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It wasn't long ago that I would have agreed with this article in full. I may have even posted here on HN to that effect before. I am still sympathetic to the po

It wasn't long ago that I would have agreed with this article in full. I may have even posted here on HN to that effect before. I am still sympathetic to the point it makes. However: Universities boot people out for other reasons which are not actionable in a criminal (or even civil) court all the time. Getting shitty grades, being a disruptive asshole in a class on a regular basis, and so on, can end your university career. So, with that in mind, "creeps everyone the fuck out and is probably a rapist", isn't such a stretch. I would not put someone in jail for that for any length of time. But, I don't know if "deserves jail time" is the right comparison. Maybe "I would fire this person, if they worked for me" or "I would kick this person out of my social club" are more apt. Now, I think that someone so expelled should have an easier time getting into another university than they currently do. Right now it seems that getting expelled because a university tribunal found you responsible for an alleged rape carries, for the purposes of college admissions elsewhere, nearly the same consequences as being an actual convicted rapist. This puts too much faith in the judgement of some other university's tribunal, which bring me to my next concern: These tribunals are too often full of shit. There are a few horror stories going around and you've probably read a few. Some places I think are not requiring a high enough burden of proof. The regulations and standards at the federal and state levels ought to be improved, and in light of the fact that sexual violence on campuses is on the decline, the improvements should result in fewer students being expelled, not more. But, in principle, I think it's fine for a university to do this, even if the accused rapist could not possibly be convicted in a court of law.

