Dean Dominic DiSola entered the main office of the College of Arts and Sciences from the corridor of University Hall. Waiting for him there, as he expected, was Jacob Cohen--full professor of English, but more importantly for today's meeting, chair of the CAS Promotion and Tenure committee. The committee had met last Friday, and Jacob was bringing him the final memos on each of the ten cases it had considered. Even more important for Dominic, though, would be the "after action" account of the committee discussion that Jacob was here to provide.
"Come on into my office," said Dominic. He shut his door after ushering Jacob in. "Please sit down. I'm sorry I'm late. I was just at the presentation being made by the first of these candidates being considered for the directorship of the new Public Policy Institute."
Dominic shook his head. "What a turkey! Someone on the search committee told me that he had glowing letters of recommendations from his colleagues at NYU where he is now. From what I can tell, they must have said great things about him in order to palm him off on us and be rid of him themselves."
"Oh, yeah," responded Jacob. "I got the e-mail notice sent out yesterday about his coming. I wonder how much the provost is paying that headhunting firm coordinating the search for us. And why all the mystery about the candidates, only identifying each the day before he or she actually arrives?"
"Jeannette really has hyped this," observed Dominic, referring to the provost. "Maybe it's because she doesn't want anyone to have enough time to find out what losers these people are before they arrive."
"It sounds like this guy today unmasked himself," said Jacob.
"That's for sure!" laughed Dominic. He looked at his watch. "I'm booked up solid with appointments this afternoon, so let's get down to business."
"Right," said Jacob, pulling out the memos from the manila envelope he had brought them in. "As you know, we had ten cases altogether--three for promotion to full professor, seven for tenure.
"The committee voted unanimously in favor," Jacob continued, "of the three going up for full. Four of the seven tenure cases also received unanimous approval. The committee was, to a greater or lesser extent, divided on the remaining three tenure cases."
"Let's focus on those," said Dominic. There was little point in discussing the others since he was hardly going to recommend against any of the cases which had received unanimous approval from the P&T committee.
"Right," said Jacob. "The three split votes occurred with regard to Rob Barnes and Ann Sweezy from Political Science and Elita White from History. Rob's vote was seven in favor and two against; Ann's was four in favor, three against, and one absence; and Elita's was three in favor, four against, and one absence."
Dominic looked quizzical. "Why the absences in the latter two cases? There's nobody from Political Science or History on the committee this year, is there? Of course, if someone from Poli Sci was on it, there should have been an absence recorded for Barnes too."
"No, nobody from those departments is on the committee this year," Jacob confirmed. "I'm afraid it's a bit of a complicated story."
"Maybe I'd better just let you tell it, then," commented Dominic.
"Right," said Jacob. "Although they were mixed in with the others, I'll talk about them in the order they occurred vis-a-vis one another.
"That means starting first with Robert Barnes. The `vital statistics' are as follows: the vote of the tenured faculty in his department was thirteen in favor, two against, and one abstention; the chair was in favor (though her letter was lukewarm); and the P&T committee vote was seven in favor and two against."
"What was the argument of those opposed to Barnes in the committee?" asked Dominic. "Did they bring up this `unwanted' poster business from last semester?"
"That was not discussed," responded Jacob. "And the reason why is because at our organizational meeting at the end of last semester, Charles Gibson insisted on being Barnes's liaison. Gibson himself, as you know, later became the target of one of those posters--which was why the university stopped any more from being published. When we met last week, nobody else was willing to raise the subject in committee--especially after Gibson himself made an impassioned speech describing Barnes as the innocent victim of a malicious radical feminist conspiracy."
"How did that go over with the rest of the committee?" asked Dominic.
"If anybody else had said it," responded Jacob, "I think there would have been a huge furor. Between you and me, I think that virtually no white professor is willing to challenge a black professor who makes an impassioned statement. There were three women in the room whom I knew wanted to, but none of them did. Each, I'm sure, was hoping one of the others would, but none was willing to risk being denounced by Gibson as a racist for openly disagreeing with him. And considering that Gibson saw himself as the victim of such a conspiracy, he just might have reacted this way if anyone had challenged him on Barnes."
Dominic was very familiar with this reluctance on the part of white professors to openly challenge black ones in meetings for fear of being denounced by them as racist. It was a reluctance that he shared.
"Gibson," continued Jacob, "then presented a strong case for giving Barnes tenure based on his stellar research record. Nobody could point to any deficiency there. In fact, I suspect that Barnes has published more than most people here who already do have tenure. To tell you the truth, he made a very convincing case."
"There were two members of the committee, though, whom he obviously didn't convince," observed Dominic. "Did they present a case for why Barnes shouldn't get tenure? There's no need to mention the names of the people who made the argument--I just need know to what their argument was for when I write up my own memo."
"It was basically the standard old guard position," Jacob replied. "They argued that almost everyone (including themselves) who had been awarded tenure here at NDU had only gone up in their sixth year as an assistant professor. They had put in their dues, and so Barnes should too. They referred to Ruth Silverstein's letter stating that while she supported Barnes, she would have preferred him to go up later after proving himself a good university citizen through the performance of his share of service.
"Gibson pooh-poohed this argument," Jacob continued, "saying that while tenure may have been granted mainly on the basis of service in the past here, a strong research record was now essential if NDU was going to sustain, much less enhance, its growing reputation. One of the old guard actually said to Gibson that that was well and fine for him to say as a university professor who could more easily do research thanks to the lesser teaching and service load than the rest of us carry."
"How did Gibson respond to that?"
"Actually, quite thoughtfully," said Jacob. "He said he understood why university professors might be resented by others here. But he said that we shouldn't take it out on Barnes, who is, after all, an assistant professor who has managed to excel despite the constraints faced by the regular faculty. He even said that for someone like Barnes to be highly productive in terms of research was more of an accomplishment than for someone like himself after becoming a university professor."
"That was quite decent of him," remarked Dominic. "Was anything else said either for or against Barnes?"
"No, I don't think that there were any other points raised," responded Jacob. "We later turned to Sweezy's case. Her vital statistics are: thirteen for, two against, and one abstention in the department (the same as Barnes); a favorable recommendation from the chair (warmer, actually, than Barnes got); and four in favor, three against, and one absence in the P&T committee."
"An absence, not an abstention?" queried Dominic.
"Right."
As they both knew, the difference was important. An abstention was counted as a negative vote while an absence was regarded as neutral. "Technically, then," said Dominic, "that should be recorded as 4-3-0-1," reflecting the usual order in which votes for, votes against, abstentions, and absences were recorded.
"Right," said Jacob again. "That's what I actually have here."
"Good. So what happened?"
"It was very odd. She came under attack from Gibson for having a weak research record--which indeed she has. He said that academics typically publish less after receiving tenure than before it when they face a stronger incentive to do so. And since Sweezy has published so little when she had the incentive to get tenure, he said, we could reasonably expect that she would publish nothing at all when she no longer had that incentive. He then asked us if that was what we really wanted.
"Well, you know how it is," Jacob continued. "When someone on the P&T committee condemns a candidate for a poor research record--and especially when the person doing so is someone as senior as Gibson--nobody wants to step forward and say, `Actually, I think her research record is pretty good.' It would be tantamount to saying, `My standards are lower than yours, and you should accept mine.'"
"Four people ended up voting for her," Dominic observed. "Did any of them make a case for her?"
"Her liaison did," said Jacob. "She acknowledged that Sweezy had not done a lot of research, but had met the minimum standards of her department with the publication of a book. Gibson quickly pointed out that it was only a scholarly commercial press with a reputation for not being terribly selective that was publishing it.
"Sweezy's liaison then went on to argue that the real case for her being awarded tenure was her outstanding service record. She then started to list Ann's accomplishments in this realm. And here is the strange part: when she mentioned that Sweezy was now serving in her third year on the Sexual Assault Complaint Review Committee, Gibson blew up.
"He said that he'd been hauled before what he termed `that kangaroo court' just recently. He hadn't paid much attention to the names of the people serving on it when they were introduced at the beginning of the session. He also said that except for the person he was serving as liaison for, he had not bothered to read the sections on service in the other dossiers we were considering, focusing instead on research records and letters from external referees. If he had known Sweezy had been on this committee which he held in such low regard, he said, he would have recused himself before her case was even discussed. Now that he did know, he continued, he would recuse himself before we voted on her--and then he walked out of the room, telling me to call him back in after we had done so."
"Wow!" said Dominic. "So he had no idea that he had just encountered her? He hadn't ever crossed paths with her before?" Now that he was dean of the College of Arts and Sciences and was responsible for overseeing all the departments within it, Dominic was constantly amazed at how little the faculty from different departments interacted with or even knew about one another. People whose departments were located in the same building might never converse with each other even once in their careers unless they happened to serve together on a CAS or university-wide committee--and maybe not even then. There certainly would not be anything to draw together a renowned university professor specializing in African-American literature like Gibson with a low-level assistant professor who combined public administration and women's studies like Sweezy.
"No, he had never been aware of meeting her, and had not recognized her from the parts of her dossier that he had read," said Jacob. "Well, even though Gibson left the room, we had all heard the damning case he had made against her. One of the old guard made the case that Sweezy had put in her dues like the rest of them, and so had earned tenure despite what any university professor might say. There wasn't much additional discussion and so we proceeded with the vote."
"I see," said Dominic. "And what was the story with Elita White?"
"I'm especially familiar with this case," said Jacob, "since I served as her liaison." In response to Dominic's raised eyebrows, he added, "Nobody else volunteered." Considering all the time-consuming work that being chair of the P&T committee involved, its occupant was traditionally exempt from the burden of serving as a liaison.
"Her vital statistics," Jacob continued, "were six for, six against, and one abstention when the tenured history professors voted, and a favorable recommendation from her chair.
"But when I interviewed the chair" (part of the duty of being a liaison was to interview both the candidate and the chair of the candidate's department before the P&T committee meeting), "he indicated that she was an extremely difficult person to deal with, and that he would not be sad if she was denied tenure."
"Why didn't he recommend against her in his memo then?" asked Dominic.
"I asked him that," said Jacob. "He hemmed and hawed, but didn't really give me a straight answer. I had the strong impression, though, that he anticipates her filing a lawsuit if she is denied tenure. He may have calculated that with such a weak vote from the tenured faculty, she'll never make it past the P&T committee, you, or the provost. Thus, we'd do the dirty work of axing her for him, but he would avoid being included in her lawsuit by virtue of his giving her a positive recommendation."
"And again, how did your committee vote on her?"
"Three in favor, four against, and one absence--Gibson again," replied Jacob.
"How did the discussion go?"
"Since I was her liaison, and since I had read her entire dossier," Jacob began, "I was able to state right away that White was also a member of the Sexual Assault Complaint Review Committee, and so I asked Gibson if he wanted to recuse himself in this case too.
"Gibson said that he would absent himself from the voting," Jacob continued, "but that he thought he should say something about her both because he had, after all, talked a lot about Sweezy before leaving the room and because he had some familiarity with this particular candidate and that it was his duty to tell what he knew. He then said something very surprising."
"It seems he was full of surprises that day," remarked Dominic.
"He told us," Jacob said, "that he really didn't hold it against either White or Sweezy for being a member of the Sexual Assault Complaint Review Committee--especially since Elita had telephoned him the Monday after his hearing to say that the committee had decided in his favor, that she had gotten him off the hook, that she was his black sister, and as Gibson put it, `a lot of other shit like that.'
"Gibson went on to say that Elita hadn't fooled him. He suspected she was calling less out of sympathy for him than because she knew, he was sure, that he was on the P&T committee. Once he'd thought about it, he said that he actually had more respect for Ann Sweezy for not pulling a stunt like that.
"Gibson then pointed out that White's research record was even weaker than Sweezy's. He stated that he was intimately familiar with the African-American studies field, and that the publications in which White's few articles appeared were not scholarly, and that her own work could only be described as polemical. I, of course, had read them myself: he was right.
"He then said that she was an extremely difficult and unpleasant person to deal with, and that he doubted her personality would improve much if she were awarded tenure. He also said that for a university to grant tenure to a candidate as weak as Elita White would be the height of what he called `white liberal condescension'--and then he left."
"In body if not in spirit," remarked Dominic. "Were any arguments presented in her favor?"
"Well, I pointed out that, like Sweezy, White has a strong service record. In addition, she does enjoy a following among African-American female students--something that the university likes, considering what a poor retention rate we have for this group. And, of course, her being here contributes to diversity among the faculty. That was about it."
Dominic wondered whether, despite making these arguments in her favor, Jacob had actually voted for her. Unlike the recommendations made by department chairs, the CAS dean, and the provost which were statements made by individuals that the candidate would see, the votes of the tenured faculty in a department as well as in the college P&T committee were conducted in secret. Each P&T candidate would see how the committee voted as well as its memo to the dean, but nobody voting against a candidate had to acknowledge having done so to him or her. Dominic would have loved to ask Jacob how he voted, but such a question would definitely be unethical.
"I guess that wraps it up," said Jacob. "When do you have to make your recommendations by?"
"My recommendations are due to the provost by the end of this month," replied Dominic. "The provost's recommendations to the president are due at the end of March. The president is supposed to make his final decisions by the end of April, and then those he approves are presented for ratification to the Board of Trustees in May."
"Right," said Jacob as he got up to leave. "I don't envy you having to decide these three cases."
"Thanks for all your hard work, Jacob. You don't have to worry about them any more. At least I have a little time to think about the three cases your committee was divided on," said Dominic as he ushered Jacob out.
Dominic, though, had already made up his mind about them. He would approve all three for tenure, but for different reasons. Barnes was a star--and the college sorely needed stars. Sweezy was just a grunt--but the college needed competent grunts, too. And as for White--well, Dominic also wanted to avoid being named in a lawsuit. If the provost wanted to ax her (and he knew from past experience that Jeannette Bobier was highly likely to), then she could face the storm Elita would raise without him.
Saturday, September 4, 2010
Friday, August 27, 2010
Chapter 12
Ann Sweezy came back into Ellen Stenkovsky's office with a cup of coffee in a paper cup. A Styrofoam cup would have been much easier to carry, but that would not have been environmentally correct. Ellen had also returned, as had Elita White--the African-American African-American history professor. Ann was glad she wasn't last. They were just waiting now on Maurice--the contemporary theater professor who was also African-American. Both Ann and Maurice were usually late both to the beginnings and the resumptions of meetings. But while Ann always felt a little guilty about this, Maurice never seemed to notice that he was late. Ann admired his self-confidence.
This was Maurice's first year of his three-year membership on the committee. It was Elita's second year, and Ann's third. The three of them were all tenure track professors, but since Ann had been on the committee the longest, she was the senior faculty member this year and thus officially the chair. Ellen, though, dealt with all the logistics of the committee and, in truth, actually ran it. It was a late January Friday just before the week spring semester classes began.
Ellen seemed preoccupied with paper work while Elita, as usual, had a grim expression on her face which did not invite conversation. Ann, then, silently mused about her own situation while sipping her coffee and waiting for Maurice.
Ann would be sad when her three year term on the committee came to an end with the close of the current academic year. But if she was denied tenure and had both to appeal the decision as well as search for another job next year, she wouldn't have any spare time to devote to the committee anyway. So far, she thought, things were still on track. The vote of the tenured faculty on her case had been thirteen for, two against, and one abstention. This was obviously less favorable than a unanimous vote in her favor, but at least it was the same, she had been told, as Barnes had gotten. In addition, Ruth Silverstein had written a very positive chair's memo for her. She wondered, though, how it compared with the one Silverstein wrote for Barnes.
After the long winter break, both their dossiers now advanced to the promotion and tenure committee of the College of Arts and Sciences--which, Ann understood from her liaison to the committee, would probably meet next Friday, the last day of the first week of classes. Ann was glad that she was a habitual saver and filer. She had recently looked back through her fall semester collection of What's New at NDU, the faculty/staff information newsletter, and saw that Charles Gibson was a member of the college P&T committee. For once, she had succeeded in not revealing this bit of intelligence to anyone else on the Sexual Assault Complaint Review Committee. With any luck, he would not remember that he had encountered her here when the P&T committee met next week.
The fact that she served on the Sexual Assault Complaint Review Committee was noted in her dossier. She wondered, though, how thoroughly each P&T committee member could read each of the thick dossiers being considered in addition to the dossier that they each had to become very familiar with when serving as the liaison who presented the case to the committee.
