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Will I Ever See the $36MM Oberlin College Owes Me?
- superchroma 4y agoThe reptile brain inside us is very strong and does terrible things. Will we ever overcome it?
- sharpasacrayon 4y ago
- debacle 4y agoNever. We need to learn to live with (and love, if we can) our reptilian side.
- Jerrrry 4y ago
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- jcims 4y agoI've done quite a bit of work with Oberlin College over the years. Some great people there and the campus is beautiful, but the culture is primed for this kind of reaction and I get the impression that the administration doesn't have the guts to do anything but go along with it. My guess is Gibson's won't see a penny any time soon. There would be a revolt by the student body and they wouldn't be able to afford it.
- eitally 4y agoEven when I was heading to college in '95 Oberlin was known as the SJW school. It was the "most woke", most liberal, most feminist, most LGBTQ+ friendly, etc. Those aren't necessarily negative attributes, but they are VERY EASY to weaponize, whether intentionally or not ... and things like the situation with Gibson's are the result.
- Eupraxias 4y agoI always thought that was Bard, or perhaps Reed or Hampshire.
- neaden 4y agoEven before then, Oberlin was the first college in the US to admit women on a permanent basis, and one of the first to admit black students. Back before the civil war it was an important sanctuary for people freeing enslavement in the south, with the college and town both providing support and resistance to people trying to enforce the Fugitive Slave Act. The kind of radicalism it has known for has done a lot of good, though as we see here it can lead to bad as well.
- jcims 4y agoAt ~$40k a semester the student body is for the most part operating in a nerfed universe.
- gffrd 4y agoWait … did I read that right? $40k Per semester? Guess I haven't looked at tuitions in a while.
- ceejayoz 4y agoVirtually no one pays full list price for college tuition.
- JackFr 4y agoThat's not true.
- ceejayoz 4y agohttps://www.oberlin.edu/admissions-and-aid/tuition-and-fees https://www.oberlin.edu/admissions-and-aid/tuition-and-fees > Each year, more than two-thirds of Oberlin students receive some form of need-based financial assistance. Our three-part award package typically includes grants from the college, low-interest students loans, and work-study jobs. My school gave $10k "merit-based scholarship" to everyone, as the ACT/SAT score threshold for that aid was well below the threshold for admission. https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/college-expensive-most-students-dont-pay-full-cost https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/college-exp... > As Paul Tough reports for New York Times Magazine, 89% of students don't pay full price, and giving students a break has caused some colleges to operate at a loss. > The average freshman student in the class of 2018 at one of these private nonprofit universities will get a discount of 50%, he reports.
- semenko 4y ago>they wouldn't be able to afford it. Oberlin has an endowment valued at approximately $1 billion — this is ~3% of that. (Understanding all those funds may not be liquid, they certainly have some assets.)
- jcims 4y agoTheir annual revenue is ~$180M. If any appreciable portion of their student body turns on them it's going to start to hurt very quickly. A sober assessment says that very few students would actually leave but there's a tail risk that it turns into something unsustainable.
- ceejayoz 4y agoCourts don't tend to accept "it'd hurt" as a reason to not pay a judgement.
- snovv_crash 4y agoThe article asserts that there are still effectively boycots taking place. If this was actually organized in any capacity by college officials, couldn't they be found in contempt of court and criminally charged as well?
- ceejayoz 4y agoOnly if they're still actively organizing them, and there's an active court order for them to stop doing so, which is unlikely.
- tptacek 4y agoThis is silly. Oberlin doesn't have a choice. They will appeal as far as they can appeal, and then they will pay.
- dekhn 4y agoBy "doesn't have a choice" I'm not sure what you mean. Certainly their lawyers could have chosen not to appeal upon reasonable grounds ("we're likely to lose, and that will cause greater fines").
- tptacek 4y agoAny defendant assessed a 36MM penalty is going to appeal, to the limit of their ability to appeal, as is their right. Gibson's is going to get 36MM, and they can wait a little while to get it.
- jcims 4y agoI wonder if you could borrow against it. 36MM in the future is a nice thing but doesn't pay your bills today.
