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Comic Strip of the Day

CSotD: Delayed Justice moves forward

Published: January 27, 2016 1 minute 9 comments

Marlette
Andy Marlette comments on Florida State University's settlement of a lawsuit stemming from the (alleged) rape of a student by Jameis Winston, their Heisman-winning star quarterback, and the cartoon is of interest on several levels.

To start with, I'm dismissing the "sports sucks" element.

I don't like modern dance and would rather be staked to an anthill than forced to attend a dance recital, but I don't categorically condemn it as "sucking," though I will admit that I was never shoved into a locker by a barefoot person in a leotard, so your mileage may vary.

However, if the dance department of a major university were permitted to run rampant, that would indeed suck: Not the art form, but the way it's administered. And that's very much the point here.

Meanwhile, the overall, relevant-to-this-blog, level is that it shows good handling of the essential need to simplify commentary for the single-panel format.

I like the idea that Winston bears some responsibility for what the college has been put through, and for the $950,000 settlement, plus whatever legal costs they've spent on the case.

On the other hand, while putting the $950,000 into the caption was necessary as part of that simplification, I'm not in favor of making it all the fault of a rogue individual, because the lawsuit was not over the (alleged) rape. It was over how the university responded to the allegation of rape.

And, by implication, whether Jameis Winston was all that "rogue."

StatePennWhich is the point at which we start down a twisting rabbit hole, starting with the tail-wagging-the-dog nature of revenue-producing college sports. That was what played out in the Penn State case of a pederast protected by the Good Old Boy Network, a cover-up, it should be noted, that ended up costing PSU a good deal more than $950,000. 

And, while the legal issues in a cover up may involve "what did they know and when did they know it," moral justice — and NCAA regulations — involve "what should they have known and when should they have known it."

In the NCAA rule book, it's called exercising "adequate oversight" over the program.

In the court of moral justice, it falls under "How many times can a man turn his head, and pretend that he just doesn't see?" and the follow-up question is "How many more injustices could have been prevented?"

Again, let's not get distracted by stereotypes and prejudice: There are, absolutely, plenty of college athletes who use their talents and skills to finance their educations.

The vast majority of college athletes, even at the Division I level, never get anywhere near a professional career and many who do make it in the pros remain good, decent people.

However, that doesn't mean that a particular player is a rogue, if he is attending a university at which not only is talent placed above character, but where allegedly the alleged atmosphere of the alleged team allegedly makes that allegedly clear.

And Florida State's record — on the police blotter, that is, not the gridiron — does suggest a willingness to look the other way.

But the issue is broader than that.

For example, while Winston appears to have gotten away with shoplifting, there are college towns where things that would get a townie arrested result in a student being turned over to the dean for discipline, as well as campuses where the laws on underage drinking are all but ignored. That's changing, but the factor remains in play.

It's also worth noting that, when a geology major gets busted for anything less than murder, it is rarely picked up by the national press.

And, getting back to accusations of sexual assault, while athletic departments may put more resources into protecting their proteges, it's hardly the case that the laws are universally applied with adequate rigor to other students.

Colleges are dealing with it, but they haven't got an answer.

Maybe a few more lawsuits, not over what happened (which can be hard to prove) but — as in this case — over how it was handled (which tends to leave a trail) would help grease the wheels of justice for all involved.

I think it would be nice if Winston chipped in to help his alma mater pay for the results of his actions, assuming their liability insurance won't do that.

But he seems more of a co-conspirator than a rogue.

 

On A Far Brighter Note

K Chronicles
Keith Knight has been focusing on issues of racial justice and the police to a level where, while I approve of his passion, I've been missing his other commentary. Well, boo-hoo for me. His latest K Chronicles shows that focused creative pressure, applied with reason, can pay off.

It's particularly encouraging that Keef hasn't throttled back on his anger and outrage. This invitation to collaborate can hardly have been based on his willingness to be compliant.

Certainly, as he says, it's not like getting through to one chief of one police department in one town is going to solve the problem across the country.

But it sure beats hell out of not getting through to anyone, doesn't it?

Justice delayed is justice denied, but you need to start somewhere, some time.

So a cartoonist visits with a police chief who wants to make things better.

And the legal system threatens to slap the crap out of a university that didn't.

And we make some progress towards justice, still delayed, but no longer as effectively denied.

