decided never to resume operations.)

Three things: 1. I did not say they intended harm. 2. I was not giving legal advice. Only commenting on my beliefs about where the actual culpability likely resides. 3. But since you brought it up... intent matters when determining criminal negligence, does it not? And to extend the concept of criminal negligence to an institution, intent once again matters. In my opinion, the nonsense was in drawing institutional equivalence between drum corps and asbestos industries. When all the most fashionable drum corps started saying they were going to operate more like a "business", I doubt this is what they meant.

So we have some common ground.

Yes, but this sounds like another case of legitimate institutional culpability. A company whose primary objective is to make money in the business of manipulating money had half a billion dollars in sanctions violations occur on their platform over a period of six years.

Fixed that for you.

The rabbit? Or the car?

If I understand the context correctly, the asbestos makers/users were found to have continued using the substance long after discovering it was hazardous to health... all the while acting to conceal this knowledge from the people they were endangering so that they could continue asbestos use as a primary business operation. And these were not isolated acts by individuals, but company-wide policies. There is institutional culpability there. Now, I suppose if sexual abuse was a primary objective of an institution, that would be comparable. Go check the mission statements, press materials, internal correspondence, or anything else documenting drum corps throughout time, and let us know when you find one that made sexual abuse an institutional primary objective.

Um, no. They also changed out the people running the whole thing. You know, the actual perpetrator, and the entire board of directors who failed in oversight. By the way, I notice that you did not include sexual abuse among the list of traditions that "shall always be". I guess that is because sexual abuse is perpetrated by people, not institutions.

Sure. I would want justice... for the perpetrator. Should I also sue the siblings of the perpetrator, the restaurant where it happened and all their employees personally, the manufacturer of the knife used or, if that company was subsequently merged, acquired or liquidated, all the successor businesses, and the ten John Does at neighboring tables who also had silverware handy and therefore presumably could have done something to stop it but presumably chose not to?

I do not recall saying they were. Checking again... no, never said that. Just wishing that accountability could be in proper proportion to culpability.

It was particularly different right then. In 1960 (and again in 1961 and 1962), only four states (Massachusetts, New Jersey, Illinois, Wisconsin) put corps in VFW finals.

Got it. But comparing this lawsuit with the GH cases... it seems like actual predators are far more able to negotiate a slap-on-the-wrist, while it may be the death penalty for the institutions they corrupted.

Then someone explain to me why that is. Does GH hire better lawyers than the Cadets? Or are deeper pockets a curse that transcends all else?

We could play chicken-egg with this. But to set a couple of things straight: - Cadets had bad behavior for 38 years, and fielded a corps every single one of those 38 years. But only now are they taking a season off. Both explanations given (fundraising shortfall and legal expenses) are financial. - SCV did not have all kinds of money when they called off 2023... they had all kinds of debt. They told us they were taking time off, paying outstanding debts, then replenishing drained contingency funds. They told us... the masters of transparency admitted that much. That is financial.