In any event, Ann had not said anything to provoke Gibson this morning. Indeed, she was inclined to side with his version of events. But this was not, she assured herself, because he was on the P&T committee. It had, however, been a grueling morning. But then, the deliberations of the Sexual Assault Complaint Review Committee always were.
Maurice came into the room with a can of Diet Coke. "I'm not late, am I?" he asked jovially. "Whew! Nobody told me just how intense this committee was going to be! I'm glad we didn't have any more cases to deal with!"
Ellen looked up from her writing. "Okay, let's get started again," she said in a very serious voice. "Let me remind you of the differences between these two cases, and what we're expected to do now.
"The first complaint we heard this morning was a formal complaint lodged by a student, Genevieve Lacouture, against a professor, Charles Gibson. Because it was a formal complaint, the complainant herself was here to state her grievances against Professor Gibson and he had the opportunity to challenge her--which, I am sure you recall, he did."
"Yes, I think we all recall that," interrupted Maurice. "It was quite a shouting match they had!"
"The second complaint we heard," continued Ellen, ignoring the interruption, "was an informal complaint. This procedure is allowed when the complainant does not wish to reveal her name to the accused."
"I really have to admit," commented Maurice, "that I have some problems with that. Doesn't that sort of violate the whole notion of due process? Right to face one's accuser and all that?"
"I realize, Maurice, that this is your first year on the committee," responded Ellen condescendingly. "As I tried to explain to Professor Barnes earlier, universities enjoy special legal status to govern and adjudicate their own internal affairs. Because there are usually no third party witnesses to sexual assault cases, observing the patriarchal legalism requiring the victim of sexual assault to actually prove it occurred places an undue and unfair burden on her. It is the presumption at this and other progressive universities that sexual assault victims do not file complaints frivolously or maliciously. Indeed, there is reason to believe that they usually do not file complaints at all. When they do, then, they must be taken seriously. The fact that the complaint is an informal one does not detract from the seriousness of the charge. An informal complaint places even more of a burden on the committee than a formal one to question the accused on behalf of a victim fearing retaliation.
"It is now our responsibility," Ellen continued, "to reflect on each case and to draft a memo to the Provost stating our findings. Let's start with the Gibson case since we heard that one first. Since you're the chair, Ann, would you like to begin?"
After expressing what Ann felt was a sufficient number of self-deprecating remarks proclaiming that being chair shouldn't entitle her to speak first and that she wanted to hear the views of her colleagues, she noted that Ellen really ran the committee anyway so she may as well speak first after all. She also noted that her two previous years on the committee might have given her some additional experience to put this particular case in perspective. After all this, Ann paused. "It's difficult to know what to say about this particular case. I must confess that it's very unusual for me to see two people of color so adamantly opposed to each other."
"Not for me!" said Maurice. "I see it all the time! Ha! Ha! Ha!"
A hissing noise appeared to issue from Elita.
Maurice may be both African-American and gay, thought Ann, but he still had what she considered to be some annoyingly male characteristics. She wondered if he was part white. "It seems to me," Ann continued, "that while Professor Gibson did say something a little...untoward...and that the student understandably felt...offended, it appears to me that she just may have overreacted somewhat. And I do think Professor Gibson made a strong case that her charge against him was being manipulated by racist elements to attack not just him but all African-American professors."
"Oh, come on!" said Maurice. "He's just trying to hide behind the fact that he's black. He didn't deny telling Genevieve that if she wanted a higher grade, she should wear a shorter skirt. In fact, he admitted saying it when he claimed it was just a joke."
Elita hissed again. "This case should never have been brought before this committee," she pronounced. "It should have been dealt with quietly by the Minority Affairs Office."
"And why's that?" asked Maurice. "Just because the two parties involved are African-American? Whether the charge is valid or not, it is about sexual assault, not racial discrimination."
Continuing not to look at Maurice, Elita stated tersely, "This is a case that should be dealt with inside the African-American community. It should never have been aired to outsiders who want to use it both to discredit and divide African-Americans. This Lacouture girl can never be forgiven for writing graffiti about Brother Gibson in a woman's bathroom knowing full well that white racists would publish it in the student paper! She even admitted that she did it! I just wonder what she was offered to betray her own kind."
"Oh, come on, Elita!" responded Maurice. "Genevieve just complained about Gibson the same way a lot of other young women complained about their sexual assailants here. There was no great white conspiracy to find this girl and pay her to write something false about Gibson."
Elita, again refusing to look at Maurice, hissed again. "I don't know that that is what happened," she said, "but you don't know that it didn't!"
"From what Genevieve told me," Ellen interjected, "she did go first with her complaint to the Minority Affairs Office. But once they realized who she was complaining about, they threw her out..."
"Just what they should have done," muttered Elita.
"...and so she came here," continued Ellen. "As we all know, there are a number of offices on campus that can take complaints about sexual assault. I, of course, would prefer that they all come here, but the way it works is that whatever office gets it has the responsibility to investigate. Whatever this or any other office receiving such a complaint decides, though, all report to the provost who then makes the final determination about guilt as well as disciplinary action. Were you going to say anything more, Ann?"
"Well," she began slowly, taken slightly by surprise at this sudden opportunity to try once again to reassert control over the conversation, "I think really what we have here is a case of... miscommunication. Professor Gibson made a joke, the student thought he was serious and reacted accordingly. I just think Genevieve misunderstood his meaning."
"Au contraire!" said Maurice, "I think she understood his meaning all too well!"
"Nobody who is not an African-American can possibly judge whether or not two African-Americans did or did not understand each other," pronounced Elita.
Ann knew this was a jab at her. She was mystified. Wasn't it obvious that Ann and Elita had expressed similar views on this case, and so should be allies? Ann had tried repeatedly to befriend her when Elita first came on to the committee last year, but all her attempts were rebuffed. Elita seemed to regard all whites as enemies. Didn't she understand that Ann was a liberal and a progressive who consistently supported and spoke out for the rights of people of color? Why didn't Elita appreciate this?
"On the other hand," Elita continued, "nobody who isn't female can tell whether or not another female is being honest when she claims she's been sexually assaulted. It's obvious to me that this Genevieve is just a little black rich bitch who’s turned her back on her own."
"That's pretty strong stuff, Elita," commented Maurice. "Would you care to explain how you arrived at that conclusion?”
Elita appeared to be profoundly affronted. Still not looking at Maurice but with an obvious effort to keep her voice under control, she replied, "It's perfectly obvious. There's no need for further explanation."
"Perhaps this would be an appropriate time," intervened Ellen, "to take a vote to see if there is a majority on the committee which would recommend disciplinary action against Professor Gibson to the provost. Would anyone approve such a step?"
Only Maurice raised his hand.
"Would anyone oppose this?" Ellen asked.
Both Ann and Elita raised their hands.
"Aren't you voting?" Maurice asked Ellen.
"I don't vote in cases involving faculty members," Ellen responded. "But it is clear that the majority of the faculty on the committee is not willing to recommend disciplinary action in this case. Unless anyone wishes to change her--or his--mind, I will record this as your decision and advise the provost accordingly."
Maurice seemed about to say something, but then just shook his head. "If there's nothing further to say on this matter," Ellen continued, "then I propose we turn to the case of Professor Barnes. Let's start with you, Ann."
After once again going through the obligatory self-deprecation, Ann said, "I think this is a much more serious case. I also think that the negative attitude Barnes displayed here this morning is symptomatic of his arrogance. After all, if that is how he treats other professors, imagine how he must treat his students!"
Barnes had come in with the now famous Washington Post article by Kate Morgan stating that the student identified by a member of the staff as having filed a complaint against him denied it (Ann knew that Ellen was still angry with her for talking to Kate about this). Ellen countered by saying that, on the contrary, a student had come to her with an informal complaint about him, and that there was even a witness--the student's roommate.
Barnes had then demanded to know who had filed the complaint. Ellen refused to tell him, stating that the informal complaint process existed for those occasions when a complainant felt "uncomfortable" about revealing her name--possibly, Ellen had pointedly stated, due to fear of retaliation. Barnes then had the effrontery to state that he was being denied due process and that this committee amounted to nothing more than a kangaroo court. He said that he had consulted with an attorney, and that if any action was taken against him on the basis of an anonymous accusation, which he had good reason to believe had either never been filed or had been withdrawn, then he intended to file suit against both the university and each member of the committee individually.
Ellen then explained (rather helpfully, Ann thought) that universities enjoyed a special legal status enabling them to govern and adjudicate their own internal affairs, and that due to sexual assault being an un-witnessed crime, "progressive" universities had abandoned the anachronistic legalism requiring a victim to prove that it had occurred.
Ellen next asked Barnes whether he had ever touched a student "inappropriately" or spoken to any in his office with the door closed. He categorically denied having done the former and stated that he certainly had not done the latter since the publication of what he termed "that damned `unwanted' poster." Whether a student had been in his office with the door closed prior to that occasion he claimed not to remember. Nobody else having any questions for him (actually, Ann did have questions she wanted to pose, but Barnes's demeanor intimidated her--a sure sign of his guilt as far as she was concerned), Ellen declared that the hearing was over. Barnes reiterated his warning about filing suit and then left.
What had upset Ann more than anything else was that Barnes didn't even seem to recognize her. It is true that they didn't have much opportunity to interact as she taught on a Monday, Wednesday, Friday schedule while he taught on the more desirable Tuesday, Thursday schedule. And, as she well knew, he had been away last year. But surely these were not adequate excuses! They had attended some of the same department meetings--though he had not come to all of them the way she had (Ann wondered whether Ruth had taken adequate note of this).
"Well," said Ann, "given the belligerent way in which he addressed the members of this committee, and from what I've seen of his arrogant behavior in our department, I see no reason to doubt the allegations made against him in the informal complaint. Indeed, I can well understand why the student in question would be too intimidated to file a formal complaint in which she would have had to face him."
"Point of order!" said Maurice. "Don't you have something of a conflict of interests here, Ann, in that you’re passing judgment on someone in your own department?"
"We're both tenure track," Ann replied. "He has no say over my future, and I have no say over his--at least within the department. It would be different if one of us had tenure and the other didn't."
Ann was glad that Maurice didn't have any objection to this reasoning. But she was not happy to hear him say, "I have to admit, I sympathize with Barnes. If I first read an anonymous accusation in the student paper that I had inappropriately touched someone (whatever that means!), then read in the Washington Post (no less!) that the student who someone on the staff says filed a complaint against me denies having done so, and then I'm called in to answer questions about a charge that I was led to believe was either never filed or withdrawn, and I couldn't find out who made it, I'd be pretty mad too! In fact, I'd have been a lot more belligerent than Barnes was here!"
"Oh, Maurice! Ellen has already explained how the process works," Ann said with exasperation. "What do you think, Elita?"
"I have no opinion on this case," said Elita perfunctorily.
Now Ann was really upset. She needed at least one person to side with her against Barnes in order for the committee to recommend disciplinary action to the provost.
Ann anguished over how difficult Elita was being. What was wrong with her? Ann had sided with Elita on Gibson. The least Elita could do was to side with Ann about Barnes, she thought.
Ann was desperate. "Did the student who filed the informal complaint against Barnes actually withdraw it?" Ann asked.
The look on Ellen's face immediately told Ann that she had asked the wrong question. She should have coordinated with Ellen on this in advance.
Ellen explained how in fact the complainant had asked to withdraw her complaint, how this occurred frequently in sexual assault cases, and how this and other "progressive" universities ignored these requests and proceeded on the basis of the original complaint. She also expressed her private view that the complainant's near hysteria about Professor Barnes facing negative consequences after being told she could not withdraw her complaint "suggested" to Ellen that an "inappropriate" relationship had developed between them.
Maurice shook his head. "If the complainant has withdrawn her complaint, then I see no reason for us to press it. This is ridiculous!"
Ellen informed him that consensual sex between a professor and student was considered to be just as "offensive" as sexual assault given the favoritism that would naturally arise from such a "conflict of interests."
"I'm sorry," said Maurice, "but there's no case here."
Elita said nothing. "Would you be convinced of the seriousness of the charge against Barnes if further evidence were available?" asked Ellen.
"What evidence?" asked Maurice.
Ann had been dreading this. Ellen had been furious with Ann over showing Tiffany's paper identifying Cindy McMann as the complainant against Rob Barnes to that Post reporter, which led to the fiasco of Cindy denying to Kate that she had filed a complaint against him. Ellen had demanded that Ann present Tiffany's paper (which Ann had, characteristically, told Ellen about), but Ann did not want to do this for fear of it becoming known and finding its way to Barnes. Ellen had accused Ann of talking about the paper so much that Barnes was bound to hear about it, though he had not mentioned anything earlier today. As a peace offering, Ann suggested that the committee not be informed about the paper unless it looked like Barnes would get off, in which case Ann would produce it--which she now did.
After explaining what the document was and how she came by it, both Maurice and Elita read through it quickly (something professors are practiced at doing with student papers). Written by Tiffany when Cindy's complaints against Professor Barnes were quite fresh, the paper made dramatic reading. Maurice, though, was still not convinced that any action should be taken against Barnes. But that didn't matter since Elita was.
"He's obviously insensitive," she pronounced. "He clearly needs some sensitivity training." Ann, Elita, and Ellen all agreed that this was what the committee's memo to the provost should recommend. Although registering his dissent, Maurice did not do so strenuously: recommending sensitivity training did not seem like such a terrible thing anyway. He did not realize, Ann knew and congratulated herself heartily for not revealing, that Barnes was going up for tenure and that the provost would see the committee's memo on this sexual assault matter well before she made her decision on that.
Ann detected a feeling of relief pervade the room as everyone got ready to leave. In that Ann and Elita had ended up being on the same side in both cases after all, and that together they had prevailed, Ann thought that Elita might finally be receptive to a friendly overture from her.
As Maurice and Ellen talked together, Ann went over to Elita and asked, "So tell me: are you working on anything special this year?"
Without looking directly at her, Elita stated simply, "I'm going up for tenure." And then, without asking anything of Ann in return, she picked up her things and left the room.
Her friendly overture had failed. But Ann now had a clearer understanding of why Elita had voted the way she had on the Gibson case.
This was Maurice's first year of his three-year membership on the committee. It was Elita's second year, and Ann's third. The three of them were all tenure track professors, but since Ann had been on the committee the longest, she was the senior faculty member this year and thus officially the chair. Ellen, though, dealt with all the logistics of the committee and, in truth, actually ran it. It was a late January Friday just before the week spring semester classes began.
Ellen seemed preoccupied with paper work while Elita, as usual, had a grim expression on her face which did not invite conversation. Ann, then, silently mused about her own situation while sipping her coffee and waiting for Maurice.
Ann would be sad when her three year term on the committee came to an end with the close of the current academic year. But if she was denied tenure and had both to appeal the decision as well as search for another job next year, she wouldn't have any spare time to devote to the committee anyway. So far, she thought, things were still on track. The vote of the tenured faculty on her case had been thirteen for, two against, and one abstention. This was obviously less favorable than a unanimous vote in her favor, but at least it was the same, she had been told, as Barnes had gotten. In addition, Ruth Silverstein had written a very positive chair's memo for her. She wondered, though, how it compared with the one Silverstein wrote for Barnes.
After the long winter break, both their dossiers now advanced to the promotion and tenure committee of the College of Arts and Sciences--which, Ann understood from her liaison to the committee, would probably meet next Friday, the last day of the first week of classes. Ann was glad that she was a habitual saver and filer. She had recently looked back through her fall semester collection of What's New at NDU, the faculty/staff information newsletter, and saw that Charles Gibson was a member of the college P&T committee. For once, she had succeeded in not revealing this bit of intelligence to anyone else on the Sexual Assault Complaint Review Committee. With any luck, he would not remember that he had encountered her here when the P&T committee met next week.
The fact that she served on the Sexual Assault Complaint Review Committee was noted in her dossier. She wondered, though, how thoroughly each P&T committee member could read each of the thick dossiers being considered in addition to the dossier that they each had to become very familiar with when serving as the liaison who presented the case to the committee.
In any event, Ann had not said anything to provoke Gibson this morning. Indeed, she was inclined to side with his version of events. But this was not, she assured herself, because he was on the P&T committee. It had, however, been a grueling morning. But then, the deliberations of the Sexual Assault Complaint Review Committee always were.
Maurice came into the room with a can of Diet Coke. "I'm not late, am I?" he asked jovially. "Whew! Nobody told me just how intense this committee was going to be! I'm glad we didn't have any more cases to deal with!"
Ellen looked up from her writing. "Okay, let's get started again," she said in a very serious voice. "Let me remind you of the differences between these two cases, and what we're expected to do now.
