Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
December, A.D. 2013: The innocents who frequent the Oregon forum discover what others have observed for almost a millennium – that university students misbehave.
Some, including the perpetually offended curmudgeons, of course, are surprised, shocked and even outraged.
A reading of history will tell you that this behavior started with the establishment of the first universities in the Middle Ages. It isn't likely to stop now.
Get used to it.
"I am shocked---shocked to discover that snowball fights were taking place here..."
I blame those rowdy members of Delta Tau Chi...they're always up to no good. Where's Dean Wormer when you need him?
Make some kids apologize, but gimme a freaking break, this was just college kids having a snowball fight on a snowday that got slightly out of hand.
Flash mob? That's just another one of those media buzzwords...(Oh right, there were a certain type of kids there). I remember doing the same thing at college in Southern Oregon when it occasionally snowed... College kids on a college campus throw snowballs at each other and get a little too rowdy when they threw them at a couple cars driving through that stretch of campus. Well they did film Animal House on that campus, I blame Hollywood...
Geez, we used to throw snowballs at all the cars driving through our cul-de-sac when we were kids in Canada, and our elderly neighbors just laughed and threw snowballs back. Hell, some kids were throwing snowballs at my girlfriend and I on and our way to work on Friday.
One got suspended for the bowl game. Not sure what the others will get.
See here is the deal...did you see that video where those motorcycles surround the family driving in NYC, and pulled the father from the car, stabbed and beat him in front of his wife and kid? Those types of videos have a huge impact on how people perceive people that surround cars. The minute the person stood in the road and blocked the car from moving forward it progressed into a threatening gesture.
I threw snowballs at passing cars as an 8-10 year old or so. Never stepped in front to stop one. I also didn't do it as a college student. I did engage in snowball fights with friends in college, but I was old enough to know that you only do that with people that are willing to engage. Otherwise, you are victimizing people. Yes, when you do something to someone against their will, you are victimizing them. The problem is you can't tell which strangers will have your "please pelt me because i'm okay with it" attitude and those that aren't okay with it. That's why adults don't hit strangers with snowballs.
What if one of the cars had a really sick kid with a parent trying to get to the doctor? Is it okay that the "person having fun" was allowed to stop them and delay them from their destination? What if I was driving my hubby to the ER because he sliced his hand really badly. Is it okay that I have to sit and wait for "just some kids having fun" to move out of my way because their need for fun is more important than my need to get to the hospital?
I think the bowl game suspension was great. Criminal charges? No, but I think the school will take care of it appropriately.
Yes, yes, students will be students, and on occasion, they will do something a little silly. and sometimes they will get carried away, and become stupid. It's the nature of the mob mentality that takes over.
These guys got a little carried away when they started harassing the drivers. Certainly there was little here that required severe disciplinary measures. A good talking to should suffice. But apparently somebody felt harassed enough to call the police about it, and obviously, once there is a police report, there must be a police investigation. and of course the news media gets wind of the "Police investigation", and now, SOMEBODY NEEDS TO DO SOMETHING ABOUT THIS!!!!!
And the school administration can't just blow it off with "Boys will be boys."
Like you said, stuff happens. Deal with it. But don't make it more than it is. Boys misbehaved, boys get "spanked", life goes on.
The problem here is that it got out of hand. When the man got out of his car, the students threw snow in his car. It was more than just a mere snowball fight between students. The professor said he was confused as to why this was happening and looked around to make some sense of it all. At that point, things turned into a mob and you can hear the shouting in the background as they piled snow in the front seat of his car.
I use the word "attack" because the man didn't quite knew what was going on. I think, from his statement, partly because the snow was being thrown at his car and then into it and because his vision was obstructed from the snow because he was wearing glasses he felt felt he was being attacked.
If it had just been a friendly snowball fight, the students would have just thrown some snowballs at his car, allowed him to wipe the snow off his windshield as he tried to do, and let him be on his way. But as it can be seen in the video, and as he says in his statement, he simply couldn't discern what was happening at first. I don't think anyone in his position would have been able to.
The great thing about this guy is he stated his is forgiving the students and will not press charges because he feels "mob mentality" took over their senses and they were not responsible. To call him "grumpy guy" is just plain ignorant. He is the exact opposite. He is being kind and generous.
The university, however, is a different matter. I saw a statement released by the dean last night on the news. It said that the school wants to punish the perpetrators.
I have read various comments on the actions of the people who did this where the video was posted and the story was told and everyone agrees the students crossed the line when AFTER they refused to allow the man to wipe off the first barrage with his windshield wipers and go on his way. No one is saying the snowball fight was wrong or even so much that they threw some at the car. It's the fact that they continued to harass him and would not let him leave the area when he first tried. That is what they are objecting to. Especially when they approached the car and threw more snow into it. Anyone who cannot see that is missing the point as to why what these students did was wrong.
