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After a Legal Fight, Oberlin Says It Will Pay $36.59M to a Local Bakery

nytimes.com

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Re: After a Legal Fight, Oberlin Says It Will Pay $36.59M to a Local Bakery

#151

Post by tptacek »

woooooo wrote: post #150
tptacek wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is no requirement that Oberlin learn anything here. The law pretty severely limits the extent to which civil damages can be used to teach lessons, as we just learned from the Alex Jones case: punitive damages are capped, constitutionally, at some low multiple of economic damages. It is an enormous defamation award, regardless of how you feel about where it leaves Oberlin.

Maybe we could hold Oberlin to a higher standard than Alex Jones? If their goal is to make a total joke of the movements they support, they're doing a bang-up job. If their goal us anything else, maybe they should try and learn something.

It has nothing to do with the relative standards, and everything to do with the idea of not allowing the courts to impose arbitrary punishments, a capability that would with absolute and perfect certainty be abused to target disfavored people and organizations.

Re: After a Legal Fight, Oberlin Says It Will Pay $36.59M to a Local Bakery

#152

Post by remarkEon »

rayiner wrote: post #138
tptacek wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would have thought the same thing, a year ago. It's a low-effort provocation either way, though. The thread has nothing whatsoever to do with Saudi Arabia.

When someone points out a problem with healthcare in America, others always chime in with “we should have socialized healthcare like Sweden.” This is in the same thing, except the premise is that maybe Saudi Arabia and other Sharia law countries are on to something. The affluent, privileged Oberlin students profiled in the article don’t even feel shame about stealing from local small businesses. That suggests not onl…

I (mostly) find myself agreeing with you on this website, and I see what point you're making by referencing healthcare, but that's not at all relevant.

To steelman your argument, you're concerned about proliferation of, essentially, tomfoolery and pilferage amongst the young. Because of changing or weakening of cultural norms, or because of some other reason (maybe poverty or class divides or some such explanation). I mostly share these concerns, to be honest, because in the last 2 years I've started to see the apathy present in younger co-workers that have joined the company I'm at. The problem I have with your comparison is that ... no one wants to be like Saudi Arabia except the Saudis. Older iterations of Civilization had much more draconian enforcement of law because, and this is just my personal opinion based on my own reading of history, the stakes were a lot higher. Stealing someone's coin or robbing them of their livestock literally killed the victim (usually very slowly and very very miserably), and so, in a way that I understand, it made sense for the penalty for such a transgression to be as or nearly as extreme as the cost to the victim.

I'm not sure what purpose it would serve to bring that back, since the stakes are demonstrably not that high. I realize you're not arguing for that, and are making a broader point. I'm trying to think of constructive ways to explain to these kids that "stealing is bad", but then I just realize that the problem isn't the kids, it's the Professors and the University, and redirect my criticism toward those institutions instead.

Re: After a Legal Fight, Oberlin Says It Will Pay $36.59M to a Local Bakery

#153

Post by fortran77 »

tptacek wrote: post #137
fortran77 wrote: post #42

Quoted post unavailable.

That's a clownish thing to say, and suggests that you're unlikely to be in a position to hire Oberlin grads. The rationale you provide downthread, that you found a Twitter thread with Oberlin students complaining about the verdict, doesn't help your argument much.

Yes, I'm in a position to hire. Your prejudices are extreme.

Re: After a Legal Fight, Oberlin Says It Will Pay $36.59M to a Local Bakery

#154

Post by tptacek »

fortran77 wrote: post #153
tptacek wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a clownish thing to say, and suggests that you're unlikely to be in a position to hire Oberlin grads. The rationale you provide downthread, that you found a Twitter thread with Oberlin students complaining about the verdict, doesn't help your argument much.

Yes, I'm in a position to hire. Your prejudices are extreme.

If that's the case, it's only because you say things like "I'll never hire an Oberlin grad" anonymously, rather than signing your name to it.

Re: After a Legal Fight, Oberlin Says It Will Pay $36.59M to a Local Bakery

#155

Post by StanislavPetrov »

kevin_thibedeau wrote: post #43

> Carmen Twillie Ambar: archaic chase-and-detain policy regarding suspected shoplifters was the catalyst for the protests. If you witness a crime you can arrest the criminal. It's basic civics. Something you might find about in an institution of higher learning. Don't know if they have one of those in Oberlin.

Unfortunately a certain segment of people reject the agency of individuals, and see things only in terms of "identity". If someone who is considered part of a "marginalized" group commits a crime, this segment of the population doesn't put the responsibility for the crime on the individual, but on social and historical grievances suffered by whatever "marginalized" demographic the criminal has been arbitrarily assigned. Ironically (but unsurprisingly) it is is lost on this segment that it is incredibly demeaning to treat people like they have no agency or autonomy, and are simply agents of their environment.

