While the Title IX coordinator at the University of Missouri had the good sense to reject a sexual harassment complaint involving a dancing Teletubby, her new rules for student liaisons are baffling – and seem to contradict the popular mantra that student should only have sex after getting unambiguous consent.
The Foundation for Individual Rights in Education notes that coordinator Linda Bennett released an all-university memo a few weeks ago:
“Examples of behavior that will not be tolerated,” the letter says, include “Requesting another person to engage in a behavior with a sexual body part or enacting a sexual behavior.” (Emphasis added.) How is a student supposed to engage in any sexual activity, except by first requesting that the other person engage in it? Maybe MU doesn’t think consent is sexy, after all.
So if I understand correctly, the best way to suggest a sexual encounter is through euphemism – something like “want to do the horizontal polka?” (that’s an old one, sorry kids) or “let’s clean the flagpole” or… let’s just stop there.
The memo doesn’t get any clearer after that. One example of harassment is “Remarks of a sexual nature, such as comments about a person’s clothing, appearance, or sexual experience.” So… which one is harassment, saying “you look nice in that dress” or “you look fat in that dress”?
The problem with these rules, FIRE says, isn’t that
90 percent of the student population will be suspended, but that they allow for selective or arbitrary enforcement—they can be used by administrators to punish whatever or whomever they just don’t like.
The group raised a similar issue with the University of Oregon earlier this month, concerning a female student who faces possible expulsion for yelling a four-word sex joke out a window at a couple.
Read the full FIRE post here.
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