"The first complaint we heard this morning was a formal complaint lodged by a student, Genevieve Lacouture, against a professor, Charles Gibson. Because it was a formal complaint, the complainant herself was here to state her grievances against Professor Gibson and he had the opportunity to challenge her--which, I am sure you recall, he did."
"Yes, I think we all recall that," interrupted Maurice. "It was quite a shouting match they had!"
"The second complaint we heard," continued Ellen, ignoring the interruption, "was an informal complaint. This procedure is allowed when the complainant does not wish to reveal her name to the accused."
"I really have to admit," commented Maurice, "that I have some problems with that. Doesn't that sort of violate the whole notion of due process? Right to face one's accuser and all that?"
"I realize, Maurice, that this is your first year on the committee," responded Ellen condescendingly. "As I tried to explain to Professor Barnes earlier, universities enjoy special legal status to govern and adjudicate their own internal affairs. Because there are usually no third party witnesses to sexual assault cases, observing the patriarchal legalism requiring the victim of sexual assault to actually prove it occurred places an undue and unfair burden on her. It is the presumption at this and other progressive universities that sexual assault victims do not file complaints frivolously or maliciously. Indeed, there is reason to believe that they usually do not file complaints at all. When they do, then, they must be taken seriously. The fact that the complaint is an informal one does not detract from the seriousness of the charge. An informal complaint places even more of a burden on the committee than a formal one to question the accused on behalf of a victim fearing retaliation.
"It is now our responsibility," Ellen continued, "to reflect on each case and to draft a memo to the Provost stating our findings. Let's start with the Gibson case since we heard that one first. Since you're the chair, Ann, would you like to begin?"
After expressing what Ann felt was a sufficient number of self-deprecating remarks proclaiming that being chair shouldn't entitle her to speak first and that she wanted to hear the views of her colleagues, she noted that Ellen really ran the committee anyway so she may as well speak first after all. She also noted that her two previous years on the committee might have given her some additional experience to put this particular case in perspective. After all this, Ann paused. "It's difficult to know what to say about this particular case. I must confess that it's very unusual for me to see two people of color so adamantly opposed to each other."
"Not for me!" said Maurice. "I see it all the time! Ha! Ha! Ha!"
A hissing noise appeared to issue from Elita.
Maurice may be both African-American and gay, thought Ann, but he still had what she considered to be some annoyingly male characteristics. She wondered if he was part white. "It seems to me," Ann continued, "that while Professor Gibson did say something a little...untoward...and that the student understandably felt...offended, it appears to me that she just may have overreacted somewhat. And I do think Professor Gibson made a strong case that her charge against him was being manipulated by racist elements to attack not just him but all African-American professors."
"Oh, come on!" said Maurice. "He's just trying to hide behind the fact that he's black. He didn't deny telling Genevieve that if she wanted a higher grade, she should wear a shorter skirt. In fact, he admitted saying it when he claimed it was just a joke."
Elita hissed again. "This case should never have been brought before this committee," she pronounced. "It should have been dealt with quietly by the Minority Affairs Office."
"And why's that?" asked Maurice. "Just because the two parties involved are African-American? Whether the charge is valid or not, it is about sexual assault, not racial discrimination."
Continuing not to look at Maurice, Elita stated tersely, "This is a case that should be dealt with inside the African-American community. It should never have been aired to outsiders who want to use it both to discredit and divide African-Americans. This Lacouture girl can never be forgiven for writing graffiti about Brother Gibson in a woman's bathroom knowing full well that white racists would publish it in the student paper! She even admitted that she did it! I just wonder what she was offered to betray her own kind."
"Oh, come on, Elita!" responded Maurice. "Genevieve just complained about Gibson the same way a lot of other young women complained about their sexual assailants here. There was no great white conspiracy to find this girl and pay her to write something false about Gibson."
Elita, again refusing to look at Maurice, hissed again. "I don't know that that is what happened," she said, "but you don't know that it didn't!"
"From what Genevieve told me," Ellen interjected, "she did go first with her complaint to the Minority Affairs Office. But once they realized who she was complaining about, they threw her out..."
"Just what they should have done," muttered Elita.
"...and so she came here," continued Ellen. "As we all know, there are a number of offices on campus that can take complaints about sexual assault. I, of course, would prefer that they all come here, but the way it works is that whatever office gets it has the responsibility to investigate. Whatever this or any other office receiving such a complaint decides, though, all report to the provost who then makes the final determination about guilt as well as disciplinary action. Were you going to say anything more, Ann?"
"Well," she began slowly, taken slightly by surprise at this sudden opportunity to try once again to reassert control over the conversation, "I think really what we have here is a case of... miscommunication. Professor Gibson made a joke, the student thought he was serious and reacted accordingly. I just think Genevieve misunderstood his meaning."
"Au contraire!" said Maurice, "I think she understood his meaning all too well!"
"Nobody who is not an African-American can possibly judge whether or not two African-Americans did or did not understand each other," pronounced Elita.
Ann knew this was a jab at her. She was mystified. Wasn't it obvious that Ann and Elita had expressed similar views on this case, and so should be allies? Ann had tried repeatedly to befriend her when Elita first came on to the committee last year, but all her attempts were rebuffed. Elita seemed to regard all whites as enemies. Didn't she understand that Ann was a liberal and a progressive who consistently supported and spoke out for the rights of people of color? Why didn't Elita appreciate this?
"On the other hand," Elita continued, "nobody who isn't female can tell whether or not another female is being honest when she claims she's been sexually assaulted. It's obvious to me that this Genevieve is just a little black rich bitch who’s turned her back on her own."
"That's pretty strong stuff, Elita," commented Maurice. "Would you care to explain how you arrived at that conclusion?”
Elita appeared to be profoundly affronted. Still not looking at Maurice but with an obvious effort to keep her voice under control, she replied, "It's perfectly obvious. There's no need for further explanation."
"Perhaps this would be an appropriate time," intervened Ellen, "to take a vote to see if there is a majority on the committee which would recommend disciplinary action against Professor Gibson to the provost. Would anyone approve such a step?"
Only Maurice raised his hand.
"Would anyone oppose this?" Ellen asked.
Both Ann and Elita raised their hands.
"Aren't you voting?" Maurice asked Ellen.
"I don't vote in cases involving faculty members," Ellen responded. "But it is clear that the majority of the faculty on the committee is not willing to recommend disciplinary action in this case. Unless anyone wishes to change her--or his--mind, I will record this as your decision and advise the provost accordingly."
Maurice seemed about to say something, but then just shook his head. "If there's nothing further to say on this matter," Ellen continued, "then I propose we turn to the case of Professor Barnes. Let's start with you, Ann."
After once again going through the obligatory self-deprecation, Ann said, "I think this is a much more serious case. I also think that the negative attitude Barnes displayed here this morning is symptomatic of his arrogance. After all, if that is how he treats other professors, imagine how he must treat his students!"
Barnes had come in with the now famous Washington Post article by Kate Morgan stating that the student identified by a member of the staff as having filed a complaint against him denied it (Ann knew that Ellen was still angry with her for talking to Kate about this). Ellen countered by saying that, on the contrary, a student had come to her with an informal complaint about him, and that there was even a witness--the student's roommate.
Barnes had then demanded to know who had filed the complaint. Ellen refused to tell him, stating that the informal complaint process existed for those occasions when a complainant felt "uncomfortable" about revealing her name--possibly, Ellen had pointedly stated, due to fear of retaliation. Barnes then had the effrontery to state that he was being denied due process and that this committee amounted to nothing more than a kangaroo court. He said that he had consulted with an attorney, and that if any action was taken against him on the basis of an anonymous accusation, which he had good reason to believe had either never been filed or had been withdrawn, then he intended to file suit against both the university and each member of the committee individually.
Ellen then explained (rather helpfully, Ann thought) that universities enjoyed a special legal status enabling them to govern and adjudicate their own internal affairs, and that due to sexual assault being an un-witnessed crime, "progressive" universities had abandoned the anachronistic legalism requiring a victim to prove that it had occurred.
Ellen next asked Barnes whether he had ever touched a student "inappropriately" or spoken to any in his office with the door closed. He categorically denied having done the former and stated that he certainly had not done the latter since the publication of what he termed "that damned `unwanted' poster." Whether a student had been in his office with the door closed prior to that occasion he claimed not to remember. Nobody else having any questions for him (actually, Ann did have questions she wanted to pose, but Barnes's demeanor intimidated her--a sure sign of his guilt as far as she was concerned), Ellen declared that the hearing was over. Barnes reiterated his warning about filing suit and then left.
What had upset Ann more than anything else was that Barnes didn't even seem to recognize her. It is true that they didn't have much opportunity to interact as she taught on a Monday, Wednesday, Friday schedule while he taught on the more desirable Tuesday, Thursday schedule. And, as she well knew, he had been away last year. But surely these were not adequate excuses! They had attended some of the same department meetings--though he had not come to all of them the way she had (Ann wondered whether Ruth had taken adequate note of this).
"Well," said Ann, "given the belligerent way in which he addressed the members of this committee, and from what I've seen of his arrogant behavior in our department, I see no reason to doubt the allegations made against him in the informal complaint. Indeed, I can well understand why the student in question would be too intimidated to file a formal complaint in which she would have had to face him."
"Point of order!" said Maurice. "Don't you have something of a conflict of interests here, Ann, in that you’re passing judgment on someone in your own department?"
"We're both tenure track," Ann replied. "He has no say over my future, and I have no say over his--at least within the department. It would be different if one of us had tenure and the other didn't."
Ann was glad that Maurice didn't have any objection to this reasoning. But she was not happy to hear him say, "I have to admit, I sympathize with Barnes. If I first read an anonymous accusation in the student paper that I had inappropriately touched someone (whatever that means!), then read in the Washington Post (no less!) that the student who someone on the staff says filed a complaint against me denies having done so, and then I'm called in to answer questions about a charge that I was led to believe was either never filed or withdrawn, and I couldn't find out who made it, I'd be pretty mad too! In fact, I'd have been a lot more belligerent than Barnes was here!"
"Oh, Maurice! Ellen has already explained how the process works," Ann said with exasperation. "What do you think, Elita?"
"I have no opinion on this case," said Elita perfunctorily.
Now Ann was really upset. She needed at least one person to side with her against Barnes in order for the committee to recommend disciplinary action to the provost.
Ann anguished over how difficult Elita was being. What was wrong with her? Ann had sided with Elita on Gibson. The least Elita could do was to side with Ann about Barnes, she thought.
Ann was desperate. "Did the student who filed the informal complaint against Barnes actually withdraw it?" Ann asked.
The look on Ellen's face immediately told Ann that she had asked the wrong question. She should have coordinated with Ellen on this in advance.
Ellen explained how in fact the complainant had asked to withdraw her complaint, how this occurred frequently in sexual assault cases, and how this and other "progressive" universities ignored these requests and proceeded on the basis of the original complaint. She also expressed her private view that the complainant's near hysteria about Professor Barnes facing negative consequences after being told she could not withdraw her complaint "suggested" to Ellen that an "inappropriate" relationship had developed between them.
Maurice shook his head. "If the complainant has withdrawn her complaint, then I see no reason for us to press it. This is ridiculous!"
Ellen informed him that consensual sex between a professor and student was considered to be just as "offensive" as sexual assault given the favoritism that would naturally arise from such a "conflict of interests."
"I'm sorry," said Maurice, "but there's no case here."
Elita said nothing. "Would you be convinced of the seriousness of the charge against Barnes if further evidence were available?" asked Ellen.
"What evidence?" asked Maurice.
Ann had been dreading this. Ellen had been furious with Ann over showing Tiffany's paper identifying Cindy McMann as the complainant against Rob Barnes to that Post reporter, which led to the fiasco of Cindy denying to Kate that she had filed a complaint against him. Ellen had demanded that Ann present Tiffany's paper (which Ann had, characteristically, told Ellen about), but Ann did not want to do this for fear of it becoming known and finding its way to Barnes. Ellen had accused Ann of talking about the paper so much that Barnes was bound to hear about it, though he had not mentioned anything earlier today. As a peace offering, Ann suggested that the committee not be informed about the paper unless it looked like Barnes would get off, in which case Ann would produce it--which she now did.
After explaining what the document was and how she came by it, both Maurice and Elita read through it quickly (something professors are practiced at doing with student papers). Written by Tiffany when Cindy's complaints against Professor Barnes were quite fresh, the paper made dramatic reading. Maurice, though, was still not convinced that any action should be taken against Barnes. But that didn't matter since Elita was.
"He's obviously insensitive," she pronounced. "He clearly needs some sensitivity training." Ann, Elita, and Ellen all agreed that this was what the committee's memo to the provost should recommend. Although registering his dissent, Maurice did not do so strenuously: recommending sensitivity training did not seem like such a terrible thing anyway. He did not realize, Ann knew and congratulated herself heartily for not revealing, that Barnes was going up for tenure and that the provost would see the committee's memo on this sexual assault matter well before she made her decision on that.
Ann detected a feeling of relief pervade the room as everyone got ready to leave. In that Ann and Elita had ended up being on the same side in both cases after all, and that together they had prevailed, Ann thought that Elita might finally be receptive to a friendly overture from her.
As Maurice and Ellen talked together, Ann went over to Elita and asked, "So tell me: are you working on anything special this year?"
Without looking directly at her, Elita stated simply, "I'm going up for tenure." And then, without asking anything of Ann in return, she picked up her things and left the room.
Her friendly overture had failed. But Ann now had a clearer understanding of why Elita had voted the way she had on the Gibson case.
Saturday, August 21, 2010
Chapter 11
As Ellen Stenkovsky started to reread the article by Kate Morgan appearing in that morning's Washington Post, she remembered how Lenin had described some setback suffered by the Bolsheviks in the pre-revolutionary period in a book entitled, One Step Forward, Two Steps Back. This article, she knew, would result in at least two steps back for the women's revolution here at NDU.
The article began on the very front page of the paper, though "below the fold." It certainly had a lurid headline: "Campus Furor over Anonymous Sex Charge against Renowned Black NDU Prof." As soon as she had seen this headline earlier that morning, she knew that this would spell the end of the `unwanted' posters in The New Dominion.
The article began: "NDU University Professor Charles Gibson, a leading authority on African-American literature, declared that racial prejudice was the motive for the NDU student newspaper reprinting an anonymous complaint against him allegedly written in the stall of a woman's lavatory on campus.
"The alleged graffiti reprinted by The New Dominion read, `Prof. Gibson told me: If I want a higher grade, I should wear a shorter skirt.'"
Ellen knew one thing: she herself hadn't written this. She was sure, though, that this was probably a real complaint. But she also knew that nobody had filed a charge against Professor Gibson here at SASO.
"`The African-American professors at NDU,' said Gibson, `have long been aware that certain parties within the university do not want us here. But since they can't move against us openly, they resort to this kind of dirty trick to discredit us.'"
The article then quoted Gibson saying that he was contemplating filing a lawsuit against the student newspaper for publishing this unsubstantiated allegation, and against the university for allowing it to do so.
The article continued: "When asked to comment, New Dominion editor and NDU student Tricia Raditz said, `We had no idea Professor Gibson was black. We would never have reprinted this if we had known he was.'"
The fact that Gibson was black shouldn't make a difference, Ellen knew. Sexual assault was an "equal opportunity" offense, committed by males from all races. Whenever they were charged with it, though, Ellen's experience was that men from minority groups always claimed that they were the victims of racism.
Actually, Ellen had doubts about some of these claims to minority status. What were Hispanics, after all? As far as she could see, most of them were white people who spoke Spanish. She could definitely see through their little game. This was not the time, however, for the battle against "Hispanic" males.
In any case, the white male was the ideal sexual assailant since he couldn't claim that he was the victim of racism. Proceeding against white males, then, was far easier than proceeding against non-white ones. But since white males were the main oppressors of women, it was necessary to proceed against them first anyway.
As Lenin had argued in another context, it was sometimes necessary to form a "united front" with less powerful adversaries against more powerful ones. In the context of the women's revolution of today, then, it was essential for the movement to maintain an alliance with black males against the white male patriarchy.
It was only after the more powerful adversaries were defeated that the revolutionaries could then turn their attention to the less powerful ones. Before then, it was imperative for the revolutionaries to avoid antagonizing their less powerful opponents to the point where they joined forces with their more powerful ones.
