Rutgers U. announces new Tyler Clementi Center

February 1, 2013 @ 10:20 am

NEW BRUNSWICK, N.J. (AP) - Rutgers University is announcing a center named for the student who killed himself after his roommate used a webcam to see him kissing a man.

The university says the Tyler Clementi Center will build programs to help people transition to college. It will also offer lectures and training on social media, youth suicide, bullying and other topics.

The center is a collaboration with the Tyler Clementi Foundation, begun by the student's parents.

The 18-year-old killed himself in September 2010, just weeks into his first year at Rutgers. His death sparked a national conversation about the treatment of young gays.

Roommate Dharun Ravi (dah-ROON' RAH'-vee) was convicted last year of invasion of privacy, bias intimidation and other counts and served less than a month in jail. He is appealing his conviction.


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Comments (17)


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  • WT wrote...
    What a Shame!
    May 6, 2011 11:05 am
    What a shame that such perverse behavior is now seen as normal by those who practice it and that this young woman has to go to "sensitivity" training toward it. I understand that adults may do with one another what they wish but why tell me do the participants in such queer behavior wish to de-sensitize the rest of us to it? Rather than addmit they are sick? It seems to me that the parents of the young man who committed suicide would lay blame at the feet of the perverse behavior and those who drag people into it for answers. Suicide is usually a indication of a deeper problem than being discovery.
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  • thatgirl wrote...
    villianizing the victim
    September 9, 2011 7:57 am
    The crime was not the victim's behavior,it was the invasion of his privacy that caused the suicide. It probably would not have mattered who his partner was, being publicly humiliated and intimadated by the roommate is what pushed him over the edge. Trying to shift the blame of what happened to Clementi because of his orientation is just petty and cruel.
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  • gb1118 wrote...
    Putting people on trial....
    February 28, 2012 7:45 am
    For a mental midget homosexual killing themself. Unbelievable.
    { "Thumbs Up":"1","Thumbs Down":"-1" }
  • Hayduke wrote...
    I guess you homophobes don't believe in privacy.
    February 29, 2012 11:49 am
    I'm guessing you biblethumpers wouldn't like someone secretly videotaping you, even if if you're doing nothing "wrong" at the time. After all, it's outrageous that someone would spy on another and then post it on the web, right? Unless, of course, they're engaging in acts that you personally object to, then it's open season on them.

    It doesn't matter to you what they're doing is perfectly legal. Or that's being done in private, and not "in your face," which is another typical complaint you righties have about gays. The guy was minding his own business, wasn't hurting anyone. But you and the a-holes who recorded him just can't leave him alone, can you?

    You're all so self-righteous, and have no qualms about butting you noses into other people's business and lecturing them on how they should choose to live their lives.

    So tell me; what's it like to be a saint?

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  • ssbn629g wrote...
    WT and gb1118
    February 29, 2012 5:53 pm
    You two are fine examples of judgmental, dogmatic "Chrsitians" As I have heard it said....."God save me.......from your followers"
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  • Derrol_o wrote...
    Hayduke & ssbn
    March 17, 2012 1:32 am
    Judgmental, dogmatic, biblethumping, self-righteous a-holes? Sounds like you guys have a prejudicial hatred and phobia against christians. That's your idea of enlightened, progressive-thinking tolerance to you?
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  • HockeyMom wrote...
    So-called Christians
    May 21, 2012 7:08 pm
    And lets not let it go unnoticed that these same people who want to dictate what is right and wrong by God and the Bible are the same folks sitting in judgement of others. Last time I checked, it isn't any of our place to judge. Only God gets that job. And remember that He doesn't have a rating system on what sins are worse than others. Our sins are all equal sins in His eyes. Sounds like a few of the posters here think they are without sin.
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  • ElenaT wrote...
    the comments in this thread
    March 2, 2012 7:56 am
    are mind-boggling. i can't believe i share air with you people. i am going to go ahead and assume that many of you didn't go to college, so in addition to being poorly educated you must not understand the shock dorm life can be for young minds who don't fully understand how cruel the world is just yet. i remember experiencing my own severe invasions of privacy and bullying during my freshman year of college, and i remember the raging thoughts of suicide that accompany being trapped in a tiny box of a room being suffocated by evil people. shame on all of you.
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  • jstumbo wrote...
    Punishment should fit the crime...
    March 4, 2012 8:41 am
    I think they have way over charged this guy. Was it wrong what he did, yes. He could not foresee that his roommate would kill himself. I doubt very much if he had put a video of his heterosexual roommate with no shirt on kissing some girl on the Internet, that he would be charged with all this. If people want to say that homosexual behavior is normal, and should be accepted just as heterosexual behavior, then fine. But don't turn around and then say that it is a big deal that he put a video of him on the Internet because it was homosexual behavior. You cannot have it both ways.
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  • It's me! Ha ha! wrote...
    ElenaT
    March 6, 2012 12:18 pm
    Are you serious? Do you not think that any person walking this planet may never have had thoughts of suicide or at least wondered what drives people to this end? Just like if you wonder what it must be like to want to have sex with someone of the same sex automatically makes one Homosexual?

    So you think that your stint in a collage dorm room prepared you 100 percent for everything that life could possibly throw at you? I have seen and done a lot (I am a firefighter) and most likely am older by a number of years than yourself and I still get tripped up by life many times. I don't consider suicide but recent events in my life causes me have I feel some empathy for those who do.

    I have taken a number of Collage classes but never attended Collage just the life school of hard knocks!

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  • Keitho wrote...
    College....Really?
    March 9, 2012 7:49 am
    What a stupid and juvenile act. Sounds like a junior high prank. He should really be ashamed of himself and should pay some penalty for his actions. That being said, I would hardly blame him for a suicide. Of course his action was horrible and I could see leaving the school had something like that happened to me but it was not worth killing yourself over.
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  • Citizen of Krazy Town wrote...
    The New Yorker published a very good article on this case last month
    March 16, 2012 11:24 am
    http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2012/02/06/120206fa_fact_parker It provides a lot of background and insight regarding Clementi and Dharun that may by enlightening to the knee-jerkers in this thread, from both sides of the discussion.
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