- mhuffman 4y agoYes you can! Back in the day there was a very famous company that advertised 24/7 to do just that![1] [1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J.G._Wentworth https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J.G._Wentworth
- lvh 4y agoOberlin's general politics makes it all the more surprising that they're represented by none other than Congressman Jim Jordan.
- ska 4y ago> My guess is Gibson's won't see a penny any time soon. Oberlin is acting differently than any other large organization with a judgment like this, you run your appeals, if you can't get it thrown out you try and get it reduced, and in the end if you run out of appeals you pay. This is a dog-bites-man story....
- ska 4y ago"isn't acting"
- bwanab 4y ago"the administration doesn't have the guts to do anything but go along with it" The previous administration actually did, but maybe that's why they are now "the previous administration".
- djohnston 4y agoHow can you "refuse to pay"? Certainly this should only incur more penalties or perhaps a criminal prosecution against whomever is ignoring the court order?
- kansface 4y agoEndless appeals and delays in order to force a settlement.
- TakeBlaster16 4y agoI remember the headlines when a bank refused to pay a judgement and the sheriff showed up later to foreclose on a local branch. That might be the next move here. https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2011/06/06/137002727/sweet-justice-a-florida-couple-forecloses-on-bank-of-america https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2011/06/06/137002727...
- jwilk 4y agoText-only version: https://text.npr.org/137002727 https://text.npr.org/137002727
- CitrusFruits 4y agoUp until this point, I believe it's because the appealed. While the appeal is pending, you don't have to pay. After the last appeal was denied, however, I don't know what the process is. My guess is the lawyers are getting creative.
- voisin 4y agoYou don’t have to pay, but interest accrues and every time you appeal and lose you end up paying a big portion of the winner’s legal costs, so you are just digging your own grave if you’ve got a loser case that you keep prolonging.
- Tangurena2 4y agoThere are more than a few corporations that follow "scorched earth" tactics when they're sued. Never underestimate the power and longevity of spite. Many litigants won't pay until after you are dead. No matter how much that costs - they can't let you "win".
- ralph84 4y agoWhy can't they file a lien on the campus and foreclose?
- kylebenzle 4y ago
- duxup 4y agoLegal process was still ongoing until just recently.
- tptacek 4y agoNobody's going to file a lien. The story is misleading. Oberlin appealed the verdict; they'll pay when the courts force them to, and not before, as would any defendant in a $36MM defamation case.
- stjohnswarts 4y agotheir appeal to the ohio supreme court failed. They will have to pay up.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- chadash 4y agoWithout getting into the facts of the case itself, I’ll take the word of the article’s author that she won the lawsuit and the two appeals. Is there not a mechanism for enforcing payment? I get it if the defendant doesn’t actually have the money. But can’t the court go to the college’s banks and force the transfer? The fact that that isn’t happening makes me feel like I’m missing part of the story.
- blisterpeanuts 4y agoMy understanding is that a clerk from the Supreme Court will deliver the decision (refusal to hear appeal) to the lower court, and then it's up to a constable to enforce the order. What happens next, I'm not sure. But they can't just defy a court order.
- ifsothen 4y agoYes, eventually they can seize bank accounts, seize physical assets, and so forth.
- throw_m239339 4y agoOberlin will end up paying, no matter what, but it's going to take years. Successful defamation lawsuits like that are rare. Of course all the parties involved into conspiring against the bakery on Oberlin's side have now moved on and failed upward, none of these individuals have to live with the consequences of their actions.
- neaden 4y agoI grew up in a college town, and it's a weird experience in some ways. The college provides so much, jobs obviously but also opportunities for classes, concerts, and other things that wouldn't normally be in a city that size. But at the same time there are always troubles with a minority of the students, exacerbated by the fact that you are continually getting new people who don't know the history of things, or the reason they are a certain way. Oberlin, both city and college, seem like an even more exaggerated version of what I grew up with and it's a shame to see how a 100+ year positive relationship can turn sour so quickly.
- gotoeleven 4y agoYes relationships quickly turn sour if you accuse people of racism for trying not to have their business robbed.
