Still, I think 30 days is a bit light. I think he needs a larger portion of a year in jail, with a year as a maximum. I don’t see the point of more than a year in this case.

He’s also getting three years probation. I don’t know what probation entails, but depending the terms of probation, that could be a significant thing also.

If Tyler Clementi’s parents’ description of Dharun Ravi’s bigoted behavior toward Clementi are representative of Ravi’s thinking, then the judge worked hard to ignore the evidence to be able to claim Ravi didn’t hate Clementi but acted out of “insensitivity”. And I don’t accept the judge’s implicit false dilemma that lets Ravi substantially off the hook if he doesn’t feel hatred. Contempt and callousness are each probably more common among anti-gay bigots than is hatred. Either emotion could motivate someone to commit worse crimes than Ravi’s in this case.

I’m against deportation for Ravi, too, but for a different reason than anyone here has stated so far: India doesn’t deserve this little creep either, and since he commit his crimes here, he’s our problem to deal with.

So what? He considered it a harmless prank and that makes it ok? So you would be perfectly ok with your roommate hooking up a webcamera and twice broadcast the fact that you are going to have sex to whoever wants to watch? Invasion of privacy is a crime and that is what he was prosecuted for. He was not charged in the suicide, but 30 days is just plain BS.

It may be vindictive, and yes i wasn’t personally effected by this, but I hope he suffers for the rest of his life because of what he did. It doesn’t even sound like he has any remorse for what he did.

And then for crimes of tampering with evidence, witness tampering, and hindering prosecution — acts which occured after Tyler Clementi’s death? 30 days? DAYS? Puh-leeze? This is a MISDEMEANOR-LEVEL term to jail!

Under N.J. Stat. § 2C:43-6(a)(2), a Crime in the Second Degree is punishable by a term between five and ten years in prison. Those letters and pleas to the court must have been REAL good to get the sentence down from five years to 30 days. Damn!

What we need to work toward is letting gay teenagers know that they are just as normal as straight teenagers, and to stand proud of who they are. And, to get them a support system while they are teenagers.

Yes Tyler felt perhaps more violated than might a jock who scored with any cheap drunk girl he could get his paws on. And most of that is related to society’s base level of homophobia. But I don’t think that Ravi should be jailed for the culture’s bias.

— Timothy Kincaid

Part of the reason the situation was sensationalised by Ravi was the fact that Clementi was with a guy, not a girl. That makes homophobic tittilation, and therefore society’s endemic homophobia, central to Ravi’s motivation.

I have an opinion about most things, but I don’t about this. As a mother I think for a few minutes what if Tyler was my son, then I think a few minutes more and think what if Ravi was my son. I’ll have to leave it to the rest of you to talk about this.

The difference in ramifications between the two are enormous.