posted
It seems too easy by far to denigrate things that we don't comprehend. You call it "lawyeresk obfuscation" but people manage to spend lifetimes learning and working in that field.
If you want to be anti-intellectual, that's your call. But you run the risk of missing out on some incredibly interesting and subtle arguments that actually DO matter if one is interested in having a fair and comprehensive system of laws.
That's not to say that this particular set of laws is objectively "good" "bad" or even "neutral." I'm just saying that if you let yourself label legal arguments as "obfuscation" instead of actually trying to think them through, you may be missing something important and meaningful.
Essentially, what you've told us, Sam, is that you have a strongly held opinion, but you can't really express why it is the right one, other than you "feel it." That's okay, as far as it goes, but it's not really very enlightening or convincing.
And, ultimately, I'd rather listen to someone who CAN back up their opinions before agreeing to a bunch of "reforms."
Moan about the world all you want, but you should at least consider that one of the reasons you may feel victimized is that you set yourself to be blind-sided in ignorance. That's easily remedied, but it's a lot more difficult than just being angry about things or railing against the status quo.
Posts: 300 | Registered: Dec 2002
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posted
So are you saying that we don't have a problem in our schools and that there are not depredations committed against children there? Because that is the real issue and not whether or not I like to take cheap shots at lawyers.
And yes, I do have a strongly held opinion - against anyone who hurts children. Now tell me that that opinion is out of line.
[ January 22, 2007, 12:12 AM: Message edited by: Samuel Bush ]
Posts: 631 | Registered: Oct 1999
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quote:Originally posted by Samuel Bush: And yes, I do have a strongly held opinion - against anyone who hurts children. Now tell me that that opinion is out of line.
[after rethinking, I edited it out for rudeness]
I think this statement grossly oversimplifies taking care of kids in general. I do, however, think we all agree that sexual assault of children is wrong.
I'm not sure what grandstanding about that does, other than obscure the issue at hand.
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For me, what breaks my heart is that four boys have been violated in the worst way a person can be. It just, it absolutely breaks my heart. Posts: 208 | Registered: Jun 2005
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quote:Originally posted by Samuel Bush: So are you saying that we don't have a problem in our schools and that there are not depredations committed against children there? Because that is the real issue and not whether or not I like to take cheap shots at lawyers.
And yes, I do have a strongly held opinion - against anyone who hurts children. Now tell me that that opinion is out of line.
Engaging in a little obfuscation of your own? Show me where I said anything about thinking the rape of children is a good thing.
And if you are trying to paint everyone who disagrees with you on how the law works as somehow "pro rape" that IS obfuscation and a lazy way to debate any topic. Unless your point is something else here?
You assumptions about the "depredations" at school is neither here nor there. Unless your solution involves making sure that children never have any unsupervised time anywhere, you are going to have to contend with bullying and much of the petty stuff that you level against "schools." If your solution is more supervision, then you should work towards that and find ways to fund it. The more serious problems are indeed real problems. Not every school administration deals with them the way this principal decided to. Overgeneralizing doesn't make for a reasonable viewpoint either.
Posts: 300 | Registered: Dec 2002
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posted
If you got down to the bottom of Dag's quote, the judge was only saying that the 14th ammendment wasn't the part that applied. He never said what happened was ok or not illegal. It just didn't apply to what they were suing for.
Dag isn't saying we don't have the facts of what happened to the children. (Although it's still possible we don't, no matter how clear that part of the article was.) He was saying the reporter didn't tell us exactly what the school is being sued for and under which law.
The judge and defense lawyer's comments obviously made sense to them when they said them. They don't make a lot of sense to us. It's most reasonable to assume that we're missing the context of the comments.
Posts: 2283 | Registered: Dec 2003
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quote:I made no such allegation of anyone being “deprived” of anything.
You made an allegation that the students were deprived of their right to defend themselves right here:
quote:Oh, and another thing, if a student tried to protect himself or his parents tried to protect him they would end up in jail. So you can’t protect yourself and the school won’t protect you and the cops won‘t protect you. Well, I guess that is what school is for - to teach students about the real world.
