Zero tolerance for racist chant

CNN reports on our latest national scandal:

Even with the national chapter shutting the Sigma Alpha Epsilon house at the University of Oklahoma, the school president said the university's affiliation with the fraternity is permanently done as a campus group called for the expulsion of fraternity members.

The members have until midnight Tuesday to get their things out of the house, university President David Boren said in a Monday afternoon news conference.

"The house will be closed, and as far as I'm concerned, they won't be back," he said, adding that the university is exploring what actions it can take against individual fraternity members.

A Saturday video showing party-bound fraternity members on a bus chanting a racial epithet found its way anonymously to the school newspaper and a campus organization, which both promptly publicized the nine-second clip.

The students on the bus clap and pump their fists as they boisterously chant, "There will never be a ni**** SAE. You can hang him from a tree, but he can never sign with me."

By Sunday night, SAE's national chapter had suspended the University of Oklahoma members and threatened lifelong suspensions for anyone responsible for the chant, but Boren took it a step further.

Wait a minute. This was a 9-second video clip! I would have said that it is impossible to get the whole country mad at you from a 9-second video.

The punishment is against the whole fraternity, including members who were not involved. And punished for life.

I may get into trouble for saying this, but I do not believe that anyone should be punished for privately expressing their personal opinions about who they want to associate with, regardless of how offensive those opinions might be.

The former LA Clippers owner was forced out of the NBA for private opinions of who his paid mistress should associate with. That was bad enuf, but these are just partying college students who could have been joking, for all we know.

Even if they favor segregation, or slavery, or deporting blacks to Africa, or any other racist opinion, that should be their right. Certain types of discrimination in employment, housing, and a few other areas are illegal, but this action is purely against expressing an opinion.

And maybe not even an opinion. No one has  bothered to ask these boys whether it was really their opinion, or they were just reciting a chant.

I think that if a bunch of white racists in Oklahoma want to have their own little all-white private club, then the blacks and liberals should be happy that those people have separated themselves from the community so that their presence will not bother anyone.

One trouble with this is that I do not what most white people think of blacks. Many express anti-racist views, but are they just saying that to avoid the thought police?

The country Jordan does not truly have free speech:

Earlier this month, Jordan's Information Minister Mohammad Al-Momani told a conference that freedom of expression can contribute to stopping radicalization.

On the very same day, a military court in the capital Amman sentenced a man to 18 months in prison for a Facebook post that was seen as insulting a friendly country, the United Arab Emirates.

Okay, that is Jordan, but I thought that Oklahoma was better than that.

Here is another story of someone being punished before the facts are in:

In a stunning move just two days before the season-opening Daytona 500, NASCAR suspended Kurt Busch indefinitely on Friday after a judge said the former champion almost surely strangled and beat an ex-girlfriend last fall and there was a "substantial likelihood" of more domestic violence from him in the future.

NASCAR said Busch would not be allowed to race or participate in any NASCAR activities until further notice given the "serious nature of the findings and conclusions" made by the Delaware judge. ...

In a 25-page opinion explaining why he issued the no-contact order this week, Family Court Commissioner David Jones concluded that it was more likely than not that Busch abused Patricia Driscoll ...

So his race-car career is over because of some stupid family court commissioner has an opinion about what is "more likely than not", and that there is a "substantial likelihood" that he do something bad in the future?!

As I keep complaining, no one believes in innocence until proven guilty, and people are guilty in family court for what they might do in the future.

Busch has denied the alleged assault, which is the subject of a separate criminal investigation, ...

[Commissioner] Jones noted that [girlfriend] Driscoll presented false testimony that conflicted with that of a chaplain who saw her immediately after the alleged assault and said he didn't see any marks or bruises on her. Jones nevertheless said he didn't believe Driscoll's false testimony amounted to perjury or intentional falsehood. ...

Busch's attorneys filed a motion late Thursday asking Jones to re-open the Family Court hearing so that they can present testimony from three acquaintances of Driscoll who they say were previously reluctant to get involved but have now come forward to contradict statements Driscoll has made about her relationship with Busch.

So he denies the charges, the girlfriend was proved to be a liar, and he has not been criminally charged or convicted of anything.

The judge [ie, the commissioner] concluded that Busch did not appear to be a prototypical batterer who uses violence to subjugate or control, but that the incident instead was most likely a "situational" event in which Busch was unable to cope and to control his tendency to act out violently in response to stress and frustration, causing him to "snap."

At the same time, however, Jones said he believes there's real possibility that Busch will lash out again.

"Given respondent's passion for his racing career and his intemperate and frequently violent reactions to seemingly minor racing setbacks, the court finds that there exists a likelihood of future acts of domestic violence against petitioner in the event that respondent's racing career is damaged or destroyed as the result of his having been found to have committed an act of domestic violence in this case or any subsequent criminal prosecution," Jones wrote.

Jones added that because Busch has a propensity to lose control in response to disappointing or frustrating situations involving racing and that those who love him are likely to be around him at those times "there is a substantial likelihood of acts of domestic violence by respondent against future intimate partners.

So this family court commissioner is psychoanalyzing him based on him being a race-car driver. This speculation is that he might lose a future race, become irritable, and take it out of a future intimate partner!

So not only does this commissioner pre-judge Busch in a way to destroy his racing career, he punishes Busch for how he might react to his racing career being unfairly destroyed!

Family court judges rarely spell out such crazy reasoning, but I wonder how often they do it. That is, a judge takes a dad's kids away, and then is reluctant to give the kids back because the dad is probably angry about his kids being unfairly taken away.

If NASCAR thinks that he lacks the temperament or safe practices to the point where he is a hazard to other drivers or fans, then I could understand suspending him for bad behavior. But a family court commissioner trying to protect some future girlfriend who might be trying to comfort him after a loss? This is crazy. It is like that movie about pre-crime. Or wrecking his racing career based on false testimony from his girlfriend, and then justifying wrecking his career because of how upset he might be at having his career wrecked by false testimony? The world has gone mad. I wonder if anyone in the NASCAR world is defending Busch.

Update: A free speech law professor says that it would be unconstitutional to expel the students, and sticks to that after OU does expel them.

My guess is that Boren has already made a deal with some prosecutor to charge these kids with a hate crime. If they can be coerced to pleading guilty to some misdemeanor, then the university will be vindicated.