Bluecoats, BD, and SA (TW: Sexual Assault)

[Cappybara]

1 hour ago, scheherazadesghost said:

That is, if you're into firmly choosing sides. I am not. Unlike others here, it seems, I'm willing to work within that cognitive dissonance. I've been very clear about that.

 

15 minutes ago, scheherazadesghost said:

If you have a better way, I'm all ears. Sounds like, in general here and in the activity, most do not.

I never said I was fair or neutral. I said I'm on the side of victims because I am one and I actively witness their stories, a new one every month pretty much.

Sure is a lot of correcting victim-centric approaches here without a lot of data-based, proven alternatives. I'm here wrestling in the mud over this day in day out while most will forget and move on in a few days. 🤷🏽‍♀️

Y'all can keep correcting me, but most are not in the mud doing the work.

Lordymercy, I've never said otherwise.

You said you are firmly into not choosing sides. All I’m doing is pointing out that this is not true. You are choosing sides.

You are correct, I do not do this day in day out like you and I do not have some detailed alternative to offer other than “Let’s not just immediately kick this guy out of this corps. Let’s take some time to properly assess the situation first before we spring into action”

Edited July 18, 2023 by Cappybara

[scheherazadesghost]

14 minutes ago, HockeyDad said:

I don’t know about this part. Thinking back to the Duke lacrosse event, the falsely accused students were arrested, kicked out of school, the lacrosse team coach resigned, community relations were inflamed, the prosecutor went rogue (and was subsequently disbarred).  Shall we tell these kids the adverse affects were not as bad?  I have a real problem with that. You have to get it right for all involved. You can’t kick a person to the curb and say - hey if we’re wrong we’ll apologize later. 

The adverse effects of abuse that have been disclosed to me have ended human life in two cases. That is worst case scenario and most other adverse effects don't match up to that.

I'm not saying that's not possible in the case of the falsely accused, merely sharing as much as I safely can to help others understand my stance.

Y'all are approaching my stance like I should have the perfect answers that will make everyone happy. That's not my job and I never claimed it was. It's also putting an awful lot of responsibility on a survivor.

[scheherazadesghost]

7 minutes ago, Cappybara said:

 

You said you are firmly into not choosing sides. All I’m doing is pointing out that this is not true. You are choosing sides.

You are correct, I do not do this day in day out like you and I do not have some detailed alternative to offer other than “Let’s not just immediately kick this guy out of this corps. Let’s take some time to properly assess the situation first before we spring into action”

Choosing to support survivors at first and then being willing to admit when that hurts the falsely accused shows intellectual malleability and the willingness to admit when mistakes are made. Not the same.

Edit to add: I purposely never once in this thread said what actions I think BD should take. That's not my job.

Edited July 18, 2023 by scheherazadesghost

[Jeffe77]

I just watched last night's run-through of BD on YT. The accused is not on the field. If you put 2 and 2 together or know who it is, it's obvious watching the run-through. Full disclosure, it's possible it may be someone else from the section sitting out as the video is a high-cam vantage point. So I could be wrong. But yet, one of the apparatus is missing off the field

Edited July 18, 2023 by Jeffe77
editorial

[kdaddy]

As I understand it, the student in question refutes the allegations made. However, he is departing the Blue Devils, reportedly of his own will.

[IllianaLancerContra]

4 hours ago, Waxman said:

What would that process look like? I'm not really sure what tools they have at their disposal that would allow them to verify sexual assault allegations during the final weeks of a drum corps season.

As some of you know, I am a retired US military officer. We had to deal with sexual assault in the ranks (Tailhook 91 and other, less reported occurrences) throughout my career.   I can’t tell you how many iterations of training I went through, both ‘don’t do this’ training and ‘if your Airmen are accused this is what you do’ training.  And for a while, r*pe in military was an offense subject to the death penalty under the Uniform Code of Military Justice.   And still it happened. So, I ‘get’ the difficulties surrounding the issue. 
 

That said -  law enforcement must be involved - in the jurisdiction where the alleged assault occurred. The victim would need to have a Sexual Assault Forensic Examination (acronym is SAFE) which is not a pleasant experience, but needed to document evidence of a potential crime. Although DNA evidence takes time, the SAFE, at the time of the exam, can produce other, court-admissible evidence of a crime.   IMHO, that evidence would be enough to act on removing the accused from the Corps.  It may (or not, depending on jurisdiction) be enough for law enforcement to arrest the alleged perpetrator.   Yes it would cause an uproar within the Corps.  Yes, it could ruin the season.  Sexual assault sucks. Sexual assault has consequences, and perhaps if a Corps imploded during a season due to an assault, then TPTB in Drum Corps would get the message (apparently the Hopacolypse wasn’t enough).  

Now, considering the current situation:

One thing I am not clear on is whether victim told Bluecoats staff about the alleged assault?  They say medical staff got involved with them crying, but whether they were told of the alleged assault at the time is very important w/r/t how Bluecoats acted at the time. 
 

edit to add - What I meant was I am not sure if Bluecoats were aware of the alleged assault at the time.  I realize now that they learned of spring 2023 at the latest.  

Edited July 18, 2023 by IllianaLancerContra

[DAYGO]

16 minutes ago, kdaddy said:

As I understand it, the student in question refutes the allegations made. However, he is departing the Blue Devils, reportedly of his own will.

If that's true, that is terrible.  

[jaylogan]

1 minute ago, DAYGO said:

If that's true, that is terrible.  

What else can he do? If he is innocent, his reputation has been besmirched.   It is not emotionally healthy to go through weeks of potentially being looked down upon and treated as a monster in the eyes of his peers. He would have to go try to recover and figure out how to proceed from there. 

[Cappybara]

42 minutes ago, scheherazadesghost said:

Choosing to support survivors at first and then being willing to admit when that hurts the falsely accused shows intellectual malleability and the willingness to admit when mistakes are made. Not the same.

Edit to add: I purposely never once in this thread said what actions I think BD should take. That's not my job.

Seems like a lot of wordsmithing to say the same thing I am saying. Regardless, I’ll leave it alone, thanks for the discussion

[jwillis35]

51 minutes ago, HockeyDad said:

I don’t know about this part. Thinking back to the Duke lacrosse event, the falsely accused students were arrested, kicked out of school, the lacrosse team coach resigned, community relations were inflamed, the prosecutor went rogue (and was subsequently disbarred).  Shall we tell these kids the adverse affects were not as bad?  I have a real problem with that. You have to get it right for all involved. You can’t kick a person to the curb and say - hey if we’re wrong we’ll apologize later. 

The 30 for 30 documentary on this was a real eye opener.  So many mistakes were made by the D.A. and Police. They were so desparate to arrest privileged Duke students that they were willing to change the facts, withhold exculpatory evidence, and describe the event as if it actually happened to a media that ate it up and reported it like it was fact. Because of those false charges and all the lunacy that took place the falsley accused were able to sue Duke for over $20 million per person, not to mention all the other law suits which reportedly cost Duke over $100 Million.