Metallo
NWOBHM forever \m/
But if the case goes to court it becomes public matter and he will be identified? No?
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- Thread starter Qurpiz
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MarkT
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- Nov 11, 2017
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I think we should stay away from this idea. There are way too many people who believe if you're a man and you do anything sexual with another man, it means you're gay no matter the reason you did it. And among those people with those beliefs, too many believe being gay is a bad or morally wrong thing.
MarkT
Heretic
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Another thought that came to mind when discussing this elsewhere:
You can say all you want what you would do if you were in this player's situation, but the reality is you have no idea. In his shoes, there's every chance you'd have ended up doing the exact same thing regardless of what you intended to do. And if you think that bullshit, there's a good chance you've never committed yourself as long and as hard to anything and made it as much of your personal identity as an NHL player has to in order to make it to the league.
Basically, when people are put under extreme pressure, they often act in ways that even surprise themselves. That's actually a big part of the damage sexual assault and rape cause. People tell themselves "I'd fight back. I wouldn't let that happen to me", but then it happens and in the moment they freeze or they panic. Then afterwards they hate themselves for not living up to their own expecations, and they end up blaming themselves for what happened.
Edit: to give another example, this is also how soldiers tend to get PTSD - they can't come to terms with the terrible actions they took in high stress situations.
You can say all you want what you would do if you were in this player's situation, but the reality is you have no idea. In his shoes, there's every chance you'd have ended up doing the exact same thing regardless of what you intended to do. And if you think that bullshit, there's a good chance you've never committed yourself as long and as hard to anything and made it as much of your personal identity as an NHL player has to in order to make it to the league.
Basically, when people are put under extreme pressure, they often act in ways that even surprise themselves. That's actually a big part of the damage sexual assault and rape cause. People tell themselves "I'd fight back. I wouldn't let that happen to me", but then it happens and in the moment they freeze or they panic. Then afterwards they hate themselves for not living up to their own expecations, and they end up blaming themselves for what happened.
Edit: to give another example, this is also how soldiers tend to get PTSD - they can't come to terms with the terrible actions they took in high stress situations.
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I don't believe so. I'm definitely not an expert but I don't believe the individual is under any obligation to come out publicly.
This is true and I would imagine is what most likely happened. People are capable of doing much more than they think themselves possible when pushed to the extreme. Crappy situation that it ever got to that point.
SirLoinOfCloth
Registered User
The other thing to consider is that if your career isn't enough to comply with unwanted sexual advances, chances are there may be something else that could. Like threatening harm to your family, for example. Everyone has their weak or blind spots and attackers like this are experts at finding and exploiting those. Maybe in a vacuum of you, your job and an attacker, you would stand up and fight, but what if the threat was related to your child or spouse.
MarkT
Heretic
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I totally agree with your point, but it's not even a great analogy. If someone was threatening your family, attacking them might actually be the best option. But in this case, any decision other than going along with it led to the potential loss of his career.
SirLoinOfCloth
Registered User
It's not the best like-for-like analogy, I agree, as additional context would be needed - like an accomplice with access to the family. The point being, most people will likely have something that can be exploited by a manipulative predator, it's just about them figuring out what it is and how to exploit it.
We know for sure he threatened him with actual bodily harm (with a baseball bat in his hand at the time) and the ruination of his NHL dream. Why does there need to be more than that?
Qurpiz
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Metallo
NWOBHM forever \m/
I disagree. But I understand from a brand perspective.
Heck the Cleveland Guardians took the right step.
Bill Peckerskull
Fargin' Icehole
dahrougem2
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Nihiliste
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I kind of get the gut reaction “but what about violence” posts in this thread because it’s a common initial reaction, but it’s a shallow read of the situation.
What if he had good reason (nepotism, known favor of management) to believe that the coach was not bluffing about destroying his financial future?
From the comments the players made maybe he was gay and the abuser knew that and he knew fighting the blackmail would require making that very public. It doesn’t seem like long ago but in 2010, bashing people by calling them gay was still the mainstream Hollywood standard. The culture shift on that issue really has felt like much more than 10 years.
There is a lot of nepotism in the league, he could easily have had good reason to believe that the coach could put him in a position where no team would hire him, not just the Hawks, and his reputation would get dragged through the mud in the process.
What if he had good reason (nepotism, known favor of management) to believe that the coach was not bluffing about destroying his financial future?
From the comments the players made maybe he was gay and the abuser knew that and he knew fighting the blackmail would require making that very public. It doesn’t seem like long ago but in 2010, bashing people by calling them gay was still the mainstream Hollywood standard. The culture shift on that issue really has felt like much more than 10 years.
There is a lot of nepotism in the league, he could easily have had good reason to believe that the coach could put him in a position where no team would hire him, not just the Hawks, and his reputation would get dragged through the mud in the process.
No doubt there is but again I advise against speculation about the accuser’s sexual orientation.
redandyellowcametobe
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Metallo
NWOBHM forever \m/
I fail to see the issue about speculating about that case. Isn’t pretty much what we do 24/7 on HFBoards?
- Jul 25, 2006
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Shane Diesel
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NHL GMs are the dumbest people on the planet. $9.5 million for Seth Jones? Absolutely hysterical.