It has nothing to do with a simple snowball fight.
Make some kids apologize, but gimme a freaking break, this was just college kids having a snowball fight on a snowday that got slightly out of hand.
.
Not really, no. They were stopping and blocking traffic, dumping containers of snow and ice on cars and even inside of one guy's car. A snowball fight involves two or more separate "sides." And since you have some experience with snow, surely you know that hard-packed snowballs, particularly with this type of extremely cold-weather, low-moisture snow, can pack a punch similar to that of rocks. The students involved in the "snowball fight" were hurling this stuff right at the guy's head.
I'm pretty sure that if I went outside right now and started doing the same thing, the cops wouldn't be too interested in hearing any excuses that I might make about "just having a little fun in the snow."
Silverfall makes some good points. Also, certain parts of Eugene are simply unpleasant places to be anymore, and a lot of people are really tired of the football team being given endless passes for their bad behavior. This really wasn't about snowball fighting so much as about harassing and menacing actions. If nothing is done about this, certain parts of Eugene will just get worse. It's time for the residents to say that enough is enough. This type of sense of entitlement among certain U of O students has been a problem for years.
Last edited by Metlakatla; 12-09-2013 at 07:29 PM..
Were they twice your size and shouting obscenities at you?
Didn't think so.
They actually were taller than me, I'm only about 5'7"... Were the kids yelling obscenities at them, I couldn't hear that on the video.
Look some of those kids were acting very poorly. The little monkey who jumped and danced in front of the car should expect to be smacked upside the head, I'm all in favor of that. The U of O player who dumped snow on the professor rightfully got suspended for being a moron(though he's a football player, you can't expect much).
At the same time though, who really cares? This story is obviously the most important thing to come down the pipeline for Oregon all year, so we'll all keep commenting on it(and the clip will keep playing around the nation), but nothing really happened that's really going to be relevant in a week. College students had a snowball fight in the middle of campus that got out of hand. A few people in driving through campus got momentarily inconvenienced by jerks who went too far. If you counted everytime that happened around a high school or college campus(or junior high) all year nationally it'd be in the thousands. Even the professor who got ambushed says he's not all that concerned in the end.
Quote:
"It was a snowball fight," said Simmons. "The students shouldn't involve people who aren't part of it, but this is not high crimes, not an assault, not even a misdemeanor. No one should be charged. That would be nuts."
Simmons continued: "It's not anything I wouldn't have done at Yale when I was a student there, only we would have thrown snowballs at each other. Not at a white haired professor like me! I am 68 years old, after all."
Ironically that poor professor who kind of got embarrassed, now gets to see the rest of the nation view him getting snow dumped on him for the next week on TV news broadcasts... That's the real reason this is on the news, once again people engaging in shenanigans film them for the whole world to see again and again--pre-internet/smartphone age this wouldn't have even made the news.
A lot of people who live in Eugene actually care. Like I said before, bad behavior by the football team and fans have been an ongoing issue for quite some time. The reason that some people are so adamant that this doesn't just get swept under the rug is because they're sick of it.
Even if it hadn't made the national news, people in Eugene would still be sick of it. It's easy to sit in another city and say that it was just "kids" having a "snowball fight" and compare them to adorable tots in bunny suits throwing the pretty snowballs when it was in fact just another example of boorish behavior by a bunch of self-entitled brats from out of state.
I'm pretty sure that Simmons' statement was highly influenced by the fact that U of O is his employer.
Last edited by Metlakatla; 12-10-2013 at 09:23 AM..
A lot of people who live in Eugene actually care. Like I said before, bad behavior by the football team and fans have been an ongoing issue for quite some time. The reason that some people are so adamant that this doesn't just get swept under the rug is because they're sick of it.
Even if it hadn't made the national news, people in Eugene would still be sick of it. It's easy to sit in another city and say that it was just "kids" having a "snowball fight" when it was just another example of boorish behavior by a bunch of self-entitled brats from out of state.
So why aren't people on the Eugene forum posting anything about this? Why isn't yourself or someone else over there leading a real discussion about why it's important to stop these sort of shenanigans as a Eugene resident...
So why aren't people on the Eugene forum posting anything about this? Why aren't you over there leading a real discussion about why it's important to stop these sort of shenanigans as a Eugene resident...
I don't think that very many Eugene residents are actually even aware of City-Data's existence. I hardly ever see anyone who actually lives there posting. Online discussions concerning the issue are taking place elsewhere, though.
A couple of the local news channel websites have some pretty active discussions about this. Most of the locals seem to share my opinion (I'm not a local anymore; I moved from the area months ago).
I'm not in the Eugene forum "leading a discussion" about it because I've chosen to participate in that particular discussion elsewhere. I also have to work today and don't have time for it.
Last edited by Metlakatla; 12-10-2013 at 10:35 AM..
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
