My Title IX Inquisition
chronicle.com
chronicle.com
> I’m no expert on legal fees, but I was pretty sure the meter was ticking in $10,000 increments.
> new Title IX complaints have been filed against the faculty-support person who accompanied me to the session with the investigators... Another team of lawyers from the same firm has been appointed to conduct a new investigation.
> At the end of the interrogation, the investigators asked if I wanted to file my own retaliation complaint against the student who’d revealed the charges.
Well, I see one party who's winning it big here.
On a related note, it's obscene how locked-down the process sounds. Forbidding having an attorney present, forbidding the recording of the proceedings, being extremely unwilling to reveal the charges ahead of interrogation so that a defense could be prepared. Is it even legal to forbid recording? Some quick Googling suggests the jurisdiction the author is in is a one-party consent state, but IANAL. What would be the consequences of refusing to accept their terms?
> Also that my tweets were apparently being monitored.
Well, "monitored" is too strong IMO -- really, people just got angry enough to stalk the author on social media until they found something damning. Then again, as this and other pitchfork mob cases show, you may as well treat everything you say or write as if it is monitored; because someday, someone will probably find a reason to dig through it.
You don't have the right to an attorney. You don't have the right to know the charges against you. You don't have the right to face the accused.
This is rule 12 from Alinsky's Rules for Radicals:
"Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it." - Cut off the support network and isolate the target from sympathy. Go after people and not institutions; people hurt faster than institutions.
[1] More cynically, policymakers want to be seen as doing something, and do not care sufficiently what it is that they are actual doing.
[2] The author did acknowledge this nature of the problem.
This is the problem with governing in general and is why trying to over-regulate students lives (i.e. "infantilize" them) is such a bad idea. The folly of those who think they can engineer a better society put millions to death in the 20th century. It's kept billions in poverty through today. No one is being killed for their opinions at American colleges, but speaking from first hand experience as a recent graduate, freedom of speech is suffering.
But when the systems begin to balance out -- not many universities maintain anti-feminist or pro-racist cultures, though I can name a few that do -- then those same powers are easily abused, simply because there aren't significant targets to go after. So, minor figures, often on the same political side as the aggrieved, are attacked using laws that are the equivalent of using grapeshot to kill a goldfish.
Unfortunately, as you point out, it's hard to reform those laws, because when you have people who want to repeal progress entirely, it's hard to distinguish (and, practically, there might not be any difference) between "reform" and "repeal."
But, seriously, young people. What the hell? (And get off my lawn!)
As somebody who often takes the "reform" side I'd say it's not an accidental misunderstanding when people think I'm saying "repeal". FWICT it stems from a deep and fundamental disrespect for the views of others. It's a common pattern: the default response to someone being critical of any social justice movement is an accusation of racism, sexism, bigotry, etc. Honestly it's why I try to only discuss these things anonymously on the internet where it isn't so risky.
What does produce these results is terrible governance. The "system" described here is a case study in how not to handle dispute resolution.
I lay blame squarely at the feet of the demonstrably overpaid "leadership" at Northwestern who allowed these procedures to take root in the first place.
Since the political beliefs involved are common across cases they becomes a prime suspect. Bureaucracy exists in many of the cases as well, but it's only one tool that this group uses to further their agenda.
This is a basic sanitation issue. If you run your university that badly, problems like this are a mathematical certainty. The specific set of grievances is immaterial. If it's not one, it will be another.
Indeed, for some, ideology itself in the means to an end, and these people can be quite flexible about how seriously they take it depending on how well it supports their more fundamental goal, which is raw dominance.
But since you asked, no, there's no moral equivalence here. The reason why people who get raped, abused, etc. are not responsible for the crimes and assaults committed by others because they have a basic right to walk around freely and securely.
