Opinion: Congrats to the Trib on their Pulitzer Prize


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Opinion On Monday, The Salt Lake Tribune was awarded the 2017 Pulitzer Prize for Local Reporting for “revealing the perverse, punitive and cruel treatment given to sexual assault victims at Brigham Young University.” For church members, this may feel like mainstream praise for a condemnation of BYU, and, by extension, LDS policy. A Pulitzer for an exposé of church practices? It's natural to feel a little bit of a sting. Our persecuted past gives us an increased sensitivity to anything that feels like religious discrimination. Paired with the call to be “in the world, not of the world” and it may seem that this Pulitzer is an example of the 'world vs. church' mentality. I've seen comments on Facebook blaming the victims, shaming ex-BYU student Madi Barney, and disputing the stories of unreported sexual assault on campus. But minimizing these charges, arguing against improvement of sexual assault systems, or, worst of all, accusing the victims of lying, is shameful and unchristian. This situation—a campus in which individuals are scared to report being raped in...

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This is such a sensitive topic, every single article I've read on it has had at least one part that rubs me the wrong way in one way or the other.  BYU professor Dr. Peterson's comments and links on the topic aren't bad.

“Salt Lake Tribune wins Pulitzer for campus rape coverage, praises victims for sharing their stories”

“How the BYU Honor Code may help prevent sexual assaults”

At the end of the day, this isn't really a BYU/Mormon story.  This is just the most recent notable paragraph in a very long book about humanity's spotty track record in dealing with the evils we humans do to one another.   

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I think the reaction that LDS feel towards the article could be like how Catholics thought about the priest scandals in New England and the coverage they received. I noticed two reactions from Catholics: One was to bury your head in the sand and pretend like nothing happened, blame a giant "conspiracy", and live in denial while the other was to leave the church over it and lose all faith in God and humanity. 

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I'm of the opinion that a rapist should be harshly penalized (castration comes to mind).  But I'm really leery of the modern definition of rape.  If a woman says no at any point and the man doesn't immediately comply it can be rape.  There is a saying where I served my mission, "don't heat up the pot, if you're not going to drink tea".  

Much of modern rape cases comes down to he said she said (and we are told to always trust the victim)-which IMO is a really crappy standard to put someone in jail over.  The saying, "hell, hath no furry like a woman scorned" comes to mind.  IMO, if a woman has been raped, report it to the police within 24 hours, they take a rape kit and document the physical evidence.  Otherwise, shut up.  A victim of a crime has obligations if they want to be taken seriously. Nobody has their house robbed and then reports they were robbed months later.

Rather than saying "we need to trust the victim", we need to teach women to immediately report a rape, that if someone is raping you, you should fight back, and you better have a really good reason why you didn't ("he had a gun or a knife, that looked like this").  If there is no physical evidence of rape (bruising, etc.) and you just say well we were in the middle of it and I told him to stop and he didn't-sorry I don't have any belief that you were truly raped.  You knew what you were getting into when you invited him into the house (he knew it too), you knew what you were doing when you started "warming up the pot". If you decide to stop before doing the deed and he doesn't stop, slap him and if he keeps going fight him and now you have physical evidence.

This isn't hard. I haven't read the in-depth reporting, but my guess is that BYU took the old-school approach to rape rather than the modern-day junk.

Edited by yjacket
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21 minutes ago, yjacket said:

I'm of the opinion that a rapist should be harshly penalized (castration comes to mind).

Same here. I have no problem applying the death penalty to rapists. I know it's a controversial view but like everyone else who has a conscience I have zero sympathy for rapists. 

Edited by MormonGator
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Doctrine and Covenants 64:10 I, the Lord, will forgive whom I will forgive, but of you it is required to forgive all men.

I crashed headlong into this scripture 20+ years ago.  On the very subject of rape, actually.  

I totally get both of your opinions about such things.  Learning to forgive these guys has been one of the top five hardest things I've ever done in my life.  Just remember - according to God, if you can't see yourself standing in His presence in the Celestial kingdom next to someone who had committed rape, then you won't need to worry about that situation ever occurring, because the celestial kingdom won't be your kingdom.  

Edited by NeuroTypical
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2 hours ago, NeuroTypical said:

Doctrine and Covenants 64:10 I, the Lord, will forgive whom I will forgive, but of you it is required to forgive all men.

I crashed headlong into this scripture 20+ years ago.  On the very subject of rape, actually.  

I totally get both of your opinions about such things.  Learning to forgive these guys has been one of the top five hardest things I've ever done in my life.  Just remember - according to God, if you can't see yourself standing in His presence in the Celestial kingdom next to someone who had committed rape, then you won't need to worry about that situation ever occurring, because the celestial kingdom won't be your kingdom.  

I, very fortunately, have not had someone close to me subject to this and yes if it did happen I would eventually forgive (it would probably take a while though).  I have learned holding onto hate for an individual does more damage to the soul than the individual could have ever done so I refuse to be damaged twice.

That said, the demands of justice must be paid-both temporally and spiritually.  For an individual to receive forgiveness from God for serious sins, a whole change of heart must occur and there is a price to be paid for that. For the penitent that change of heart will require lots of suffering, from which only Christ can save us. There are some sins that require not just a spiritual demand but a temporal demand and rape is one of those.

The beauty of the Atonement is that in the Celestial Kingdom while I might be next to someone who has committed rape, they are not a rapists-in other words at that point in time they will be a completely different person. They will have changed so much that what they have done previous will be irrelevant, b/c they are in effect two different people-one who committed such horrible crime in the past and then someone who would never dream of doing such a thing.

