Orlando Sentinel editorial board doubles down after hitting new low in 2012

Orlando Sentinel editorial board members Darryl E. Owens and Paul Owens

The Orlando Sentinel editorial board has doubled down on its decision to respond to FAMU’s alleged insensitivity to victims of voluntary hazing by being insensitive to rape victims. 

Back in 2012, FAMU filed a motion to dismiss the wrongful death lawsuit filed by the parents of deceased drum major Robert Champion. The motion pointed out that the Orange County Sheriff’s Office investigation concluded that their son “willingly participated” in the illegal hazing ritual that took his life in Orlando on Nov. 19, 2011. FAMU argued that Florida taxpayers shouldn’t be held legally liable for a 26-year old adult’s decision to break rules that were in place to protect him.

The Orlando Sentinel editorial board criticized FAMU with the statement: “Rather than working contritely with the family on a resolution, FAMU borrowed a page from the rape defense playbook and blamed the victim.” It doubled down on that statement in a Sept. 24, 2015 editorial entitled: “Hazing lessons must guide FAMU.”

Rattler Nation wrote the following after the newspaper ran the original editorial in 2012:

Individuals who are injured in voluntary hazing rituals are absolutely nothing like rape victims.

Rape is an involuntary, violent sexual attack. That’s why it’s ridiculous to ever claim that a rape victim is responsible for what happened.

No person ever asks to be raped. But there are students who do ask to be hazed. That is the difference that the Orlando Sentinel’s editorial board can’t seem to understand.

Hazers AND voluntary hazing pledges are BOTH making a mutual decision to do something that is wrong.

Since the time of the 2012 Orlando Sentinel editorial, the Office of the State Attorney for the Ninth Judicial Circuit and two circuit court judges have also said that the evidence shows that Champion volunteered to be hazed.

Circuit Judge Renee A. Roche addressed the issue before sentencing three of the criminal defendants in the hazing case on June 27. 

“The court recognizes that perhaps Mr. Champion had thoughts or philosophical objections or reservations about this conduct, but there was no evidence of that presented in this case,” she said. “To the contrary, the evidence was that he went to the bus on his own, that he responded affirmatively when he was asked if he was sure repeatedly, and there was no external pressure for him to participate.”

Hazing victim Keon Hollis testified under oath that he and Champion asked to be hazed.

“Yeah we was talking about it,” Hollis said in a statement to investigators. “He didn’t want to do it, but he was just like, I’m gonna do it. I told him, ‘If you don’t wanna do it, don’t do it.’”

The Orlando Sentinel editorial board finally acknowledged the voluntary hazing inside the Marching 100 with the statement: “What is past at FAMU is prologue to a campus where band members no longer are dying to fit in.”

The problem is that the Orlando Sentinel editorial board doesn’t seem to understand that the crime of rape is nothing like what happens when adults try to “fit in” by voluntarily participating in hazing rituals. Rape takes an individual’s choice away. But adults who volunteer to be hazed do make a choice.