Patrick Witt Speaks
Posted on February 1st, 2012 in Uncategorized | 15 Comments »
…and makes Richard Perez-Pena’s NYT stories look even weaker.
Witt spoke—on the record—to the Yale Daily News in an article published today.
I’ll quote at some length:
Witt said he first learned his candidacy had been called into question when he received a phone call from Yale Director for National Fellowships Katherine Dailinger on either the evening of Nov. 9 or morning of Nov. 10. In the call, Witt said Dailinger informed him that he would need re-endorsement from Yale to remain eligible for the scholarship.
By that time, however, Witt said he had already chosen to play in The Game rather than pursue the Rhodes. He told Dailinger that, as a result, he would not need University re-endorsement.
“I told her at that time I had already made my decision due to a conversation that I had with the regional secretary by email, who told me on the eighth that I was going to have to choose between the two decisions,” Witt said. “Essentially it was an ultimatum. After getting that confirmation from the regional secretary, I told my parents, told my coaches, told people in the Athletic[s] Department that I was going to play in The Game. And so when Kate Dailinger called me on the night of the ninth or the morning of the 10th to let me know about the second letter, it was essentially a moot point.”
So: Yale’s Rhodes liaison notifies Witt that he’ll need a re-endorsement, he tells her he’s already decided to play in The Game, and he lists multiple people whom he’s already informed of his decision.
Over to you, Mr. Perez-Pena.
As Gavan GIdeon and Caroline Tan report in the YDN,
Witt flatly denied claims that he knowingly misled the public.
“I didn’t keep it a secret from any of my friends and the New York Times’ insinuation that I was circulating a media circus is ludicrous,” he said. “I’m not talented enough to do that. I’m not a media expert.”
When will the Times admit it was wrong?
15 Responses
2/1/2024 11:29 am
Of course, Witt has every reason in the world to lie about this, and again notably does not take the opportunity to say “I have never sexually assaulted anyone.”
Also, since you’ve expressed doubts on this blog about whether women at Yale are ever pressured by the university into following the informal grievance procedure instead of lodging a formal complaint against their assailants, I hope you will give equal prominence to the brave account a victim gives in the YDN today of exactly this sort of pressure being applied to her as you do to Witt’s possibly self-serving denials (that shed no new light on the story anyway, and nobody else involved has as yet been willing to corroborate).
2/1/2024 11:58 am
Funnily enough, I read that article moments before you posted. I think it’s a very interesting article, but I don’t find it particularly “brave.” Why is it brave to write an anonymous article?
I certainly think the author raises some serious points, but it’s also important to bear in mind that this is one person’s version of the story, and just because it is her truth doesn’t mean it is the truth, to the extent that there is such a thing. So often people seem to forget about this when it’s a “victim” saying something, because we have a natural tendency to empathize with victims. (And, unfortunately, because in the past many people have tried to talk victims out of believing or doing anything about their experiences.) But it’s important to think critically (in the best sense of the word) about all accusations—and all defenses.
Have I ever written that I doubted women are pressured to go the informal route? I don’t think I have. But I do wonder what “pressure” means. Does it mean saying to a student, “Look, here are your options, and judging from what you’ve told us, if you go to the police, this is what they may say”? I would love some of the details from that student on what specifically she was told.
Not saying it didn’t happen—just saying “I was pressured to…” is awfully vague.
Anyway, for anyone interested, here’s the piece:
http://www.yaledailynews.com/news/2012/feb/01/anonymous-on-assault-narratives/
2/1/2024 12:15 pm
You say: “Have I ever written that I doubted women are pressured to go the informal route? I don’t think I have..”
But a mere four days ago you wrote: “I’ve heard this argument that Yale (et al) ‘pressures’ people to opt for the informal procedure, but I’ve never seen a lot of evidence for this. Or any, really. I’d be curious to read more about it. But I find it hard to believe that, given the Justice Department investigation, Yale would pressure any student with a potentially high-profile allegation to do anything other than exactly what she wanted to do.”