While I wouldn't really be in favor of castration, I say it to mean that rape is a very, very serious crime, I would say close to murder.  As such the gravity of the punishment and the gravity of the accusation should be made clear.  And that accusation shouldn't be one of "well 4 days later I realized having sex with this dude was a bad idea, so now I'm going to the police to get back at this guy b/c I caught him with my best friend" or some other crap. And yes, I have seen plenty of evidence of this in newspaper reports and the supposed "rape culture" on college campuses.  

Rape culture, really?  Women are getting smacked around violently as men have their way with them on college campuses?  I don't think so.  Does it happen, yes, but is there a "rape culture"- I highly doubt it and if there really is-then we are much, much worse off as a culture than I thought. 

If a woman gets raped, then it is a crime of violence and as such, there better be physical evidence of the violence not a "he said, she said" affair.

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The problem I have had with this whole story is the combining of two separate events (rape and honor code violations) into one  And saying that because of something horrible that happened that a person didn't choose.. they should therefore be immune to the natural consequences of what they did choose. I find that to be wrong

 

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43 minutes ago, estradling75 said:

The problem I have had with this whole story is the combining of two separate events (rape and honor code violations) into one  And saying that because of something horrible that happened that a person didn't choose.. they should therefore be immune to the natural consequences of what they did choose. I find that to be wrong.

I am of two minds here.  I have a real problem with private institutions having access to law enforcement databases for non-law-enforcement-related purposes; and it does look like the information management dividing line between the Honor Code office and BYUPD/BYU Title 9/Provo PD/Utah's county Sheriff, got awfully fuzzy at times.  

But I am also aware that BYU subsidizes its students' tuitions to the tune of $20-$30K per year; and it's galling when students like Madi Barney suggests that BYU must keep doing that, no questions asked, while she breaks out the contraception and invites men into her bedroom for what was initially planned as a voluntary sexual encounter.

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3 minutes ago, Just_A_Guy said:

I am of two minds here.  I have a real problem with private institutions having access to law enforcement databases for non-law-enforcement-related purposes; and it does look like the information management dividing line between the Honor Code office and BYUPD/BYU Title 9/Provo PD/Utah's county Sheriff, got awfully fuzzy at times. 

Indeed... accusations of rape should be investigated and the details of the investigation should be handed per the proper legal processes.  I have no problem with that kind of legal misconduct (that you are suggesting) being dealt with and corrected.  However that is a law enforcement issue not a BYU or Honor Code issue... But it is the later two that everyone is pointing fingers at.

 

 

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1 minute ago, estradling75 said:

Indeed... accusations of rape should be investigated and the details of the investigation should be handed per the proper legal processes.  I have no problem with that kind of legal misconduct (that you are suggesting) being dealt with and corrected.  However that is a law enforcement issue not a BYU or Honor Code issue... But it is the later two that everyone is pointing fingers at.

Well, and I haven't followed this as closely as I ought; but my impression is that it was reasonably well established that at least in some cases, BYUPD had been pulling info off the county-wide crime report database and feeding it to the Honor Code office; which then acted on it.  If that's correct, there is some BYU institutional culpability here.

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1 hour ago, yjacket said:

?? Could you please explain.

It just strikes me as an untruth. The act requires a certain level of violence (because it is "force"), but the implication that it is an act of violence comes across that it's more motivated by violence. That's the part I don't believe. So really it's probably just semantics.

Edited by The Folk Prophet
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2 hours ago, Just_A_Guy said:

Well, and I haven't followed this as closely as I ought; but my impression is that it was reasonably well established that at least in some cases, BYUPD had been pulling info off the county-wide crime report database and feeding it to the Honor Code office; which then acted on it.  If that's correct, there is some BYU institutional culpability here.

When you say BYUPD... Are you saying they have their own Police Department?   And the point still stands...  If BYU has access to the Crime Report database then they need to follow whatever rules are in place for that.  If they are abusing such privilege then it needs to be dealt with.  If they are not then.. they are not... 

If it is over reach then the part of BYU that is abusing the privilege of the database needs to be reigned in.  But that is not a problem with the Honor Code or its enforcement which is what people are focused on.

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3 hours ago, Just_A_Guy said:

Well, and I haven't followed this as closely as I ought; but my impression is that it was reasonably well established that at least in some cases, BYUPD had been pulling info off the county-wide crime report database and feeding it to the Honor Code office; which then acted on it.  If that's correct, there is some BYU institutional culpability here.

I had never heard or read anything of the sort. The closest thing was that a Utah County deputy had given information to BYU that he should not have.

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42 minutes ago, estradling75 said:

When you say BYUPD... Are you saying they have their own Police Department?

Yes. The BYU PD has no role (that I know of) in Honor Code enforcement, only in enforcing city, state, and federal laws and protecting BYU's private property.

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20 minutes ago, MormonGator said:

How strict is the honor code? If I get a speeding ticket would I be kicked out?

No. The Honor Code is pretty specific. I'm sure a quick Google search will give it to you in full.

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3 minutes ago, Vort said:

No. The Honor Code is pretty specific. I'm sure a quick Google search will give it to you in full.

I did. It said "obedience to the law" is one of the rules. A speeding ticket is a violation of the law. I'm glad they aren't THAT strict, because I'm sure that ever some high ups in the church have gotten speeding tickets before! 

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2 hours ago, The Folk Prophet said:

It just strikes me as an untruth. The act requires a certain level of violence (because it is "force"), but the implication that it is an act of violence comes across that it's more motivated by violence. That's the part I don't believe. So really it's probably just semantics.

Got ya.  I definitely agree with what you are saying; I do think it is semantics.

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