>And this is what is supposed to happen. Unfortunately, there wasn't a conviction (two of the proverbial 10 guilty free), but your sister has far, far, far more credibility than if she contacted law enforcement in 2040 when one of them was in the public spotlight, or about to be promoted. Everything about her and your parents behavior in that situation is very consistent.
Yes she does. That's not the point of my story. The point is that many women today see the end result and they don’t think it’s worth the public shame.
30 years ago in 1982 when a rape investigation could end up with the victim being accused of wanting it because they dressed too slutty.
It’s not about what women should do it’s about what they actually do. The evidence shows that they are very likely not to immediately report assaults.
>Exactly. Assume -- just for a minute -- that Ford is lying.
At what point would she have accused Kavanaugh? 1982? 1983? 1984? 1985? 1986? 1987? 1988? 1989?...2012? 2013?...Jan 2018? Feb 2018? Mar 2018?...Or July 2018?
If she was lying. She was lying in 2012. The potential motive of wanting to sink a SCOTUS nominee, didn’t hold in 2012. And since she didn’t do so publicly, the potential publicity motive didn’t hold then either.
Her testimony isn’t proof, but it’s strong enough evidence that I would pass on the candidate if I were interviewing him for a job.
>Agreed. Or Ford's explanation of a phobia of flying so intense she nearly couldn't leave her hometown.
This explanation?
-------------
Mitchell: I ask that because it’s been reported by the press that you would not submit to an interview with the committee because of your fear of flying. Is that true?
Ford: Well, I was willing—I was hoping that they would come to me. But then realized that was an unrealistic request.
Mitchell: It would have been a quicker trip for me.
[Both laugh.]
Ford: Yes. So, that was certainly what I was hoping, was to avoid having to get on an airplane. But I eventually was able to get up the gumption with the help of some friends, and get on the plane.
-------------
It sounds perfectly reasonable to me. I hate flying, but I fly 2 or 3 times a year for work because they pay me a lot of money to do it. I won’t do it if I can avoid it, but with sufficient motivation I will.
>They were credibly accused, and only by virtue of being a reliable conservative judge, even if excessively emotional, was he confirmed
This is just not the case. Ford had many issues
- She couldn't remember which party it happened at
- She couldn't remember what year it even happened
- She told nobody until 2012 and even then she didn't mention Kavanaugh
- Multiple people she described as her friends denied they knew anything of this event including one who was allegedly at the party
- She lied to the Washington Post when she said she was frustrated that in 2016 she heard that Trump would potentially nominate Kavanaugh. She couldn't have been frustrated in 2016 since Kavanaugh didn't have his name put out until 2017.
- Her parents and siblings would not sign a document in support of her statement. Her family in law did though.
>The FBI got 4500 tips in the 80s, as well as multiple corroborating witnesses and chose not to investigate - presumably because of Kavanaugh's family and the 80s being even worse at investigating or prosecuting rape than they are today.
Prove to me that the police were even informed.
>There are then more recent, similarly corroborated cases of sexual harassment by Kavanaugh which confirm the kind of person he is.
Provide examples.
>So yeah I'm biased, in the sense that I consider a bunch of judges that are clearly uninterested in the law if it ever runs counter to their personal beliefs to be fundamentally unfit to serve
You haven't shown this is the case.
>and I consider a judge that supports an insurrection to be similarly unfit to serve.
Which judge did that? I assume you will say Thomas, but that was his wife. Unless you are going to say that spouses are responsible for everything they do, you can't put that blame on him. Thinking a man should have complete control over what his wife says is a remarkable sexist view.
>Your piss poor attempt at an argument is more reflective of your own bias and unwillingness to consider anything other than your own - based on your comments in other threads - fairly sexist world view.
You are the one making the claim that we should believe women because they are women. That is sexist. I am saying let's ignore their sex and only look at the facts.
>I'm going to assume that you would be one of those jurors that would happily accept and defend the "she was clearly asking for it"/"she's a slut"/"why would she be drinking" rape defense.
Please stop being an idiot. If you genuinely believe I think this then you need to get off the internet and as the kids say touch grass.
>I really hope that you're never put in an employment position giving you any power over women, and I sure as shit hope I never have to work with you - I already have enough shithead "conservative" coworkers w/o adding someone who is at the very least sexist.
I have stated multiple times in these posts (might not have been to you though) that Ford quite possibly was assaulted and Kavanaugh was possibly involved.