However, governments (or people charged with the responsibility for governance) don't have the same right to operate without being targeted by assholes. That's because a major part of their job is dealing with assholes. It is literally what they get paid to do. So unlike people (who are generally not paid to deal with rape threats or worse), the people who are paid to deal with assholes cannot accept their giant salaries then turn around and say "hey, we're subjected a bunch of toxic assholes."
This is about as unreasonable as a divorce lawyer getting upset because of exposure to people having distressingly sharp conflicts over irreconcilable differences. Seriously, if you have a problem taking out the trash, don't accept work in waste management.
It's morally wrong to subject others to unfair lawsuits, as noted elsewhere in this thread in some jurisdictions it's even codified in law: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barratry_%28common_law%29
It's not awful for me to point out that I see people who are the victims of morally wrong actions being blamed for what's happening to them. Who's doing the blaming just makes it ironic.
http://harvardlawreview.org/2015/02/trading-the-megaphone-fo...
Both define discrimination in such a broad way, that expressing an opinion could be considered as discrimination. Whether that opinion is "girls are not as smart as boys on average" or "political correctness has gone too far" is a detail. In principal, holding any incorrect opinion could indicate a bias that leads to discrimination.
It's like a cockroach--you never see just one cockroach, if you do, there's a lot more you're not seeing.
"It's my opinion that girls are not as smart as boys on average, but I will treat everyone in my class fairly" doesn't pass the sniff test for believability.
This is a great example of the kind of reasoning I was talking about. Because of your political beliefs you have determined that no reasonable person thinks "girls are not as smart as boys". From this you conclude that the only reason a person would conclude this, is because of some deeper bias against women. Therefore you conclude that such a person is very likely to treat women unfairly in the classroom.
Your political beliefs have become law, because the law interprets discrimination in a way that is informed by your beliefs.
EDIT: After more research, the government's advice is that title IX never applies to protected speech alone [0]. So saying "girls are less intelligent than boys" in fact could never, in itself, violate title IX. However, the definition of harassment is so vague that it's understandable that universities can't figure out how to reconcile the first amendment with title IX.
[0] http://www2.ed.gov/about/offices/list/ocr/firstamend.html Harassment, however, to be prohibited by the statutes within OCR's jurisdiction, must include something beyond the mere expression of views, words, symbols or thoughts that some person finds offensive. Under OCR's standard, the conduct must also be considered sufficiently serious to deny or limit a student's ability to participate in or benefit from the educational program. Thus, OCR's standards require that the conduct be evaluated from the perspective of a reasonable person in the alleged victim’s position, considering all the circumstances, including the alleged victim’s age.
As far as I can tell, you're the one politicizing speech here.
One is ok, the other suggests a bias that's going to cut half the class off at the knees.
Would this be an unacceptable opinion for an Olympic track referee to hold?
Or to pick an example with with similar moral connotations: "It's my opinion that black people have higher blood pressure than Asian people on average, but I will treat every patient fairly."
Would this (accurate) opinion prevent a doctor from providing appropriate care to hypertensive Asian patients?
Her accusers were allowed to remain anonymous. She was denied the right to use a lawyer. The specific charges against her were never provided in writing. And they were apparently based merely on the fact that her op-ed offended her accusers.
Since the attacks against her were instigated by the students, who represent our future, this story will give you a good sense of where our society is heading. And it ain’t paradise.
Source: http://www.nacua.org/documents/OCRLetterviolence.pdf
"In maritime law, barratry is the commission of an act by the master or mariners of a vessel for an unlawful or fraudulent purpose that is contrary to the duty owed to the owners, by which act the owners sustain injury." [1]
EDIT: Link
This seems extra interesting to me since a second conviction of Barratry in Texas is a felony, where most patent lawsuits happen.
No male academic in his right mind would write what I did. Men have been effectively muzzled, as any number of my male correspondents attested.
People who "knew the truth but turned their back on it" get a special level of disdain from groups with strong ideologies, in their eyes it's worse than being ignorant of the truth.