- _jal 4y agoI went to an expensive school with sometimes-tense "townie" relations. I tended to empathize more with the town folks, honestly, which was probably a class thing - I was on a "full-ride" scholarship, from a poor family, and working in the cafeteria with a lot of non-students. There are a lot of reasons for tension, but I think the hardest one is that most of the students are explicitly in an experimental mode, trying out new ways of thinking and relating, while folks in the surrounding town... are not, and have no incentive to indulge the rich kids from out of town.
- Tomdarkness 4y agoAs someone from the UK I'm a bit confused why he can't seem to get the college to pay him? If a court has ruled that the college has to pay how can they avoid this? In the UK if a company failed to pay a debt then ultimately you can apply to the court for a winding up petition which if they didn't resolve the situation the company would be liquidated by the court.
- kylebenzle 4y ago
- neaden 4y agoIt looks like the Ohio supreme court just declined to hear the case yesterday, and before that they were appealing the ruling. IANAL but I would assume that it's only now that Gibson's will be able to really go after them for the money.
- drewbeck 4y agoYa it's only been two days since the state supreme court ruling. Oberlin could keep appealing to the feds, which they may do. Imo the "when will we see our money" is a bit silly; an emotional appeals when this process always entails a ton of legal appeals before the …final_final_forReal.PDF decision is handed down.
- ifsothen 4y agoOnly appeal from a state supreme court decision is directly to the US Supreme Court, which is generally not very interested in those kinds of appeals.
- renewiltord 4y agoThere was a post about second order thinking a while ago. And things like this are something I think about. When we think about policies it's useful to think of who will exploit them. For instance, if you say to yourself "It's better to have a single human who can judge whether other people should have X" you've just turned that person into a powerful figure among those who want X. Sheriff Laurie Smith in the Bay Area appears to have sold gun permits. If you go with "I will always believe person of traits X against person of traits Y" you are providing a handle for X to use you as a weapon against Y. Essentially, it could be totally true that there are very few people who will use the handle. However, once you make it explicit policy to have the handle, you will find that your population has moved.
- causi 4y agoThe school put out a statement that implied that this wasn't an isolated incident. Why is a school even getting involved, even if some business in town was being racist? Schools are for educating students and keeping them safe on campus.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- voisin 4y agoIt is shocking how schools begin to act like quasi governments, trying to regulate things off campus only because people who happen to be individuals are involved. I’ve lived in a number of college towns and seen it regularly.
- neither_color 4y agoInstead, the school proposed a deal where, in the future, if a student were caught shoplifting, we’d call the dean instead of the police. School campuses are like fiefdoms these days. A lot of schools have their own campus police and handle cases between students internally, but asking local townsfolk to use their own arbiters instead of the police is really something else. Tangentially related I helped a friend with move-in day recently and they told me international students had been there for 2 weeks already... quarantining... in a city where all mask mandates ended months ago. It all seems so performative.
- anoonmoose 4y agoI find the other two responses to your question bizarre considering that the answer is in the paragraph directly above the line you quoted: > A week after the incident, the school canceled all of our standing orders. It's not a random business in town, it's a business they do business with. Seems reasonable to me that the racism of my chosen business partners would be relevant to my business.
- pookha 4y agoDoes the school have some kind of CSI racism squad? Keeping tabs on every micro aggression for every business partner? Why would ANYONE do business with people like this?
- vector_spaces 4y ago
- drewbeck 4y agoagree
- calculatte 4y ago> people trying to make it in a world that's exploited them relentlessly and then mostly tried to stamp them from existence It's time to step away from the propaganda.
- a_shovel 4y agoWhat, exactly, are you calling propaganda here?
- erulabs 4y agoThe statement '"the world" has "mostly tried to stamp [minorities] from existence"' is not propaganda, and if you squint enough, is probably true, but it's also so broadly stupid and over generalized as to be mostly meaningless. It's not wrong, but it paints a picture wherein racists and "the world" are equated haphazardly - the danger being that one can invert the idea into "its okay to commit a particular crime if the only person it hurts is guilty by virtue of their group ownership". People get particularly sensitive about that conclusion - especially if they've read the history of the 20th century. It's not okay to commit crimes against other people because we're all protected equally under the law and because every human being deserves respect and contains something divine. This is the most basic tenant of liberalism. It has for sure not been implemented equally or fairly, and boy-howdy is there a lot of work to do, but I'd venture that suggesting that the baby ought to be thrown out with the bathwater does border on dangerous propaganda.
