...to think that women should be able to warn other women....

[thebrollachan]

...about the behaviour of specific men in their friendship group?

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/cancel-culture-death-oxford-university-b2643626.html

(The incident appears to have happened a few days before his death, was sexual in nature, and involved an ex-girlfriend.)

Maybe it was a lie. Or a mistake. Or it really happened and she didn't want other women to run the same risk.

What it wasnt was "cancel culture".

Yes they do. The investigator said,

the allegations against Mr Rogers caused a “pile-on” effect of students agreeing with others because of an “unwritten” moral imperative to “do the right thing”.

They obviously believe that life is black and white and that blanking him was the virtuous thing to do. I can imagine that anyone who didn't would be treated the same.

But was it just the young woman/women involved who told him off? Or was there a wider pile-on?

Did he have a chance to apologise? Make amends?

Those are all things we don't know

Jesus, put the boot in why don't you.

The woman pours her heart out and you start bellowing about the "fucking inquest" to shut her up.

Could you not just accept that obviously none of us know the people involved in this particular case, but the broader possibilities touch a nerve for many of us?

What a patronising post - as well as being untrue. And I'll comment in response to a thread however I'm moved to do so, regardless of whether you like it or not.

I have read it.

The coroner felt that cancel culture meant the young man thought he would have no hope of re-entering his friendship group.

If I thought one of my friends had sexually assaulted someone, they wouldn't have a chance of being my friend again and that is my right. Actions like this do keep women safe. I know it was led by the men this time but that doesn't change my mind.

We don't need a judge and jury to decide who to be friends with. We can decide that for any reason we want.

It is very sad that this man dies but no I don't hold his friends, the young woman or cancel culture responsibile.

‘If I thought one of my friends had sexually assaulted someone, they wouldn't have a chance of being my friend again and that is my right. Actions like this do keep women safe. I know it was led by the men this time but that doesn't change my mind.’

If you ‘thought’. But you didn’t KNOW. How could you know if you weren't there? And your ‘noble’ stance potentially destroys a young man and his family. You haven't kept them, or anyone else ‘safe’.

Please think about this. It’s dangerous mob mentality,

I’ve had a friend go to prison for making violent threats. Of course I didn’t condone his actions and made it abundantly clear to him how I thought he completely deserved his punishment.

It never occurred to me to abandon him however and he was not ostracised nor “cancelled” by his friends. Instead we supported him as best we could and visited him throughout his incarceration. He is a changed person and now completely rehabilitated.

We can not know exactly what happened in the case and still at least articles or the thread itself.

That poster 'poured her heart out' equating her ex who raped her multiple times, bit her, stabbed her etc to the young man in this case who was only informally accused of causing 'discomfort' to a young woman and who is now dead and saying if her ex had killed himself he might be getting sympathy and she would have been blamed.

They're completely different situations and she couldn't be arsed to find out what was being discussed being wading in implying her highly abusive and criminal ex is a similar situation.

Which also misses the fucking point that at no stage has this young woman been blamed for fucking anything.

The OP decided based on nothing to assume the young woman here was advising other women to avoid this young man and being blamed for him being cancelled.

Yet you think it's okay for someone who's committed suicide to be compared to a multiple rapist who bites and stabs women?

I'm not trying to shut her up, i'm saying her post was irrelevant and inappropriate and offensive on a thread which she hasn't bothered to read. She can pour her heart out on another thread when she can be bothered to read it and realise her post is relevant and not offensive.

And you clearly didn't read the comments made by the independent investigator who was hired by Oxford University to look into the 'cancel culture' that exists there.

FFS, it wasn't about someone losing some mates.

Can no-one be fucking bothered to actually read what happened or even read the thread before wading in with their ill-informed opinions?

No. Men are rarely taken to task for their sexual violence. Friend groups aren't held to a 'beyond a reasonable doubt' standard. A standard which means the majority of rapists are walking around free.

I a woman says she was raped, I believe her. I could be wrong, but chances are I'm right to believe her.

I don't need incontrovertible proof to stop being friends with someone. Losing my friendship isn't a custodial sentence, I'm not bound by the level of proof needed for a conviction.

If a woman tells me she's been raped or assaulted, I would believe her in the vast majority of cases. We all know how few assaults result in a conviction.

Could you remain friends with a man you suspected had assaulted a woman?

Do you mean the comments by Dr Thompson in the article OP posted? I don't know why you think I didn't.

Sorry, meant to quote @YourHangryAmberPombear but it didn't work.

Could you remain friends with a man you suspected had assaulted a woman?

My patriarchy-enthusiast BIL once said that he would let Micheal Jackson babysit his kids, so much did he agree with innocent until proven guilty.

SIL leaned over and said, "like fuck".

Men are really married to the system that defends them all. The guilty ones, so they can stay free. The innocent ones so they can never worry. The ones in the middle so they can carry on being fucking dodgy but never actually properly criminal with impunity.

