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Northwestern Professor Runs Afoul of the Title IX Mob

Discussion in 'Sports and News' started by doctorquant, Jun 2, 2015.

  1. doctorquant

    doctorquant Well-Known Member

    Read about this on the Chronicle of Higher Education but didn't link because everything was behind a paywall. Now it's making its way into more open outlets, so here goes ...

    Feminist professor Laura Kipnis at Northwestern penned a piece decrying the climate surrounding sexual conduct in today's academy. Students protested with the mattress bit (of course), but two others, believe it or not, filed Title IX complaints. Later, when the chairman of the faculty senate discussed the Kipnis investigation at a faculty senate meeting, one of the original complainants filed a Title IX complaint against him!

    Late last week Kipnis received word she'd been cleared on the Title IX complaints (and the complaint against the faculty senate guy has been dropped). In fact, there's a whole lotta walking back going on.

    How Laura Kipnis' 'Sexual Paranoia' Essay Caused A Frenzy At Northwestern University

    There's tons of stuff out there on this now, but all of it's pretty politicized.
     
  2. doctorquant

    doctorquant Well-Known Member

    Megan McArdle sums up my thoughts pretty succinctly here:

    Campus Justice: Punished Until Proven Innocent - Bloomberg View
     
  3. swingline

    swingline Well-Known Member

    I read Kipnis's article about the case yesterday in The Chronicle of Higher Education. I don't know much about her politics, but the fact that someone can be hauled before what is essentially a tribunal for something like this is outrageous. Sorry, coddled students, college is supposed to challenge you and your precious sensibilities. Get over yourselves, already; you arent special, and something you don't agree with doesn't make it hate speech.
     
  4. meh ... its just like politics.
     
  5. Big Circus

    Big Circus Well-Known Member

    You guys aren't wrong, but it's worth pointing out that the system worked in this case. They made the correct decision quickly.
     
  6. JayFarrar

    JayFarrar Well-Known Member

    Interesting that the Huffington Post would leave out their own role in the ongoing story as they published a piece written by a graduate student.

    Anyway, I've said it before and I'll say it again, the lounge lizards fights are always the best because the stakes are so low.
     
  7. Armchair_QB

    Armchair_QB Well-Known Member

    Actually, no they didn't make the correct decision.

    The correct decision would have been to throw the complaint out about five seconds after it was filed. The fact she was "cleared" meant the idiots sitting in judgement thought the complaint had merit enough to warrant a hearing.
     
    franticscribe likes this.
  8. britwrit

    britwrit Well-Known Member

    The original essay has to be one of the most obnoxious pieces I've read in a while:

    Back in the day, hooking up with your professors was awesome! Really, it was! And if it sometimes wasn't, well, you'd be a little sad for a while and then you'd go back to partying with the English faculty, laughing and learning, because that's just the way things were in that best year ever possible of 1975....

    I love nostalgia too but wow, remember when it used to be so much better?

     
  9. MisterCreosote

    MisterCreosote Well-Known Member

    I don't know which Neanderthal came up with the talking point, but the idea that rape accusations are just a modern-day manifestation of post-hookup regret is one of the more insulting and troglodytic mindsets in this country.

    This dipshit professor has the right to say it, of course, but it doesn't make her any less pathetic.
     
  10. doctorquant

    doctorquant Well-Known Member

    Ummmm, MC ... Could you kindly point out where this professor said that?
     
    YankeeFan likes this.
  11. MisterCreosote

    MisterCreosote Well-Known Member

    I really don't have the desire to rehash this whole thing with you. Nor do I have a desire to give this dingbat any more attention. But:

    They used to be respectable citizens—leaders in their fields, department chairs, maybe even a dean or two—and now they’re abusers of power avant la lettre.
    ---
    On my campus, several such "mixed" couples leap to mind, including female professors wed to former students. Not to mention the legions who’ve dated a graduate student or two in their day—plenty of female professors in that category, too—in fact, I’m one of them. Don’t ask for details. It’s one of those things it now behooves one to be reticent about, lest you be branded a predator.
    ---
    I suppose I’m out of step with the new realities because I came of age in a different time, and under a different version of feminism, minus the layers of prohibition and sexual terror surrounding the unequal-power dilemmas of today.
    ---
    It’s not that I didn’t make my share of mistakes, or act stupidly and inchoately, but it was embarrassing, not traumatizing.
    ---
    And the kowtowing to the fiction—kowtowing wrapped in a vaguely feminist air of rectitude. If this is feminism, it’s feminism hijacked by melodrama.
     
  12. doctorquant

    doctorquant Well-Known Member

    Don't worry, MC, no rehashing will be necessary ... if that's what you call depicting "rape accusations [as] just a modern-day manifestation of post-hookup regret" then I've got nothing for you.
     
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