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?

And how did it pan out? That’s why you need to report to appropriate channels and let them deal with it, and not get involved, because otherwise you’re implicated in the consequences.

The quote was 'unintentional but unforgivable.' Which could just mean that he felt awful when he realised she felt that way.

There is no information out there either way. No amount of vague descriptors equals information on what actually happened.

If his friends thought it was enough to break off a friendship then it was enough to break off a friendship. You are not obliged to be friends with anyone.

When it escalates to physical attacks and suicide, it needs to be addressed, which is the issue at hand.

Your wording was bad OP. The ‘superficially a tragedy’ line jumped out at me.

I think this sounds very sad. Trial by cancellation is something I’m sure will continue to play out due to the mass public shaming that is endemic on the internet and spills out into the real world. I’m sure whatever happened was discussed in WhatsApp groups, in small huddles on campus, in the student bar etc etc.

We won’t ever know the truth but he obviously felt the stigma would never leave him and also probably thought the girl might go to the police and he’d have to deal with the fall out of an investigation into the bargain.

In answer to your question I think it can be one thing, a different thing and both things. Yes the woman might choose to not go to the police as she doesn’t think she’d be believed. Yes a woman might have had a difficult sexual encounter where she feels the man was in the wrong but it wouldn’t be a strong enough case to warrant police involvement. Yes a woman might choose to talk about it amongst friends but not expect it to blow up to a level of wide spread ostracism. Yes the man has the right to defend himself in a legal setting. Yes the man might have a completely different take on the sexual encounter and think both parties walked away happy. Yes the man might be upset that his social circle has deemed him guilty and might be terrified the police will come knocking and he be part of an investigation that could ruin his future career.

I think young people need to be taught that sex is a powerful weapon. It can be an amazing, exhilarating experience and it can be a devastating, humiliating memory. We need to raise our boys to be respectful, thoughtful and never sleep with a woman who cannot consent. The tea video is something I plan on showing my eldest directly he hits the age where girls are on his mind.

m.youtube.com/watch?v=oQbei5JGiT8

Good post.

But not by the people who don’t want to be friends.

I am also very wary of narratives that suggest women shouldn't speak up because it makes men sad. Ultimately this was an adult who made his own decision. It's really tragic but it's no woman's fault. There were other options (go home, get medical help, talk to a trusted mentor, call the Samaritans etc)

If women have to shut up in case men don't like what they say we're going to end up like Afghanistan.

Bollocks. The girl and the friends are not responsible for his decision to end his life. And if he had done something sexually inappropriate - which we will never know - then his friends ostracising him was no more than he deserved.

Why would people ostracise people who had drunken sex with the wrong person at the wrong time . This seems incredibly harsh in a liberal society and in a university where let's face it there is a fair amount of sex and a fair amount of alcohol.

my impression would be that there must have been something about the 'uncomfortable' sex that made people shun the student in question.

I suppose it's looking at the options women have if student services or the police are unapproachable and there will be almost no chance of prosecution or disciplinary action. Is it possible the woman in question decided,no, I am not brushing this under the carpet but I am going to be vocal? Is the ostracism a kind of result of an unofficial kangaroo court which springs up when the official channels for justice are simply ieffective?

So you think ending your life over a fall out with friends you’ve known maybe three years is a reasonable and rationale course of action?

He did something he seemingly regretted and admitted was unforgivable. If a friend drunkenly took advantage of me when I was drunk, as a potential example of what might have happened, I wouldn’t resort to the police as it might not have been an intentional assault - but I wouldn’t want to continue a relationship with that friend, and our mutual friends might feel the same.

I can see how this felt like the end of the world for him, but he seemingly did something wrong and no one should be made to feel guilty for having a proportionate response to that. We don’t owe anyone forgiveness.

It’s similar to the Caroline Flack scenario. Absolutely tragic, but she was accused of abusing her partner. It was okay to hold her to account for that, it was correct that the courts pursued the allegations. She made the decision to end her life, and that’s on her - if she hadn’t I’m sure we would have all forgotten what happened (see Chris Brown as an example).

It’s devastating when people don’t think they have options or a future and choose to end their lives - but in most cases it’s because of a tragic lack of perspective. We don’t have to ‘be kind’ to everyone, we should just never be cruel.

You're treating the words of a suicidal 20 year old as an admission of guilt, leaving out that he also said 'unintentional'. We don't know what happened. That doesn't mean she was to blame for his suicide but you have absolutely no idea what the true situation was.

Bullying and attacking people can't be characterised as 'people who don't want to be friends.'

Did he complete suicide due to the ostracism or fear of legal and further social consequences for his part in the incident?

It’s highly irresponsible to attribute suicide to one factor, whether that is ‘ostracism’ or guilt.

His note indicated remorse for his (unspecified) actions.

Is it ostracism to say “we don’t like what you did, we don’t want to talk to you for a bit”? I think I’d be proud of my son if he confronted a male friend over allegations of sexual misconduct.

She was entitled to tell whoever she liked about what happened to her.

We don’t know if there was an assault. The article only states she felt uncomfortable. Too little to go on.

Do you have inside information on this or is this just speculation?

But It can be characterised by telling someone they must not share their experience and doing so makes them to blame for someone’s suicide. Or that you must remain in a friendship with someone whose behaviour you find intolerable.

This is a young man who had been publicly shamed for being sexually inappropriate. Everyone in his social circle knew

from a PP. Frankly, this is absolutely what should happen to men who’ve been sexually inappropriate. No other messaging or campaigns seemed to have stopped men doing it so far.

Where have you seen that? Or did you just make it up to slander the woman?

Strange if that were the case that the coroner didn’t say so.

my impression would be that there must have been something about the 'uncomfortable' sex that made people shun the student in question.

You are purely speculating here. The culture is very different nowadays

Why would people ostracise people who had drunken sex with the wrong person at the wrong time . This seems incredibly harsh in a liberal society and in a university where let's face it there is a fair amount of sex and a fair amount of alcohol.
my impression would be that there must have been something about the 'uncomfortable' sex that made people shun the student in question.

Your impression may be the right one, equally it might be the wrong one. Thats why we have legal process for this. If the current cancellation culture continues unabated we may as well go back to vigilantism and stocks outside the village hall. We are going backwards.

Responsible for and implicated are not the same thing.

Read @ThatTidyCrab post at 09:41 - it’s spot on. The drama, the gossip, the groupthink, it’s very teenage and heightened and not very mature.

If he did something sexually inappropriate he needed to be supported to understand what he did wrong and change his behaviour.

I think there is a problem with uncomfortbale sex as a decription. Uncomfortbale is different to regretful or embaressing. Something about the sexual encounter meant the woamn felt uncomfortable and surely in 2924 we should be concerned when a term like is used?

Couple this description with the ostracism and you have a murky picture.

One question is as pp have said is about how do we accommodate sexual experimentation at an age of experimentation with the very real prospect of assault and the unambiguity that it is criminal? Does everyone actually know the boundaries?