4 ms·
>I presume there's another version from a different point of view that makes them look more heroic. Comment is free, but facts are sacred. The facts of the cas
by jdietrich 7y ago
>I presume there's another version from a different point of view that makes them look more heroic.
Comment is free, but facts are sacred. The facts of the case can only be interpreted to make Oberlin look heroic if the Gibsons were in fact racist; a jury found that they weren't. If we accept that the jury were correct in that judgement, then the actions of Oberlin are inexcusable - the college administration were actively complicit in libelling the Gibsons. I see no reason to doubt that the jury came to a conclusion that was justified by the evidence.
If we accept the facts of the case, what possible alternative explanation is there? That it's OK to try and ruin a business based on the mere suspicion that they might possibly be racist? That accusations of racism should be believed uncritically, regardless of the evidence? That the law of libel is an unjust restriction of speech and that anyone should be able to make false accusations with impunity?
I'm genuinely looking for a steelman argument, but I can't find one. The closest I could find to a defence of Oberlin are the articles below, which argue that a) Oberlin should not be culpable for merely failing to rein in the actions of students and faculty and b) accusing someone of being racist is merely an opinion, so cannot by definition be libellous. On the first point, I think the evidence is clear that senior administrators acting in an official capacity were far more than passive bystanders. On the second point, while an accusation of racism in the general case may possibly be mere opinion, an accusation that the Gibsons engaged in racial profiling is actionable.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/evangerstmann/2019/06/12/the-11-million-dollar-libel-verdict-against-oberlin-college-is-a-threat-to-colleges-nationwide/ https://www.forbes.com/sites/evangerstmann/2019/06/12/the-11...
https://academeblog.org/2019/06/13/the-dangerous-defamation-judgment-against-oberlin-college/ https://academeblog.org/2019/06/13/the-dangerous-defamation-...
- mushufasa 7y ago[I'm removing this because I don't think this is a productive discussion, and I shouldn't have commented to begin with]
- speedplane 7y ago> the legal definition of racism is a small subset of the colloquial definition and the academic definition There is no legal definition of racism. There are legal definitions of unlawful discrimination > I wouldn't take the jury's decision here as a 'fact' You don't have to agree with the jury, but the very purpose of juries is to decide "facts". If a jury decides that something is true, then legally, it is true, even if you personally disagree. Giving such weighty authority to a collection of people from society is not a bug of the system, it's a feature.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- barry-cotter 7y ago> I wouldn't take the jury's decision here as a 'fact' about racism. 1) the legal definition of racism is a small subset of the colloquial definition and the academic definition. I would be very surprised if the legal definition of racism in this context is anything but the colloquial one. In English or Commonwealth law that would be the “reasonable man” test. The attempt to elide the difference between the sociological concept of structural racism and a person being racist as a description has not had enough success to be able to pass the reasonable man test.
- m-ee 7y agoAnecdotal sources, so take that as you will. I didn't go to Oberlin but have a fair amount of friends that did and they have talked about this case extensively. They all agree that Gibsons frequently racially profiled students but that the students and university overstepped here and made the matter much worse by organizing protests to support students that were very obviously in the wrong. This case aside, it's not an outlandish claim that a store in an isolated semi rural area would have issues like this, and I don't doubt that it happened. In addition to whatever racial undercurrents are present there's a strong students vs townies tension in the town of Oberlin and the store, again not surprising with a very activist liberal school in the middle of nowhere. Car ownership is actively discouraged and most students don't have other options for shopping so despite there being no love lost neither party really had other options. Students needed the store and the store needed business. General consensus among my friends is that the university's egregious missteps gave Gibsons an opportunity to cash out of a business they didn't particularly enjoy being in and they took it.
- awinder 7y agoThe environment which could produce that synopsis is covered in the article pretty thoroughly though. There was always going to have to be some face-saving historical reconstruction of what happened. If the Gibson’s were frequently racially profiling, then this was a case of the students being morally right, if strategically incorrect, even legally. They were outmatched and outwitted, but remember we fought the right fight etc. It’s not the most unfair historical maneuvering ever, there is at least some culpability taken though. But for people outside of the distortion field...
- dnissley 7y agoIs Gibson's going out of business? I had heard reports that the college had renewed the contracts to receive product from the bakery that they had previously broken off, and can't find anything that indicates the store is closing.
- Mountain_Skies 7y ago"They were only in it for the money" is another lazy way to demonize the Gibson family while justifying the actions of the school.