Uni suicide - tragedy but is this the only recourse for women that experience assault ?

[mids2019]

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-14060637/Oxford-University-student-20-killed-cancelled-female-friend-told-pals-felt-uncomfortable-sexual-encounter.hotlink

Superficially this is a tragedy and the sites is was the major factor for that led to it. However given the extremely low probability of criminal conviction of the university acting from a disciplinary point of view are women justified in using ostracism as the only till they have left for justice and as a warning to others that may consider assault a crime where there are in reality limited chance of consequence?

The woman concerned comes across as psychologically cruel and the coroner warns against 'cancel culture' but there seems more to this and perhaps the woman concerned was justified in talking to their friendship group at the very least as warning to other woemn?

Is this the social equivalent of a lunch mob with no proven guilt or the actions of a woman who knew there is typically no justice from authorities in such cases?

According to the note he left, he admitted that his actions were unforgiveable.

Perhaps the other students had good reason to "want space" from him.

Sometimes friends fall out, and sometimes you mess up and feel guilty. It's really sad that no-one recognised the warning signs that he was not able to mentally withstand this.

I also behaved a bit badly and had my friends be icy with me at Uni, who didn't? I apologised and some forgave me and some did not, and life moved on. No-one said I'd been "cancelled" and I didn't jump off a bridge.

Horrified at the number of people on here who would seemingly remain friends with a man who they believed had assaulted their friend.

No one owes anyone else friendship. People can end friendships for any reason they like, and suspicion of sexual assault is an excellent reason.

It's very sad that this young man died, but placing any blame at the woman's door is despicable.

Agree.

there’s not likely to be a clear distinction between his friends and hers. In a smallish college, everyone will know everyone in their year group, at least to some extent.

Absolutely not. People should be able to break friendships without worrying the person will kill themselves.

Very, very dangerous rhetoric to blame women for sharing their experiences with trusted friends. Andrew Tate would be proud.

Baring in mind what a sad and sensitive topic this is, there could be many contributing factors why this young man committed suicide including existing fragilities, trauma, neurodiversity, OCD, rigid thinking, or quite likely he experienced abuse or severe bullying previously and didn't feel he could reach out to his family 😭

It's utterly tragic and probably could have been prevented if the culture at the Oxford college he attended was different. If it is such a close knit college experience, the colleges need to tackle this sort of culture quickly, they are largely to blame.

They should provide confidential support for victims of bullying and sexual assault. They should provide clear rules about social media use with the threat of expelling students if they don't adhere to the clean code of conduct (e.g. pile ons, rumours, sharing demeaning media etc). Ostracising is cruel but on the other hand, distancing yourself from a friendship or relationship is normal human behaviour though.

These are the most privileged people in the country for the most privileged families and schools. I reckon the overarching culture at some of the Oxbridge colleges is not inclusive, it's all about being effortlessly top dog. Academic high fliers often struggle with mental health, perfectionism and there are more neuro-diverse students an Oxbridge who might need additional guidance and support. For all we know both or all involved students could have been neuro-diverse.

Ironically the media and people on this thread are witch hunting the girl and her friends while blaming them for ostracising the boy.

If anything it tells us to remember that people can be fragile. Do speak up if you see something unjust happening but try to be fair and balanced too. This terrible situation may not have played out on social media but the the cancel pile on culture is fostered and amplified because of our social media driven culture. Do not blindly believe or pass on gossip. people who talk badly about others to destroy their reputation are master manipulators and evil. I don't think that's what happened here though.

I feel gutted for the boy and his family and hope the other students are able to learn from this and move in on peace.

Heartbreaking case. Interesting debate.

Throws up so many lessons in protecting the safety and well-being of everyone having sexual encounters in an ever-changing world.

IMHO the big one is of respect. For oneself and other people.

Another is where and how (young) people learn how to have sex.

Another is everyone being aware we still live in a patriarchal society.

For those suggesting reporting - we all know there is a raft of poor sexual behaviour that wouldn’t qualify as assault.

Whatever happened, it wasn't worth taking his life over. Tragic.

It is a tragedy. Very sad for him and his family.

A. could have called samaritans. Reached out to pastoral support. Gone home. The uni could have more posters up with samaritans numbers on etc. He could have learned from.his actions which made a person uncomfortable.

Years ago at uni my housemate was sexually assaulted/had an overnight encounter she did not ask for.. My housemates told me and we all agreed to say and do nothing for the shame and blame on her. Luckily things have changed.

Maybe his friends were wrong to ostracise him. But you cannot blame others for a suicide.

And that even rape tends not to end in conviction when reported.

No woman should be judged for not going to the police. As I said on the other thread, gossip keeps us safer than the courts. I'm sure we've all given and received the warnings. Don't get in a lift with him, don't let him buy you a drink, don't share a taxi with him.

What I'm saying is that if this boy had generally a more sensitive nature he is likely to have been bullied, even severely bullied previously during his school years. At Oxford he finally feels he found his people, his tribe, he belongs. The college has a tribal culture. He makes a big mistake (we all make mistakes) and can't deal with the fall out because his existing PTSD due to previous bullying is triggered and prevents him from reaching out for help. It's also a huge reminder to allow our dc to make mistakes bog and small as they grow up and help them take responsibility, learn from them and move one forgiving themselves. I am heartbroken at this story.

