The NFL suspends Ray Rice for 2 games... for punching his wife in the face, knocking her unconscious

[PeaceNikki]

and dragging her through a casino.

2 fucking games. They would have punished him far more harshly for smoking weed.

Rice, 27, was accused of striking his then-fiancee unconscious and ultimately was charged with felony aggravated assault. He was accepted into a pretrial intervention program that allowed him to avoid jail time and could lead to the charge being eliminated from his record.

Read more: http://www.baltimoresun.com/sports/ravens/ravens-insider/bal-ray-rice-suspended-for-two-games-20140724,0,1145794.story#ixzz38OwyZcnP

That is fucked up.

[Throd]

1. How about 2 seasons?

[PeaceNikki]

2. It's fucking sick. Domestic violence is not taken seriously.

[PeaceNikki]

25. Seriously? He has a *morality* clause. He's not a fucking accountant at H&R Block.

[Throd]

29. The NFL is marketing and entertainment. Part of his job is not to diminish the brand.

[InAbLuEsTaTe]

20. Seriously, shows you how out of touch the NFL really is.

[William769]

3. That is really fucked up.

NFL does not a very good track record this year.

[d_b]

4. punk

big tough guy who hits women. some blind helmet-to-helmet strikes would do him good

[jmowreader]

49. Too bad he plays in the AFC and not the NFC

A little bit of Kam Chancellor Love would do him good...

(The Super Bowl ended at this exact second. Kam Chancellor took away the Broncos' will to live.)

[d_b]

58. I still can't get over how easily Seattle made it look

Like the Broncos had no business being in there. The NFC Championship was the real Super Bowl.

[underpants]

5. Let's get Tony Dungy's take on it

No let's not.

2 games is not enough

[joeybee12]

9. My first thought, too...

The shithead.

[underpants]

14. Never liked him

Really I just don't care for Peyton and Dungy was, obviously, tied to him. THEN there was the speech Tony did to a homophobe group in Indiana and that was enough for me. His self righteous radio spots are just more reason.

I had a RW "Christian" coworker who was shocked that someone didn't like Dungy. I didn't want get into it with him so I just said," nope don't like him much"

[joeybee12]

18. I've never liked Payless either...

The two of them together was more than enough for me to root for Da Bears in the Super Bowl, although you kinds knew from the beginning who was going to win.

[Initech]

45. Seriously, how about 2 seasons without pay?

[Orrex]

6. What kind of penalty would I get for punching him in the face & knocking him unconscious?

[jmowreader]

51. Death, unless you can run the 40 in less than 4.2 seconds

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

7. Did they give him a disapproving frown while administering the slap on the wrist?

[Are_grits_groceries]

8. The elevator tape the police have needs to be FOIAed and broadcast.

It may have to wait until he finishes his intervention program and the case is closed. I wish somebody would slip a copy out.

He will hit her again. We may not hear about it, but this has to fester.

[PeaceNikki]

10. and, if not her, another woman.

[dsc]

11. I agree he should have had worse happen to him

for example jail. But I do wonder would a normal person get fired for this assuming they got no jail time?

[PeaceNikki]

13. very different. he has a contract with a morality clause.

And gets paid millions.

[dsc]

15. the morality clause is relevant

the millions, not so much. I am quite sure a high ranking but fairly anonymous executive making millions would not be fired. Again, this guy deserved jail, not some sort of suspended sentence. I also think if he were my employee I would do what I could to make sure he wasn't my employee after this. I just wondered about private employees.

[Hassin Bin Sober]

40. I can think of several cases of upper level people being fired...

..... when their name gets attached to disgusting behavior.

Off the top of my head, their was a couple recent airplane incidents that ended in the dismissal of employees. There was a guy that hit a kid and another one where the guy pissed in the aisle.

[badtoworse]

12. What a class act

[Avalux]

16. Really sad. She was his fiance at the time, then married him AFTER he punched her.

I hope she's getting the help she needs somehow; and I hope the pretrial intervention program has helped him. Otherwise I expect we'll be hearing more about Rice in the news.

[shanti]

19. that's messed up!

i can't imagine staying with someone who knocked me unconscious....no matter how much money they had.

[Luminous Animal]

59. If the intervention program does not last at least a year (2 is preferable), it is likely not

going to work.

[KamaAina]

17. Or for having someone whacked in his limo

Oh, wait a minute...

[msongs]

21. Rice could claim he was exercising his sincerely held christian beliefs so it was ok nt

[randome]

22. Since the NFL accepts that 'their boy' did something wrong...

...I wonder if they offered any help to his wife. Or maybe they don't think she counts.
[hr][font color="blue"][center]Treat your body like a machine. Your mind like a castle.[/center][/font][hr]

[n2doc]

24. 4 games, or a whole season (second offense) for smoking weed

But 2 games for beating up a woman. What a league.

[Calista241]

26. Do we want employers to start punishing employees for their "infractions?"

Domestic violence is terrible, but it is the governments job to punish its citizens.

That's all we need is employers being able to decide what is and what is not acceptable behavior. I know the NFL does a little of this, punishing players for whatever makes the news they don't like, but in general, this is a bad thing IMO.

[PeaceNikki]

28. Seriously? He has a *morality* clause. He's not a fucking accountant at H&R Block.

He's a public figure and a role model.

And I don't care who you are, if you punch a woman out cold and drag her unconscious through a casino, if you get fired because of it. Good.