That being said it's hard to imagine the author receiving more venom than all the men who wouldn't have dreamed to write such an article.
The original 1972 document is useless to read. The OCR wrote revised guidance in 2001, and further clarified in an April 2011 "Dear Colleague" letter. These documents are both very clearly written.
2001: http://www2.ed.gov/about/offices/list/ocr/docs/shguide.html 2011: http://www2.ed.gov/about/offices/list/ocr/letters/colleague-...
The coordinator's job here, IMO, should have been clearcut. The 2001 Guidance explains that his or her first task would be to determine whether the OPs conduct denied a student's ability to participate in or benefit from the program:
In assessing sexually harassing conduct, it is important for schools to recognize that two distinct issues are considered. The first issue is whether, considering the types of harassment discussed in the following section, the conduct denies or limits a student's ability to participate in or benefit from the program based on sex.' If it does, the second issue is the nature of the school's responsibility to address that conduct. As discussed in a following section, this issue depends in part on the identity of the harasser and the context in which the harassment occurred.
The complainant's made a crafty argument for how the OpEd limited their educational experience, but their argument is also specifically excluded in the "First Amendment" section of the 2001 Guidance:
In cases of alleged harassment, the protections of the First Amendment must be considered if issues of speech or expression are involved. [112] Free speech rights apply in the classroom (e.g., classroom lectures and discussions) [113] and in all other education programs and activities of public schools (e.g., public meetings and speakers on campus; campus debates, school plays and other cultural events [114]; and student newspapers, journals, and other publications [115]). In addition, First Amendment rights apply to the speech of students and teachers. [116]
Title IX is intended to protect students from sex discrimination, not to regulate the content of speech. OCR recognizes that the offensiveness of a particular expression as perceived by some students, standing alone, is not a legally sufficient basis to establish a sexually hostile environment under Title IX. [117] In order to establish a violation of Title IX, the harassment must be sufficiently serious to deny or limit a student's ability to participate in or benefit from the education program. [118]
Moreover, in regulating the conduct of its students and its faculty to prevent or redress discrimination prohibited by Title IX (e.g., in responding to harassment that is sufficiently serious as to create a hostile environment), a school must formulate, interpret, and apply its rules so as to protect academic freedom and free speech rights. For instance, while the First Amendment may prohibit a school from restricting the right of students to express opinions about one sex that may be considered derogatory, the school can take steps to denounce those opinions and ensure that competing views are heard. The age of the students involved and the location or forum may affect how the school can respond consistently with the First Amendment.
Unless there's more to the complaint than the OP reveals, this should never have been investigated.
I would love to know if there's been new precedent set since 2011 that would make the university's response here seem more appropriate. Does anyone know?
From http://www.nacua.org/onlinecourses/title_ix_coordinator_trai...
"State and federal courts — not OCR — have the final say in determining relevant due process requirements. Courts are likely to give accused students a right to legal assistance"
(OCR is the DoE Office of Civil Rights which controls Title IX)
Of course, the people who currently benefit from it (the hordes of administrators who enforce these ridiculous policies) are never going to admit that they are in the wrong, or that they should allow for more reasoned due process. Hopefully, enough people read articles like this, and realize that Title IX is a complete farce. Pressuring legislators to throw out Title IX is the only sensible course of action against it.
[1] http://chronicle.com/article/Sexual-Paranoia-Strikes/190351/
Do you disagree with the principle of Title IX (i.e. that federal money should not fund educational activities that discriminate on the basis of sex), or is it that Title IX has led to bad events and the only way to stop those bad events is to remove Title IX?
The question becomes, why didn't the author find good, pro-bono legal counsel willing to fight against students in a title IX case.
This would be a risky case for a leftist lawyer to take pro bono because they may face a severe political backlash for it.
Of course the fight of the (self perceived) marginalized groups to try and dismantle the first is more than ironic and amusing.
