This still goes on?Follow

How did I not let you make your case, ******? I didn't, and indeed can't, shout you down, and I read your posts. It's not my fault that the things you're saying are retarded.

Why don't you understand that video-taping people having sex without their consent is not in itself a little thing? It's not a letter of the law issue (and I never made any claim in that regard, you stupid fuck)) - the act itself is disgusting and the vast majority of people would be humiliated and angry were it to happen to them. If you don't understand this you don't understand people. You must be a sad, lonely little man, am I right?

That makes sense. That, in this case makes it illegal since it happened while Tyler was in his private dorm room. Thanks for clearing that up.

According to Dutch laws, yes. It's in the privacy of his own home, has no news value (I forgot to mention this above, if the photo has news value your right to privacy can be overridden by that. a.k.a you're a criminal and I photograph your arrest or something like that) it also shows him in a recognizable way and the damage is very high because it was published to a large public and lead to his suicide.

Also the gossip argument Shadowedge used somewhere earlier in this thread (something about TV shows) doesn't count here, public figures have less protection of their privacy due to the fact that just about anything they do has news value.

I personally know at least 2 people who might. And assuming it was a heterosexual pairing, several girls who would be mortified to the point of dropping out of school and possibly changing their name.

But I might just know a lot of sensitive people.

edit: Should add that the girls would AT LEAST do that, if not take their lives. Welcome to the Bible Belt. People take their reps WAY seriously down here. Odds are that getting "outed" like this in my parents' town would lead to a vicious beating when you least expect it. In Gainesville it's better, but we're home of that Koran-burning church, so... yeah. Bible Belt.

Edited, Sep 30th 2010 8:09pm by LockeColeMA

It should be considered "cruel" because it's a violation of privacy, not because he's a homosexual. In this case, it was his own issues with his sexuality which drove him to suicide. And while being "outed" and the assumption of negative reaction to his sexuality by society at large are also factors, I think we also need to place a large heap of responsibility on the head of the guy who decided that the only way to deal with this was to kill himself. People's tolerances for negativity in their lives vary. Some people have extremely low tolerances. The homosexuality aspect is really secondary here. In recent years, we've had a girl kill herself because a fictitious boyfriend broke up with her. Another killed herself because some classmates spread rumors that she was easy. And this boy kills himself because his roommate films him fooling around with another boy.

The common factor is lack of self esteem, and a low tolerance for adversity. It's not really about this guy being gay. That's just the specific event which triggered him. I guess, just as Joph pointed out about EQ, we shouldn't fly off on some jihad against the perceived causes of these sorts of things. Some people are a bit unstable and easily set off. And some of them will end out committing suicide. Should we make it illegal to do anything to anyone which they might take offense at and perhaps kill themselves over?


Charge them with invasion of privacy. Don't try to nail them worse than any other similar act of invasion of privacy because the guy decided to kill himself. IMO, that's the wrong response.



We're fighting against special rules for homosexuality. I guess what this case illustrates to me is that people should learn to be comfortable with who and what they are. Someone else earlier made a valid point. If this guy had been having sex with a girl, and had been equally embarrassed about being filmed, and then had decided to kill himself, would we be making allegations that this was all about him being a "heterosexual"? I don't think so.

And if we assume (as that earlier poster did), that he wouldn't be as embarrassed about it, can we place all the blame on society? A whole lot of the discomfort of gay teens isn't just because of social norms. They actually tend to be confused and unsure about themselves. I don't know if any specific studies have been done, but it seems to me from talking to gay friends of mine, that even if there were no social issue with homosexuality at all, most of them would still feel very anxious about it and unsure and uncomfortable. While biology absolutely does allow for homosexuality, despite what our bodies may be telling us, our brains tend to be wired for procreative activities. I would suspect that young homosexuals are going to be confused by the mixed signals they're getting no matter what outside social pressures exist.


I just don't think you can place all of this on the boilerplate "the world isn't kind enough to gays". And I absolutely don't think the rest of the world should make special exceptions for gay people. If you're gay, then your gay. Accept it and go forward with your life. If people act against you because of it, then by all means cry discrimination. But I see nothing in this case to cause me to assume that the roommates actions would have been any different if the guy had been fooling around with a girl. What seems to often happen is not that gay people be treated exactly the same, but that they be treated differently because they are gay.

I think that's wrong.

You have fun with that, I'm not going to bother.

it was his own issues with his sexuality which drove him to

Nah, it was morons like you perpetuation a culture of stigmatizing on e sexual orientation that drove him to kill himself. YOU ARE RESPONSIBLE TO A DEGREE FOR THIS PERSONS DEATH.

Not that it'll matter, obviously, narcissists are devoid of empathy, pretty much by definition.

Good riddance.

If that was the point that you were trying to make, then you should have, you know, made it. Instead of trying to downplay the crime into a "harmless prank" that nobody should be charged for.

Edited, Sep 30th 2010 8:56pm by Eske

Crazy 'merican weirdos.

I agree with this, with one caveat. IF the roommate did this because his roommate was homosexual and with the idea of exploiting his sexuality, then it is a hate crime. He (and the girl, depending on her complicity/involvement) should be charged accordingly.

I think you don't believe in hate crime legislation, gbaji, but again, it's the law and it should be followed. Charge them for the laws they broke.