[Yavin4]

32. Yes. If the employers are entertainment companies that make their money by promoting

their employees to the public as "heroes".

[PeaceNikki]

33. You call what he did an "infraction"... in fucking quotes, even?

He wasn't speeding on a city street.

[Calista241]

37. If employers can punish you for domestic violence

Then they can punish you for anything else they want to.

I wasn't trying to diminish what he did, say it wasn't bad, or anything else. Domestic abusers should be punished to the full extent of the law.

And yes, I know the nfl has a morality clause.

All I question is the ability of a private entity to exact punishment for crimes or other "infractions" of whatever policy they observe.

There's already little enough oversight on cops and courts, now we want to turn employers loose and enforcing their own brand of the law?

[PeaceNikki]

41. Yes, when the employee's behavior is a violation of their employment contract, yes. Yes, yes.

[randome]

52. Like it or not, it's up to the employer to decide the consequences.

It's not like we want employers to put punitive actions up for a public vote. But I agree the NFL should do more, especially since they promote these guys as 'heroes'.
[hr][font color="blue"][center]You have to play the game to find out why you're playing the game. -Existenz[/center][/font][hr]

[PeaceNikki]

53. I am not an idiot, I get that.

But thanks for the patronizing reply.

[bluestateguy]

34. As soon as it turns into a felony conviction its a whole new balllgame

nt

[bluestateguy]

27. Reminds me of Lawrence Phillips

He kept getting second chances and third chances and fourth, fifth and sixth chances.

He is currently serving a 30 year prison sentence.

[Yavin4]

30. So kids, if you punch a woman and knock her out, you're only suspended for 2 games

But, if you're Gay, then you're too much of a distraction and no team will want you.

Yaaaahhh NFL!!!

: :

[Inkfreak]

36. The Rams chose Sam. Dungy opinion be damned. (nt)

[dilby]

31. How long does your employer suspend people who beat their wives?

You might not like that the NFL only gave a two week suspension but there is not an Employer out there that would do the same. Maybe law enforcement but that is pretty much it.

[PeaceNikki]

35. For the third fucking time....

Seriously? He has a *morality* clause. He's not a fucking accountant at H&R Block. He's a public figure and a role model.

And I don't care who you are, if you punch a woman out cold and drag her unconscious through a casino, if you get fired because of it. Good.

[backwoodsbob]

63. here is the problem

First let me say I think the guy is scum and in no way am I excusing him
That said:

There were multiple witnesses at the casino that say she was intoxicated and assaulted him in the casino...punches and all.
He claims she assaulted him again in the elevator and he hit her in self defense(not excusing this...like she was really hurting him...yeah right)
She refused to testify against him.

It's not as cut and dry as people are making it appear

[Yavin4]

44. If my employer's business model heavily depended upon the public's perception of the employees

then I would assume that my employer would fire someone convicted of spousal abuse, esp. when the abuse is caught on camera.

[abelenkpe]

38. Wait, what?

Did she marry him after he punched her in the face and knocked her unconscious?

So nice to see the NFL keeping abusive a-holes employed. Guess it's more profitable and since that's all we worship in this country....

[Inkfreak]

39. Hey diddle, diddle. Ray Rice ran up the middle.

And he can go fuck himself, cause he's a wife-beating asswipe.

[PeaceNikki]

42. Amen.

[misterhighwasted]

43. But..He can still play ball, right?

[Initech]

46. Hey NFL owners! You say that having a Michael Sam in your club is a distraction?

How about the quarterback who was brought up on attempted rape charges?
Or the quarterback who killed dogs for sport?
Or the running back who was brought up for literally shooting himself in the foot?
Or now Ray Rice?

You know NFL material.

[Taitertots]

47. Who cares how many games he will miss? I'm more concerned that he got absolutely no punishment

From the judicial system.

[RockaFowler]

48. This is the big problem with this case

There is a video (it's on TMZ) where it shows him dragging her out of the elevator. Nothing happened to him legally. I think it was partly due to her - she didn't want to press charges. Then she married him a few weeks later. I don't understand her at all.

[Dr. Strange]

50. No shit.

Who cares what the NFL does or doesn't do? If he committed an act of violence, I'm more concerned with the government's response.

[PeaceNikki]

54. Then start a thread about it. I don't know the details of how his case is proceeding. I know what

the NFL did at this point. And I know how harshly they punish players for smoking weed in comparison. And that pisses me off.

His felony case is still pending. He's been charged and is an intervention program, I know nothing of the details.

[TheKentuckian]

55. Appropriate jail time would result in many more games missed, where is the appropriate sentence?

[davidn3600]

56. NFL is the only one punishing him at all.

The victim married him the day after he was indicted!

Legal experts say the marriage complicated any real attempt for prosecutors to push the case forward.

[Luminous Animal]

61. The marriage SHOULD have nothing to do with the state prosecuting. They don't need his wife as a

witness in order to prosecute.

San Francisco will arrest and prosecute if there is evidence of violence even if the victim is unwilling to testify.

[WI_DEM]

57. Well, of course, he's an athlete!

[awoke_in_2003]

60. The team press conference was sickening...

They had the victim there. She basically took the blame, and he came off as the victim.

[Guy Whitey Corngood]

62. Good thing he didn't kill her. He might have had

to miss the whole season....

[tabasco]

64. Good thing he didn't have any pot on him ...

or he'd be in REAL trouble.