The point is the policing powers of the radical left are such that when a member of the moderate left is chosen for public castigation their peers don't want to get involved. Like the author said, she's getting a lot of silent support from people who aren't daring to go public with their support. The reason libertarians are happy to get involved publicly is they're far outside the political left so the radical left holds very little power over them.
A moderate leftist reaching out to Ken White for help would be like a centrist republican contacting the ACLU, that's a lot of trust to place in people that you normally disagree with.
edit: Not sure why I'm getting downvoted here, just trying to explain why it might be difficult for the author to find pro-bono legal help from within her existing social network.
This has nothing to do with rape or feminism or any other of these issues: it has to do with respect and self-respect, neither of these the student body at that school seems to be rich in.
To that point, I think they (18+ year olds) should be allowed to drink, too, but that's a topic for a different day.
What particularly struck me was the refusal to believe professors had any power over students, followed by a story of an author being harassed by an editor, followed by the argument that if students aren't exposed to harassment at university then they won't be prepared for real life. That's not even internally consistent on several levels.
- But should she be subjected to an investigation for writing a "naive" article? I think not, as surely the freedom of thought includes the freedom to have "wrong" opinions?
(2) "then took a very unwise turn with the recounting of the ongoing court cases."
-Disagree. These cases are in the public record. Why shouldn't she mention them? It's not as if she has sworn confidentiality or she had inside information.
(3) "What particularly struck me was the refusal to believe professors had any power over students"
- I don't think this is an accurate summary at all. You don't have to agree with her opinion, her point was that the new attitudes she's complaining about greatly exaggerate the power of professors over students. A professor has the power to give a student a bad grade or write them a bad recommendation. A student has the power to complain about the professor to the dean/chair and give him/her a bad evaluation. If a student alleges sexual harassment or assault the professor's career could be destroyed even if the charges are not proven. Basically a professor has some power, but not some kind of unlimited power over individual students, which seems to be what is being alleged.
(4) "if students aren't exposed to harassment at university then they won't be prepared for real life."
-Nope. I would phrase it as "If students are overly coddled and swaddled they will not develop psychological coping skills to deal with a real world which is not going to exquisitely cater to their sensitivities".
There needs to be a better way to monetize written content online than this...
Let's assume that the studio is outside CA so the following law does not apply: http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/cgi-bin/displaycode?section=lab&gr...
Let's hope more people like her continue to speak out against these persecutions.
There are a few possible remedies here. One is to vehemently deny that these people are feminists, and recapture the label. Another is to not identify as anything, and just follow the ideas—but it’s hard for most people to be that egoless.
Feminism isn't just a "good idea". It has a lot of baggage about what that exactly means that not every reasonable person is going to agree with (such as equal opportunity vs. equal outcomes), and the underlying theories and ways to achieve whatever they are trying to achieve.
Saying that feminism is just a "good idea" is kind of like putting all political ideas and movements into one soup as "good ideas" if their ultimate goals are well-meaning. It just so happens that feminism has an ideological monopoly on gender matters... but that doesn't mean that Feminism==gender matters.
Worth reading: http://www.thenation.com/article/178140/feminisms-toxic-twit...
I massively disagree with the general thrust of these "inquisitions" as discussed in the article, although the original Title IX, if I understand it, was meant to be about equalising opportunity[1] and not about whatever this is all about.
[1] "The principal objective of Title IX is to avoid the use of federal money to support sex discrimination in education programs", from http://www.justice.gov/crt/about/cor/coord/titleix.php
I also believe women should have equal political and social rights, yet I'm not at all a feminist.
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/feminism
So by the dictionary definition, you are a feminist (and, of course, based on your advocacy of social and political rights for women, I and anybody else using a dictionary would describe you as a feminist, no matter how much you insist that you're not).
What definition are you using that means that you're not, and what's the source of that definition? It's not really fair for you to be using a different definition without saying so in advance.