danieltillett 10y ago
The major problem with this is the person booted is “convicted” of a very serious crime. Getting kicked out because you have been found guilty of rape by some sham court is a lot more harmful to the person than getting kicked out because you are disruptive in class. I sometime think we should adopt the Scottish system of not proven [1]. 1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Not_proven https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Not_proven
- deciplex 10y ago
  Yeah, I know. That's why I'm still sympathetic to the view. I would hope that we could still have the tribunals but treat their findings for what they are: the non-professional opinions of a few administrators, based mostly on informal testimony, hearsay, and perhaps a poorly-executed investigation. But, perhaps there is no way to accomplish that in a way palatable to most people attending a school. Maybe people are just going to take the obvious shortcut and say "this school admitted a rapist" instead of what actually happened. If we can't work that out, then maybe these tribunals shouldn't exist. I'm just saying I'm not opposed to them in principle.
  - danieltillett 10y ago
    There is really no way to solve this problem when you have basically one person’s word against another. I really feel for the victims, but I don’t know what can be done when the consequences of getting a conviction wrong are so high.
    - Khaine 10y ago
      I mean we could force everyone must wear cameras at all times. But yeah, rape cases are always going to have the lowest rate of conviction because most of the time they fall to he said/she said. I agree, it really sucks for the victims, and as you say the consequences of getting a conviction wrong are so high, and for these reasons we really need to fight these infantizing statements like "we need to listen to the woman's perspective". We do need to listen to victims, and provide them appropriate support but we can't compromise on justice.
marcoperaza 10y ago
>These tribunals are too often full of shit. There are a few horror stories going around and you've probably read a few. Some places I think are not requiring a high enough burden of proof. The regulations and standards at the federal and state levels ought to be improved, and in light of the fact that sexual violence on campuses is on the decline, the improvements should result in fewer students being expelled, not more. Part of the problem is that the Obama administration has been issuing new "legal interpretations" (i.e. making up new laws) that require colleges to apply a preponderance standard to sexual assault proceedings, based on a very contorted reading of Title IX, which requires equal treatment of genders by universities receiving federal funds. "Preponderance of the evidence" means that whoever is more likely to be right wins, even if its 51-49. So in a "he said, she said" situation you have to convict if the accuser's story is even a bit more plausible. Additionally, accused are denied the right to have counsel, to confront their accusers, to remain silent. Such rules are particularly egregious when you realize that the contents of the proceedings could prejudice the result of a subsequent criminal trial.
- cperciva 10y ago
  the contents of the proceedings could prejudice the result of a subsequent criminal trial. To the extent that universities coerce testimony from their students, shouldn't it be inadmissible in court?
nickysielicki 10y ago
> Maybe "I would fire this person, if they worked for me" or "I would kick this person out of my social club" are more apt. You can't have it both ways. Universities shouldn't be able to get the benefit of federal endowments and federally guaranteed student loans while also being considered aristocratic social clubs with the autonomy to pick and choose and deny whoever they want. If they're a resource that is so important that it must be protected and governed and funded by the federal government, then you should go full-stop and consider it a public resource. And if it is a public resource, then there should be no special laws that the institution is governed by, and the deciding factor as to whether someone should be kicked-out should be violation of general law, decided by real courts, brought by real police, and argued by real lawyers.
- SolaceQuantum 10y ago
  By that logic, universities shouldn't be able to kick someone out for being disruptive repeatedly or getting bad grades. No?
  - nickysielicki 10y ago
    I think you could work those policies into law.
Dr_tldr 10y ago
What if gay and transgendered people "creep you the fuck out", or orthodox jews, or people in wheelchairs? Once you start making the case for expulsion and the application of a sliding scale of guilt due entirely to other people's beliefs about an unpopular individual or group as fine in principle, you've basically undone the entire enlightenment in law, governance, and ethics.
- deciplex 10y ago
  Those are all protected classes under the law, so it doesn't hold up. It's the "and is probably a rapist" (or more likely to be than the average student) (according to the university's tribunal) which is the important part. "Is probably gay", "is probably transgendered", "is probably a jew" and "is probably disabled" are not analogous and I hope I don't have to explain why.
  - Dr_tldr 10y ago
    Ask anyone sufficiently conservative/radical feminist which groups of people they think are "probably rapists", and you get the same results as baseless discrimination but through a different explanation. People tend to think "probably" a lot more often with a lot less evidence about individuals or groups they dislike for any reason. For instance, I think you're probably a crypto-nazi and should lose your job, but that's almost certainly a totally unfair belief based on my very limited and highly subjective viewpoint.
    - deciplex 10y ago
      Good thing we're not talking about what some random person on the internet thinks, but rather a conclusion the university arrives at after a rigorous and hopefully well-defined process which still comes short of the burden of proof required for a criminal conviction.
      - Dr_tldr 10y ago
        Rigorous? Citation needed, since a great deal of evidence points to the opposite--that these are politically motivated kangaroo courts with decisions being made by a single individual with no appeals process and no oversight.
morgante 10y ago
So, to be clear, you think it's okay to ruin people's lives because one woman doesn't like them? Expulsion for rape is a lot more severe than merely firing someone. Your name gets tarnished in the press and your future employability is destroyed. At that point, you might as well be in jail—your life is already ruined.
- deciplex 10y ago
  > So, to be clear, you think it's okay to ruin people's lives because one woman doesn't like them? I don't know how you could possibly take that away from my post unless you are being deliberately ignorant and selectively ignoring things I write. I quite clearly stated that I think the tribunals doing this stuff now are too often full of shit and that the federal regulations governing their behavior need to be reworked and that the result of the reworking (i.e. as a goal of the policy) should be that these tribunals find fewer people guilty than they do now, resulting in FEWER EXPULSIONS THAN WE SEE NOW. If a university expels a students because they have arrived at the conclusion that they believe, with let's say 3:2 odds on, that a particular student did in fact commit a rape, then I have no problem with that. That is, however, substantially less than the burden of proof typically required to obtain a criminal conviction. Moreover, I don't think that the findings of that tribunal, after the expelling the student, should have a serious impact on that student's ability to successfully apply for admittance to some other school.
  - morgante 10y ago
    Sorry, I don't think I read your comment closely enough. I interpreted "creeps everyone the fuck out and is probably a rapist" as a euphemism for a simple rape accusation (since, in practice, that's sometimes what's going on). Your other ideas are solid and I definitely think students who are expelled should have an easier time applying elsewhere. However, I think in practice these tribunals are too corrupt and incompetent to do any good. They're too susceptible to activism by students on campus and hence it seems unlikely they'll ever provide justice—even to a lesser standard than courts.
tremon 10y ago
the accused rapist Agreed with most of what you wrote, but there's no such thing as an accused rapist (unless you're including previous convictions).
erroneousfunk 10y ago
But it's not just about Universities booting people out of school because it's their own private club and they can do what they want. There are some weird terrible consequences that come out of the "school court" system that many people don't realize are perfectly legal, and commonly practiced. A student at my alma mater was brought before the "honor board," where the school specifically prohibits lawyers at the hearings. Part of the required procedure for these hearings is giving a full account of your side of the story, and answer questions from school administrators, a "jury of your peers" and the person bringing the case against you. These two things combined wouldn't be such a huge deal, except that the person bringing the case against her was the chief of campus police -- a registered police officer in the town the school was in. So the deal was either "automatic expulsion with no proceedings" or "give your account of the story and answer questions from us and a police officer without a lawyer present" So we have 18-21 year olds, forced to testify against themselves, without lawyers, in front of police officers. Also keep in mind that this often isn't just a case of "well, it sucks that they're threatening your degree..." These students often live and eat on-campus. They may not have significant money in the bank between student loans. They may have recently moved and not know anyone in the area. In the case of my friend, the school got a restraining order that prevented her from being on campus, and changed the locks on her housing, all without warning, in order to put pressure on her to leave quietly. I mean, she was living out of a backpack and sleeping on a couch while going through the Honor Board case, but if she left, she'd have access to her stuff again. It was nuts.

