<p>Thanks for explainin’! I haven’t been reading that site but occasionally there is mention here of something there and I have looked at the time and it is a very informative site. Just following the case on CC has already consumed time and so one discussion board was enough for me, generally speaking.</p>
<p>Finally!!! Nifong is no longer the DA!! Of course Judge Hudson refused to order his removal, saying the issue was moot because Nifong tendered another resignation to the Governor today, effective immediately. He didn’t show up–still out-of-state. (More likely he is out-of-his-mind! We can all still picture him playing his guitar in the backwoods somewhere!) If he doesn’t show up for his July 28th criminal contempt hearing that judge has already said he will issue a warrant for his arrest!</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.newsobserver.com/news/crime_safety/duke_lacrosse/nifong/story/624091.html[/url]”>http://www.newsobserver.com/news/crime_safety/duke_lacrosse/nifong/story/624091.html</a></p>
<p>Good article in the Wall Street today (Saturday) about the 88. Writer says their presence shows a side of Duke that would lead him to not want Duke on the list for his grandchildren. Says something needs to be said/done about the 88, even though the boys and the coach have now been financially compensated for some of the harm done to them.</p>
<p>MOWC, Since I don’t subscribe to the WSJ, what are “the 88”?</p>
<p>"But not so fast! What’s left to be done at Duke is taking action against the Group of 88. This group is made up of Duke professors representing more than a dozen academic departments at Duke who took out a large newspaper ad that constituted a rush to judgment about the guilt of the three accused lacrosse players. The ad: (1) publicly demeaned the players (their own students about whom they are supposed to care), (2) castigated the players for their actions (as the Group of 88 presumed those actions to be) and, (3) called for the lacrosse players to simply confess to their presumed misdeeds.</p>
<p>So here we have 88 very politically correct, tenured intellectuals sitting in their comfortable academic chairs, indicting, trying and convicting the three young student athletes before the facts were completely known and before truth could be discerned. As far as I am concerned, the Group of 88 has done more damage to Duke than the rape case would have done – if the rape case had been true."</p>
<p>Portion of the letter to editor from WSJ.</p>
<p>E, someone more articulate can explain in better detail, basically, 88 professors at Duke who were (and still are, I guess) rather vocal in support of Nifong’s point of view, sympathetic to the AV, and in general very judgmental of the young men.</p>
<p>I purchased Mike Pressler’s book, and read the whole thing last night in one sitting - I couldn’t put it down. It’s not written very well - it’s actually rather irritating to read as it’s rather like a word salad, but, it’s shocking - if even half of the detail is true, what happened - and what failed to happen - is shocking. It’s not so much that there is any new information, but rather it goes into depth re points of existing information - perhaps it’s so shocking when eaten in one huge meal, rather than in media sound bites over time. I’m not sure I’d recommend buying the book though because the net of it isn’t really worth the investment of 3-4 hours to read it. </p>
<p>Having said that, the group of 88 strikes me as more or less no big deal - they’re professors, fully entitled to express their opinions, regardless of how divergent from reality. (Furthermore, I think people should welcome very disparate points of view, even if very incendiary.) What I was NOT expecting to come away with was absolute disgust at the poor/absent/inconsistent leadership of Broadhead. The way his actions - as well as his lack of actions, and his mixed messages, and contradictory management of this issue I found simply disgusting. The view I got of Duke administration from the book makes me want to add something to my will that says no heir of mine is ever permitted to use inheritance funds to attend Duke!!! - that’s how appalling the account is. Of course, I recognize I’m viewing it through the lens of the author, who is a fired, disgruntled former employer (although unfairly so). I was also disgusted by the lack of effort to try to repair/improve relations with Durham, but, it’s easy to sit in armchair judgement I guess.</p>
<p>I found this ad, but I assume there is another someplace that the WSJ is referring to. This one doesn’t say much about the case and says nothing about guilt or innocence so I assume there is another? </p>
<p><a href=“2023澳洲幸运5开奖号码直播 | 澳洲幸运5技巧出号规律 | 产品展示”>2023澳洲幸运5开奖号码直播 | 澳洲幸运5技巧出号规律 | 产品展示;
<p>thanks to both MOWC & cartera. I knew about the PC profs & the rush to judgment, just ddn’t realize there were 88 of them. Oy vey.</p>
<p>And probably some poster has said this already. I was never a part of the earlier Duke CC discussion, or the earlier part of this thread, for that matter. But what really upsets me about the disservice Nifong has done, is that it could affect (probably has affected) legitimate complaints & charges for the many actual sexual incidents against women by college athletic teams. I could tell you a hair-raising story about a local incident, but unfortunately it is merely a template of what happens over & over with too many collegiate teams, against female students from those same colleges & Universities. And much of it <em>is</em> swept under the rug, and/or the women are pressured to drop the case or to settle for a very low damages when they file suit. </p>
<p>So true victims really needed Nifong to affect their credibility.</p>
<p>cartera45 - here’s a picture ([link](<a href=“http://photos1.blogger.com/x/blogger/2862/372/1600/99636/Listening_Statement_b.jpg]link[/url]”>http://photos1.blogger.com/x/blogger/2862/372/1600/99636/Listening_Statement_b.jpg)</a>) of the original “What Does a Social Disaster Sound Like” advertisement, as it appeared in the student newspaper on April 6th, 2006. The departmental endorsements are listed at the bottom; individual faculty and staff were listed on a page that no longer exists, though numerous copies abound.</p>
![http://photos1.blogger.com/x/blogger/2862/372/1600/99636/Listening_Statement_b.jpg]link[/url]](http://photos1.blogger.com/x/blogger/2862/372/1600/99636/Listening_Statement_b.jpg%5Dlink%5B/url%5D){kind=link}
<p>One difficulty at this point is trying to read it in the context of the time, rather than now… And that cuts in multiple directions.</p>
