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The Potential Fall of Varsity Brands


MikeN

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22 hours ago, JimF-LowBari said:

Hardest training to go through was the anti sexual assault one. That one was added about 15 years ago. It was online and had a couple of scenarios of what to watch for so you could protect your teammates (it was geared to the military).

Last one was a voice talking about “Taylor” and “Sam”. At the end the voice said “notice we didn’t say what gender either person was. What genders did you think they were and what does that say about your assumptions?”. Kinda ironic as have a niece named Taylor (named after her grandFATHER) and former actress Jennette McCurdey (played a character named Sam) has a book out related how she was harassed/abused:

I remember going through the sexual assault one in USAF - there was a video about an interaction between a male & a somewhat intoxicated female.  After it was over we were asked to discuss it.  I recall saying that 'When she said "No", that should have ended it'.  And this remains the central issue - No means No.  What part of No is hard to understand.   

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  • 2 weeks later...
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“Defendants established a competitive environment soliciting young athletes to cross state lines with minimal parental or adult supervision to converge at prescheduled locations where these athletes were then exposed to drugs, alcohol, and predatory conduct by adults, including coaches choreographers, and music producers, all while publicly representing that (they) provided a culture of safety in the sport,” the suit alleged.

Hmmmmm....doesn't seem like many words would need to be changed for this to pertain to DCI in a suit.  As other have said, I'm betting it won't be long before we see how well DCI has insulated itself from litigation by deliberately passing full responsibility for member safety to individual corps.  

Edited by Lance
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The legal landscape involving (in part) Varsity is getting more complicated. 

This is link to South Carolina lawsuit (filed in Federal Court); Varsity is the first defendant listed.  

 

https://www.wspa.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/53/2022/09/Jane-Doe-1-et-al-v.-Varsity-Spirit-LLC-et-al-Complaint.pdf

Edited by IllianaLancerContra
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2 hours ago, IllianaLancerContra said:

 

The legal landscape involving (in part) Varsity is getting more complicated. 

This is link to South Carolina lawsuit (filed in Federal Court); Varsity is the first defendant listed.  

 

https://www.wspa.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/53/2022/09/Jane-Doe-1-et-al-v.-Varsity-Spirit-LLC-et-al-Complaint.pdf

This is a bit OT, but reading through the lawsuit I found this part to be interesting with respect to the other discussions regarding the cost of participating in drum corps:

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A single season can, at minimum, cost between $3,000 and $7,000 per team member. Some families spend $20,000 or more for transportation, lodging, and entrance fee costs at the multiple competitions they attend throughout the year. 

This falls in line with what some other parents have told me it costs for their kids to participate in other travel sports teams/clubs... and puts drum corps right in the same ballpark as those other activities.

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1 hour ago, rjohn76 said:

This is a bit OT, but reading through the lawsuit I found this part to be interesting with respect to the other discussions regarding the cost of participating in drum corps:

This falls in line with what some other parents have told me it costs for their kids to participate in other travel sports teams/clubs... and puts drum corps right in the same ballpark as those other activities.

I noticed that too.  
 

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“Our investigation has revealed a league in which abuse and misconduct — verbal and emotional abuse and sexual misconduct — had become systemic, spanning multiple teams, coaches and victims,” Sally Q. Yates, the lead investigator, wrote in the report’s executive summary. 

Regarding the NWSL.  Again, change a couple of words.....

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On 9/28/2022 at 4:49 PM, Lance said:

Hmmmmm....doesn't seem like many words would need to be changed for this to pertain to DCI in a suit.  As other have said, I'm betting it won't be long before we see how well DCI has insulated itself from litigation by deliberately passing full responsibility for member safety to individual corps.  

DCI has already done this. Member safety issues are the responsibility of each member corps. DCI works in an advisory role with regards to member safety. 

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I know.  My implicit point was that it'll be very interesting to see how well DCI will be able to hide behind that in actual litigation...if it ever gets there.  For instance, in "verbal and emotional abuse and sexual misconduct - had become systemic, spanning multiple teams" with the NWSL case, replace the word "teams" with "corps".   

If a lawsuit against them ever comes to pass, the DCI front office would definitely try to keep up with the feckless "it's up to the corps to police themselves" idiocy that's been in place for all these decades.  I know nothing about the law, so it would be interesting to see how well it holds up.   

Edited by Lance
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