Being called feminist because I believe in social and political equality is like being called a Christian because I think heaven sounds like a wonderful place. But IMHO if you don't believe in Jesus you're not a Christian and if you don't believe in the feminist social critique you're not a feminist.
Even then it was absurd. I think that people need to grow the hell up, and develop a little bit of a thick skin here. I also agree with other comments, any legal charges are best met with legal council, and I don't think the law firm in question is driven by proper motives, which should be to establish if the charges have merit and what corrective actions to take if they do. It seems more about perpetuating murky legal maneuvering.
The people whose home addresses were published, along with death threats of unknown credibility (i.e. they could be credible, they could be jokes, how can you tell at a glance?) don't need a thicker skin; the rest of us need to make sure that menacing behavior doesn't happen.
It's all fun and games until the death threats/doxxing happen. (That's where we go from actual civil or uncivil discourse, which should always be ok, to something that's never appropriate/ok.)
"It’s not that I didn’t make my share of mistakes, or act stupidly and inchoately, but it was embarrassing, not traumatizing." [1]
I think this is an important point. These kids can't tell being embarrassed from being traumatized. Presumably this woman embarrassed herself by getting too drunk to perform in bed, so she felt traumatized, and the idiotic professor was the obvious scapegoat.
And when the infantilized man- and womanchildren are dragged out of their "safe spaces" to face real criticism for their embarrasing ideas, it's a traumatic experience, so who else to blame, but those who criticise them? In that mindset it's easy to imagine the op-ed as a retaliation.
I don't understand how she's shocked that this could be taken as retaliation. It's disingenuous to say she "mentioned no one by name" when she was clearly talking about the student that filed the complaint.
If you think professors should be more 'free' than corporate executive, how do you ensure the students aren't more vulnerable than corporate employees?
This is a person in a high status position mocking someone for being intimidated.
Read the article carefully. The student that filed the complaint wasn't the one who she mentioned in the previous article. It was someone she had "mentioned fleetingly" -- so looking at the previous article [1], it might be the grad student that the professor had previously dated, and that he subsequently filed a lawsuit against. His reasons for doing so are not mentioned in the article.
I fail to see how mentioning that the professor filed a lawsuit against someone he had previously dated is retaliatory. It is a simple statement of fact, and if anything, paints the professor in a bad light.
[1] http://chronicle.com/article/Sexual-Paranoia-Strikes/190351/ (paragraph starting "The aftermath...")
>>"The professor sued for defamation various colleagues, administrators, and a former grad student whom, according to his complaint, he had previously dated; "
She's repeating a 'fact' out of the professor's complaint, while leaving out the supposedly defaming statements. The additional relevant information might include the conditions under which they started and stopped dating, or if it happened at all.
So this person said something about a sexual assault suspect, then got sued for it, and he said they had dated. Then some other professor writes about her, and nothing about what actually happened. (And we, still now, are mainly relying on that other professor's narrative.) And the article she's mentioned in is extremely dismissive of the whole situation.
So who's getting attacked for free speech and stating facts here?
Let's not forget the professor's most recent book "Men: Notes From an Ongoing Investigation (Metropolitan Books, 2014)."
> You can make a lot of propaganda by choosing facts.
Like you did by choosing to only quote half of her sentence? The full sentence was "The professor sued for defamation various colleagues, administrators, and a former grad student whom, according to his complaint, he had previously dated; a judge dismissed those suits this month".
Presumably this means the professor is suing someone he claimed to be dating, who denies that they dated, and again presumably that person has made some claim about the professors sexual conduct.
ETA: Also, you highlight my omission of the mention of the dismissal, as if that's relevant. Why?
There's a guide to reporting sub judice here:
http://www.out-law.com/en/topics/tmt--sourcing/media-and-cre...
http://www.bbc.co.uk/academy/journalism/article/art201307021...
I'm not sure why you're so heavily downvoted. What you're saying doesn't seem so outlandish: be careful when you blog about stuff that's currently being litigated.