# Hope Solo shouldn't be allowed to play for team USA **URL:** \ **Category:** The Game Room\ **Created:** [September 24, 2014, 9:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hope-solo-shouldnt-be-allowed-to-play-for-team-usa/699416 "2014-09-24T09:10:00Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![EllisDee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ellisdee/32/4531_2.png) [@EllisDee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EllisDee)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2014, 6:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hope-solo-shouldnt-be-allowed-to-play-for-team-usa/699416/41 "2014-09-25T18:11:54Z")
> [@Marley23](#): > > “Does any of this mean that Hope Solo should keep playing while she awaits her day in court? Not necessarily.” Yes, and what a strong, principled stand against domestic violence that was! ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2014, 6:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hope-solo-shouldnt-be-allowed-to-play-for-team-usa/699416/42 "2014-09-25T18:12:41Z")
> [@EllisDee](#): > > Yes, and what a strong, principled stand against domestic violence that was! Sir, I’m going to have to ask you to put down the goal posts and step away from the pitch. ---
**Author:** ![Jimmy\_Chitwood](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/f475e1/32.png) [@Jimmy\_Chitwood](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jimmy_Chitwood)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2014, 6:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hope-solo-shouldnt-be-allowed-to-play-for-team-usa/699416/43 "2014-09-25T18:20:52Z")
TLDR for both you and **TriPolar** , **Ellis** : my opinion is that the cases are very obviously qualitatively different from each other, and any accusation of a double standard premised on an equivalence between two things that are qualitatively different is suspect. > [@EllisDee](#): > > I can’t tell if you’re saying that I’m misrepresenting the linked articles, or that the linked articles are bullshit. If the latter, agreed. If the former, they explicitly make the argument that it’s not as big a deal specifically because Solo is a woman. > > Also, I don’t know why you repeatedly tried to make it seem like I said all domestic violence is the same. Of course it’s not. That would be stupid. “Domestic violence is domestic violence” doesn’t mean “all domestic violence is the same.” It means “all domestic violence is unacceptable.” I’m saying that your paraphrase of the articles is based on what must be a misunderstanding of why those articles think the Hope Solo and Ray Rice cases are not analogous. I don’t think you believe they really are analogous (because you said they’re not, not because I’m clever, admittedly). But I don’t agree anybody is explicitly saying they’re not analogous because Hope Solo is a woman… I don’t even think it seems like you believe that. I haven’t been trying to make it seem like you said all domestic violence was the same. I said that, assuming that you weren’t saying that, it wasn’t clear to me how “domestic abuse is domestic abuse” is responsive to Slate or the Atlantic’s criticism of people who were saying things like “why isn’t anyone talking about Hope Solo?” That’s what happened, right? A bunch of people wrote or tweeted stuff about how there’s an inexplicable silence about Hope Solo even though people are _so worried_ about Ray Rice. So then some other people wrote articles saying well, hey, the Hope Solo thing is bad, but there are reasonable and obvious explanations for why people are talking much more about Ray Rice than about Hope Solo. And among those explanations is the fact that severe spousal abuse, particularly of women by men, is just frankly a worse problem and causes more trouble for society than people getting into fights of some provenance with their teenage nephews and (probably) assaulting them. It seems like you agree with that in general since you agree that in the isolated cases the Rice crime was worse than the Solo crime. Not because one is a woman and one is a man, but because shit’s complicated and is made up of a lot of parts and we are capable enough of contemplating the whole of the thing and coming to some sort of understanding of its severity, but partly because Rice was hitting his wife, and violence in that kind of intimate relationship, which one does not ordinarily have with a teenaged nephew, is especially scary. But then, despite being mindful of the responses about the false equivalence, because you linked to them, you said basically the same thing in your OP that the people on twitter were saying, which I took to mean (“domestic abuse is domestic abuse”) that like **TriPolar** and the Peterson thing you actually do believe that the two cases are functionally equivalent and that there’s a sexist agenda at work in not treating them as equivalent. And I don’t know why you would say that, considering that you agree that the Ray Rice thing was worse, and that’s basically what those articles are saying. ---
**Author:** ![Saint\_Cad](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/saint_cad/32/18907_2.png) [@Saint\_Cad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Saint_Cad)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2014, 7:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hope-solo-shouldnt-be-allowed-to-play-for-team-usa/699416/44 "2014-09-25T19:04:22Z")
All I know is I saw her on Dancing with the Stars while the wife had it on. She is a cunt and I don’t use that term lightly. ---
