BYU Honor Code changes

[Vort]

Just now, MormonGator said:

I was much blonder in my late teens/early 20's, so I could basically go six months without shaving and no one would notice! 

I had such light facial hair that I could easily get by shaving only twice a week.

Most such "HC violations" were cleared up by someone appearing at the honor code office all clean-shaven. I'm sure they dealt with such things a lot, and I assume the honor code office people had a sense of humor about such things.

[Guest MormonGator]

Just now, Vort said:

I had such light facial hair that I could easily get by shaving only twice a week.

Most such "HC violations" were cleared up by someone appearing at the honor code office all clean-shaven. I'm sure they dealt with such things a lot, and I assume the honor code office people had a sense of humor about such things.

Understand. My first college (I left after my sophomore year and graduated from UNH) had no appearance code. You could have tattoos, facial hair, girls could sunbathe wearing bikinis in the quad. But in theory if you broke one of the rules about girls/guys being where they shouldn't after hours you could get in trouble. Though I think the trouble was "just" a fine/community service. 

[mordorbund]

5 hours ago, Just_A_Guy said:

That wasn’t my experience, MG.  For me there wasn’t really an element of fear, because I knew I was being a good boy and I was less concerned about notions like “procedural due process” than I am now.  And I didn’t see people going about looking for breaches. 

Although—and I never thought much about this at the time—but when Just_A_Girl and I were dating, we would often talk in her apartment until midnight (at which time I, being a male, had to leave the apartment); and then we’d move into the hallway outside the apartment and talk for another hour or two.  I remember one night, sitting in the hallway chatting, and around 12:30 the door of the apartment across the hall opened just a crack and swiftly shut again.  This happened again and again, probably, every five or ten minutes for the next hour.  At length the door opened completely, and the female resident emerged and asked if we were “hall monitors”.  We, of course, denied this (I had never heard of such a thing at BYU).  Eventually we managed to convince this young lady that Just_A_Girl was simply a neighbor talking to her boyfriend; whereupon the door opened a bit wider and a young man sheepishly exited the apartment and beat a hasty retreat.

You know, the more family stories you share the more I wonder where you have room to hang your suits when you get home.

 

[JohnsonJones]

Anonymous reporting was basically along the same lines of whistleblowers.  It was to avoid the obvious lynching that some would have.

My son-in-law went to BYU.  One of his semesters there was the worst he ever had at any location (including the military, even the military didn't have as much going on in the dorms as what happened in this apartment apparantly).  His apartment had every last roommate drinking, doing drugs, and being rather promiscuous.  Now, he did not report it, I suppose that's just not the way he does things, but he did NOT enjoy going to the location he lived at (he did not participate in these activities).  Eventually, luckily, someone DID report it.  He came back from Christmas break to find an empty apartment (well, except for himself who had suddenly become it's lone occupant).  No one knew who reported it, but he was glad someone had.  The last group that had wanted to report them had gotten attacked by the people of the apartment (and their friends) and it had turned out rather badly, with police knowing of the attack but unable to press specific charges against specific individuals  (attack was at night in the dark).

It is for THAT specific reason, to allow people to report gross violations of the honor code that such anonymity was permitted.  Of course, in such situations, verifications of such activity was also probably rather easy to obtain if an investigation was done over any length of time (afterall, beer cans and cigarettes in the trash along with other materials is pretty easy to figure out what is going on or at least build up evidence).

I can see reasons for allowing someone to confront their accusers...IF formal charges are brought up and it seems things are going forward, but there are also times when anonymity is also probably a good thing which also allows valid concerns or actual violations to be reported without fear of reprisals on the witness or witnesses to the situation.

The other problem that can pop up is once one knows the person who says they saw something...counter accusals seem to pop up pretty commonly.  These can be even more problematic in whether they are actually true or false in many situations.

The other two changes seem common sense.  Knowing what you are accused of allows one to actually create their defense or at least be aware, and knowing the process also seems like it should be something one should be made aware of.

People breaking the rules and laws who are caught in it seem to want to bring others down, and if they feel someone is accusing them who may actually be innocent is the one making the accusations, they will actually lie through their teeth to try to bring that person down with them.  There are ways to deal with this in the US legal system (though in some cases it can be costly), but I'm not sure if there will be such a system in place at the BYU Honor Code office.  If nothing else, such things could weigh down the office with a lot more baseless accusations than what already went through it. 

Overall, not bad changes, and some with common sense, with a slight worry or two tossed in.

The thing that bothers me a LOT MORE about the changes is this.  Take a look at those who were actually protesting this.  A LOT of those people didn't look like students.  They actually looked like they came from off campus from other areas specifically to protest the Honor Code that they, themselves, were not under.  This feels like many recent things that have occurred, but this more so in that it feels as if BYU is bending the knee to social pressures from those who are not even students at BYU, rather than actually seeing what the majority of BYU students (who signed, agreed to live it, and are adhering to the Honor Code) actually feel about the matter.

Edited May 17, 2019 by JohnsonJones