- dekhn 4y agoThe courts determined they were wrongly cancelled (not "supposedly"). All three students pled guilty, admitting there was no racism. I actually do think the college was right about contacting the dean first. In particular, the store should have excellent security cameras, and when somebody steals, you send the forensic-grade evidence to the dean, asking if they would like the photos to be shared with the police or whether the university should handle the matter internally.
- throw_m239339 4y agoI remember that story. An absolute travesty. Theft is theft no matter the thief race. All that insanity and energy wasted in the name of "inclusivity"... If people want to "fix injustices", well start making colleges like Oberlin free of charge for poor students, not try to harass a bakery into dropping charges when thieves are of a certain color of skin...
- snovv_crash 4y agoThere's something that I find horrifically condescending towards people of color in the woke community; the excuses for theft and violence as if somehow people are unable to control themselves or should avoid consequences for their actions has a stench of racism and superiority complex to me. As someone who has been mistaken for Colombian, Moroccan, Egyptian and more, I would NEVER want to be given a leg up based on appearance or ethnicity, despite the fact that I've been lumped in with furniture delivery men at my own apartment or passed over for various opportunities. I would much rather try to break people's perceptions of the stereotype through my actions, than reinforce stereotypes through claiming that I need special treatment due to my deficiencies. I would rather work hard to make things better than be condescended towards, and I fervently hope others would too. If you go to Eastern Europe you can see farmers in absolute poverty tilling their small plot with a donkey, and yet it is safe and the people are welcoming and friendly. If you go to Mozambique the markets are teeming with people who have but a few dollars to their name, and yet it's safe to sleep on the beach. What is so different with America's minority communities which invites the woke to be so overprotective towards them on the topic of violent crime? From what I've seen, usually this crime negatively affects the community it is from more than anyone else, anyways.
- mxkopy 4y agoThat's insane. The robbers should be in jail. Imagine being an average Joe, robbing your local liquor store, and getting out fine with a public apology.
- bnralt 4y agoWorth pointing out they didn't just rob the store, but they assaulted the store employee who tried to stop them[1]: > Gibson followed the student from the store, where they began struggling across the street, which is campus property. Police said they arrived to find Gibson on his back, with Aladin, joined by two friends, punching and kicking him. All three undergraduates were charged — Aladin with robbery and his friends with assault. >Students mobilized, encouraging a boycott of the establishment, which is owned by Gibson’s father, David R. Gibson, and his grandfather, also named Allyn. [1] https://archive.ph/20190613153725/https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2019/06/10/oberlin-college-gibsons-bakery-libel-million-racist/#selection-1647.0-1653.154 https://archive.ph/20190613153725/https://www.washingtonpost...
- jessaustin 4y agoI was going to observe that throwing down in the street with multiple petty thieves seems like a mistake in general, but at your link we discover Gibson was actually assaulted in the store when he tried to take a picture of somebody in a coat with wine bottles sticking out. Avoiding this kind of terribly escalating situation will require careful consideration.
- neaden 4y agoThey did eventually plead guilty and recant their accusations of racial profiling. The plea deal didn't involve any jail time.
- mxkopy 4y agoThat feels like blackmail though. They wouldn't have as much incentive to drop the charges if their reputation wasn't also on the line. Ugh
- loloquwowndueo 4y ago36MM = 36 million, in case anyone was wondering about 36 millimeters and how anyone can be owed that.
- rahimnathwani 4y agoM = 1000 MM = 1000*1000
- philipwhiuk 4y agoExcept: 1. In Roman numerals M is thousand but MM is two thousand (e.g. MMXXII) 2. In scientific notation M is million (e.g. 1 MW) The usage of MM to represent 1 million is done by people who didn't understand Roman numerals originally.
