South Carolina coach Dawn Staley still won’t accept reality of unfounded racist claims involving BYU

What bothers me most about this whole episode is the complete public silence on the matter by the other Duke players. There's just the one making this horrid hoax of an accusation, and not a blip from the others. The hoax part, sadly, can be expected in the current political climate- there'll always be people taking advantage of things. Obviously that doesn't make it right.

BYU in the end discovered the truth- that this never happened. I'm glad that they actually investigated and didn't just get swept away by politically correct posturing.

But the silence of the other Duke athletes galls me badly. If they had heard the supposed racial slurs or genuinely believe them to have occurred, is there any doubt whatsoever that they would've said something publicly in the aftermath? Of course not. Their silence implies that they knew this whole thing was crap from the start, but also that it wouldn't be in their best interests to point that out. And it wouldn't, either- they'd surely get dragged as racists or hateful etc for speaking out and end up in the crosshairs of the outrage machine.

That's what pisses me off the most- that we've reached a climate where a rational person- in this case another Duke volleyball player- could look at a hateful hoax and decide, probably wisely, that it's not worth it to state the truth. This is a large part of why Ms. Richardson decided to attempt the hoax in the first place- who would dare contradict her? And what consequences has or will she ever face?

Disclaimer- video would not play for me, in case I seem to be missing something

I’m a BYU graduate. In terms of post season success, Volleyball (both Women’s and Men’s) is likely the most successful sport at BYU over the past several decades. That match with Duke set a new attendance record. Also, the fans that attend are very vocal. It is reasonable for me to believe that only the server could hear and understand any comments from the fans since the server starts well back from the end line. Also, from the article I read about it, that Duke player, while not the only minority on the team, was the only one to get significant playing time. Any racial comments said may only have been said while she was serving.

That said, according to the article, she told teammates what she thought she heard. They told she should tell their coach who then went to the BYU coach. Uniformed campus security went into the stands as well as both Duke and BYU athletic department officials but were unable to find anyone who might have said anything. BYU also thoroughly analyzed and audio from the BYUTv broadcast and couldn’t find anything there as well.

Dawn Staley is a hard core leftist who was quick to cancel their game against BYU because The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints absolutely stands by it’s doctrine that marriage is only valid between a man and a woman.

My post wasn't meant to be a thorough debunking of Ms. Richardson's claims. The most damning evidence is perhaps the following: she identified a specific fan as the one supposedly doing the racial catcalling; that's the fan that got banned.

And yet, that fan was specifically found not to have been yelling at all during the match, and wasn't even paying attention during her serves (he was observed on video to be invested in something on his phone).

So, in recap: she claimed she heard something. BYU responded by posting security and other trusted personnel in the crowd, including back by where she was serving from. After these people joined the crowd, she claims it only got worse. But no one who went out into the crowd specifically to listen for this behavior heard anything.

Nor did any members of the crowd interviewed by BYU.

Nor did these supposed slurs show up in the BYUtv audio, nor that of a number of personal recordings shared by fans.

Nor, apparently did any other member of the Duke team or coaching staff hear these slurs (BYU interviewed them too!).

And finally, the fan she specifically accused has been thoroughly exonerated by video evidence.

Bottom line, the evidence only points in one direction here, and it's not toward someone in the crowd sustainedly screaming racial slurs that only Rachel Richardson and no other person or microphone could detect.

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