But thanks to Tricia Raditz, that is exactly what was happening. The Post article then went on to quote President Michaelson condemning The New Dominion for having printed this unsubstantiated charge against a prominent African-American scholar and announcing the dismissal of Tricia Raditz as editor-in-chief.
"`At first I thought these "unwanted" posters were useful since they did expose two real sexual assailants,' said Michaelson. `But reprinting unsubstantiated charges against faculty members obviously crosses the line into irresponsible journalism. The paper's editor has displayed gross racial insensitivity.'"
What was happening was clear: the white male patriarchs were allying with the black males against the women's revolution here at NDU. They were also seizing upon The New Dominion's effort to "out" Professor Gibson as an excuse to prevent the publication of future "unwanted" posters and purge the paper's feminist leadership. Thanks to Tricia Raditz, the opportunity provided by racial difference to prevent cross-racial male solidarity had been squandered, at least for now.
How could she have done this? Why hadn't Tricia checked with her first before publishing the graffiti about Gibson? The patriarchy would undoubtedly find a suitably reactionary male to replace her.
The article in the paper then went on to recount the history of the "unwanted" posters, pointing out that they had led to the arrest, and subsequently to the conviction of, two real sexual assailants. But, the article went on to point out, they had led to confusion in other cases.
Morgan then related how the poster reprinting the "Charles Truehart fondled me!" graffiti had been widely interpreted on campus as referring to a student of that name. In fact, though, it had been written about a food service manager who was abusing his female employees. He was later caught doing this on one of the campus police's security cameras. This had been news to Ellen. As usual, the campus police had not bothered to inform her about this but had operated on their own. Ellen wished that she could install security cameras herself in the offices of all male professors, but sufficient progress in the women's revolution had not yet been made to allow this.
It was the next section of the article, though, which had made Ellen angry. "Another `unwanted' poster," the article continued, "reprinted graffiti stating, `Prof. Barnes touched me inappropriately.' A student was identified by an NDU staff member (who insisted on anonymity) as having written the graffiti and filed a complaint against Professor Barnes. When questioned, however, the student told this reporter that she had neither authored the graffiti nor filed any complaint about Professor Barnes."
What the hell was going on here? It was true that Cindy McMann had not written the graffiti; Ellen was well aware of who had done that. But why had she denied filing a complaint against Barnes when she actually had? Ellen had tried to phone her immediately after reading the article the first time, but Cindy’s cell phone was turned off. Ellen had left a message on her voice mail asking her to call back as soon as possible.
It was not difficult for Ellen to figure out who Kate Morgan had learned about Cindy from: Ann Sweezy. Ann hadn't let Ellen or anyone else at NDU (Ann claimed) see it, but she had told her about the paper written by Tiffany Rodriguez. Ellen knew that Ann was capable of showing the paper to the Post reporter in the hopes that it would discredit Barnes. God, what a fool! Ann thought of herself as such a clever little Machiavellian who could manipulate things this way and that for her own advantage. Instead, she'd screwed everything up. Wasn't it obvious to Ann that Kate Morgan would contact Cindy McMann after reading Tiffany's paper? Of course, Ellen thought ruefully, Ann had no way of knowing that Cindy hadn't written that graffiti about Barnes. And neither she nor Ellen would have anticipated that Cindy McMann would deny having filed a complaint against him. Why had Cindy done that? Ellen wished she would hurry up and call.
The article ended with a smug little quote from a male journalism professor at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C. about how reprinting anonymous charges without verifying their accuracy was not only unethical for a newspaper, but also extremely unwise for it if the charges turned out to be false. Ellen suspected that Kate Morgan must have gone to Georgetown and that this guy had been her professor. Didn't people from these elite private universities just love to look down on public schools like NDU? It was this sort of snobbishness, Ellen was sure, that had motivated Kate Morgan to write an article like this which would result in setting back the women's revolution. Ellen could think of no other explanation for Kate being such a traitor to her gender.
Ellen's phone rang and she picked it up immediately. Leticia Cummings, her assistant who worked in the outer office, informed her that Cindy McMann was on the line. Ellen said that she would take the call.
"Hello, Cindy," said Ellen. "Have you seen this morning's Washington Post?"
"I have," said Cindy. She and Tiffany had already had a furious argument about it. "I've actually been meaning to call you for some time now."
"This paragraph about Professor Barnes obviously refers to you," Ellen interrupted. What does this mean that you denied filing a complaint against him? We both know that you did!"
"Well," said Cindy hesitantly, "I've been thinking it over. I may have overreacted to what happened. Besides, it wasn't a formal complaint--just an informal one. And who the hell identified me to the reporter as having both written the graffiti--which I didn't do--and filing a complaint? I thought this kind of thing was supposed to be confidential."
"That I don't know," said Ellen. Technically, this was not a lie: she would not know it was true until Ann Sweezy actually confessed. But Ellen had every intention of pressing her to do so. "It certainly wasn't me. But as far as filing an informal complaint is concerned, remember this: we allow this procedure in cases where victims are too afraid to give their names for fear of retaliation. It is just as serious, if not more so, than the formal process. When you came in here toward the beginning of the semester, I recall you expressing the fear that his touching you with the door to his office closed was a signal that he would only raise your grade in return for sexual favors."
"Well actually," said Cindy a little more brightly, "that fear proved to be unfounded. Since then, I've been doing really well in his class. I'm sure I'll get at least an A- from him. And there's been no hint from him about wanting sex in exchange--even when I've gone back to talk to him in his office."
Ellen instantly recognized that Cindy had disobeyed her instructions about this. "Can't you see through his little game?" she asked. "He must have assumed that you were the one who wrote that graffiti reprinted in the `unwanted poster' about him. It's a quid pro quo situation again. But instead of an A for a lay, he's offering you one just for dropping your complaint against him."
"I resent that!" Cindy responded angrily. "I've earned my grade in that class! And why do you say that I wrote that graffiti? I had just assumed that another student had done that. Has nobody else filed a complaint against Barnes?"
Ellen knew she had to be cautious in how she replied to Cindy. "SASO's files are strictly confidential. So I can't even tell you whether or not anyone else has filed a complaint against Barnes. But if you didn't write that graffiti about Barnes, then it should be clear that he's a serial abuser." Ellen was proud of herself for thinking of this argument so quickly. Like all successful revolutionaries, she could improvise in a crisis. "Do you want him to get away with it?"
"If Barnes ever did touch anybody inappropriately before that `unwanted' poster appeared," said Cindy, "he certainly hasn't afterward. He appears to be scared to death of me and every other woman I know who's gone to see him in his office since then.
"Besides," Cindy continued, "that graffiti about Professor Barnes could have been false or mistaken somehow, just like it was against my boyfriend, Charles Truehart. The article in the paper talked about that. Or maybe someone wrote this graffiti on my behalf, thinking that they were somehow being helpful. It could have been Tiffany. It could have been that strange Professor Sweezy she wrote that paper for. It even could have been you."
This was too close for comfort. "That's libel!" said Ellen coldly. "If you ever repeat what you just said, you're going to face a lawsuit!"
"I'm not accusing anyone in particular," said Cindy. "All I'm saying is that I have no idea who wrote that graffiti or whether it was true or false. I just know that it wasn't me. And I also know that I am withdrawing whatever complaint I filed against Professor Barnes."
"You can't," said Ellen quietly.
"What?" asked Cindy.
"Just what I said: you can't."
"And why not?"
"It is very common both here and at other universities," she informed Cindy, "for victims of sexual assault first to file complaints against their assailants, but later try to withdraw them. Psychologists studying this phenomenon have not reached definitive conclusions about why it occurs. It may be that particularly sensitive individuals--such as women--feel guilty after they complain about their assailants if measures are then taken against them.
"But for whatever reason that victims of sexual assault file complaints and then attempt to withdraw them," continued Ellen, "it is standard procedure for SASO here at NDU and similar offices at other universities to ignore these withdrawal attempts and to act on the original complaints. And as you may know, universities have special status allowing them to establish their own norms as well as to both investigate and punish their violation outside the normal legal process. Although your continued cooperation in this matter is highly desirable, it is by no means essential after your complaint has been filed. The university can proceed against a sexual assailant on the basis of the complaint alone.
"I would have arranged for Barnes to be questioned by the Sexual Assault Complaint Review Committee before, but I was waiting to see whether he would launch any new assaults on you over the course of the semester. Now that I see he has gotten you to withdraw your complaint against him, we will--with or without your cooperation--initiate proceedings on the basis of your original complaint, which, you may recall was witnessed by Tiffany Rodriguez."
"You can't do this!" shouted Cindy. "I just overreacted earlier this semester. It wasn't my idea to file a complaint against him, it was Tiffany's! I won't let you hurt him!"
"Defending him now, are you?" mocked Ellen. "Let me warn you, Cindy: a professor can be disciplined for making unwanted sexual advances against a student, but a professor and a student who engage in a consensual sexual relationship can both be disciplined."
"How dare you accuse me of having sex with him!" yelled Cindy.
"I'm not accusing you at all," Ellen replied scornfully. "I'm just telling you what can happen if a professor and student engage in consensual sex. But something has just dawned on me: Professor Barnes has no idea that you filed a complaint against him, does he?"
"I...I don't think so," Cindy stammered.
Now I have her, Ellen gloated to herself. "I think I understand the situation, Cindy. You're looking forward to getting an A from him in this class, and maybe in other classes later. Perhaps you're even counting on him to write your letters of recommendation to graduate school, or whatever. Yes, I can see why you might not want to cooperate further in the investigation of the complaint you filed against him before you and he reached this...understanding.
Ellen paused, and then continued icily: "Let me just tell you this: if you do not choose to cooperate with our investigation, that is your privilege. We can proceed without you. But any effort on your part to impede or discredit our investigation may well have the unfortunate consequence of revealing to Professor Barnes that you filed a sexual assault complaint against him. He might not think quite as highly of you then."
"This is blackmail!" shouted Cindy. "I can't believe it! You'd stop at nothing to get your way, wouldn't you?"
"I'd stop at nothing to stamp out sexual assault," replied Ellen. "It's a pity that you seem willing to tolerate it for an A or two and some letters of recommendation.
"Have a nice holiday, Cindy. Don't forget what I told you," said Ellen as she hung up.
The phone on her desk immediately rang. It was Leticia saying that the provost, Jeannette Bobier, had tried to phone her, saying it was urgent that they talk as soon as possible.
Ellen dialed her number immediately and was quickly put through to the provost herself.
"Hello, Ellen. I'm sure you've seen the article about Charles Gibson on the front page of this morning's Post."
"Yes I have, Dr. Bobier." Ellen would never dream of calling the provost by her first name.
"As I'm sure you understand," the provost continued, "this is a public relations disaster. Tell me: has a complaint been filed against Gibson with your office?"
"No, one has not," Ellen admitted. SASO's records were confidential, but since SASO reported to the provost, Ellen had to tell her.
"Well, I'm glad to hear that!" said the provost. "The campus police haven't received a complaint either. Of course, there are so many damn offices where these can be filed; I can't check them all. I want you to let me know right away if you do receive a complaint."
"Of course," responded Ellen.
"Now, I would never presume to tell you how to do your job," said the provost. Ellen understood that this was, in fact, exactly what the provost was about to do. "But this is obviously a delicate case. If there is overwhelming evidence against Gibson, that's one thing. But if it's just an unsubstantiated charge, we can't afford to have this thing played out in the press.
"It's not just that Gibson is likely to sue," the provost continued, "though that by itself would be bad enough. But as you know, we face a difficult situation with our funding from the state legislature. As you know, the Republicans down there are always trying to cut our budget, especially with regard to non-academic services."
Ellen knew what that included: SASO.
"But if the black liberals in both houses turn against us too over this thing, we are sunk," the provost continued. "I don't have to remind you that the conservatives tried to cut out funding altogether for SASO last year. If the black liberals join them because of Gibson, SASO will be history." Along with, of course, Ellen's job.
"You need to handle this very sensitively, Ellen," Bobier continued. "A lot is at stake."
"I understand." Cindy McMann was wrong, thought Ellen. Jeannette Bobier was the real blackmailer here at NDU.
"Good girl, Ellen. And what was this bit about Robert Barnes? Was there, or was there not, a complaint filed against him?"
"There was," said Ellen emphatically.
"They tell me he's going up for tenure," said the provost. "If you have anything, I'm going to need it early next semester before his dossier gets to my desk--if he doesn't withdraw first."
"I'm going to try to arrange a meeting of the Sexual Assault Complaint Review Committee by the beginning of spring semester."
"All right, Ellen. I know how conscientious you are about these matters."
Almost as soon as this conversation ended, Ellen's phone rang yet again. "There's a student here who wants to file a sexual assault complaint," Leticia informed her.
"Do you think you could get her to come back later?" asked Ellen. "I'm frazzled right now."
"I think you need to see this one right away."
God, what a morning. "All right, send her in."
A few seconds later, a young black woman came into her office holding a copy of today's Washington Post. "My name is Genevieve Lacouture," she said forthrightly. "And I want to file a complaint about Professor Charles Gibson."
Ellen's heart sank. This is just what she and the provost didn't need.
Ellen wondered: did Lenin and the reds ever get the blues?
The article began on the very front page of the paper, though "below the fold." It certainly had a lurid headline: "Campus Furor over Anonymous Sex Charge against Renowned Black NDU Prof." As soon as she had seen this headline earlier that morning, she knew that this would spell the end of the `unwanted' posters in The New Dominion.
The article began: "NDU University Professor Charles Gibson, a leading authority on African-American literature, declared that racial prejudice was the motive for the NDU student newspaper reprinting an anonymous complaint against him allegedly written in the stall of a woman's lavatory on campus.
"The alleged graffiti reprinted by The New Dominion read, `Prof. Gibson told me: If I want a higher grade, I should wear a shorter skirt.'"
Ellen knew one thing: she herself hadn't written this. She was sure, though, that this was probably a real complaint. But she also knew that nobody had filed a charge against Professor Gibson here at SASO.
"`The African-American professors at NDU,' said Gibson, `have long been aware that certain parties within the university do not want us here. But since they can't move against us openly, they resort to this kind of dirty trick to discredit us.'"
The article then quoted Gibson saying that he was contemplating filing a lawsuit against the student newspaper for publishing this unsubstantiated allegation, and against the university for allowing it to do so.
The article continued: "When asked to comment, New Dominion editor and NDU student Tricia Raditz said, `We had no idea Professor Gibson was black. We would never have reprinted this if we had known he was.'"
The fact that Gibson was black shouldn't make a difference, Ellen knew. Sexual assault was an "equal opportunity" offense, committed by males from all races. Whenever they were charged with it, though, Ellen's experience was that men from minority groups always claimed that they were the victims of racism.
Actually, Ellen had doubts about some of these claims to minority status. What were Hispanics, after all? As far as she could see, most of them were white people who spoke Spanish. She could definitely see through their little game. This was not the time, however, for the battle against "Hispanic" males.
In any case, the white male was the ideal sexual assailant since he couldn't claim that he was the victim of racism. Proceeding against white males, then, was far easier than proceeding against non-white ones. But since white males were the main oppressors of women, it was necessary to proceed against them first anyway.
As Lenin had argued in another context, it was sometimes necessary to form a "united front" with less powerful adversaries against more powerful ones. In the context of the women's revolution of today, then, it was essential for the movement to maintain an alliance with black males against the white male patriarchy.
It was only after the more powerful adversaries were defeated that the revolutionaries could then turn their attention to the less powerful ones. Before then, it was imperative for the revolutionaries to avoid antagonizing their less powerful opponents to the point where they joined forces with their more powerful ones.
But thanks to Tricia Raditz, that is exactly what was happening. The Post article then went on to quote President Michaelson condemning The New Dominion for having printed this unsubstantiated charge against a prominent African-American scholar and announcing the dismissal of Tricia Raditz as editor-in-chief.
"`At first I thought these "unwanted" posters were useful since they did expose two real sexual assailants,' said Michaelson. `But reprinting unsubstantiated charges against faculty members obviously crosses the line into irresponsible journalism. The paper's editor has displayed gross racial insensitivity.'"
What was happening was clear: the white male patriarchs were allying with the black males against the women's revolution here at NDU. They were also seizing upon The New Dominion's effort to "out" Professor Gibson as an excuse to prevent the publication of future "unwanted" posters and purge the paper's feminist leadership. Thanks to Tricia Raditz, the opportunity provided by racial difference to prevent cross-racial male solidarity had been squandered, at least for now.