- jofer 4y agoIt's not logical, but it is a standard on the finance and business side of things. MM is universally "million" there, be it dollars, liters, barrels, etc.
- scblock 4y agoAh yes, all those thousands of engineers over the decades who are "using roman numerals wrong", rather than using a well understood system of prefixes that is just not SI.
- kube-system 4y agoIt is not a misuse of Roman numerals. It is an abbreviation of the Latin “Mille Mille”.
- fortran77 4y agoHow dare you accuse me of not understanding Roman numerals. MM is a standard accounting abbreviation for “million”. See, for example https://corporatefinanceinstitute.com/resources/knowledge/other/mm-millions/ https://corporatefinanceinstitute.com/resources/knowledge/ot... Obviously, you’ve never looked at a financial statement of any sort.
- paxys 4y agoThe legal system doesn't care about your mother's dementia, your baker's wife's ALS, your husband's pancreatic cancer or anything else. Whether Stevie Wonder came to your bakery or not is irrelevant. The college didn't just turn around and say they won't pay, they are following the established legal process and appealing to higher courts. For a $36 million (!) judgement they would be stupid not to (why does a defamation lawsuit need to be that much anyway?). The state supreme court handed down their judgement 2 days ago, and it is likely that Oberlin will have to pay now (with interest) unless they want to take it further federally.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- iepathos 4y agoYes, this. Facts and logic aren't what the Gibsons are pitching here though.
- at_a_remove 4y agoIt wasn't like the ball thrown to them was made of facts and logic, either.
- curiousllama 4y ago$36M is because the school knowingly made false statements that destroyed a business, which was (presumably) worth ~$36M. If I knowingly-falsely call you a pedo and you lose your job as a result, then I’m liable for your lost wages. That’s how libel works. ETA: according to the lawsuit, that is. Idk the detailed facts of the case personally, just reacting to the article.
- tptacek 4y agoOnce again, no. The jury awarded $11MM in actual damages, and the balance was punitive --- punitive damages are communicative and have nothing at all to do with the value of the business, beyond that they're capped at a low multiple of the actual damages.
- bell-cot 4y agoShe should look into selling the $36M debt to a firm specializing in such things. (Wikipedia claims that Oberlin's endowment is ~30X larger.) Far better to get paid (say) 97 cents on the dollar up front, then get on with her life & business.
- Tangurena2 4y agoCompanies that "specialize in such things" rarely offer 50 cents on the dollar. Payments that high tend to be for "sure things" like slow Accounts Receivables. Anecdote: one small company that I worked for (in the 90s) was having cash flow problems with their larger customers stretching "net 30" into partial payments 4-6 months late. The firms offering to buy AR stuff like this were offering 25-33% up front, or 50% after 60 days. I don't know if the vultures smelled blood, or if there was an industry-wide problem that they saw (and we didn't).
- bell-cot 4y agoCommercial A/R is a different world. The seller ain't selling the debt because he's confident of a quick & sure collection. A load of things about the transactions which produced the debt might be disputed (the thingies they sold us failed to pass QC...). Every line on every invoice can probably be argued by a debtor trying to weasel out of paying. Such grief can really run up the overhead on collecting. Vs. Oberlin has 30x the needed assets, the courts have already ruled that the $36M is owed, and the debt-collection economies of scale kicked in quite a few $M ago. (No, I'm not saying that this particular debt would sell at 97 cents on the dollar. But far less than that would let Lorna get on with her life. And the threat of such a sale might suddenly un-jam the payment check printer at Oberlin.)
- nawgz 4y ago> 97 cents on the dollar You really think you could get such a rate? I was thinking the opposite - the firm would take 97 cents on the dollar. Debt collection is surely not a business built on such thin margins
- hcknwscommenter 4y ago
- mongol 4y agoHow are damages calculated in cases like this?