danieltillett 10y ago

The major problem with this is the person booted is “convicted” of a very serious crime. Getting kicked out because you have been found guilty of rape by some sham court is a lot more harmful to the person than getting kicked out because you are disruptive in class. I sometime think we should adopt the Scottish system of not proven [1]. 1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Not_proven https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Not_proven

deciplex 10y ago
Yeah, I know. That's why I'm still sympathetic to the view. I would hope that we could still have the tribunals but treat their findings for what they are: the non-professional opinions of a few administrators, based mostly on informal testimony, hearsay, and perhaps a poorly-executed investigation. But, perhaps there is no way to accomplish that in a way palatable to most people attending a school. Maybe people are just going to take the obvious shortcut and say "this school admitted a rapist" instead of what actually happened. If we can't work that out, then maybe these tribunals shouldn't exist. I'm just saying I'm not opposed to them in principle.
- danieltillett 10y ago
  There is really no way to solve this problem when you have basically one person’s word against another. I really feel for the victims, but I don’t know what can be done when the consequences of getting a conviction wrong are so high.
  - Khaine 10y ago
    I mean we could force everyone must wear cameras at all times. But yeah, rape cases are always going to have the lowest rate of conviction because most of the time they fall to he said/she said. I agree, it really sucks for the victims, and as you say the consequences of getting a conviction wrong are so high, and for these reasons we really need to fight these infantizing statements like "we need to listen to the woman's perspective". We do need to listen to victims, and provide them appropriate support but we can't compromise on justice.

marcoperaza 10y ago

>These tribunals are too often full of shit. There are a few horror stories going around and you've probably read a few. Some places I think are not requiring a high enough burden of proof. The regulations and standards at the federal and state levels ought to be improved, and in light of the fact that sexual violence on campuses is on the decline, the improvements should result in fewer students being expelled, not more. Part of the problem is that the Obama administration has been issuing new "legal interpretations" (i.e. making up new laws) that require colleges to apply a preponderance standard to sexual assault proceedings, based on a very contorted reading of Title IX, which requires equal treatment of genders by universities receiving federal funds. "Preponderance of the evidence" means that whoever is more likely to be right wins, even if its 51-49. So in a "he said, she said" situation you have to convict if the accuser's story is even a bit more plausible. Additionally, accused are denied the right to have counsel, to confront their accusers, to remain silent. Such rules are particularly egregious when you realize that the contents of the proceedings could prejudice the result of a subsequent criminal trial.

cperciva 10y ago
the contents of the proceedings could prejudice the result of a subsequent criminal trial. To the extent that universities coerce testimony from their students, shouldn't it be inadmissible in court?

nickysielicki 10y ago

> Maybe "I would fire this person, if they worked for me" or "I would kick this person out of my social club" are more apt. You can't have it both ways. Universities shouldn't be able to get the benefit of federal endowments and federally guaranteed student loans while also being considered aristocratic social clubs with the autonomy to pick and choose and deny whoever they want. If they're a resource that is so important that it must be protected and governed and funded by the federal government, then you should go full-stop and consider it a public resource. And if it is a public resource, then there should be no special laws that the institution is governed by, and the deciding factor as to whether someone should be kicked-out should be violation of general law, decided by real courts, brought by real police, and argued by real lawyers.

SolaceQuantum 10y ago
By that logic, universities shouldn't be able to kick someone out for being disruptive repeatedly or getting bad grades. No?
- nickysielicki 10y ago
  I think you could work those policies into law.

