There is a bizarre case out of New Orleans where Alabama football fan Brian H. Downing has begun serving a two-year sentence for “teabagging” an unconscious LSU fan outside a Bourdon Street restaurant — a vile humiliating act that was videotaped and posted on YouTube. The victim is also suing Downing in tort. Notably, Orleans Parish Criminal District Judge Karen Herman commented at sentencing that he “chose wisely” in accepting the plea bargain — indicating that she would have hit him with an even higher sentence for the disgusting act.
A plea is probably a good idea when you are being tried in New Orleans for abusing an LSU fan in celebrating Alabama defeating the Louisiana school. However, Herman was expressing the sentiment of many inside and outside that state regarding the disgusting behavior.
Downing pleaded guilty in October to two counts of obscenity in return for prosecutors dropping a charge of sexual battery. It was a very good deal for him since the sexual battery charge would have triggered a potential 10 year sentence (though that would be unlikely) and the need to register for life as a sexual offender.
The video below doesn’t show the act but it does show a large crowd of Alabama fans abusing a passed out fan — not a single Alabama fan in the video appears to recognize that they are acting in a cruel and contemptible fashion.
The video offers ample basis for a tort action for the intentional infliction of emotional distress as well as battery. It is unfortunate that more of the fans were not identified to be included in such a tort action.
“Ethics are what you feel at the moment is correct”
No, ethics is “the basic concepts and fundamental principles of right human conduct” and practicing them no matter how that may affect your self-interest in any area. I do understand the mistake because morality and ethics are entwined and subtle, as my definition adds to the confusion. Think of morality as the code while ethics the practice of the code where the code is understood as heirarchical, weighted. Ethics include questioning the code.
Lying is morally wrong, but ethically correct when the question is “any Jews here?”. Adultery is morally wrong but ethically correct in order to save the life of a spouse or child. The latter from a situational ethics question in class regarding a shipwreck and two islands, and by which I irritated a professor because I saw nothing situational in it, relentlessly so.
It isn’t what you “feel” at the moment.
Thanks to Jerry Springer for his inspiring vignettes.
Kudos to the gang at MTV.
Luv to all the rappers for eloquent lyrics.
Noble Piece award to sex in the city.
Why so judgmental about my city? Thought the idea was inclusion…diversity…or is it selectively applicable?
The south does not hold a monopoly on ignorance or intolerance.
Walk the school hall. Have a beer in a bar in Boston.
Hold a conversation with a Kardashian.
Let’s hope the dood ain’t shipped to an Arizona prison …
Gene,
Ethics are what you feel at the moment is correct….. Or in this matter…. If it’d been anybody but an LSU body….. Then they’d probably look the other way….. Like they have a strict moral code in NO…..
Justagurl,
You know what I don’t disagree with you on skank, slut , or whatever (I am laughing at all this but not at you, and mean that sincerely) but I have teenage daughters and they use skank, slut, and more than I ever used in my whole life. Girl social media is so full of this that I fear for the next generation of women, and you can’t blame it on society you have to blame it on the women coming up or you infantilize them. They have to take responsibility.
I’ve had to deal with this from elementary school through HS. The girls (as a group) becoming women today are vicious, vile, and exceed boys in being detestable by the standards I was raised on in the 60s and early 70s. I’ve been told at all three levels of school by VPs that the girls are worse than the boys, including sex labeling and even violence (lower level but more relentless). Women have been the social rule enforcers as much or more so than men. I get a kick about today’s social mythos of men being so simple (sex, food, clean house, and football) because then who the hell are really forcing all the complex social rules on women and men? Just something to think about…
As for this:’I guess that was my point in that women are shamed when doing something like this……. where as men aren’t treated in the same degrading manner…..” No, they more often go to prison.
In fact a woman displaying her labia stands a much less chance of going to prison for a sex crime, and will get fewer years if she does than a man exposing his penis. She’s loose, he’s a deviant. Though both will go on that execrable “sex offenders list”.
At a party of young adults or adolescents, I agree with you, but the labeling is just as likely, even more likely today, to be by other girls than the boys. Socially, girls are really hard on girls. Applies to women too.
Socially we are more forgiving of boys, legally we aren’t. Socially we are less forgiving of girls, legally we are.
Personally, I don’t like bars.
Oh, Junctionshamus – you are spot on!
If you wrote women do it less often or are less likely, I’d go there. The tea-bagging though was more dominance and shaming than sex. Even there, women go there.
—————————
YES….. I should have said LESS likely for sure…..
Now what is so strange is that in the video of the Football fan…..
That boy was arrested….
BUT…. NOBODY called him a slut…. or a Skank…… or any really degrading names……
many of us looked at it as a juvenile prank….
Now…. Thanks to you, I have seen Bottle Girl…..
Now look at how different society treats Bottle Girl… Vs Tea bagging guy…..
I guess that was my point in that women are shamed when doing something like this……. where as men aren’t treated in the same degrading manner…..
I always found it funny that men mooning people does not shock…..
BUT…. women doing the same thing does shock us….