How could she have done this? Why hadn't Tricia checked with her first before publishing the graffiti about Gibson? The patriarchy would undoubtedly find a suitably reactionary male to replace her.
The article in the paper then went on to recount the history of the "unwanted" posters, pointing out that they had led to the arrest, and subsequently to the conviction of, two real sexual assailants. But, the article went on to point out, they had led to confusion in other cases.
Morgan then related how the poster reprinting the "Charles Truehart fondled me!" graffiti had been widely interpreted on campus as referring to a student of that name. In fact, though, it had been written about a food service manager who was abusing his female employees. He was later caught doing this on one of the campus police's security cameras. This had been news to Ellen. As usual, the campus police had not bothered to inform her about this but had operated on their own. Ellen wished that she could install security cameras herself in the offices of all male professors, but sufficient progress in the women's revolution had not yet been made to allow this.
It was the next section of the article, though, which had made Ellen angry. "Another `unwanted' poster," the article continued, "reprinted graffiti stating, `Prof. Barnes touched me inappropriately.' A student was identified by an NDU staff member (who insisted on anonymity) as having written the graffiti and filed a complaint against Professor Barnes. When questioned, however, the student told this reporter that she had neither authored the graffiti nor filed any complaint about Professor Barnes."
What the hell was going on here? It was true that Cindy McMann had not written the graffiti; Ellen was well aware of who had done that. But why had she denied filing a complaint against Barnes when she actually had? Ellen had tried to phone her immediately after reading the article the first time, but Cindy’s cell phone was turned off. Ellen had left a message on her voice mail asking her to call back as soon as possible.
It was not difficult for Ellen to figure out who Kate Morgan had learned about Cindy from: Ann Sweezy. Ann hadn't let Ellen or anyone else at NDU (Ann claimed) see it, but she had told her about the paper written by Tiffany Rodriguez. Ellen knew that Ann was capable of showing the paper to the Post reporter in the hopes that it would discredit Barnes. God, what a fool! Ann thought of herself as such a clever little Machiavellian who could manipulate things this way and that for her own advantage. Instead, she'd screwed everything up. Wasn't it obvious to Ann that Kate Morgan would contact Cindy McMann after reading Tiffany's paper? Of course, Ellen thought ruefully, Ann had no way of knowing that Cindy hadn't written that graffiti about Barnes. And neither she nor Ellen would have anticipated that Cindy McMann would deny having filed a complaint against him. Why had Cindy done that? Ellen wished she would hurry up and call.
The article ended with a smug little quote from a male journalism professor at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C. about how reprinting anonymous charges without verifying their accuracy was not only unethical for a newspaper, but also extremely unwise for it if the charges turned out to be false. Ellen suspected that Kate Morgan must have gone to Georgetown and that this guy had been her professor. Didn't people from these elite private universities just love to look down on public schools like NDU? It was this sort of snobbishness, Ellen was sure, that had motivated Kate Morgan to write an article like this which would result in setting back the women's revolution. Ellen could think of no other explanation for Kate being such a traitor to her gender.
Ellen's phone rang and she picked it up immediately. Leticia Cummings, her assistant who worked in the outer office, informed her that Cindy McMann was on the line. Ellen said that she would take the call.
"Hello, Cindy," said Ellen. "Have you seen this morning's Washington Post?"
"I have," said Cindy. She and Tiffany had already had a furious argument about it. "I've actually been meaning to call you for some time now."
"This paragraph about Professor Barnes obviously refers to you," Ellen interrupted. What does this mean that you denied filing a complaint against him? We both know that you did!"
"Well," said Cindy hesitantly, "I've been thinking it over. I may have overreacted to what happened. Besides, it wasn't a formal complaint--just an informal one. And who the hell identified me to the reporter as having both written the graffiti--which I didn't do--and filing a complaint? I thought this kind of thing was supposed to be confidential."
"That I don't know," said Ellen. Technically, this was not a lie: she would not know it was true until Ann Sweezy actually confessed. But Ellen had every intention of pressing her to do so. "It certainly wasn't me. But as far as filing an informal complaint is concerned, remember this: we allow this procedure in cases where victims are too afraid to give their names for fear of retaliation. It is just as serious, if not more so, than the formal process. When you came in here toward the beginning of the semester, I recall you expressing the fear that his touching you with the door to his office closed was a signal that he would only raise your grade in return for sexual favors."
"Well actually," said Cindy a little more brightly, "that fear proved to be unfounded. Since then, I've been doing really well in his class. I'm sure I'll get at least an A- from him. And there's been no hint from him about wanting sex in exchange--even when I've gone back to talk to him in his office."
Ellen instantly recognized that Cindy had disobeyed her instructions about this. "Can't you see through his little game?" she asked. "He must have assumed that you were the one who wrote that graffiti reprinted in the `unwanted poster' about him. It's a quid pro quo situation again. But instead of an A for a lay, he's offering you one just for dropping your complaint against him."
"I resent that!" Cindy responded angrily. "I've earned my grade in that class! And why do you say that I wrote that graffiti? I had just assumed that another student had done that. Has nobody else filed a complaint against Barnes?"
Ellen knew she had to be cautious in how she replied to Cindy. "SASO's files are strictly confidential. So I can't even tell you whether or not anyone else has filed a complaint against Barnes. But if you didn't write that graffiti about Barnes, then it should be clear that he's a serial abuser." Ellen was proud of herself for thinking of this argument so quickly. Like all successful revolutionaries, she could improvise in a crisis. "Do you want him to get away with it?"
"If Barnes ever did touch anybody inappropriately before that `unwanted' poster appeared," said Cindy, "he certainly hasn't afterward. He appears to be scared to death of me and every other woman I know who's gone to see him in his office since then.
"Besides," Cindy continued, "that graffiti about Professor Barnes could have been false or mistaken somehow, just like it was against my boyfriend, Charles Truehart. The article in the paper talked about that. Or maybe someone wrote this graffiti on my behalf, thinking that they were somehow being helpful. It could have been Tiffany. It could have been that strange Professor Sweezy she wrote that paper for. It even could have been you."
This was too close for comfort. "That's libel!" said Ellen coldly. "If you ever repeat what you just said, you're going to face a lawsuit!"
"I'm not accusing anyone in particular," said Cindy. "All I'm saying is that I have no idea who wrote that graffiti or whether it was true or false. I just know that it wasn't me. And I also know that I am withdrawing whatever complaint I filed against Professor Barnes."
"You can't," said Ellen quietly.
"What?" asked Cindy.
"Just what I said: you can't."
"And why not?"
"It is very common both here and at other universities," she informed Cindy, "for victims of sexual assault first to file complaints against their assailants, but later try to withdraw them. Psychologists studying this phenomenon have not reached definitive conclusions about why it occurs. It may be that particularly sensitive individuals--such as women--feel guilty after they complain about their assailants if measures are then taken against them.
"But for whatever reason that victims of sexual assault file complaints and then attempt to withdraw them," continued Ellen, "it is standard procedure for SASO here at NDU and similar offices at other universities to ignore these withdrawal attempts and to act on the original complaints. And as you may know, universities have special status allowing them to establish their own norms as well as to both investigate and punish their violation outside the normal legal process. Although your continued cooperation in this matter is highly desirable, it is by no means essential after your complaint has been filed. The university can proceed against a sexual assailant on the basis of the complaint alone.
"I would have arranged for Barnes to be questioned by the Sexual Assault Complaint Review Committee before, but I was waiting to see whether he would launch any new assaults on you over the course of the semester. Now that I see he has gotten you to withdraw your complaint against him, we will--with or without your cooperation--initiate proceedings on the basis of your original complaint, which, you may recall was witnessed by Tiffany Rodriguez."
"You can't do this!" shouted Cindy. "I just overreacted earlier this semester. It wasn't my idea to file a complaint against him, it was Tiffany's! I won't let you hurt him!"
"Defending him now, are you?" mocked Ellen. "Let me warn you, Cindy: a professor can be disciplined for making unwanted sexual advances against a student, but a professor and a student who engage in a consensual sexual relationship can both be disciplined."
"How dare you accuse me of having sex with him!" yelled Cindy.
"I'm not accusing you at all," Ellen replied scornfully. "I'm just telling you what can happen if a professor and student engage in consensual sex. But something has just dawned on me: Professor Barnes has no idea that you filed a complaint against him, does he?"
"I...I don't think so," Cindy stammered.
Now I have her, Ellen gloated to herself. "I think I understand the situation, Cindy. You're looking forward to getting an A from him in this class, and maybe in other classes later. Perhaps you're even counting on him to write your letters of recommendation to graduate school, or whatever. Yes, I can see why you might not want to cooperate further in the investigation of the complaint you filed against him before you and he reached this...understanding.
Ellen paused, and then continued icily: "Let me just tell you this: if you do not choose to cooperate with our investigation, that is your privilege. We can proceed without you. But any effort on your part to impede or discredit our investigation may well have the unfortunate consequence of revealing to Professor Barnes that you filed a sexual assault complaint against him. He might not think quite as highly of you then."
"This is blackmail!" shouted Cindy. "I can't believe it! You'd stop at nothing to get your way, wouldn't you?"
"I'd stop at nothing to stamp out sexual assault," replied Ellen. "It's a pity that you seem willing to tolerate it for an A or two and some letters of recommendation.
"Have a nice holiday, Cindy. Don't forget what I told you," said Ellen as she hung up.
The phone on her desk immediately rang. It was Leticia saying that the provost, Jeannette Bobier, had tried to phone her, saying it was urgent that they talk as soon as possible.
Ellen dialed her number immediately and was quickly put through to the provost herself.
"Hello, Ellen. I'm sure you've seen the article about Charles Gibson on the front page of this morning's Post."
"Yes I have, Dr. Bobier." Ellen would never dream of calling the provost by her first name.
"As I'm sure you understand," the provost continued, "this is a public relations disaster. Tell me: has a complaint been filed against Gibson with your office?"
"No, one has not," Ellen admitted. SASO's records were confidential, but since SASO reported to the provost, Ellen had to tell her.
"Well, I'm glad to hear that!" said the provost. "The campus police haven't received a complaint either. Of course, there are so many damn offices where these can be filed; I can't check them all. I want you to let me know right away if you do receive a complaint."
"Of course," responded Ellen.
"Now, I would never presume to tell you how to do your job," said the provost. Ellen understood that this was, in fact, exactly what the provost was about to do. "But this is obviously a delicate case. If there is overwhelming evidence against Gibson, that's one thing. But if it's just an unsubstantiated charge, we can't afford to have this thing played out in the press.
"It's not just that Gibson is likely to sue," the provost continued, "though that by itself would be bad enough. But as you know, we face a difficult situation with our funding from the state legislature. As you know, the Republicans down there are always trying to cut our budget, especially with regard to non-academic services."
Ellen knew what that included: SASO.
"But if the black liberals in both houses turn against us too over this thing, we are sunk," the provost continued. "I don't have to remind you that the conservatives tried to cut out funding altogether for SASO last year. If the black liberals join them because of Gibson, SASO will be history." Along with, of course, Ellen's job.
"You need to handle this very sensitively, Ellen," Bobier continued. "A lot is at stake."
"I understand." Cindy McMann was wrong, thought Ellen. Jeannette Bobier was the real blackmailer here at NDU.
"Good girl, Ellen. And what was this bit about Robert Barnes? Was there, or was there not, a complaint filed against him?"
"There was," said Ellen emphatically.
"They tell me he's going up for tenure," said the provost. "If you have anything, I'm going to need it early next semester before his dossier gets to my desk--if he doesn't withdraw first."
"I'm going to try to arrange a meeting of the Sexual Assault Complaint Review Committee by the beginning of spring semester."
"All right, Ellen. I know how conscientious you are about these matters."
Almost as soon as this conversation ended, Ellen's phone rang yet again. "There's a student here who wants to file a sexual assault complaint," Leticia informed her.
"Do you think you could get her to come back later?" asked Ellen. "I'm frazzled right now."
"I think you need to see this one right away."
God, what a morning. "All right, send her in."
A few seconds later, a young black woman came into her office holding a copy of today's Washington Post. "My name is Genevieve Lacouture," she said forthrightly. "And I want to file a complaint about Professor Charles Gibson."
Ellen's heart sank. This is just what she and the provost didn't need.
Ellen wondered: did Lenin and the reds ever get the blues?
Saturday, August 14, 2010
Chapter 10
Although only a quarter past six, it was already dark outside on the relatively warm December evening of the last day of classes. Cindy McMann knew the feeling wouldn't last for more than a day or two, but it seemed like the beginning of a long holiday since the weekend and a two day reading period lay ahead before the start of final exams. Cindy knew she was fifteen minutes late as she entered the Turkish restaurant, but there was Charles Truehart sitting in the waiting area--wearing his black suit, just as she had asked him to.
He stood up when he saw her. "Hello, Cindy. It's been a long time. It was quite a surprise to get that call from you yesterday."
"Hi Charles! Let me just hang up my coat." Cindy quickly dashed into the self-serve cloak room (it was that kind of restaurant) and re-emerged revealing herself in a short, black cocktail dress and black stockings.
"Wow! You sure look nice!" exclaimed Charles. "What is going on? What's the mystery reason for calling me to meet here tonight all dressed up?"
"Let's sit down and I'll tell you," she responded. They were quickly ushered to a table and given menus. Charles had never been to a Turkish restaurant, so Cindy recommended that they start with dolma and then have doner kebabs. When the waitress came to their table, Cindy gave their order and also asked for a bottle of merlot.
"That's kind of expensive, isn't it?" asked Charles.
"Not really," said Cindy. "Besides, this is all my treat, so don't worry about it."
"Cindy, what is this all about?" Charles asked again.
Cindy looked downward as she said, "I found out it wasn't you. And I'm really sorry."
"You found out what wasn't me?"
"You weren't the Charles Truehart that the graffiti was written about."
"I could have told you that," said Charles. "In fact, I tried to but you wouldn't listen. But all that was a long time ago. Why is it being brought up again now? And who has convinced you that I am innocent?"
Cindy was glad that Charles did not appear to be angry. The fact that he had agreed to meet her at all had led her to expect that he wouldn't be.
"Something odd happened yesterday morning, before I called you," began Cindy. "I actually got a call from a Washington Post reporter--Kate Morgan. She was the one who told me that it wasn't you."
Charles looked at her incredulously. "A Washington Post reporter called you to say that some graffiti written about me in a woman's lavatory a couple of months ago was not true?"
Cindy laughed. "No, that's not the main reason why she called. I'm not quite sure why she wanted to talk to me in particular. She said she was talking to a number of people at NDU about the whole sexual harassment situation and those `unwanted' posters in The New Dominion."
"Oh, yeah," said Charles. "I remember seeing a new one this week--something about a professor telling someone that if she wanted a higher grade, she should wear a shorter skirt."
"It was about a Professor Gibson. I've never heard of him. Have you?"
"No," said Charles. Like most white students, they were only vaguely aware that African-American literature was even taught at NDU, and were not at all aware of who taught it. "I'm kind of surprised that a professor would say that."
"Well, yeah. Wasn't that outrageous?"
"No, what I mean," said Charles, "is that I wouldn't have thought it was necessary. Although not surprising at the end of spring semester, I'm always amazed at the number of girls who wear incredibly short skirts to final exams even at the end of the fall semester. Have you ever noticed that?"
"I have actually," Cindy said laughing. She usually did it herself, but didn't think Charles needed to know. "I remember during my first semester at NDU, one of my girlfriends who was a sophomore told me: `Wear a short skirt to all in-class exams. It might not help your grade, but it sure can't hurt it either!"
Both of them laughed, but Charles shook his head. "I feel sorry for these professors with girls teasing them like that. It's kind of sad that these older guys must think you're attracted to them, only to find out that you're just working on your grade."
Cindy snorted in contempt. "They know better than that! And any who don't should!"
The wine arrived. When the waitress began the ritual of pouring a small amount in the man's glass for him to taste it first, Cindy grabbed the glass, swallowed the wine, and pronounced it acceptable. The waitress looked scandalized but said nothing. She poured out their two glasses and left the bottle with them on the table.
"I don't think women in Turkey would do what you just did," commented Charles.
"Well, shit!" said Cindy. "I'm the one that's buying. It's a sexist ritual anyway. They should pour a little in both glasses."
"If there were a party of ten or more, the bottle would be practically empty by the time everyone was given a taste. It's more efficient if just one person tries it," said Charles.