You did it again in the same post you claimed to not have done it:
quote:I was also suggesting the hypothesis that we are becoming increasingly unable (or not permitted) to protect our children, and that schools are becoming increasingly unable (or unwilling or maybe even not permitted) to protect our children
quote:I also can’t tell if the above court case that Dagonee cited (with it’s "deprivation of liberty" argument and all) has any parallel to the Allentown case. It looks like lawyeresk obfuscation to me. But the Allentown case probably has plenty of lawyeresk obfuscation too. I’ve never learned much legal jargon so I just don’t know.
It's not obfuscation. It's precision. Too often, people here about something horrible government has done and assume it must be unconstitutional. We don't - no should we - live in a country where judges and juries use some vague "this is horrible" standard when deciding cases.
quote:As for whether or not this Allentown article was poor reporting or there is not enough information, I don’t know. But unless Matt Birkbeck of The Morning Call was flat out lying, (oops, I mean “spinning“ the facts) the article seemed pretty clear : Someone fouled up.
Yes, but we knew that. Not one person here has argued that the school acted correctly. What we don't know from the article is what provision of the federal law or constitution the district is claiming does not create a duty to protect children. We know there are many provisions of the law that do create such obligations. Which means it is almost certain that those laws weren't the ones being sued under.
quote:It is not unreasonable to wonder if there are a lot of things the article is not telling us that we would need to know in order to draw a reasonable and intelligent conclusion.
It's not only no unreasonable, we KNOW that there is at least one crucial thing left out of the article: the cause of action. Without that, no one can draw a reasonable and intelligent conclusion about the district's legal argument. I can - and have - made what I think to be reasonable and intelligent suppositions, which are essentially "conclusions with an if."
Imagine you hear about a person who admits - in court, in front of his lawyer - to going into a home, beating up the occupants so that they are paralyzed for life, and stealing all their stuff. Then you find out the judge threw the case out of court. Shock! Outrage! Impeach the judge!
Until you later hear that the prosecutor had charged him with murder and no other crime, even though no one had died.
Posts: 26071 | Registered: Oct 2003
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posted
I'm going to side with AvidReader above. The legal rulings that we directly and indirectly cited here deal with one specific issue, and do not decide the case as a whole.
I picture a legal proceeding going on and the Victim's lawyer asserting that the victim has a Constitutional right to protection. The School's lawyer then says that there is no Constitutional right to this type of protection. Then the courts is ajourned while the respective lawyers go off and write legal briefs citing their arguments. The Judge review each legal arguement, and rules. Then they come back to court and argue new issues.
My point again is that the whole issue of right and wrong, legal and illegal, does not hinge on this one specific item. Once the various Constitutional aspects are resolved, then they can raise other issues and act on those.
This process can go on until the lawyers run out of ideas for things to argue about. That's why these court cases can drag out for years, because each individual issue raised needs to be resolved before the proceeding can move forward.
I say that independant of any Constitutional issue, the school clearly broke several laws, and further failed in it's implied obligation, which I would consider an implied contract, to provide a minimum level of security to students while those students are under their care.
So, the school can still be sued independant of the 'constitutional issue', they just can not be sue using that constitutional issue as the foundation for the law suit.
Other issue can come into play; for example -
Due Care or Diligence - the conduct that a reasonable man or woman will exercise in a particular situation, in looking out for the safety of others. If one uses due care then an injured party cannot prove negligence. This is one of those nebulous standards by which negligence is tested. Each juror has to determine what a "reasonable" man or woman would do.
Implied Contract - an agreement which is found to exist based on the circumstances when to deny a contract would be unfair and/or result in unjust enrichment to one of the parties.
Carrying out or covering up a criminal activety -
Again, I'm not saying these are good arguements, I'm just pointing out that resolving one specific issue of contention does not resolve the entire law suit.
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