So, women have far MORE shame attached to their sexual organs…
If guy flashes his penis in a joking manner… we laugh…. the guy will be looked at as a joker…. a clown….
If a woman flashes her “Jajayjay” … (I’m using that in the general sense)
WE are shocked by it… and the girl is called a slut….. and she is then degraded by the act…..
WE treat these 2 so differently…..
Justagurl,
“This is something you will NEVER see a woman do….
Women do not get drunk and think that pulling their pants down and preforming sexual acts on people is a good idea….”
We’ve attended some really different parties, I guess. I’ve seen dominate, high libido woman do some really surprising things. (Originally used disgusting, but then I’d have to call fellatio, cunnilingus, and cowgirling disgusting. Just can’t do it.)
The problem is “never”, and thinking that they don’t perform sexual acts on other people. The “good idea” is something I leave to the individual.
If you wrote women do it less often or are less likely, I’d go there. The tea-bagging though was more dominance and shaming than sex. Even there, women go there.
As for this: “NOT ONCE have I seen ANY OF THEM pull out their Vaginas
and say… “hahaha… Watch this!!!! “ God, I hope not. That’s prolapse and requires surgery. Don’t ever pull your vagina out, don’t even try it. Showing labia OTOH is much safer. Internal should stay internal, external is meant to be external and does have display purpose. If I saw a women pull her vagina out I’d likely puke. It’s like pulling out your rectum. It just shouldn’t happen…
You did miss “bottle girl” though, but she never pulled her vagina out. She did put something in it for all to watch.
stay classy alabama
Justagurl, you are correct about frat parties. I personally saw nothing happen in this video that doesn’t happen in every frathouse in every university in this country every football weekend. This stupid and adolescent behaviour seems to be par for the course for frats. HOWEVER. >”This is something you will NEVER see a woman do….<" True again. Women don't have the equipment necessary to 'tea-bag', but there were enough women around, obviously drunk and rowdy, who did nothing whatsoever to discourage the lead idiot. Whether they would or could indulge in the exact same activity is a moot point. By doing nothing to stop the activity, they became complicit in the activity. The problem I have with the article is that the guy was given 2 YEARS for what was a college prank. The LSU fan had drunk so much he was passed out (oh I can hear it now 'blame the victim'). He suffered no harm to his person except that in which he willingly engaged (drinking himself to a stupor). Was HE arrested for 'public intoxication'? The article doesn't mention one way or the other. The sentence was all out of proportion to the offense, but I guess it DOES prove that 'stupid' can be against the law.
Jonathan Swift “Gullivers Travels” an excellent read.
http://www.gutenberg.org/files/829/829-h/829-h.htm
junctionshamus,
Yeah, I bet they do hate “COPS” for Mardi Gras. The Quarter does have that kind of “what happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas” ethic about it. If you can call that an ethic.
Couldn’t this be considered a harmless practical joke? No one was injured, and there were plenty of Yahoos standing around lending approval.
The passed out guy didn’t even get scared. He was just a victim of harmless prankery. ….. (this is snark)
Ps. The Houyhnhnms have left the building,….and the country,.. and I think the entire planet.
I thought tricky dick was dead……
@Gene – Had a friend years ago who was a Jefferson Parish deputy, and augmented Mardi Gras enforcement. He said the directives they got for persons who were passed out, were as follows: Position the individual so they don’t choke on their vomit; and (2) get them out of the gutter, so if it rained, they wouldn’t drown. Other than that, “laissez-faire” at “laissez le bon temps roulez.” He added that, politically speaking, “COPS” (TV program) was the worst thing that happened to Mardi Gras.
bettykath,
If you haven’t been during one of the silly seasons (unfortunately there is more than one), then you haven’t seen what a zoo it is capable of being. Seeing someone passed out is usually not a cause for concern as long as they are moving or breathing on their own.
sports build character. Between the players, the owners and the fans and the type of character they have built someone needs to ask if this constant stream of character moments is what they had in mind.
When you live in States like Louisiana and Alabama what else to you have to cheer about except the local teams? College football is a professional sport, masquerading in the pompous robes of academia, with the players being paid of in pittance with degrees and coaches earning much higher wages than the most distinguished professors at the school.
Football in general is a sport that extols “Macho” values over all else. Part of that package has alcoholic celebrations before and after the game. “Macho” would not be “macho” without male demonstrations of same, while in an inebriated state, which is also a part of “Macho”. Many of the celebrities we celebrate as examples of “macho” gained their reputation by being “hard drinkers”. See Ernest Hemingway, Humphrey Bogart, etc. In many men’s minds, too many perhaps, “macho” and “manly” are interchangeable. Too my mind the entire concept of being “macho” and “manly” are examples of a lack of intelligence and self-awareness. T
his guy is guilty of a tort without doubt and no doubt deserves some criminal punishment for the act he committed. Does anyone doubt though that the severity of his sentence relates to the fact that it was an “unmanly” demonstration of an act having homosexual connotations. People routinely get sentenced to less time for physical assault. Part of the heritage in that part of the country is the celebration of “manliness” and a disdain for men who are in their limited usage “unmanly”.
yes, i’ve been to french quarter but not in silly season