"Yeah, but does it always have to be the man?" countered Cindy, her voice rising. Then, in a lower voice: "But this wasn't what I wanted to talk to you about. Let me tell you more about what that reporter said. One of the things she asked me was if I remembered what one of the `unwanted' posters said about a Charles Truehart. When I told her I remembered it, she asked if I knew a Charles Truehart. Without telling her about us, I said that I knew you and that you were a student. Then," Cindy said dramatically, "she asked me if I knew the other Charles Truehart at NDU--apparently someone in food service. I said that I didn't. Then she said that he was observed by a security camera repeatedly molesting several of his female assistants. He's been fired and is being sued both by the women and by the university."
"That's funny," observed Charles. "I don't remember reading anything about this in The New Dominion."
"I don't think it was in The New Dominion," said Cindy. The reporter, Kate, said she learned about it from the university administration."
The dolma arrived. Charles started to pick one up with his fingers, but Cindy indicated that he should eat it with a fork. Cindy refilled their wine glasses.
Charles shook his head. "I still don't see why anyone from the Post would be interested in something as unimportant as this--even if it does vindicate me."
"Sexual assault is not unimportant, Charles," Cindy informed him primly. "Besides, it wasn't just you--I mean, the other Charles Truehart--which she was mainly asking me about. She was more interested in talking to me about Professor Barnes."
"Professor Barnes?"
"Yeah, you remember that `unwanted' poster: `Prof. Barnes touched me inappropriately.' She wanted to know if I was the one who wrote that."
Charles sat upright. "Were you?" he asked. "More importantly, did he?"
"No and no," Cindy replied. She was touched that he seemed both jealous and protective. "Well, the answer to your second question is a little more complicated." She then told him the whole story of what happened when she went to Prof. Barnes's office after the first midterm in his IR Theory class, though in considerably less emotional tones than she had originally related it to her roommate, Tiffany.
"He touched you on the shoulder because you were crying? I don't think that constitutes sexual assault, or harassment, or whatever," commented Charles.
"Well, I guess not," Cindy admitted. "At the time, though, I was really indignant. In fact, I went and complained about him to the Sexual Assault Services Office."
"Cindy, you didn't!" exclaimed Charles.
"It wasn't a formal complaint," she explained. "Just an informal one. It's not really serious. It was Tiffany who talked me into going there."
Cindy giggled. "Actually, the main reason I went was to try and find out if anyone had filed a complaint against you."
The doner kebab arrived. They were both quiet for a few minutes as they ate the tender meat and the pomegranates in the yogurt sauce it was smothered in.
"I wonder if Professor Barnes thinks you're the one who wrote, `Prof. Barnes touched me in `intimately' or whatever it was," mused Charles.
"`Inappropriately,'" Cindy corrected. "I don't think so. Why would he think that?"
"If I were him and I knew you filed some sort of complaint against him, I would just assume that you were the one who wrote that graffiti. I presume he knows that you filed a complaint against him?" asked Charles.
"No," said Cindy. "Like I said, it was an informal complaint. I didn't sign anything or officially give my name."
They ate in silence for awhile longer.
"Well, if it wasn't you, I wonder who wrote, `Prof. Barnes touched me inappropriately,' then," said Charles.
"I don't know," responded Cindy. "When that `unwanted' poster was first published, I just assumed that it was another female student describing a separate incident with him."
"But as my own case shows," Charles remarked, "this sort of graffiti is not always accurate."
"It was accurate about Charles Truehart the food service manager," Cindy corrected, "but not about Charles Truehart the student."
They ate a little more. This time, Charles refilled their wine glasses.
"I wonder if that Washington Post reporter somehow knew that you had filed a complaint against Barnes," suggested Charles. "Maybe that's why she called to see if you wrote that graffiti about him."
Cindy considered this over a sip of merlot. "I'm trying to think of the exact words she used. She asked if I knew who might have written the graffiti about Professor Barnes, not whether I had actually done so. But she then asked if I or anybody I knew had filed a sexual assault complaint against him."
"What did you tell her?" asked Charles.
"I told her that I knew of no such complaint, and that I myself thought he was a terrific professor," Cindy answered. "Since I'm not going to follow through on that complaint, I didn't see any point in telling her about it."
"Why are you so positive about him now? I thought you didn't like him."
"I didn't at first, but I've warmed up to him since then," Cindy explained. I really studied hard after the first midterm and came to understand what he meant about the difference between description and analysis. I got an A on the second midterm, I feel very confident that I'm going to ace the final as well.
"Besides," she continued, "I found IR theory to be pretty interesting, especially as the class looked at the twentieth century. Barnes even gave a pretty good lecture about feminist IR theory. That was pretty cool!"
Someone took away their empty plates. When the waitress came to enquire whether they wanted dessert, Cindy ordered baklava and Turkish coffee for them both.
"I've already signed up for his International Political Economy class in the spring, and I plan on taking his Latin American politics seminar next fall," Cindy continued.
"Wow! You've really become a fan of his," commented Charles. "I think I'm jealous."
"Oh, Charles! It's not like that," she reassured him. "You know what I like about Barnes? He's one of the few professors I've had here who will go to the bother of telling you what you're doing wrong and how you need to improve. Most don't care enough to do that, you know? And when someone like Barnes does tell you that you're doing well--you know you've earned it! I have to admit, though, that being away from you for most of the semester gave me a lot more time to concentrate on my classes."
"Oh, so it's my fault you didn't do well on that first midterm, is it? By the way, what was it like in his class after that `unwanted' poster appeared about him?" asked Charles. "I certainly received some negative reaction for a week or so after the one my name was in appeared."
Cindy hung her head. "Yes, Charles, I know. I slapped you. I'm really sorry."
"I wasn't talking about that," said Charles. "I meant that for a week or so, the girls in my classes tried to sit as far away from me as possible. Some even put their arms across their breasts if I looked in their direction. But then it all died down. What was it like to be in Barnes's class when the `unwanted' poster came out about him?"
Cindy thought about this as the coffee and baklava were served. "Normally when he walks into the classroom, people just keep on talking with one another until he starts lecturing. But I remember when he came into class for the first time after the poster appeared, everyone stopped talking. He didn't say anything, and nobody said anything to him--at least, not in class. After that, it went back to normal. Still, he completely stopped making wisecracks the way he did beforehand."
They ate their dessert and were sipping their thick Turkish coffee. "This is really sweet!" remarked Charles. "So Barnes never indicated that he suspected you of writing that graffiti even after the scene you two had in his office?"
"It's funny," said Cindy, "but I don't think he even remembered that. The Sexual Assault Services Office told me not to go back to his office, but I did after the second midterm to ask him about his class next semester. He didn't even remember my name! I had to introduce myself to him all over again. I thought he would remember what happened before, but he sure didn't seem to."
"Most of the professors I've had wouldn't recognize me outside of class," said Charles. "I guess there's a lot more of us than there is of them. Still, I would think a pretty girl like you would be more memorable."
"That's a sexist thing to say, Charles," Cindy admonished, "but I do appreciate the compliment."
The bill came, and Cindy grabbed it. When Charles reached for his wallet, Cindy insisted that she was paying in order to atone for having slapped him and for doubting his loyalty to her. "You haven't been seeing anyone since then, have you?"
"I haven't, actually," he said. "I guess I've been concentrating on my studies too this semester. Well, thank you so very much for the dinner. By the way--why did you choose this place? We never came here before."
Cindy smiled mischievously. "I chose this restaurant because it is right next to the Holiday Inn where I booked a room for us. Actually, I've already checked in; that's why I was a little late. This way, we get to avoid having to deal either with your roommate or with mine."
Charles beamed with happy anticipation. "Cindy, what a great idea!"
"Shall we go?"
"All right!" As they stood up, Charles furled his brow. "So is there going to be a story in the Post about Professor Barnes and me?"
"I think it's going to have more do with Professor Gibson," she said. "He's some sort of big fish or other. Sorry, but I think you--or Charles Truehart--won't get much attention."
As they went inside the cloak room, Charles said, "You know, Cindy, if you're
not serious about pursuing a complaint against Professor Barnes, I hope you withdraw it. He might be in trouble because of it."
"Don't worry, I will. Barnes doesn't know it yet, but he's going to be writing law school recommendations for me next fall. I can't have him resigning in disgrace or anything before that!"
Alone in the cloak room, Cindy and Charles indulged themselves in a long kiss.
"In just a few minutes," she said afterward, "I too will truthfully be able to write that Charles Truehart fondled me." Taking his hand in hers, she added, "But it won't be a complaint."
He stood up when he saw her. "Hello, Cindy. It's been a long time. It was quite a surprise to get that call from you yesterday."
"Hi Charles! Let me just hang up my coat." Cindy quickly dashed into the self-serve cloak room (it was that kind of restaurant) and re-emerged revealing herself in a short, black cocktail dress and black stockings.
"Wow! You sure look nice!" exclaimed Charles. "What is going on? What's the mystery reason for calling me to meet here tonight all dressed up?"
"Let's sit down and I'll tell you," she responded. They were quickly ushered to a table and given menus. Charles had never been to a Turkish restaurant, so Cindy recommended that they start with dolma and then have doner kebabs. When the waitress came to their table, Cindy gave their order and also asked for a bottle of merlot.
"That's kind of expensive, isn't it?" asked Charles.
"Not really," said Cindy. "Besides, this is all my treat, so don't worry about it."
"Cindy, what is this all about?" Charles asked again.
Cindy looked downward as she said, "I found out it wasn't you. And I'm really sorry."
"You found out what wasn't me?"
"You weren't the Charles Truehart that the graffiti was written about."
"I could have told you that," said Charles. "In fact, I tried to but you wouldn't listen. But all that was a long time ago. Why is it being brought up again now? And who has convinced you that I am innocent?"
Cindy was glad that Charles did not appear to be angry. The fact that he had agreed to meet her at all had led her to expect that he wouldn't be.
"Something odd happened yesterday morning, before I called you," began Cindy. "I actually got a call from a Washington Post reporter--Kate Morgan. She was the one who told me that it wasn't you."
Charles looked at her incredulously. "A Washington Post reporter called you to say that some graffiti written about me in a woman's lavatory a couple of months ago was not true?"
Cindy laughed. "No, that's not the main reason why she called. I'm not quite sure why she wanted to talk to me in particular. She said she was talking to a number of people at NDU about the whole sexual harassment situation and those `unwanted' posters in The New Dominion."
"Oh, yeah," said Charles. "I remember seeing a new one this week--something about a professor telling someone that if she wanted a higher grade, she should wear a shorter skirt."
"It was about a Professor Gibson. I've never heard of him. Have you?"
"No," said Charles. Like most white students, they were only vaguely aware that African-American literature was even taught at NDU, and were not at all aware of who taught it. "I'm kind of surprised that a professor would say that."
"Well, yeah. Wasn't that outrageous?"
"No, what I mean," said Charles, "is that I wouldn't have thought it was necessary. Although not surprising at the end of spring semester, I'm always amazed at the number of girls who wear incredibly short skirts to final exams even at the end of the fall semester. Have you ever noticed that?"
"I have actually," Cindy said laughing. She usually did it herself, but didn't think Charles needed to know. "I remember during my first semester at NDU, one of my girlfriends who was a sophomore told me: `Wear a short skirt to all in-class exams. It might not help your grade, but it sure can't hurt it either!"
Both of them laughed, but Charles shook his head. "I feel sorry for these professors with girls teasing them like that. It's kind of sad that these older guys must think you're attracted to them, only to find out that you're just working on your grade."
Cindy snorted in contempt. "They know better than that! And any who don't should!"
The wine arrived. When the waitress began the ritual of pouring a small amount in the man's glass for him to taste it first, Cindy grabbed the glass, swallowed the wine, and pronounced it acceptable. The waitress looked scandalized but said nothing. She poured out their two glasses and left the bottle with them on the table.
"I don't think women in Turkey would do what you just did," commented Charles.
"Well, shit!" said Cindy. "I'm the one that's buying. It's a sexist ritual anyway. They should pour a little in both glasses."
"If there were a party of ten or more, the bottle would be practically empty by the time everyone was given a taste. It's more efficient if just one person tries it," said Charles.
"Yeah, but does it always have to be the man?" countered Cindy, her voice rising. Then, in a lower voice: "But this wasn't what I wanted to talk to you about. Let me tell you more about what that reporter said. One of the things she asked me was if I remembered what one of the `unwanted' posters said about a Charles Truehart. When I told her I remembered it, she asked if I knew a Charles Truehart. Without telling her about us, I said that I knew you and that you were a student. Then," Cindy said dramatically, "she asked me if I knew the other Charles Truehart at NDU--apparently someone in food service. I said that I didn't. Then she said that he was observed by a security camera repeatedly molesting several of his female assistants. He's been fired and is being sued both by the women and by the university."
"That's funny," observed Charles. "I don't remember reading anything about this in The New Dominion."
"I don't think it was in The New Dominion," said Cindy. The reporter, Kate, said she learned about it from the university administration."
The dolma arrived. Charles started to pick one up with his fingers, but Cindy indicated that he should eat it with a fork. Cindy refilled their wine glasses.
Charles shook his head. "I still don't see why anyone from the Post would be interested in something as unimportant as this--even if it does vindicate me."
"Sexual assault is not unimportant, Charles," Cindy informed him primly. "Besides, it wasn't just you--I mean, the other Charles Truehart--which she was mainly asking me about. She was more interested in talking to me about Professor Barnes."
"Professor Barnes?"
"Yeah, you remember that `unwanted' poster: `Prof. Barnes touched me inappropriately.' She wanted to know if I was the one who wrote that."
Charles sat upright. "Were you?" he asked. "More importantly, did he?"
"No and no," Cindy replied. She was touched that he seemed both jealous and protective. "Well, the answer to your second question is a little more complicated." She then told him the whole story of what happened when she went to Prof. Barnes's office after the first midterm in his IR Theory class, though in considerably less emotional tones than she had originally related it to her roommate, Tiffany.
"He touched you on the shoulder because you were crying? I don't think that constitutes sexual assault, or harassment, or whatever," commented Charles.
"Well, I guess not," Cindy admitted. "At the time, though, I was really indignant. In fact, I went and complained about him to the Sexual Assault Services Office."
"Cindy, you didn't!" exclaimed Charles.
"It wasn't a formal complaint," she explained. "Just an informal one. It's not really serious. It was Tiffany who talked me into going there."
Cindy giggled. "Actually, the main reason I went was to try and find out if anyone had filed a complaint against you."
The doner kebab arrived. They were both quiet for a few minutes as they ate the tender meat and the pomegranates in the yogurt sauce it was smothered in.
"I wonder if Professor Barnes thinks you're the one who wrote, `Prof. Barnes touched me in `intimately' or whatever it was," mused Charles.
"`Inappropriately,'" Cindy corrected. "I don't think so. Why would he think that?"
"If I were him and I knew you filed some sort of complaint against him, I would just assume that you were the one who wrote that graffiti. I presume he knows that you filed a complaint against him?" asked Charles.
"No," said Cindy. "Like I said, it was an informal complaint. I didn't sign anything or officially give my name."
They ate in silence for awhile longer.
"Well, if it wasn't you, I wonder who wrote, `Prof. Barnes touched me inappropriately,' then," said Charles.
"I don't know," responded Cindy. "When that `unwanted' poster was first published, I just assumed that it was another female student describing a separate incident with him."
"But as my own case shows," Charles remarked, "this sort of graffiti is not always accurate."
"It was accurate about Charles Truehart the food service manager," Cindy corrected, "but not about Charles Truehart the student."
They ate a little more. This time, Charles refilled their wine glasses.
"I wonder if that Washington Post reporter somehow knew that you had filed a complaint against Barnes," suggested Charles. "Maybe that's why she called to see if you wrote that graffiti about him."
Cindy considered this over a sip of merlot. "I'm trying to think of the exact words she used. She asked if I knew who might have written the graffiti about Professor Barnes, not whether I had actually done so. But she then asked if I or anybody I knew had filed a sexual assault complaint against him."
"What did you tell her?" asked Charles.
"I told her that I knew of no such complaint, and that I myself thought he was a terrific professor," Cindy answered. "Since I'm not going to follow through on that complaint, I didn't see any point in telling her about it."
"Why are you so positive about him now? I thought you didn't like him."
"I didn't at first, but I've warmed up to him since then," Cindy explained. I really studied hard after the first midterm and came to understand what he meant about the difference between description and analysis. I got an A on the second midterm, I feel very confident that I'm going to ace the final as well.