- tptacek 4y agoA trial is held, and the defendant is found liable or not. If they're liable, a damages phase occurs where both sides argue about the amount of compensatory damages owed. Compensatory damages have to be linked to actual damages; they're factual, not expressive. The jury can then decide that punitive damages are owed; a punitive damages phase occurs, where both sides argue how much should be awarded punitively. Punitive damages are expressive and not linked to actual financial losses, beyond that they're capped at a low multiple of the compensatory damages. Oberlin was assessed $11M in compensatory damages.
- Tangurena2 4y agoIt depends on the state and the court. Some only allow for actual/measured damages. Some allow for punitive damages. Some let the juries pull numbers out of their exhaust ports. In my opinion, whenever cases like this end up in the media, someone is peddling a political opinion. > The plaintiff, Stella Liebeck (1912-2004),[2] a 79-year-old woman, suffered third-degree burns in her pelvic region when she accidentally spilled coffee in her lap after purchasing it from a McDonald's restaurant. She was hospitalized for eight days while undergoing skin grafting, followed by two years of medical treatment. Liebeck sought to settle with McDonald's for $20,000 to cover her medical expenses. When McDonald's refused, Liebeck's attorney filed suit in the U.S. District Court for the District of New Mexico, accusing McDonald's of gross negligence. > Liebeck's attorneys argued that, at 180–190 °F (82–88 °C), McDonald's coffee was boiling hot and more likely to cause serious injury than coffee served at any other establishment. The jury found that McDonald's was 80 percent responsible for the incident. They awarded Liebeck $200,000[3] in compensatory damages to cover medical expenses, and $2.7 million (equivalent to $5,000,000 in 2021) in punitive damages, the equivalent of two days of McDonald's coffee sales. The trial judge reduced the punitive damages to three times the amount of the compensatory damages, totalling $640,000. The parties settled for a confidential amount before an appeal was decided. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liebeck_v._McDonald%27s_Restaurants https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liebeck_v._McDonald%27s_Restau... This case was highly publicized and used as a political boogeyman to scare the public into thinking that lawsuits were out of control.
- blisterpeanuts 4y agoThis entire situation was grossly mismanaged by the College. Their Counselor to Students encouraged the protest, provided them with hot chocolate, gave them a safe space to rest and recover in. That official was never disciplined for his role in this, and a couple of years later moved on to another role elsewhere in the country. In my non-legal opinion, the College should have acknowledged some culpability for encouraging a riot, and should have disciplined the three students involved in the shoplifting, fake I.D., and assault of the shopkeeper. Then they should have quietly settled with the shop for a couple hundred thousand plus legal fees and this whole thing would have been all but forgotten by now. In fact all the students who were around in 2016 would have long since graduated. Instead, Oberlin has a public relations disaster on its hands. Or, at a minimum, some much unwanted attention and a very painful penalty that they can ill afford. They just cut around 100 spots from their core Conservatory program, and they also controversially fired about 100 unionized custodial and food staff. My spouse is an Obie, and my teenager is looking at colleges. Having read this story, she's a lot less interested now in Oberlin, though a classmate of hers is going there this fall. Too bad.
- whisps 4y ago
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- restingrobot 4y agoSo the courts decide calling the family and the store racist was libel and slanderous, and it was upheld after sever appeals. Despite that, you are trying to claim that the Gibson's are racist? I don't understand what point you're making. I'm sure these comments were taken into account in the court proceedings and decisions, so why bring it up here. I'm not condoning what was said, but this puts nothing in a new light, as the court already ruled on what you are claiming.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- it_was_cool 4y ago
- elmomle 4y agoSometimes the court can uphold the law and yet an undesirable state of affairs can persist. Those comments were racist, and furthermore it seems the family has not acknowledged that fact or apologized for it. This would definitely affect my likelihood of shopping there--all else being equal, I'd greatly prefer to have business owners in my community who don't espouse racist beliefs.
- elmomle 4y agoI can no longer edit my comment and feel the need to add to it: upon reading the FB post (https://tinyurl.com/2h9rmkzu https://tinyurl.com/2h9rmkzu) this points to the bigger issue that is worth at least mentioning. Often people who are not very eloquent try their best to state their (sometimes naive but often not ill-meaning) views, instead of being treated as the beginning of a conversation (in which the person is validated and a dialogue forms), their words are publicized and they are demonized, which polarizes the issue. It is deeply unfortunate that in this case somebody chose to publicize rather than attempting to start a dialogue.