Instead of just asking my view on this you just assumed what I believe and had the audacity to call me a sexist. I'm not sure if you are implying I would rape a women with your statement about having power over a women or not but whatever you are trying to say is disgusting. I will never rape a women or be sexist to her. I think all rapists are terrible and the minimum punishment they should get is life in prison with no parole.
You are the bigoted person in this conversation. You assumed my entire world view and accused me of disgusting things. That is what a bigot does. You are the shithead not me.
> she said that in the years of knowing Blasey Ford and being friends with her, she already knew that she had a hard time being in enclosed spaces and she also did not enjoy flying
So it's well known to her friends that she doesn't like flying. If she's been lying she's been doing it for some time. It's not something she made up for this situation.
>But to be so frightened to request that multiple Congressmen flys across the country to see you, when you already fly multiple times every year...
It doesn't seem improbably to me. I would literally do the exact same thing.
Despite flying multiple times per year. If a group of people asked me to fly out to meet them, I'd request that they fly out to meet me instead. Particularly if this group of people was likely going to be hostile anyway.
Only if they refused, and I was sufficiently motivated, would I agree to fly out to meet them.
I can fly. I don't like to fly, and if there's a way around it I'll take it. This seems to be exactly what she's saying.
> Now, DeVarney also said in her August conversation with Blasey Ford, Blasey Ford told her a story about how when she was remodeling her home with her husband, she sort of insisted to her husband that every bedroom had to have a door that led to the outside space because otherwise she would feel trapped.
> Now, just a disturbing and noteworthy detail from what she told me, she said that in the years of knowing Blasey Ford and being friends with her, she already knew that she had a hard time being in enclosed spaces and she also did not enjoy flying for this reason because, in her words, an airplane was the ultimate closed space where you cannot get away.
---
> Mitchell: When you were here in the mid — mid-Atlantic area back in August, end of July, August, how did you get here?
> Ford: Also by airplane. I come here once a year during the summer to visit my family.
> Mitchell: OK. In fact, you fly fairly frequently for your hobbies and your — you’ve had to fly for your work. Is that true?
> Ford: Correct, unfortunately.
> Mitchell: I also saw on your C.V. that you list the following interests of surf travel, and you, in parentheses” Hawaii, Costa Rica, South Pacific islands and French Polynesia.” Have you been all to those places?
> Ford: Correct.
> Mitchell: By airplane?
> Ford: Yes.
> Mitchell: And your interests also include oceanography, Hawaiian and Tahitian culture. Did you travel by air as a part of those interests?
> Ford: Correct.
Yes, of course you can be afraid of flying and still fly.
But to be so frightened to request that multiple Congressmen flys across the country to see you, when you already fly multiple times every year...
It's not impossible, just improbable, or spun. Like Renate Alumnius.
> How did a case which apparently was not about sexism come to be so closely related to it?
Because she explicitly called out that the source of the problem was gender discrimination. Whether she was mistaken or whether the investigation failed to find the problem no one knows for sure, but it is not surprising that this case was closing related to sexism when the victim claimed that was the cause.
>I find it quite shocking and incredible that still today, she's casually dismissed as a fabricator.
Is this a joke?
She’s dismissed as a liar because she was a liar. Whoever’s idea it was to falsely present her story as fact, she went along with the lie, for decades.
It would in many ways be the only honest answer. The facts in question are almost a decade ago now. Chelsea is now in many senses a different person. The fine details of her comments could result in the execution of another person.
Anyone who is confident of the fine details from events ten years ago before experiencing a multitude of bad experiences is probably significantly overconfident in their recollection.
> I thought she was exaggerating when she complained about people accusing her of being a media whore
Not to pick on you, but why would you reflexively think her to be exaggerating about being called a media whore? People do that with literally everyone whose public complaints become a news story. And what motive would Amanda Knox have in particular? She was labeled an actual whore for the many years when the case was still in active prosecution.
> It doesn't invalidate the issue or the grievance.
It most certainly does.
In fact, I would argue that the public's opinion of the validity of these grievances hinges on the outcome of these high-profile cases.
It's never a good idea to cry wolf.
edit: I'm not saying she was lying. Hell, I have no idea. What I am saying is that if people view this as a frivolous case or think she is lying, that most certainly does harm to the underlying cause.
> This is basically the "she wore a short dress" defense...
I'm not sure why you characterize the assertion as a "defense". It's a reason.
People do things for reasons. Everyone makes choices based on how they perceive the world and predict the future from there. To flatly ignore circumstance is not constructive.
> charming, pretty women more often than others either get no feedback or get gushed at
Having watched her speak, she is neither.
> Instead, she is being dragged through this bloody mess
I am at a loss in this sentence. In a world where immigrant children drown at sea, we are supposed to think she s actually a victim?