"So say you were 20 and accused of that. But the person accusing you hasn't actually reported it to anyone formally and doesn't intend to so you're not going to be formally accused, have a chance to defend yourself or a fair hearing but in the 3 days since it allegedly happened, numerous people have been told about it, one person has had a 'physical altercation' with you because of it, the rumour mill is in overdrive and you avoid going to brunch on the Sunday but your friends organise a meeting with you to tell you they think you've done something terrible in a sexual way and that they want space from you and might check in with you in the future but with no timeline given and as you're at Uni, you know this has already spread all around campus where you study and also likely where you live and there's been a collective pile-on.
How would you feel about going into a lecture on the Monday morning? Would you think it was fine or would you think you were facing everything I outlined in my PP."

Well if I'd done something of a sexual nature to somebody else and I thought was "shameful and unforgiveable" even if "unintentional" (??? -Cannot think what this might be)
I'd probably take my medicine TBH. But I'd had a lot of practice at social isolation having been Wilhelmina No Mates through pretty much all of secondary school till I moved schools in 6th form. Back in the 90s when a lot of the subject classrooms had desks in pairs, and there was an odd number of pupils in the class, so it was painfully obvious that Power Has No Friends. 3 days would be a doddle for me, even if unpleasant and humiliating.

"So say you were 20 and accused of that. But the person accusing you hasn't actually reported it to anyone formally and doesn't intend to so you're not going to be formally accused, have a chance to defend yourself or a fair hearing but in the 3 days since it allegedly happened, numerous people have been told about it, one person has had a 'physical altercation' with you because of it, the rumour mill is in overdrive and you avoid going to brunch on the Sunday but your friends organise a meeting with you to tell you they think you've done something terrible in a sexual way and that they want space from you and might check in with you in the future but with no timeline given and as you're at Uni, you know this has already spread all around campus where you study and also likely where you live and there's been a collective pile-on.
How would you feel about going into a lecture on the Monday morning? Would you think it was fine or would you think you were facing everything I outlined in my PP."

Well if I'd done something of a sexual nature to somebody else and I thought was "shameful and unforgiveable" even if "unintentional" (??? -Cannot think what this might be)
I'd probably take my medicine TBH. But I'd had a lot of practice at social isolation having been Wilhelmina No Mates through pretty much all of secondary school till I moved schools in 6th form. Back in the 90s when a lot of the subject classrooms had desks in pairs, and there was an odd number of pupils in the class, so it was painfully obvious that Power Has No Friends. 3 days would be a doddle for me, even if unpleasant and humiliating.

My god, have some self-awareness.

Often it's the victim that gets ostracised.

Hmm... This is difficult. If he crossed a line, then the girl was perfectly entitled to tell her friends, and they were entitled to believe her and stop being his friend. People get ostracised in wider social groups for many reasons. I knew a boy at the corresponding boys' school to my girls' school who called his gf's close friend the n word in an argument. I avoided him after that, but he certainly wasn't cancelled, including by his Handmaid of a girlfriend.
More generally, no matter how bad anyone is, no-one should be allowed to get into a suicidal frame of mind. Anyone accused should have their mental health monitored.
I am very uncomfortable w the discourse on mumsnet that suicide is the responsibility of others. There's this thread running through the discussions of Caroline Flack, Ruth Perry and others. People can behave terribly to others. But the ultimate responsibility for suicide lies w the person. Otherwise it's a slippery slope, w trans children, for instance, blaming their suicide on non affirming parents.

'Discomfort' is an ambiguous word but to me doesn't point towards anything criminal and I'm not sure if it suggests anything even particularly harmful.

The woman DH briefly saw before we met caused him 'discomfort' - she was really pressuring and he was young. DH still shudders if he hears a phrase she said to him. It was a bad experience but not criminal and neither of us would want her to lose friends over it let alone take her life. I think she is pretty awful but she doesn't need to know that.

This breaks my heart from the inquest:
Dr Thompson that she was “shocked” on hearing evidence from students close to the incident, especially because Mr Rogers was described as an “upstanding” young man by those who knew him.
“It was shocking to hear that students were treating each other in this way, but I was not surprised by this pattern of behaviour,” she explained, due to the existence of “cancel culture” in society, on social media and even in schools.

Cloudyb, if your DH was being pressured by an older woman then he wasn't giving proper consent. That is v harmful imo. If someone isn't giving proper consent & the other person knows that, that is criminal.

You can disagree with the opinions on this thread but suggest you need to seriously reflect what you’re posting because it’s horrible.

Typical mumsnet responses here. Firstly this post is in very bad taste , do non of you women commenting have sons ?, has anyone actually thought that maybe the girl was embarrassed afterwards ? there is no mention of non consent. She could have told people anything to try and ease the embarrassment as women do very often ! Why is the boy to blame in all this ??? You should all be ashamed

The organised ostracised & the physical altercation was totally wrong. Could easily be abused by bad actors. Most women don't lie, but it gives the bad ones an easy in to harm.

Lucy, if someone's in discomfort during sex & the other person knows they're not enjoying & doesn't care or try & make it better, that isn't consensual. Many men & boys do behave badly. She could be lying, we don't know. But look at Everyone's Invited. Just bc you have a good son doesn't mean you need to think all sons are good.

We don't know what happened. Apparently there was an incident that caused discomfort. This incident has not been elaborated on. I took it to mean something happened that made her feel uneasy or uncomfortable.