This isn't true. Being accused of sexual assault (directly or by implication) and having your friends ostracise and shame you for it can absolutely lead to suicidal ideation in a previously mentally healthy person. Many people who have been 'cancelled' speak about the enormous impact on their mental health including suicidal ideation.

I think that the issue for me is that people today care so much about being perceived as being wrong or associated with wrong that they all jump ship very quickly. They are judged if they don't. People today are just much more reactionary. We don't know all of the facts here, so really can't judge, but there obviously is an issue with our current shame culture where people all follow like sheep rather than weighing things up more carefully.

However, I don't think that the girl nor his friends could have foreseen what would happen. And without more facts we can't possibly say whether there was an overreaction on their part. We don't know the context of the coroners recommendations, which could have been generally flagging up their concerns with things for universities to monitor, without passing judgement on all involved in this case.

I think that it's a very sad case all round and really hope that there are some lessons which could be learned.

Absolutely agree with this. This poor young man with his whole life ahead of him. I hope his so called friends have plenty of time to reflect on how their nasty, isolating and bullying resulted in this devastating loss.

It’s an absolute tragedy, I hope all those involved in his suicide realise that their actions drove that poor boy to despair. That can never be justified or excused it’s truly shameful of them all.

But that puts the onus back on the rest of us to just stay friends with the abusers, the misogynists, the racists, the homophobes.

While feeling huge sympathy for the young people and their families caught up in this, I’m not sure it’s such a bad thing to expect men to do a bit of risk assessment too. Girls, if you make the wrong call you could get raped or worse, boys if you make the wrong call you face being shunned. But the shunning is what we’re focussed on? Plus, it seems likely that the group of friends here will be making a judgement about whether what B said seems reasonable.

Anyway, what are you going to do? Instruct every member of college (or wherever) that they have to be friends with everyone, regardless of how you perceive their behaviour? It’s just not going to happen!

Absolutely spot on. Such a well written balanced response.

@Respectisnotoptional you are doing the exact same behavoiur that you accuse these young people of. You are shaming them without knowing the details based on gossip and third hand information. It wouldn't be surprising if posts like yours drive these young people to despair and self harm. Have some self awareness.

There has been no reporting whatsoever to indicate why the female friend was 'uncomfortable' so it seems salacious to try to impute. There are a myriad of reasons why she might have been uncomfortable, short of sexual assault.

This is a tiny college and everyone will know absolutely everyone. That said, even in a larger college pretty much everyone in a cohort will know of any incident causing ripples. Given that the coroner made this particular order he/ the family will know that this reaction by friendship groups to an incident is a real issue, the effects heightened by the atmosphere in a college community and being away from home, and that it needs to be called out as bullying even if done with subjectively principled motives. These young people need to recognise that a lot of their peers are fragile, as a previous poster said. I'm sure that it's hit home very hard already.

I can't believe some of the comments here alleging that the woman was manipulative. And the nasty undertone of suspicion from some posters because she didn't officially report her experience to anyone. There is not enough information in that article to infer any of this. Maybe she was full of regret and embarrassment about the sexual encounter or aspects of it and decided to stir up trouble to deflect from her mistake. Or maybe the young man was an absolute creep and behaved in an aggressive, pushy way and made her feel pressed into the type of sex she wasn't comfortable with. A version of either of these scenarios could be true. There is NO way of knowing from this article. I honestly thought that we, particularly us women, had moved past the stage of assuming that a woman must be lying if she doesn't go to the police or someone else in authority.

Also, there has always been ostracism in friendship groups when the group decides that one of their members has behaved badly or broken some code of conduct. The difference here seems to be that the friends announced they would be freezing him out, rather than just doing it which, in my albeit limited experience, is the norm. That must have been a devastating blow, to hear those words spelt out, whether he was guilty of sexual misconduct or not.

Only he was involved in his suicide.

What do you think the girl should have done?

Say nothing and face being around him every day? Or ostracise herself if she couldn't stomach it? Just tell the women and not let the men make their own choice of friend?

And even if she had reported to the police or the university (and we all know the abysmal conviction rates that are the reason women don't do that), it would have dragged on for years and she would have been faced with the same options in the short term.

Isn't it quite obvious that this isn't just a case of two people having sex when drunk and then one person regretting it?

He said himself that what he did was unforgivable, when she told their friends (they were in the same friendship group so it was her friends too) what had happened they deemed that it was serious enough that it has changed their view of him for the worse and that they weren't sure they could be friends with him anymore. I think that is quite a mature reaction (not the ex-boyfriends reaction though) for such young people and I am happy that a bunch of young men questioned his behaviour on the behalf of a young woman, I am not sure that would have happened a decade ago. They said they needed a time-out from him to digest it and, I'm guessing, making sure that their other friend is OK. If he did assault her it would have been heart breaking for her if their friends just carried on as normal with the perpetrator, she was the victim after all.

Yes, exactly. It’s social extension of cancel culture. It clearly needs to be addressed urgently as that is what has seemingly turned a standard uni story of
regrettable sex and angry ex spoiling for a fight into a tragedy,

I hope it doesn’t dissuade young women from speaking out about young men who make them feel uncomfortable sexually; but equally I hope it would persuade other young men to see, help with suicidal thoughts rather than throw their life away.

It’s impossible to know the whole story.

I don’t think speculating is helpful.

there is an interesting article about the culture of the university:

https://archive.ph/0sfAs