"Besides," she continued, "I found IR theory to be pretty interesting, especially as the class looked at the twentieth century. Barnes even gave a pretty good lecture about feminist IR theory. That was pretty cool!"
Someone took away their empty plates. When the waitress came to enquire whether they wanted dessert, Cindy ordered baklava and Turkish coffee for them both.
"I've already signed up for his International Political Economy class in the spring, and I plan on taking his Latin American politics seminar next fall," Cindy continued.
"Wow! You've really become a fan of his," commented Charles. "I think I'm jealous."
"Oh, Charles! It's not like that," she reassured him. "You know what I like about Barnes? He's one of the few professors I've had here who will go to the bother of telling you what you're doing wrong and how you need to improve. Most don't care enough to do that, you know? And when someone like Barnes does tell you that you're doing well--you know you've earned it! I have to admit, though, that being away from you for most of the semester gave me a lot more time to concentrate on my classes."
"Oh, so it's my fault you didn't do well on that first midterm, is it? By the way, what was it like in his class after that `unwanted' poster appeared about him?" asked Charles. "I certainly received some negative reaction for a week or so after the one my name was in appeared."
Cindy hung her head. "Yes, Charles, I know. I slapped you. I'm really sorry."
"I wasn't talking about that," said Charles. "I meant that for a week or so, the girls in my classes tried to sit as far away from me as possible. Some even put their arms across their breasts if I looked in their direction. But then it all died down. What was it like to be in Barnes's class when the `unwanted' poster came out about him?"
Cindy thought about this as the coffee and baklava were served. "Normally when he walks into the classroom, people just keep on talking with one another until he starts lecturing. But I remember when he came into class for the first time after the poster appeared, everyone stopped talking. He didn't say anything, and nobody said anything to him--at least, not in class. After that, it went back to normal. Still, he completely stopped making wisecracks the way he did beforehand."
They ate their dessert and were sipping their thick Turkish coffee. "This is really sweet!" remarked Charles. "So Barnes never indicated that he suspected you of writing that graffiti even after the scene you two had in his office?"
"It's funny," said Cindy, "but I don't think he even remembered that. The Sexual Assault Services Office told me not to go back to his office, but I did after the second midterm to ask him about his class next semester. He didn't even remember my name! I had to introduce myself to him all over again. I thought he would remember what happened before, but he sure didn't seem to."
"Most of the professors I've had wouldn't recognize me outside of class," said Charles. "I guess there's a lot more of us than there is of them. Still, I would think a pretty girl like you would be more memorable."
"That's a sexist thing to say, Charles," Cindy admonished, "but I do appreciate the compliment."
The bill came, and Cindy grabbed it. When Charles reached for his wallet, Cindy insisted that she was paying in order to atone for having slapped him and for doubting his loyalty to her. "You haven't been seeing anyone since then, have you?"
"I haven't, actually," he said. "I guess I've been concentrating on my studies too this semester. Well, thank you so very much for the dinner. By the way--why did you choose this place? We never came here before."
Cindy smiled mischievously. "I chose this restaurant because it is right next to the Holiday Inn where I booked a room for us. Actually, I've already checked in; that's why I was a little late. This way, we get to avoid having to deal either with your roommate or with mine."
Charles beamed with happy anticipation. "Cindy, what a great idea!"
"Shall we go?"
"All right!" As they stood up, Charles furled his brow. "So is there going to be a story in the Post about Professor Barnes and me?"
"I think it's going to have more do with Professor Gibson," she said. "He's some sort of big fish or other. Sorry, but I think you--or Charles Truehart--won't get much attention."
As they went inside the cloak room, Charles said, "You know, Cindy, if you're
not serious about pursuing a complaint against Professor Barnes, I hope you withdraw it. He might be in trouble because of it."
"Don't worry, I will. Barnes doesn't know it yet, but he's going to be writing law school recommendations for me next fall. I can't have him resigning in disgrace or anything before that!"
Alone in the cloak room, Cindy and Charles indulged themselves in a long kiss.
"In just a few minutes," she said afterward, "I too will truthfully be able to write that Charles Truehart fondled me." Taking his hand in hers, she added, "But it won't be a complaint."
Saturday, August 7, 2010
Chapter 9
Charles Gibson was the only African-American who was a university professor at NDU. A highly prominent scholar in the field of African-American literature, he had been lured to NDU from Duke University three years ago with a nine month salary of $125,000 plus guaranteed summer support money. Gibson loved being in the Washington, D.C. area where he received far more media coverage than he ever had before. He had rapidly discovered, though, that the quality of both the students and the faculty at NDU was not nearly as high as at Duke. Still, it was nice to be a big fish in a small pond.
Someone knocked on the door of his office. "Come on in," he called.
The door opened and in walked a very attractive African-American woman wearing what was obviously an expensive suit--something he would expect to see a young woman wear in an office but not on campus. He recognized that she was one of his students but did not know her name.
"Hello, Professor Gibson," she said. "I'm Genevieve Lacouture from your Introduction to African-American Literature class."
"Oh yes," said Gibson. "Please sit down. What can I do for you?"
"I know I shouldn't have waited until the last week of the semester to come talk to you," she said as she sat down. "I'm afraid I've been very busy with my part-time job this semester. In fact, I'm going there right after I talk to you. The point is this: I'm very worried about my grade in your class. You gave me a B+ on the midterm and an A- on the paper. There's only the final exam left, and I want to do as well as possible on it. So I thought I'd better come and talk to you about what I need to do to improve my grade.
"I'm a computer science major," she continued. "I'm taking this course to fulfill my humanities requirement. I'm not used to literature courses which contain a high degree of ambiguity."
Gibson was a little taken aback by this. "Computer science?" he asked incredulously. "Why are you majoring in that? Why aren't you majoring in African-American studies, or sociology, or something else that's relevant to black folks?"
"Well, to tell you the truth, I was just never very interested in all that. In fact," she confessed with some embarrassment, "I'm only in your course mainly because it's the one lit class that best fit into my schedule. I got into computer science when I was in high school. And, I'm proud to admit, I'm pretty good at it.
"Besides," she said with a knowing smile, "I think that a B.S. in computer science will get me a much higher paying job than a B.A. in African-American studies."
"So is money all that you're interested in?" asked Gibson, shaking his head. "I really just don't understand the black students here at NDU. All you're interested in is yourselves as individuals. You seem to have no concern for advancing civil rights or other black causes like my generation did. Why, when I was at Berkeley in the '60s..."
"Yes, yes," Genevieve interrupted, displaying some impatience. "We know you were at Berkeley in the '60s. You've mentioned it in class several times this semester."
Gibson wondered: Am I getting old? Am I repeating myself without knowing it? "The point I'm trying to make," he said, "is that my generation worked together for black rights. Yours isn't doing that."
Genevieve shrugged her shoulders. "Since your generation largely succeeded at this task, my generation can now move on to something else. Perhaps we could move on to discussing your expectations for the final."
Now Gibson was annoyed. "Your generation may think it can move on, but it is deluding itself. My generation worked hard for affirmative action. But affirmative action is now being destroyed bit by bit."
"I just see it differently," responded Genevieve. "Whatever benefits affirmative action may have provided decades ago, it's a program that has now outlived its usefulness. Educated African-Americans--especially ones with technical training--can get jobs as easily as anybody else. And isn't it better that corporations want to hire us because we have knowledge and skills they value instead of because they need to fill some federally mandated quota?"
"And look what's happening," Gibson continued, "to congressional redistricting to ensure black representation in the House. The courts are slowly but surely overturning it, resulting in the election of a less and less diverse House of Representatives with each passing election."
"My father says that the only thing redistricting to create congressional districts with black majorities ever accomplished," countered Genevieve, "was to ensure the election of white Republicans in all the surrounding districts."
"And it's the Republicans in Congress," thundered Gibson, "that have slashed social programs which help disadvantaged blacks."
"My father also says that it's these misguided social programs of the past that have provided skewed incentives to African-Americans, actually making it unprofitable for those on welfare to work their way out of it," said Genevieve. "We don't need welfare! We don't need special programs! We can succeed on our own!"
Gibson was disgusted. "Just what does this father of yours do for a living anyway?"
"He's a vice president at Dillo Petroleum Services in Fairfax," Genevieve replied proudly.
"Aha!" said Gibson. "He's one of those lucky blacks who succeeded thanks to affirmative action but who now want to end it for the rest of us."
"My father succeeded," Genevieve responded hotly, "through hard work and determination! His parents were poor immigrants from Haiti! They worked hard to send him to college to become a petroleum engineer! It wasn't easy--nobody handed him anything. He got where he is through his own hard work--and through his ability to work with others.
"I've traveled with my father to the Caribbean and to Africa," she continued. "Believe me: African-Americans are far better off and have far more opportunities than do blacks in those countries. And I wouldn't want to be a black person in Europe either. Whatever their situation here, nobody questions the fact that African-Americans are American. In Europe, though, blacks can never be anything besides West Indians, West Africans, East Africans, or even Americans--but never Europeans."
Gibson knew that immigrant blacks from the Caribbean and Africa as a group scored far higher than other African-Americans in indicators such as level of education and income. There was no consensus of opinion as to why this anomaly existed. Gibson couldn't explain it either. But at least now, he thought, he understood where this Genevieve was coming from.
"I don't deny," he said, "that blacks in the U.S. are far better off than blacks elsewhere. Nor do I deny that black progress received a lot of help from whites, especially during the 1960s and early 1970s. What I see now, though, is that a lot of that progress--affirmative action, congressional redistricting, and social programs--is being reversed, mainly by whites.
"It kind of makes you wonder, doesn't it?" he asked. "Why did whites go to the bother of furthering black progress back then only to reverse it now? Well, it just so happens that I have a theory about that. Would you like to hear it?"
Gibson didn't wait for her to answer. "In the past, whites were not an undifferentiated group in this country. You had the Irish, the Italians, the Scandinavians, the East Europeans, and others. Up through the 1950s, though, the whites that controlled America were the WASPs--the white, Anglo-Saxon Protestants. But thanks to all the changes resulting from the New Deal in the 1930s and World War II, these other whites became increasingly powerful and threatened to displace the WASPs.
"It was no accident," he continued, "that most of the white liberals in the 1960s were WASPs. They decided to support the cause of black progress not out of any love for us blacks, but as a way of controlling these other, rising white groups.
"Now since then, ironically enough, distinctions among whites have virtually disappeared. Whereas before whites tended to marry strictly within their narrower ethnic groups (WASPs with WASPs, Italians with Italians, etc.), these barriers have now completely broken down. WASPs can hardly be said to form a distinct group any more. I guess they all got bored with each other and married someone else--just as long as they were white.
"But also since then, something happened that the white liberals who supported black progress in the 1960s never seem to have actually expected: the creation of a strong, vibrant black middle class. Just like the WASPs felt threatened by the rise of other white groups in the past, whites as a whole feel threatened by the rise of blacks now. And just as in the past the WASPs sought to keep down those other white groups through supporting blacks, whites now seek to keep down blacks through supporting other groups. And do you know who those other groups are?"
Again, Gibson did not wait for Genevieve to answer. "Hispanics and Asians to some extent. But an even more insidious way of keeping down blacks is the white enthusiasm for the women's movement. And here their intentions are blatant: the women they mainly have in mind to support are white women. So right at the point where more and more talented black men are poised to move into the top ranks of society, they are being pushed aside by white women in the name of gender equality."
"If all that is true," responded Genevieve, "I wonder where that leaves me. It seems to me that as an African-American I would lose, but as a woman I would win."
Gibson shook his head. "This is the problem with today's young blacks--especially young black women. You don't seem to realize that what little you gain as a woman from the white-inspired women's movement would be greatly outweighed by what you would lose as a black."
"I'm not sure about that argument," said Genevieve. "It seems to me that progress for African-American women is hindered far more by African-American men than it is by white women. It's not white women who are getting black teenage girls pregnant and then abandoning them."
"I can see," said Gibson, "that their strategy of divide and conquer has certainly worked with you!"
"Maybe women of all races really have more in common with one another than with the men from their own. Maybe it's the false barrier of race that has kept women divided up to now," she countered.
Gibson shook his head again. "You know, I really don't understand today's young women--black, white, or whatever. You say you're for women's rights. But you've accepted restrictions on yourselves that the women of my generation never would have accepted." At least, not back in the 1960s and 1970s when they were young, he thought.
"What do you mean?" asked Genevieve.
"I mean all these new rules preventing relationships between men and women who work together. But when they do get together--as they inevitably do--and it's somehow discovered, it's always considered to be the man's `fault' that it happened."
"It is clearly inappropriate," Genevieve informed him, "for male supervisors to be pressuring their female subordinates for sex."
"Oh, Lord! Listen to you!" said Gibson. "Not every male is a supervisor to every female in an organization. And sex doesn't happen just because men `pressure' women for it."
"Are you sure about that?" asked Genevieve sarcastically.
"It seems to me," continued Gibson, "that if a man and woman who work in the same organization want to get together, it's nobody's business but their own."
"Can we please talk about the final exam," implored Genevieve.
"And what does it matter if they are supervisor and subordinate anyway? If they're both consenting adults, what does it matter? Who else's business is it?
"What if the shoe were on the other foot?" he continued. "With all these women getting ahead, they have subordinates now. What if a female supervisor wanted to get together with one of her male subordinates? Would you modern women oppose that?"
Genevieve did not respond.
"I can just tell what you're thinking," said Gibson. "You're thinking no female supervisor would want to get together with a male subordinate, aren't you? That wouldn't benefit her nearly as much as having an affair with a male supervisor, and then reporting him for taking advantage of her after she's gotten everything she can possibly get from him."
Genevieve did not look happy. "You know, I really don't think..." she began.
"Whenever I read these stories," Gibson plowed on, "about women charging male supervisors with pressuring them for sex after being in a relationship with them for a considerable period of time, I really wonder what the truth actually is. Women aren't all innocent little angels. Look at the way they dress! They're sure not trying to hide the fact that they're women!
"Let me tell you, things were a lot different when I was at Berkeley in the '60s. Back then, young women were trying to break away from sexual restrictions, not wrap themselves up in them. There was none of this nonsense about `inappropriate relationships' either. I remember that it was quite common for female students to have affairs with their professors. And nobody objected either--except the professors' wives, if they found out," he laughed.
"Professor Gibson!" exclaimed Genevieve.
"And the women were open and honest about it, too. I well remember how female students would boast about their conquests among the professors and the graduate teaching assistants."
Gibson had been a T.A. back then. There must have been half a dozen girls he ended up in bed with whom he met through their being students in his discussion sections. They had all been white girls too. Each had told him that she had never had sex with a black man before. He was `exotic' for them--just as they were for him. But so what? That was cool!
"With the new Victorianism that reigns at universities now, though," he continued, "male professors are scared that if they even glance at their female students, they'll be charged with `sexual assault' or some such nonsense!"
There had been three other student girlfriends later when he was a young professor at Duke. These relationships had lasted longer. Unlike his girlfriends at Berkeley, these three had all been graduate students. Like the others, they had also been white. Now that he was thinking about it, he realized that none of his student girlfriends had ever been black. More to the point, he hadn't had any student girlfriend--whether black, white, or whatever--in many years. This was a result, Gibson thought, of the new Victorianism on college campuses. At least, that's what he hoped it was. He certainly hoped it wasn't because of the age difference between him and the students. It was funny how, with their coming and going, the students he taught remained in a constant age range while he got older. Not that being in his late fifties was really all that old, of course.
"Look what's happened right here at NDU," he went on. "The `unwanted' poster in this worthless student newspaper--nothing like what we had at Berkeley--claimed to reprint graffiti written in one of the women's bathrooms about a professor here. I think his name was Barnes. What did it say about him?"
"`Prof. Barnes touched me inappropriately,'" said Genevieve
He certainly wouldn't mind touching this Genevieve, he thought. It would probably do this over serious girl a world of good. "Oh, so you saw that?" he asked. "I guess everyone did. Well, I bet the whole thing is a fraud. I'll bet he never touched anyone. Some girl tried to get him to raise her grade, and when he wouldn't, she wrote this thing about him just to cause trouble for him."
Gibson had heard that Barnes was going up for tenure this year. If that was true, he knew that this statement published in the paper--no matter how false--would cause him quite a lot of trouble. The bitch who wrote it probably knew Barnes was going up and was deliberately trying to sabotage him. Well, she wouldn't succeed if Charles Gibson had anything to say about the matter. And he did: he was on the promotion and tenure committee for the College of Arts and Sciences this year. If Barnes really was going up, Gibson decided that he would get himself appointed as the guy's liaison to the committee. And that reminded him...