Dr_tldr 10y ago

What if gay and transgendered people "creep you the fuck out", or orthodox jews, or people in wheelchairs? Once you start making the case for expulsion and the application of a sliding scale of guilt due entirely to other people's beliefs about an unpopular individual or group as fine in principle, you've basically undone the entire enlightenment in law, governance, and ethics.

deciplex 10y ago
Those are all protected classes under the law, so it doesn't hold up. It's the "and is probably a rapist" (or more likely to be than the average student) (according to the university's tribunal) which is the important part. "Is probably gay", "is probably transgendered", "is probably a jew" and "is probably disabled" are not analogous and I hope I don't have to explain why.
- Dr_tldr 10y ago
  Ask anyone sufficiently conservative/radical feminist which groups of people they think are "probably rapists", and you get the same results as baseless discrimination but through a different explanation. People tend to think "probably" a lot more often with a lot less evidence about individuals or groups they dislike for any reason. For instance, I think you're probably a crypto-nazi and should lose your job, but that's almost certainly a totally unfair belief based on my very limited and highly subjective viewpoint.
  - deciplex 10y ago
    Good thing we're not talking about what some random person on the internet thinks, but rather a conclusion the university arrives at after a rigorous and hopefully well-defined process which still comes short of the burden of proof required for a criminal conviction.
    - Dr_tldr 10y ago
      Rigorous? Citation needed, since a great deal of evidence points to the opposite--that these are politically motivated kangaroo courts with decisions being made by a single individual with no appeals process and no oversight.

morgante 10y ago

So, to be clear, you think it's okay to ruin people's lives because one woman doesn't like them? Expulsion for rape is a lot more severe than merely firing someone. Your name gets tarnished in the press and your future employability is destroyed. At that point, you might as well be in jail—your life is already ruined.

deciplex 10y ago
> So, to be clear, you think it's okay to ruin people's lives because one woman doesn't like them? I don't know how you could possibly take that away from my post unless you are being deliberately ignorant and selectively ignoring things I write. I quite clearly stated that I think the tribunals doing this stuff now are too often full of shit and that the federal regulations governing their behavior need to be reworked and that the result of the reworking (i.e. as a goal of the policy) should be that these tribunals find fewer people guilty than they do now, resulting in FEWER EXPULSIONS THAN WE SEE NOW. If a university expels a students because they have arrived at the conclusion that they believe, with let's say 3:2 odds on, that a particular student did in fact commit a rape, then I have no problem with that. That is, however, substantially less than the burden of proof typically required to obtain a criminal conviction. Moreover, I don't think that the findings of that tribunal, after the expelling the student, should have a serious impact on that student's ability to successfully apply for admittance to some other school.
- morgante 10y ago
  Sorry, I don't think I read your comment closely enough. I interpreted "creeps everyone the fuck out and is probably a rapist" as a euphemism for a simple rape accusation (since, in practice, that's sometimes what's going on). Your other ideas are solid and I definitely think students who are expelled should have an easier time applying elsewhere. However, I think in practice these tribunals are too corrupt and incompetent to do any good. They're too susceptible to activism by students on campus and hence it seems unlikely they'll ever provide justice—even to a lesser standard than courts.

tremon 10y ago

the accused rapist Agreed with most of what you wrote, but there's no such thing as an accused rapist (unless you're including previous convictions).

erroneousfunk 10y ago

But it's not just about Universities booting people out of school because it's their own private club and they can do what they want. There are some weird terrible consequences that come out of the "school court" system that many people don't realize are perfectly legal, and commonly practiced. A student at my alma mater was brought before the "honor board," where the school specifically prohibits lawyers at the hearings. Part of the required procedure for these hearings is giving a full account of your side of the story, and answer questions from school administrators, a "jury of your peers" and the person bringing the case against you. These two things combined wouldn't be such a huge deal, except that the person bringing the case against her was the chief of campus police -- a registered police officer in the town the school was in. So the deal was either "automatic expulsion with no proceedings" or "give your account of the story and answer questions from us and a police officer without a lawyer present" So we have 18-21 year olds, forced to testify against themselves, without lawyers, in front of police officers. Also keep in mind that this often isn't just a case of "well, it sucks that they're threatening your degree..." These students often live and eat on-campus. They may not have significant money in the bank between student loans. They may have recently moved and not know anyone in the area. In the case of my friend, the school got a restraining order that prevented her from being on campus, and changed the locks on her housing, all without warning, in order to put pressure on her to leave quietly. I mean, she was living out of a backpack and sleeping on a couch while going through the Honor Board case, but if she left, she'd have access to her stuff again. It was nuts.