**Author:** ![EllisDee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ellisdee/32/4531_2.png) [@EllisDee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EllisDee)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2014, 7:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hope-solo-shouldnt-be-allowed-to-play-for-team-usa/699416/45 "2014-09-25T19:24:02Z")
> [@Jimmy\_Chitwood](#): > > I haven’t been trying to make it seem like you said all domestic violence was the same. I said that, assuming that you weren’t saying that, it wasn’t clear to me how “domestic abuse is domestic abuse” is responsive to Slate or the Atlantic’s criticism of people who were saying things like “why isn’t anyone talking about Hope Solo?” > > That’s what happened, right? A bunch of people wrote or tweeted stuff about how there’s an inexplicable silence about Hope Solo even though people are _so worried_ about Ray Rice. I didn’t see any of those articles. I googled for articles to link when I posted the OP. I only became aware of the Hope Solo story when I saw it on PTI. My position has developed along the lines of how the NFL is saying (pretending, more like) their position developed. It’s also roughly analagous to how the view on DUI has changed, where it used to be taken much less seriously than it is now. I was always aware of domestic abuse as a bad problem, but not really in an internalized way. When the initial video went public, I thought the NFL’s two game ban was a little weak; probably should have been four games. When the second video came out, though, holy fucking shit, ban that guy, and ban him now! (This is basically what the NFL also claims, but I don’t buy it. They clearly had the second tape all along.) So like how DUI used to be bad but not “an issue,” I viewed domestic abuse as bad but not “an issue.” After seeing that tape, I consider it _very much_ an issue. And I see all the qualified wishy-washiness about the Hope Solo case (“it’s not so bad, she’s a girl, women’s soccer doesn’t have a history of demoestic abuse”) as a crock of shit. She was a arrested for domestic abuse. Sit her ass down until that case is resolved. Especially if she’s on a friggin national team. But to add insult to injury, they responded to the pressure to sit her by making her captain. What…the…fuck?! The pushback linked to in the above articles is basically arguing that it’s not as bad as Ray Rice, so stop making a fuss. That’s like arguing right now that DUI with a 1.5 isn’t as bad as a 2.0. I mean, really, that’s the defense to keep her playing? ---
**Author:** ![Jimmy\_Chitwood](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/f475e1/32.png) [@Jimmy\_Chitwood](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jimmy_Chitwood)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2014, 7:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hope-solo-shouldnt-be-allowed-to-play-for-team-usa/699416/46 "2014-09-25T19:31:40Z")
I don’t think that the articles you linked to (which, incidentally, themselves link to and are directly responding to the commentary you hadn’t seen) say either that she should be playing because she’s a woman or that it’s not as bad as Ray Rice so stop making a fuss. I don’t think that’s in there. In fact, I’m not aware of anyone anywhere, this thread included, who has actually said that you’re wrong to believe Hope Solo shouldn’t be playing. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2014, 7:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hope-solo-shouldnt-be-allowed-to-play-for-team-usa/699416/47 "2014-09-25T19:35:01Z")
> [@EllisDee](#): > > The pushback linked to in the above articles is basically arguing that it’s not as bad as Ray Rice, so stop making a fuss. It depends on what you mean by a fuss. They say this is not exactly the same as the Rice and Peterson (and Hardy and McDonald and…) stories on a broader level and that people shouldn’t create a false equivalence or a distraction from the NFL’s issues based on Solo. They don’t say that violence perpetrated by women is OK or doesn’t count or isn’t worth of discussion. Hess says “I agree, advocating for male victims of domestic violence and discussing the role of female perpetrators is a worthy goal.” ---
**Author:** ![ISiddiqui](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/97f17d/32.png) [@ISiddiqui](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ISiddiqui)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2014, 7:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hope-solo-shouldnt-be-allowed-to-play-for-team-usa/699416/48 "2014-09-25T19:35:08Z")
There is a reason the NFL’s new domestic abuse policy only kicks in for conviction, not arrest. We already engage in way too much crucifixion of people before they are proven guilty and in some of those cases, are vastly off the mark (anyone remember the Duke lacrosse rape case?). I’m against the witch hunt - lets get some proof first. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2014, 7:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hope-solo-shouldnt-be-allowed-to-play-for-team-usa/699416/49 "2014-09-25T19:38:03Z")
> [@ISiddiqui](#): > > There is a reason the NFL’s new domestic abuse policy only kicks in for conviction, not arrest. [Not true.](http://www.sbnation.com/nfl/2014/8/28/6079465/nfl-announces-new-domestic-violence-policy) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hope-solo-shouldnt-be-allowed-to-play-for-team-usa/699416.md?page=2)