Well, now you’ve apparently read more about it and it didn’t help. I would perhaps think that you’re being sloppy rather than dishonest right now, if you didn’t go on to “wonder” about what the student was actually told and whether it constituted pressure, and implicated that she only vaguely said “I was pressured.” That is simply a lie. And it’s a stupid lie, because even though many readers might simply skip over the link and thus fail to catch you out, anyone who actually follows it will see that what you’ve written is not only dishonest and offensive, but staggeringly so .
2/1/2024 12:33 pm
Anon-saying I’ve never seen evidence of this and would be curious to hear more about it isn’t really casting doubt so much as saying, show me the money, as it were. And yes, I do find it hard to believe that Yale would “pressure” anyone to go a certain route during or after the Justice Department investigation.
As for my “sloppiness”—here’s what the Yale student wrote regarding being “pressured”:
<>
Bearing in mind that this is still only one anonymous person’s version…I think “vague” is a perfectly fair description of that.
So, you know-I’d be careful who you’re calling a liar there…
Oh, and by the way, I do put my money where my mouth is here: Way back when, I was once a character witness in a Yale Yale disciplinary committee hearing and was so pissed off about the lameness of the process that I wrote a long letter to the Yale Daily News describing the whole thing. Clearly, not the same as sexual assault. But given that one of the committee members was Richard Brodhead and he was a resident fellow in my college, where I had a student job in the dean’s office, it was certainly uncomfortable. I was also once the subject of verbal abuse from a professor who actually threw me out of his office and I filed a complaint with the dean of the college. So…again, not nearly the same as sexual assault-but I do have some experience with dealing with the Yale bureaucracy, raising uncomfortable issues, feeling pressure to stay silent about things.
2/1/2024 12:34 pm
Sorry, here’s that quote again:
—The SHGB encouraged me to pursue an informal complaint. In retrospect, that may very well have been the right path, and I’m glad Yale provides this option. I can understand why a survivor would prefer a quiet, short process; reporting informally to the SHGB allowed me to stop the harassment quickly, and the student agreed to measures to stop contact. I’m also not sure that I would have chosen to report at all if an informal, contained procedure had not been guaranteed, given the stigmatization of sexual violence very much alive on our campus.
But I resent that I was pressured toward one specific route among many, largely because the board clearly did not think my case was serious enough for a formal or criminal complaint. I was told it wouldn’t be worth the emotional pain of going to the police or ExComm. —-
2/1/2024 1:10 pm
I see you very conveniently left off the next sentence in that second quoted paragraph, which clearly indicates that the committee inappropriately minimized both the evidence the student had against her assailant, and the seriousness of her complaint:
“When I presented my main evidence — a series of communications from my assailant admitting to wrongdoing and constituting, as I later learned from a lawyer, stalking — one member remarked that my assailant was clearly in love with me.”
And on top of this (!) she was told that it “wouldn’t be worth the emotional pain of going to the police or ExComm.” Even though she apparently had a written confession from the assailant!
That is specific, and entirely damning. So, yes, I’ll say it again: when you say her allegation of pressure is vague and leaves the reader wondering about what she was actually told, you are lying.
And do you seriously think that any competent reader of English will believe that all your wonderment and merely-asking-questions shtick is not rife with insinuations (at least as much as, say, Perez-Pena’s article in the Times)?
2/1/2024 1:33 pm
I omitted that sentence because it doesn’t indicate “pressure” to do any one thing or another. It’s obviously an asinine thing to say, and if it happened as recounted it certainly raises questions about this person’s judgment. But it doesn’t bear on the point we’re discussing.
I wonder, Anon—what on earth am I supposed to be insinuating? That the woman is lying? I’ll tell you right now, I don’t think she’s lying; I’ve no doubt she believes everything she’s written. But I do think that her account leaves a lot of question marks, and it’s very hard to judge it accurately because there are so many details missing, it’s one person’s side of the story, and that person is anonymous.
By the way, you might want to re-read what I wrote earlier on this blog about Jessica Stern’s remarkable book, “Denial—A Memoir of Terror.”
https://richardbradley.net/shotsinthedark/2010/07/01/out-of-denial/
2/1/2024 1:44 pm
Sorry, Anon, but you’ve gotten under your skin.
