Links - 18th August 2019 (1) (Oberlin)

Gibson’s Bakery awarded more than $11 million in years-long legal battle with Oberlin College - "Gibson’s Bakery won more than $11 million from Oberlin College Friday in a lawsuit stemming from protests outside the College Street business in November 2016.The bakery sued the liberal arts college and Vice President and Dean of Students Meredith Raimondo after a robbery at the bakery.Three black Oberlin students were arrested after one tried to use a fake ID and shoplifted... After the students were arrested, student protests erupted, claiming that the robbery charge and physical conflict were racially motivated. Protestors urged patrons to shop elsewhere... The students pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor in August 2017, reading statements into the record that Gibson was within his rights to detain the robber and that the conflict was not racially motivated... Raimondo handed out flyers calling Gibson’s racist and spoke into a bullhorn at the protests. The suit also said other professors participated. A member of the Gibson’s Bakery legal team said the jury found:
Oberlin College and Raimondo liable for defamation
Oberlin College liable for infliction of intentional emotional distress
Raimondo liable for intentional interference of business relationships"

Punitive Damage Award Makes Oberlin Verdict More Meaningful - "Given the prevalence of malice and falsehood in modern outrage mobs, the culture was ripe for a case like the Oberlin trial, and the plaintiff’s attorneys have drawn the blueprints for copycat litigation... employees and administrators helped publish and distribute the false flyer, including by disseminating it to the media. The college also suspended its business relationship with the bakery.Anyone who’s spent any time dealing with campus controversies knows that activist administrators often help, support, and even direct the activities of radical students. Some administrators seem to view campus activism as part of the educational process itself, a rite of passage that helps prepare them for a lifetime of political engagement. In my litigation days, I’ve seen multiple instances where administrators help activists formulate messages, plan protests, and provide university resources to favored activists. When activists are engaged in constitutionally protected speech, there is absolutely no legal problem with this kind of university engagement. When, however, student activists are spreading outright lies and violating the law, university engagement becomes extraordinarily risky.Second, the size of the jury award will create a legal market for litigation. There’s a relatively simple reason why campus free-speech codes proliferated well before there was a concerted legal counterattack — money. It takes money to sue universities, and First Amendment cases simply don’t yield eye-popping jury awards. It took the creation of large networks of nonprofit, pro-bono lawyers to turn the free-speech tide on campus. Common-law torts are different. Plaintiffs can receive real compensation, and universities have deep pockets. In a radio interview yesterday, I compared the verdict to the kind of sound that causes prairie dogs to stand alert — suddenly, lawyers are paying attention... Critics are already decrying the “chilling effect” of the Oberlin verdict. To the extent that the verdict causes activist administrators to pause and consider the underlying veracity and merit of the public campaigns they’re asked to join, then this is one chilling effect that may well do some good"

Oberlin College ordered to post $36 million bond to delay Gibson's Bakery collection of Judgment - "“there is serious concern about [Oberlin College’s] ability to pay this sizeable judgment three years from now”. Gibson’s Bakery devoted much of its opposition to arguing for a bond on the basis that Oberlin College was in poor financial shape
Get woke, go broke

WATCH: Oberlin College accused of trying to wait out bakery owner’s cancer death

WORSE THAN YOU THINK: There’s More To The Oberlin Story Than Previously Reported - "Protesters didn’t just remain outside making their false accusations. Some students actually entered the bakery and harassed customers. Lorna Gibson, wife of David Gibson (son of owner Allyn Gibson), testified that students entered the bakery “and began taking pictures of people and making nasty comments to our customers shopping.” Lorna said she asked the students to leave and they refused, “and then they started pushing their cameras in my face and yelling things at me.”She said students blocked customers from moving about the aisles. Lorna also testified the store employees had their tires slashed."

Oberlin and the price of wokeness - "When a faculty member in the theatre department wrote to a local paper, criticising the Oberlin campaign, Raimondo said in an email to her fellow administrators: ‘Fuck him. I’d say unleash the students if I wasn’t convinced this needs to be put behind us.’ She clearly saw the students as her own army she could deploy when she wanted. But, on other occasions, it appeared that the administration was deferring to the students, raising the question of whether there were any adults in charge... The administration seemed to live in fear of the students. In a telling moment in the trial, Ferdinand Protzman, chief of staff for administration, testified that the administration cut ties with the bakery because they feared students would create a ‘tantrum’ on campus, especially in the cafeteria during dinner. Specifically, they imagined angry students might throw Gibson’s food on the floor of the cafeteria and stomp on it. ‘Doesn’t that sound more like a nursery school than a college?’, Gibson’s lawyer asked. ‘Nursery school students do throw food on the floor, yes’, replied Protzman... The Oberlin case reveals more than the usual story of a few campus crazies getting out of control. For a start, it shows how the social-justice agenda has been institutionalised now, taking the place of the traditional intellectual mission. Administrators play a facilitating if not leading role in setting this agenda, including helping with protests to prove they mean it. Across the US, colleges have developed bloated bureaucracies over the past two decades, with spending on administrators increasing at twice the rate of spending on teachers (and adjuncts replacing full-time professors). These officials dominate student life, setting the rules for everything from freshmen orientation to ‘microaggression’ guidelines and kangaroo courts to handle sexual-assault accusations. More importantly, the Oberlin case has shone a light on how the culture in colleges has become deeply corrupted. Courtroom details showed how Oberlin’s pursuit of wokeness had left it devoid of a moral compass. An example is how the administration could not bring itself to condemn shoplifting... Shoplifting among students is already outrageously bad: Oberlin town police reported that 83 per cent of shoplifting arrests were Oberlin students. A 2017 article in Oberlin’s magazine discussed the school’s ‘Culture of Theft’, almost as if it was a fun rite of passage. One bookstore owner said she loses $10,000 a year in stolen goods to students. The article’s author himself admitted he shoplifted from the storeowners he interviewed. This is really sick: here are some of the wealthiest students in the country getting their kicks off from stealing from the poor townies. Clearly, the moral rot runs deep in this institution."