I don't think the reason she didn't get her reality check was her looks, but her family wealth and connections. She got plenty of feedback since WSJ started reporting about her. Her response was even more secrecy pretending there is no elephant in the room.
> she’s a coward and seeking closure by unburdening herself without doing the hard thing and being fully transparent about what happened.
I don’t see how one can draw that conclusion from reading one text she wrote. She can easily have written other articles about the case.
This article isn’t about the fraud or about its correction, but about her soul-searching years later.
I also think the article indicates she has worked on being transparent. She reported the case to the university integrity officer and hired a scientist to check the data.
She also writes “I had barely escaped the shame of having to retract a published article”, which I interpret (that “escaped” makes it a bit ambiguous to me; if that “barely” hadn’t been there I would interpret it as there not being a retraction) as that an article got retracted.
> Why are you holding back information deliberately?
Because her privacy matters a great deal to us. This is not just any ordinary person and it would harm rather than help if this blew up in the media.
> You say she was completely innocent, then why hide the story?
Because even people that are innocent are not always benefiting from having their plight spread out for all the world to see.
> We all at HN, have no idea what the case is.
No, you are wrong in that. There are a few HN'ers that know the real identity and some of the details behind this (pg for one). And I'm pretty sure they'd agree that keeping her identity a secret is of paramount importance with respect to her safety.
> So how can you expect help in such circumstances?
Well, I gambled (rightly it appears) that HN would be capable of judging for itself whether or not we were sincere in our appeal for help and that we had weighed properly the decision to keep her identity a secret.
> We all can make a much bigger difference, if we know the true story behind.
No, you could not. It would satisfy some curious people but it would not make a material difference. If this situation is not resolved in a positive way in short order and with the main protagonists' permission we may still have to do this, but if and when that happens it means we have lost the current battle.
> Get the story to the Front Page, someone will push to the right person and the media will act fast.
It may come to that yet. Better hope with us that it will not come to that.
> Ultimately, Ms Balan says, she has doggedly pursued the case for so long because she wants to prove her innocence to her son.
This... does not make any sense? Like, I don't even know about this case, but it's kind of obvious she was let go because Tesla didn't like to hear what she had to say? Why would her own son of all people think she was guilty?
>Given the risks, her lawyer would advise her to avoid making the details of the case public.
>>It's not getting released at this stage to strengthen her legal position.
Did you miss this statement, or simply fail to comprehend it?
> Unless you have years of experience in law, you have no business scrutinizing evidence.
I'm glad to hear it. This is a valid option! We should rely on the experts and refrain from making any judgments based on this until those experts reach a determination.
Wait, no, you're just another person who shouts down any views that don't match your own, contributing to insular, prejudiced communities who never communicate or have compassion for each other. Enjoy the state of your country; people like you created it.
Yes she does. That's not the point of my story. The point is that many women today see the end result and they don’t think it’s worth the public shame.
30 years ago in 1982 when a rape investigation could end up with the victim being accused of wanting it because they dressed too slutty.
It’s not about what women should do it’s about what they actually do. The evidence shows that they are very likely not to immediately report assaults.
>Exactly. Assume -- just for a minute -- that Ford is lying. At what point would she have accused Kavanaugh? 1982? 1983? 1984? 1985? 1986? 1987? 1988? 1989?...2012? 2013?...Jan 2018? Feb 2018? Mar 2018?...Or July 2018?
If she was lying. She was lying in 2012. The potential motive of wanting to sink a SCOTUS nominee, didn’t hold in 2012. And since she didn’t do so publicly, the potential publicity motive didn’t hold then either.
Her testimony isn’t proof, but it’s strong enough evidence that I would pass on the candidate if I were interviewing him for a job.
>Agreed. Or Ford's explanation of a phobia of flying so intense she nearly couldn't leave her hometown.
This explanation?
-------------
Mitchell: I ask that because it’s been reported by the press that you would not submit to an interview with the committee because of your fear of flying. Is that true?
Ford: Well, I was willing—I was hoping that they would come to me. But then realized that was an unrealistic request.
Mitchell: It would have been a quicker trip for me. [Both laugh.]
Ford: Yes. So, that was certainly what I was hoping, was to avoid having to get on an airplane. But I eventually was able to get up the gumption with the help of some friends, and get on the plane.
-------------
It sounds perfectly reasonable to me. I hate flying, but I fly 2 or 3 times a year for work because they pay me a lot of money to do it. I won’t do it if I can avoid it, but with sufficient motivation I will.
reply