Re: After a Legal Fight, Oberlin Says It Will Pay $36.59M to a Local Bakery

#156

Post by alsaaro »

googlryas wrote: post #147
alsaaro wrote: post #139

This judgement is problematic on so many fronts, most concerning is it chills free speech, and attaches popular moral precepts to political speech. Oberlin is now responsible for the speech of its adult students and now must censor them in a Ministry of Truth like role to avoid civil liability. Must they also censor researchers debunking the efficacy of drugs in trials causing financial harm to Big Pharma? Gibson's m…

Not at all. What Oberlin isn't allowed to do is the same thing it wasn't allowed to do before - help organize a boycott of a legitimate business based on libelous accusations. The students can still do whatever they want to the extent that the institution chooses to not punish them.

You can organize a boycott for any conceivable reason, the reason doesn't have to make logical sense, be politically correct, or moral.

Do you believe business are entitled to your money? And if they no longer earn your business they should be able to sue you?

This perversity happened during the Civil Rights movement, white business owners sued blacks who caused them financial losses for refusing to patronize their racist establishments.

Re: After a Legal Fight, Oberlin Says It Will Pay $36.59M to a Local Bakery

#157

Post by woooooo »

tptacek wrote: post #151
woooooo wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe we could hold Oberlin to a higher standard than Alex Jones? If their goal is to make a total joke of the movements they support, they're doing a bang-up job. If their goal us anything else, maybe they should try and learn something.

It has nothing to do with the relative standards, and everything to do with the idea of not allowing the courts to impose arbitrary punishments, a capability that would with absolute and perfect certainty be abused to target disfavored people and organizations.

I was more on the "what has Oberlin learned" part of it.

Re: After a Legal Fight, Oberlin Says It Will Pay $36.59M to a Local Bakery

#158

Post by alsaaro »

crackercrews wrote: post #148
alsaaro wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One lesson potentially learned... Oberlin and its students must comply with local "speech codes" or face being sued into non existence. And people think "woke" political correctness is bad, at least the snowflakes use speech to counter speech, rather than courts.

"local speech codes" = not slandering? Pretty sure that applies everywhere.

Who speaks for Oberlin, how can a college slander?

"local speech codes" = whatever offends the sensibilities of small town Ohioans.

Re: After a Legal Fight, Oberlin Says It Will Pay $36.59M to a Local Bakery

#159

Post by TMWNN »

googlryas wrote: post #39
spamizbad wrote: post #6

Is there more to this story? I'm honestly pretty shocked by this. The college basically got into hot water for having its Dean show up at a protest holding a flyer.

That's what you would take away if you read Oberlin's take on the matter: https://www.oberlin.edu/news-and-events/bakery-litigation/10... However, they don't mention any of the emails/texts that came out between administrators for some reason, which is what put the nail in the coffin for Oberlin. If you read the FAQ by the prosecution, you'll see that almost all of the fun details are in the private communications be…

>However, they don't mention any of the emails/texts that came out between administrators for some reason, which is what put the nail in the coffin for Oberlin.

Yes, I was "amused" to see Oberlin's FAQ on the case (https://www.oberlin.edu/news-and-events/bakery-litigation/fa...>) describe Raimondo's texts as

>Yes. Some senior administrators and faculty did use unprofessional language in a few text messages and emails well after the protest. Appropriate disciplinary action was taken in response to this behavior.

I doubt that.

Re: After a Legal Fight, Oberlin Says It Will Pay $36.59M to a Local Bakery

#160

Post by SpelingBeeChamp »

etempleton wrote: post #111
pc86 wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even if it were to come out of the endowment, it's what, 2-3% total? I don't know how much universities typically pull out of an endowment each year but a 3% total drop can't impact yearly budgets in any meaningful way.

Almost all endowment money is restricted, meaning it is earmarked for a specific purpose by donors. They can’t just pay out of the endowment. They would have to pay out of their operating revenue, which is probably not a reality because that is budgeted to the dollar. So my guess is insurance may have paid the bill, but Oberlin will pay over time in the form of high premiums or something else. The biggest punishment…

> Almost all endowment money is restricted, meaning it is earmarked for a specific purpose by donors. They can’t just pay out of the endowment.

I doubt that distinction protects the funds from a judgment creditor. The endowment money belongs to the university. Even though the university can only spend it in a certain way, that is an internal matter between the university and its donors. If the university did not have other funds from which to pay the judgment, I doubt the endowment money is protected just because it wasn't earmarked for "in case you lose a lawsuit."

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