- Leader2light 4y ago
- orangepurple 4y ago"Parents who come in tell me that their kids have been brainwashed to hate us." Sums up the movement in a nutshell
- steveneven 4y agoI went to Oberlin. Yes it's too 'woke' but this story is actually backwards from my perspective. There's more to this story and unfortunately it has nothing to do with Gibson's. Gibson's is a small business targeting the lower end, with revenue likely in the low/mid six figures per year. It's like a convenience store which sells some groceries and baked goods. Coffee was near $1.00 in the mid 2000's. If someone were to sell Gibson's on a reasonable market, it would sell for less than 1M, I would guess more like 100k if you were to discount physical assets (which could be sold even after boycott). 36MM is completely absurd from an economic perspective. Instead, something else is going on here. Conservative news outlets have made Oberlin a punching bag, and that must've percolated to this jury's award. It was meant as a political signal from biased citizens to punish Oberlin for being liberal in a now red-leaning state.
- tptacek 4y agoThey got $11MM in actual damages. If Oberlin's actions essentially ruined the business, that doesn't seem crazy; further, actual damages have to be tied to, you know, actual demonstrable damages. You could probably look up the transcript to see how actual damages were argued by both sides. The balance of the penalty was punitive damages, which are intrinsically expressive; you can disagree with them, but they have nothing to do with how much the business was worth.
- Bakary 4y agoFrom a non-American perspective, these sums are ludicrous in any case. However, they don't seem to be inconsistent with other big American payouts for various life-altering incidents, whether aligned with one end of the political spectrum or not.
- stjohnswarts 4y agoIf you realize how much money these colleges make and have in their endowment, then you understand any less of an amount won't even register with those who run the college. It seems like the amount awarded is actually on the low side and should probably have been higher to send a message to not join the "woke" mob and get the whole story before acting. Yes, I would say the same for "alt-right" mobs as well.
- tptacek 4y agoI don't understand what's interesting about this story. They won an enormous judgement (I think understandably --- that they were clearly in the right in this case, and they were wronged by a wealthy organization). They judgement was appealed. The appeal failed. Oberlin is going to pay. The courts will force them to pay. Seems simple. Bari Weiss knows the answer to the question posed by the headline; she could have just, you know, added the sentence "Yes."
- Bakary 4y agoI wasn't familiar with Oberlin before reading this story, but I found it nonetheless interesting as an example of how your life can be turned around quickly. I don't doubt that modern day businesses make decisions based on whether it can lead to a social media-powered mob forming against them. Stories like these help understand why and give some details about what the worst case scenario might look like.
- fortran77 4y agoRead The Atlantic on this, too. https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/06/the-publicly-shamed-sue-oberlin-college-verdict/591379/ https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/06/the-public...
- nindalf 4y agoBari Weiss is well aware the money is coming soon because there’s no way to appeal any more. What she needed was an example of “wokeness gone mad”, so her readers can confirm whatever biases they hold. They pay her $5/month for that and boy does she deliver.
- dekhn 4y agoI'm glad Weiss is brave enough to do this, TBH. I don't think all the causes she promotes are great, but I appreciate that she has been willing to give up her previous career to avoid being complicit.
- the_third_wave 4y agoThose who live by the sword shall die by the sword. Seeing how as Weiss was forced out of her position at the NYT [1] by 'woke progressives' she has made it her goal to expose the destructive effects this ideology has with the clear intent of putting a stop to it. Those who attempt to gain power and influence by denouncing others for thoughtcrime [2] shall be exposed and denounced themselves. The sooner this happens, the better it is for everyone involved. [1] https://www.bariweiss.com/resignation-letter https://www.bariweiss.com/resignation-letter [2] https://bookanalysis.com/1984/thoughtcrime/ https://bookanalysis.com/1984/thoughtcrime/
- glintik 4y agoWhat is $36MM and what’s difference with $36M?