<p>Thanks DukeEgr. That’s the ad I had seen, but based on what I had read and heard, I expected something different. You’re right about context, but if that is the extent of what the professors endorsed, then I guess I’m just not feeling the outrage about what they did, and I can’t imagine they could be sued by anyone based on it.</p>
<p>I agree about lawsuits based on the ad and the letter - I do not believe they are merited for those actions. The lawsuit against Kim Curtis and Duke, which was settled - at least by Duke - is more…unsettling. Certain other instances from other faculty members - some signatories and some not - I believe placed the ad and the letter into a wider context of having Duke faculty actively engaged in poisoning the atmosphere for Duke students, regardless of what actually happened. Certainly, the extraordinarily thin volume of statements regarding AG Cooper’s declaration of innocence coupled with no similar outrage to allegations of rape made this past winter makes one (at least, the one) cynical.</p>
<p>Regarding the listening statement, the ad was rushed to the presses on April 6th. Among other things, the ad thanked people for not waiting…which seems odd for academics. I’m pretty sure I would never condone rushing anything of importance… But if people <em>had</em> waited until the DNA results were released just a short time later - perhaps the whole event, at least from the perspective of faculty-student-staff relations - could have taken on a different tone. I know I would have done things differently if, say, when people threatened the lives of our students, someone in the administration had spoken out.</p>
<p>Or if, say, when Nifong joked about possibly pre-judging someone at the election polling station because that person had on a lacrosse shirt, the administration had said, “this is not a joke.” </p>
<p>Certainly in the latter case, I wrote to the Senior Vice President who’d made most of the public statements about the case and received no reply. But then, I’m just a triple alum, a faculty member, and a donor, so what do I know… I do know that one of the main Deans at Duke was surprised at the lack of response.</p>
<p>I also believe that there’s been a lot of “smearing,” where any negative thing done by one entity has been attributed to all of them, and that is definitely the case for the signatories of the listening ad. The whole term “Group of 88” is a misnomer that eliminates individuality in exactly the same way, early on in the case (and, amazingly, now that the case is over) “The Lacrosse Team” became lumped together as a single amorphous thing. As to how to fix that - haven’t much of a clue.</p>
<p>Does anyone know which colleges are less likely to practice PC? We know Duke and the Ivies do. Are there any elite schools where there is academic freedon?</p>
<p>streak - not sure what you mean by schools that practice academic freedom (specifically, not sure which schools you think do not), nor do I understand how that might be construed as perpendicular to people who are more PC than others. In the specific case of this thread, I’d add that I have received zero pressure whatsoever to modify my remarks, regardless of my postings in opposition to some administrative decisions. Though I do disagree with some of what’s been done, I do have to say, personally, that I have certainly felt free to express my opinion and I am very much of the belief that, so long as I do not act in a way that is slanderous to the institution, despite my being non-tenured, I have the freedom to say what I want.</p>
<p>So - yes - Duke is a school where there is academic freedom.</p>
<p>I am refering the the dismissal of Summers at Harvard for his remarks about his views on the male/female differences in science. That, to me, is an environwment not condusive to free thought. The Lacross Players incident made think hard about what Duke might be like. Duke EGR 93, do you feel any pressure to really think before speaking? Is it possible you won’t become tenured if you say the wrong thing?</p>
<p>I’m not tenure track, so it’s definite I won’t become tenured, regardless of saying anything 
</p>
<p>I do believe that the Summers resignation is about more than just his commentary on women in science, though overall it is a interesting study of where authority and responsibility rests for an academic institution as well as presidential accountability and the limitations placed on administrative faculty.</p>
<p>As for “pressure to really think before speaking,” certainly in the sense that if I say something indefensible I’ll hear it from my colleagues as well as the internal sense of not wanting to look a fool. I also do not want to create a hostile learning environment, but that’s a matter of avoiding incorrect remarks, versus worrying about politically incorrect remarks.</p>
<p>Streak - what happened at Duke suggests that there is the freedom to speak one’s mind. The professors who spoke out were not fired or censured in any way that I am aware of so they felt they were in an environment where they could speak their minds. Unfortunately, the ad was probably an example of “speaking before thinking.” At least it was in hindsight. You are saying that Duke handled the allegations based on some heightened sense of what is politically correct and that another institution would have handled it differently because of operating in a somehow less PC way?</p>
<p>Cartera:</p>
<p>I don’t think the ad was an example of “speaking before thinking.” I think the views of the 88 were part of a template practiced by the left. It is that whites males have been the most privleged group in society, and have oppressed everyone else. So it is fitting that they be brought down whenever possible. </p>
<p>I think Duke handled the situation the way most elite schools would have. My question is which schools would not have done this. I would prefer to send my son to a place like that.</p>
<p>Not only was he disbarred immediately, but he also has to pay the hearing fees.:p</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.newsobserver.com/politics/story/635916.html[/url]”>http://www.newsobserver.com/politics/story/635916.html</a></p>
<p>Stay tuned for the Criminal Contempt Hearing… July 26 :rolleyes:</p>
<p>Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus!</p>
<p>I guess he can kiss that retirement money goodbye–between the fees and the cost of his attorneys… </p>
<p>I was glad to see that the State Bar worded their document so strongly!</p>