You know, I once sat at a table in a public place opposite a woman I was interviewing because she had been beaten by her former husband, who was a powerful man with powerful friends. And I watched as she tried to describe the memory of this awfulness, which had happened almost a decade earlier, and slowly broke down into tears as she tried to speak. And this was a strong woman—remarkably strong. I saw what had been done to her in a way that I’ll never forget.
I put my career and my reputation on the line to tell that woman’s story, no exaggeration, and I had to endure vicious, false attacks on me being anonymously planted in the press, and I was subsequently sued for $12 million because I did. (Don’t worry, I won.)
So all this crap about what I’m insinuating—I’m a little over that. The simple truth is that I believe that journalists have a responsibility to get their facts straight before indelibly smearing someone’s character in a public forum. Richard Perez-Pena did a terrible job of this in one of the most powerful institutions in the world. People who know how journalism works—or should work—have some responsibility to point this out. You may not like Patrick Witt, or DKE, or Yale, or football, or people who’ve been alleged to have committed sexual assault. Fair enough. But don’t lower your standards of evidence and fairness, because the next person accused might not be someone you find so easy to dislike.
2/1/2024 1:45 pm
“Under my skin,” that is.
2/1/2024 1:47 pm
If your standard for pressure is that they didn’t hold a gun to her head, than sure, they didn’t pressure her.
But a reasonable person, or anyone who cares more about sexual violence against women than paying occasional lip service and then turning around to use one’s platform to throw about worn-out, sexist insinuations, understands that officials who, when confronted with clear evidence of sexual violence, like a confession (!), say things remotely like “oh, it’s not so serious, he must just love you, formally reporting it would be hard and not worth it, you shouldn’t let the word get around” are in fact pressuring women not to formally report.
2/1/2024 1:51 pm
And just for clarity-see, you did piss me off—I watched as she broke down, not me.
2/1/2024 1:56 pm
@Anonymous 1:47pm, I’m wondering why, if there was such incontrovertible evidence of sexual assault, the alleged victim didn’t go to the police? There is no reason to use a college’s executive committee (either formally, or informally) unless that is one’s preference for some reason. Sorry, but without more facts on the ground, there really isn’t anything more to say about the allegations themselves. So, we are left with the terribly unprofessional way that the NYTimes handled the story — I think that’s the point that RB has been making.
2/1/2024 1:58 pm
Let’s just try something, shall we:
“Formally reporting it would be hard and not worth it”…could have been:
“We’ve seen enough of these cases before to tell you that the police are almost certainly not going to investigate this, and it won’t be easy. Of course, you should do what you feel is right, but we want you to be prepared for that possibility.”
“He must just love you.”
—if that’s what was said, sounds inexcusable to me.
“Confession.”
—that’s your choice of word for texts described by the author. Please, whatever you do, Anon—don’t become a judge.
“You shouldn’t let the word get around.”
—Frankly, hard to believe. If true, however, idiotic.
“Anyone who cares more about sexual violence against women than paying occasional lip service…”
Bravely said, Anonymous. (Let me repeat: “Anonymous.”) But I’m sure you care a lot. I’ve put some of my bonafides on the table, and I put my name to everything I write. Other than posting anonymous comments on blogs, what are yours? You don’t even have the guts to identify yourself.
2/2/2024 3:59 pm
So glad you’re continuing to push on this, Richard. Some in the comments section seem to be misdirecting an understandable frustration with the poor track record of sexual harassment policies and procedures (or their implementation at least). The attitude seems to be I’m not going to feel bad for Witt or outraged at the NYT author’s unethical treatment of him simply because it’s typically women who get the raw deal here. Richard is talking about journalism here-per the usual-not sexual harassment policies. And he is right. Someone commenting on the previous post agreed that of course the “history of violence” on his criminal record and his membership in Deke clearly exposed him as a misogynist, and therefore it was all very relevant. That’s not a clear mind at work. Getting kicked out of a bar, breaking dormitory policy, and pushing a student security worker are a demonstrated history of violence making rape more plausible? And every one of Deke’s members is guilty of sexual misconduct? I understand that some folks are obsessed with finding a narrative to make sense of the world, but those folks shouldn’t be involved in serious journalism. Kudos, RB.
2/2/2024 5:50 pm
Thank you, Egret. As you can probably tell, I got a little stressed out about this yesterday, so I appreciate your level-headed comment.