Teh One Who Knocks
03-25-2016, 11:24 AM
By ANEMONA HARTOCOLLIS - The New York Times
http://i.imgur.com/Th1cTEk.jpg
The growing federal emphasis on combating sexual harassment on campus, along with universities’ broadening definitions of inappropriate sexual behavior, has had a chilling effect on academic freedom and speech, especially on female professors in areas like gender studies, a report released Thursday by the American Association of University Professors said.
The report says that in the last few years, the government has been regulating not just sexual conduct but also sexual speech, and that the emphasis on complying with federal law has led to some professors being investigated by universities for making statements that some students find offensive but that the report says should be protected. A heightened focus on speech, the report said, has led to episodes like one in which students demanded trigger warnings before being exposed to graphic lesbian sex in “Fun Home,” the memoir by the cartoonist Alison Bechdel.
“We need to protect academic speech and the freedom that goes with academic speech, as well as due process,” Risa L. Lieberwitz, general counsel of the association and chairwoman of the subcommittee that drafted the report, said in an interview Wednesday. “Universities are acting in a way that is overly precipitous as well as applying overly broad definitions of sexual harassment because they are afraid of scrutiny.”
The 55-page report is based on research conducted by members of committees on academic freedom and tenure and on women in academia. The report says the association does not mean to underestimate the gravity of sexual harassment complaints, but calls for the government to draw a sharper line between behavior and speech and to commit to protecting academic freedom.
“We take very seriously our responsibility to enforce federal civil rights laws and prohibitions against discrimination while respecting the First Amendment’s protection of free speech,” said Dorie Nolt, press secretary for the United States Education Department, in a statement Wednesday. The department enforces Title IX, the federal law that prohibits discrimination on the basis of sex, which has been interpreted to include sexual harassment. She said the department had consistently sent a message that preventing a hostile environment did not mean chilling free speech.
In recent years, student advocates have pushed the federal government to more strongly police university compliance with Title IX, and the government has tightened its standards and increased enforcement.
But the report said there should be a clearer distinction made between speech that is sexual harassment because it creates a hostile environment and speech discussing controversial or emotional subjects.
The association says the government should allow universities to use a “clear and convincing” standard of evidence in their internal reviews of sexual harassment complaints rather than the less strict “preponderance of evidence” standard now required. And it wants faculty members to have a greater role in determining how to handle sexual misconduct.
Ms. Nolt of the Education Department said the “preponderance of evidence” standard was consistent with case law and with the standard used in other types of civil rights complaints regulated by her office.
The report says that the federal crackdown has poisoned the traditional relationship between faculty and students by turning professors from informal confidants into official enforcers.
To make its case, the report gives examples of professors, often women, who have been investigated for their speech.
In 2013, the report says, Patti Adler, a sociology professor at the University of Colorado Boulder, was investigated for her class Deviance in U.S. Society, which had been popular for more than 20 years. Some students complained that the class was a form of sexual harassment because it involved exercises in which teaching assistants role-played pimps and prostitutes. Ms. Adler was threatened with early retirement, the report says, and though the administration relented, she was so demoralized that she soon retired anyway.
More recently, Laura Kipnis, a professor at Northwestern University, was investigated for writing an essay in The Chronicle of Higher Education in which she talked about “sexual paranoia” on campus. She was investigated by the university’s Title IX office and exonerated.
The report says the matter should have been viewed as an intellectual disagreement, not a violation of education law. But it says university administrators understood the rules “to mean that once a complaint (however questionable) had been filed, an investigation had to be pursued.”
In an email, Ms. Kipnis said: “After I wrote about being brought up on Title IX charges, I got dozens of emails from other professors around the country who’d been though similar things. It’s truly out of control.”
http://i.imgur.com/Th1cTEk.jpg
The growing federal emphasis on combating sexual harassment on campus, along with universities’ broadening definitions of inappropriate sexual behavior, has had a chilling effect on academic freedom and speech, especially on female professors in areas like gender studies, a report released Thursday by the American Association of University Professors said.
The report says that in the last few years, the government has been regulating not just sexual conduct but also sexual speech, and that the emphasis on complying with federal law has led to some professors being investigated by universities for making statements that some students find offensive but that the report says should be protected. A heightened focus on speech, the report said, has led to episodes like one in which students demanded trigger warnings before being exposed to graphic lesbian sex in “Fun Home,” the memoir by the cartoonist Alison Bechdel.
“We need to protect academic speech and the freedom that goes with academic speech, as well as due process,” Risa L. Lieberwitz, general counsel of the association and chairwoman of the subcommittee that drafted the report, said in an interview Wednesday. “Universities are acting in a way that is overly precipitous as well as applying overly broad definitions of sexual harassment because they are afraid of scrutiny.”
The 55-page report is based on research conducted by members of committees on academic freedom and tenure and on women in academia. The report says the association does not mean to underestimate the gravity of sexual harassment complaints, but calls for the government to draw a sharper line between behavior and speech and to commit to protecting academic freedom.
“We take very seriously our responsibility to enforce federal civil rights laws and prohibitions against discrimination while respecting the First Amendment’s protection of free speech,” said Dorie Nolt, press secretary for the United States Education Department, in a statement Wednesday. The department enforces Title IX, the federal law that prohibits discrimination on the basis of sex, which has been interpreted to include sexual harassment. She said the department had consistently sent a message that preventing a hostile environment did not mean chilling free speech.
In recent years, student advocates have pushed the federal government to more strongly police university compliance with Title IX, and the government has tightened its standards and increased enforcement.
But the report said there should be a clearer distinction made between speech that is sexual harassment because it creates a hostile environment and speech discussing controversial or emotional subjects.
The association says the government should allow universities to use a “clear and convincing” standard of evidence in their internal reviews of sexual harassment complaints rather than the less strict “preponderance of evidence” standard now required. And it wants faculty members to have a greater role in determining how to handle sexual misconduct.
Ms. Nolt of the Education Department said the “preponderance of evidence” standard was consistent with case law and with the standard used in other types of civil rights complaints regulated by her office.
The report says that the federal crackdown has poisoned the traditional relationship between faculty and students by turning professors from informal confidants into official enforcers.
To make its case, the report gives examples of professors, often women, who have been investigated for their speech.
In 2013, the report says, Patti Adler, a sociology professor at the University of Colorado Boulder, was investigated for her class Deviance in U.S. Society, which had been popular for more than 20 years. Some students complained that the class was a form of sexual harassment because it involved exercises in which teaching assistants role-played pimps and prostitutes. Ms. Adler was threatened with early retirement, the report says, and though the administration relented, she was so demoralized that she soon retired anyway.
More recently, Laura Kipnis, a professor at Northwestern University, was investigated for writing an essay in The Chronicle of Higher Education in which she talked about “sexual paranoia” on campus. She was investigated by the university’s Title IX office and exonerated.
The report says the matter should have been viewed as an intellectual disagreement, not a violation of education law. But it says university administrators understood the rules “to mean that once a complaint (however questionable) had been filed, an investigation had to be pursued.”
In an email, Ms. Kipnis said: “After I wrote about being brought up on Title IX charges, I got dozens of emails from other professors around the country who’d been though similar things. It’s truly out of control.”