 

 

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Comments 9

  1. Great post today. Love the reference to Blowing In The Wind. And despite being a fairly well read person and semi news junkie … I had no idea regarding the sex parties for recruits at Louisville. Disgusting …

  2. Even though the majority of student athletes may be model citizens, the simple fact remains that most major universities need these guys for income and prestige, thanks in no small part to the absurd numbers paid out to televise the “games”. A coach making three times more than a school’s head administrator is patently absurd; the very fact that most of the money raised by the athletic department *stays* in the athletic department (which means lavish training rooms for the guys while the science departments have to go begging) pushes absurdity over the edge.
    But hey, that’s how it all rolls these days, so no surprise when I read about this or that college quarterback getting busted for taking a loaded handgun into a bar (in a state that presumably doesnt allow it) and drun kenly shooting up the place or another one (allegedly) raping someone and being pretty much able to just walk away. It’s a disgusting system, but with all the money involved, no one seems especially inclined to change things.
    Gotta live with what ya got, right?

  3. I never much cared for geology majors.

  4. They certainly screwed up the curve in the “Rocks for Jocks” course.

  5. Sean – completely agree 100%. Brian – which there were a “like” button!

  6. I thought better of posting this yesterday, but what the hell. … I attended two universities, one for college and one for grad school, and both were Division III operations–i.e., no athletic scholarships. Neither are hurting for money at all (though that doesn’t, of course, prevent the mail asking for alumni to fork some over). As I get old(er) and more and more curmudgeonly, I wonder why they can’t all be that way. What would be wrong with denying federal research grants to institutions that persisted in the athletic-scholarship business? Could the lure of TV money offset that?
    Universities are presumably supposed to be “institutions of higher learning”; and if students are uninterested in learning and are using the colleges merely as minor leagues for a career in sports, I say let them skip college and let the professional basketball and football teams–who can certainly afford it–establish their own minor leagues to develop players, à la baseball.
    This wouldn’t stop athletes who really want an education from attending college (most state colleges will admit almost anyone from their state, and anyone who really wants to attend a particular college could actually try to meet the admission requirements and perhaps qualify for an academic scholarship rather than relying solely on athletic ability), and it wouldn’t stop colleges from fielding teams (both of the places I attended had them). It would, however, curtail the current sham of “student athletes”, and the TV networks would doubtless continue to broadcast college games.
    End of rant.

  7. When I was at Notre Dame, freshmen were not eligible and Notre Dame had a policy against playing bowl games. They also had a clean reputation that was generally held alongside the service academies, Stanford and at least most of the ACC schools.
    A few years before I arrived, a star halfback threw a vending machine down a flight of stairs and was out of school for a full year. We refer to that as “the good old days.”
    My senior year, the NCAA moved to make freshmen eligible. A couple of my friends on the football team shook their heads at that, saying they’d have flunked out if they’d been under that double-pressure to adjust to college courses plus the varsity practice schedule.
    But ND also began playing bowl games, and, while they still don’t have a “jock dorm” or other outward signs of excess, I’m no longer comfortable with what’s going on there. I wouldn’t want to be a vending machine.
    I don’t think there is a logical connection between federal grants and athletics, but I do like the fact that Penn State’s upper administration was nailed for failure to maintain control, and, while FSU’s settlement quelled further inquiry, a few more checks that size should get someone thinking.
    As said, it’s a step in the right direction. We’ll see.
    And I’ve seen Div III sports. Pretty entertaining.
    But they wouldn’t have lured me out to South-freakin-Bend, Indiana. More the fool I, given that there were only five home games anyway.

  8. I agree that there’s no logical connection between federal grants and athletics, but how else is one supposed to convince the university administrations to do something that they clearly don’t want to do? It worked when the feds threatened withholding highway funding to states that didn’t raise the drinking age to 21, and the connection there was pretty spurious, too.

  9. Drinking and highway safety are not separated by a whole lot, but, more to the point, giving the feds a precedent for governing the policies of universities isn’t just a slippery slope — it’s a cataract.
    Private universities are private, state universities fall under the individual states. And if Congress decides the service academies should only play in Div III, they can do that directly rather than through backdoor.
    And they don’t have to provide grants to anyone who wants to study in-vitro fertilization or climate change or the shape of the planet, but I wouldn’t want to suggest to Congress that they start cutting off all funds to a university where a professor told his class that sexual identity is genetically determined.

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