- Macha 4y agoThere's an old convention of M = mille = thousand, and the modern convention of M = million. To avoid confusion, MM is sometimes used to be very clear it means million, especially in accountancy and legal circles. This has arguably outlived anyone seriously using M=mille, but the practice carries on
- kube-system 4y agoNatural gas in the US is still measured and billed in (MCF) mille cubic feet.
- dekhn 4y agolike, 36 large vs 36 large large
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- VictorPath 4y ago
- Bakary 4y agoAs a thought experiment, let's assume the best or worst intentions of the participants depending on their relation to the case: - The blogger is cynically making money by appealing to conservatives - Hacker News commenters are privileged and prejudiced - The family is prejudiced, and altering their story in bad faith - The college and students meant well and thought there was genuine prejudice involved Even in this extreme version of the scenario, I still think the situation is terrible and that the family's life was irreparably and unfairly altered. Do they deserve tens of millions? Maybe not, but then again America is the land of big things happening. They do deserve some reparation based on the facts as delivered in the court transcript. I see commenters here flagging the story, dismissing its relevance or validity with various arguments but this doesn't really hold up at a second glance, even if you take into account the context of culture war grifting.
- noufalibrahim 4y agoThis is sad. Regardless of whether they'll get the money or whether the cost is justified, it's a bad state of affairs that an accusation and a protest etc. can more or less destroy a small (long standing) business like this. Things like "innocent until proven guilty" etc. are time tested and really need to be held up. It's a good thing that the courts see this and awarded punitive damages. Oberlin trying to appeal that is just part of the process so that whole thing works. However, the outrage culture which can be weaponised and deployed against anyone causing great long term damage without any checks and measures is not healthy.
- tptacek 4y agoThere is in fact no "innocent until proven guilty" principle regarding accusations of misconduct. People can in fact make ill-founded or shaky accusations of bad behavior of all sorts. Our pesky First Amendment ensures that no law will pass establishing a statutory right to be free of criticism, even grave criticism. A false accusation that causes damage is grounds for a defamation claim, which is a tort. There is no "innocent until proven guilty" in tort law, either; torts are civil matters. It is not enough for a claim to be "false" to establish defamation liability. Most importantly, you have to prove that the "false claim" is not a subjective matter open to debate, and you have to prove the claim caused damages. Where people making accusations get into trouble is when they include specific factual claims in their accusation that turn out to have been false, or claim that they're making their accusation based on specific factual claims that they know about but are declining to reveal. Further, when this fact pattern involves a public figure, you have to do more than prove specific false factual claims that caused damage; you have to prove that the claims were made recklessly, not just negligently: that the accuser had good reason to know that the accusation was false --- it's not enough to say the accuser should have done more investigation, or should known better; you have to prove that they had evidence presented or obviously available to them that they deliberately ignored. Oberlin managed to screw all of this up in a variety of ways. That's one of the reasons this case was so noteworthy. But an institution like Oberlin can accuse a business of racism based on conduct that the institution finds racist, but others don't; that's not defamation. It is surely worth knowing here that Oberlin was not found liable for accusing Gibsons of racism, or for being "racist". Oberlin's right to deem Gibsons "racist" is constitutionally protected, whether you agree with Oberlin or not.
- m3kw9 4y agoI’d they don’t pay but eventually will be forced, can they borrow against that fact?
- bena 4y agoCan I hate everybody involved in this story? I mean she's trying to blame her husband's cancer, his lack of treatment, and subsequent death on the College. Dude could have done his chemo. Claiming that he didn't want to appear weak so he wouldn't have gotten a sympathy judgment. That just reeks of spin.
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- leobean101 4y ago
- TearsInTheRain 4y agoI am so glad Biden plans on giving these schools a massive handout by forgiving student debt /s
- LecroJS 4y agoBiden’s student loan forgiveness only applies to federal loans. Private student loans (at a liberal arts institution like Oberlin) are not eligible
- TearsInTheRain 4y agoYou can take out federally backed student loans at Oberlin...
- LecroJS 4y agoOops you’re absolutely right. I always thought this was one of the drawbacks of private institutions. Thanks for the info/correction