Gibson looked at his watch. "Oh, shit!" he exclaimed. I've got to get going. The organizing meeting for P&T committee is about to start."
Genevieve had no choice but to stand up just as he did. "But we didn't talk about the final!" she said with exasperation. "I really wanted your advice! I've got to do well on it if I'm going to keep up my GPA and have a shot at getting into a really good graduate school!"
This girl really had to lighten up, thought Gibson. "I tell you what," he said teasingly. "If you want an A in my class, just wear a shorter skirt than you've got on now to the final--and sit in the front row. You'll feel so good about yourself that I'm sure you'll do fine."
"Professor Gibson!" exclaimed Genevieve. "I can't believe you said that to me! Would you talk to a white girl that way?"
"Only if she looked as good as you do," he said laughing as he ushered her out of his office and closed his door behind him.
As she watched Professor Gibson stride down the hall on his way to his meeting, Genevieve made three decisions. First, she would wear pants to the final. Second, she would sit in the back row during it. And third, since she was carrying a felt tip marker in her purse, she would pay a visit to the first women's lavatory she could find.
Someone knocked on the door of his office. "Come on in," he called.
The door opened and in walked a very attractive African-American woman wearing what was obviously an expensive suit--something he would expect to see a young woman wear in an office but not on campus. He recognized that she was one of his students but did not know her name.
"Hello, Professor Gibson," she said. "I'm Genevieve Lacouture from your Introduction to African-American Literature class."
"Oh yes," said Gibson. "Please sit down. What can I do for you?"
"I know I shouldn't have waited until the last week of the semester to come talk to you," she said as she sat down. "I'm afraid I've been very busy with my part-time job this semester. In fact, I'm going there right after I talk to you. The point is this: I'm very worried about my grade in your class. You gave me a B+ on the midterm and an A- on the paper. There's only the final exam left, and I want to do as well as possible on it. So I thought I'd better come and talk to you about what I need to do to improve my grade.
"I'm a computer science major," she continued. "I'm taking this course to fulfill my humanities requirement. I'm not used to literature courses which contain a high degree of ambiguity."
Gibson was a little taken aback by this. "Computer science?" he asked incredulously. "Why are you majoring in that? Why aren't you majoring in African-American studies, or sociology, or something else that's relevant to black folks?"
"Well, to tell you the truth, I was just never very interested in all that. In fact," she confessed with some embarrassment, "I'm only in your course mainly because it's the one lit class that best fit into my schedule. I got into computer science when I was in high school. And, I'm proud to admit, I'm pretty good at it.
"Besides," she said with a knowing smile, "I think that a B.S. in computer science will get me a much higher paying job than a B.A. in African-American studies."
"So is money all that you're interested in?" asked Gibson, shaking his head. "I really just don't understand the black students here at NDU. All you're interested in is yourselves as individuals. You seem to have no concern for advancing civil rights or other black causes like my generation did. Why, when I was at Berkeley in the '60s..."
"Yes, yes," Genevieve interrupted, displaying some impatience. "We know you were at Berkeley in the '60s. You've mentioned it in class several times this semester."
Gibson wondered: Am I getting old? Am I repeating myself without knowing it? "The point I'm trying to make," he said, "is that my generation worked together for black rights. Yours isn't doing that."
Genevieve shrugged her shoulders. "Since your generation largely succeeded at this task, my generation can now move on to something else. Perhaps we could move on to discussing your expectations for the final."
Now Gibson was annoyed. "Your generation may think it can move on, but it is deluding itself. My generation worked hard for affirmative action. But affirmative action is now being destroyed bit by bit."
"I just see it differently," responded Genevieve. "Whatever benefits affirmative action may have provided decades ago, it's a program that has now outlived its usefulness. Educated African-Americans--especially ones with technical training--can get jobs as easily as anybody else. And isn't it better that corporations want to hire us because we have knowledge and skills they value instead of because they need to fill some federally mandated quota?"
"And look what's happening," Gibson continued, "to congressional redistricting to ensure black representation in the House. The courts are slowly but surely overturning it, resulting in the election of a less and less diverse House of Representatives with each passing election."
"My father says that the only thing redistricting to create congressional districts with black majorities ever accomplished," countered Genevieve, "was to ensure the election of white Republicans in all the surrounding districts."
"And it's the Republicans in Congress," thundered Gibson, "that have slashed social programs which help disadvantaged blacks."
"My father also says that it's these misguided social programs of the past that have provided skewed incentives to African-Americans, actually making it unprofitable for those on welfare to work their way out of it," said Genevieve. "We don't need welfare! We don't need special programs! We can succeed on our own!"
Gibson was disgusted. "Just what does this father of yours do for a living anyway?"
"He's a vice president at Dillo Petroleum Services in Fairfax," Genevieve replied proudly.
"Aha!" said Gibson. "He's one of those lucky blacks who succeeded thanks to affirmative action but who now want to end it for the rest of us."
"My father succeeded," Genevieve responded hotly, "through hard work and determination! His parents were poor immigrants from Haiti! They worked hard to send him to college to become a petroleum engineer! It wasn't easy--nobody handed him anything. He got where he is through his own hard work--and through his ability to work with others.
"I've traveled with my father to the Caribbean and to Africa," she continued. "Believe me: African-Americans are far better off and have far more opportunities than do blacks in those countries. And I wouldn't want to be a black person in Europe either. Whatever their situation here, nobody questions the fact that African-Americans are American. In Europe, though, blacks can never be anything besides West Indians, West Africans, East Africans, or even Americans--but never Europeans."
Gibson knew that immigrant blacks from the Caribbean and Africa as a group scored far higher than other African-Americans in indicators such as level of education and income. There was no consensus of opinion as to why this anomaly existed. Gibson couldn't explain it either. But at least now, he thought, he understood where this Genevieve was coming from.
"I don't deny," he said, "that blacks in the U.S. are far better off than blacks elsewhere. Nor do I deny that black progress received a lot of help from whites, especially during the 1960s and early 1970s. What I see now, though, is that a lot of that progress--affirmative action, congressional redistricting, and social programs--is being reversed, mainly by whites.
"It kind of makes you wonder, doesn't it?" he asked. "Why did whites go to the bother of furthering black progress back then only to reverse it now? Well, it just so happens that I have a theory about that. Would you like to hear it?"
Gibson didn't wait for her to answer. "In the past, whites were not an undifferentiated group in this country. You had the Irish, the Italians, the Scandinavians, the East Europeans, and others. Up through the 1950s, though, the whites that controlled America were the WASPs--the white, Anglo-Saxon Protestants. But thanks to all the changes resulting from the New Deal in the 1930s and World War II, these other whites became increasingly powerful and threatened to displace the WASPs.
"It was no accident," he continued, "that most of the white liberals in the 1960s were WASPs. They decided to support the cause of black progress not out of any love for us blacks, but as a way of controlling these other, rising white groups.
"Now since then, ironically enough, distinctions among whites have virtually disappeared. Whereas before whites tended to marry strictly within their narrower ethnic groups (WASPs with WASPs, Italians with Italians, etc.), these barriers have now completely broken down. WASPs can hardly be said to form a distinct group any more. I guess they all got bored with each other and married someone else--just as long as they were white.
"But also since then, something happened that the white liberals who supported black progress in the 1960s never seem to have actually expected: the creation of a strong, vibrant black middle class. Just like the WASPs felt threatened by the rise of other white groups in the past, whites as a whole feel threatened by the rise of blacks now. And just as in the past the WASPs sought to keep down those other white groups through supporting blacks, whites now seek to keep down blacks through supporting other groups. And do you know who those other groups are?"
Again, Gibson did not wait for Genevieve to answer. "Hispanics and Asians to some extent. But an even more insidious way of keeping down blacks is the white enthusiasm for the women's movement. And here their intentions are blatant: the women they mainly have in mind to support are white women. So right at the point where more and more talented black men are poised to move into the top ranks of society, they are being pushed aside by white women in the name of gender equality."
"If all that is true," responded Genevieve, "I wonder where that leaves me. It seems to me that as an African-American I would lose, but as a woman I would win."
Gibson shook his head. "This is the problem with today's young blacks--especially young black women. You don't seem to realize that what little you gain as a woman from the white-inspired women's movement would be greatly outweighed by what you would lose as a black."
"I'm not sure about that argument," said Genevieve. "It seems to me that progress for African-American women is hindered far more by African-American men than it is by white women. It's not white women who are getting black teenage girls pregnant and then abandoning them."
"I can see," said Gibson, "that their strategy of divide and conquer has certainly worked with you!"
"Maybe women of all races really have more in common with one another than with the men from their own. Maybe it's the false barrier of race that has kept women divided up to now," she countered.
Gibson shook his head again. "You know, I really don't understand today's young women--black, white, or whatever. You say you're for women's rights. But you've accepted restrictions on yourselves that the women of my generation never would have accepted." At least, not back in the 1960s and 1970s when they were young, he thought.
"What do you mean?" asked Genevieve.
"I mean all these new rules preventing relationships between men and women who work together. But when they do get together--as they inevitably do--and it's somehow discovered, it's always considered to be the man's `fault' that it happened."
"It is clearly inappropriate," Genevieve informed him, "for male supervisors to be pressuring their female subordinates for sex."
"Oh, Lord! Listen to you!" said Gibson. "Not every male is a supervisor to every female in an organization. And sex doesn't happen just because men `pressure' women for it."
"Are you sure about that?" asked Genevieve sarcastically.
"It seems to me," continued Gibson, "that if a man and woman who work in the same organization want to get together, it's nobody's business but their own."
"Can we please talk about the final exam," implored Genevieve.
"And what does it matter if they are supervisor and subordinate anyway? If they're both consenting adults, what does it matter? Who else's business is it?
"What if the shoe were on the other foot?" he continued. "With all these women getting ahead, they have subordinates now. What if a female supervisor wanted to get together with one of her male subordinates? Would you modern women oppose that?"
Genevieve did not respond.
"I can just tell what you're thinking," said Gibson. "You're thinking no female supervisor would want to get together with a male subordinate, aren't you? That wouldn't benefit her nearly as much as having an affair with a male supervisor, and then reporting him for taking advantage of her after she's gotten everything she can possibly get from him."
Genevieve did not look happy. "You know, I really don't think..." she began.
"Whenever I read these stories," Gibson plowed on, "about women charging male supervisors with pressuring them for sex after being in a relationship with them for a considerable period of time, I really wonder what the truth actually is. Women aren't all innocent little angels. Look at the way they dress! They're sure not trying to hide the fact that they're women!
"Let me tell you, things were a lot different when I was at Berkeley in the '60s. Back then, young women were trying to break away from sexual restrictions, not wrap themselves up in them. There was none of this nonsense about `inappropriate relationships' either. I remember that it was quite common for female students to have affairs with their professors. And nobody objected either--except the professors' wives, if they found out," he laughed.
"Professor Gibson!" exclaimed Genevieve.
"And the women were open and honest about it, too. I well remember how female students would boast about their conquests among the professors and the graduate teaching assistants."
Gibson had been a T.A. back then. There must have been half a dozen girls he ended up in bed with whom he met through their being students in his discussion sections. They had all been white girls too. Each had told him that she had never had sex with a black man before. He was `exotic' for them--just as they were for him. But so what? That was cool!
"With the new Victorianism that reigns at universities now, though," he continued, "male professors are scared that if they even glance at their female students, they'll be charged with `sexual assault' or some such nonsense!"
There had been three other student girlfriends later when he was a young professor at Duke. These relationships had lasted longer. Unlike his girlfriends at Berkeley, these three had all been graduate students. Like the others, they had also been white. Now that he was thinking about it, he realized that none of his student girlfriends had ever been black. More to the point, he hadn't had any student girlfriend--whether black, white, or whatever--in many years. This was a result, Gibson thought, of the new Victorianism on college campuses. At least, that's what he hoped it was. He certainly hoped it wasn't because of the age difference between him and the students. It was funny how, with their coming and going, the students he taught remained in a constant age range while he got older. Not that being in his late fifties was really all that old, of course.
"Look what's happened right here at NDU," he went on. "The `unwanted' poster in this worthless student newspaper--nothing like what we had at Berkeley--claimed to reprint graffiti written in one of the women's bathrooms about a professor here. I think his name was Barnes. What did it say about him?"
"`Prof. Barnes touched me inappropriately,'" said Genevieve
He certainly wouldn't mind touching this Genevieve, he thought. It would probably do this over serious girl a world of good. "Oh, so you saw that?" he asked. "I guess everyone did. Well, I bet the whole thing is a fraud. I'll bet he never touched anyone. Some girl tried to get him to raise her grade, and when he wouldn't, she wrote this thing about him just to cause trouble for him."
Gibson had heard that Barnes was going up for tenure this year. If that was true, he knew that this statement published in the paper--no matter how false--would cause him quite a lot of trouble. The bitch who wrote it probably knew Barnes was going up and was deliberately trying to sabotage him. Well, she wouldn't succeed if Charles Gibson had anything to say about the matter. And he did: he was on the promotion and tenure committee for the College of Arts and Sciences this year. If Barnes really was going up, Gibson decided that he would get himself appointed as the guy's liaison to the committee. And that reminded him...
Gibson looked at his watch. "Oh, shit!" he exclaimed. I've got to get going. The organizing meeting for P&T committee is about to start."
Genevieve had no choice but to stand up just as he did. "But we didn't talk about the final!" she said with exasperation. "I really wanted your advice! I've got to do well on it if I'm going to keep up my GPA and have a shot at getting into a really good graduate school!"
This girl really had to lighten up, thought Gibson. "I tell you what," he said teasingly. "If you want an A in my class, just wear a shorter skirt than you've got on now to the final--and sit in the front row. You'll feel so good about yourself that I'm sure you'll do fine."
"Professor Gibson!" exclaimed Genevieve. "I can't believe you said that to me! Would you talk to a white girl that way?"
"Only if she looked as good as you do," he said laughing as he ushered her out of his office and closed his door behind him.
As she watched Professor Gibson stride down the hall on his way to his meeting, Genevieve made three decisions. First, she would wear pants to the final. Second, she would sit in the back row during it. And third, since she was carrying a felt tip marker in her purse, she would pay a visit to the first women's lavatory she could find.
Saturday, July 31, 2010
Chapter 8
When several political science professors suddenly walked past her open door on the way either to class or a long-delayed lunch, Ruth Silverstein could tell that this year's departmental promotion and tenure meeting had finally ended. This meeting was always held in November during those years that the department had promotion and tenure cases to consider. The meeting was open only to departmental faculty who already had tenure--but not to the chair of the department.
After this meeting, a professor designated during it would draft a memo stating what the vote on the candidate had been and summarizing the discussion held. A second meeting would then be held a week later to review the draft and propose any modifications. This second meeting, though, was usually less well attended as the draft memo was available several days ahead of time for the faculty to review and informally suggest changes to its author--something most professors preferred to do privately rather than in front of others. After being revised by its author (without any further recourse to the rest of the department), this memo would be placed in the candidate's dossier, which already contained both the material he or she submitted as well as letters received from external reviewers. Unlike these outside letters which the candidate wasn't supposed to see, he or she would receive a copy of the memo written at this and all subsequent stages of the review process--the next step in which would be the memo from the department chair. The chair would also receive copies of the memos about the candidate generated at later stages.
As Ruth knew, the memo from the chair would have the greatest impact if the vote of the faculty was divided. In other words, if the faculty unanimously supported a candidate for promotion and tenure, a chair who recommended against this would be seen as out of touch with his or her department at later stages in the process. Similarly, if the faculty voted heavily against a candidate, a chair's positive recommendation would probably not do much good. It was when the tenured faculty was divided on a candidate that the chair's recommendation--whether positive or negative--was most likely to carry crucial weight later on.
As Ruth anticipated, it was Trond Knutsen who came into her office and closed the door behind him. He looked exhausted; it was clear that the meeting had been difficult.
"Our colleagues decided to punish me for my past sins as chair by appointing me to write memos for both Barnes and Sweezy," he said, trying to sound jovial.
"I'm not surprised," said Ruth. "After all, you had a lot of practice at this when you were chair. So what happened? What was the vote?"
"The vote was the same for both of them," Trond informed her. "Thirteen for, two against, and one abstention."
"That's not good," Ruth observed. As she well knew, one vote against a candidate for tenure was usually not harmful. Two votes against, though, was considered evidence of the faculty being divided. And since an abstaining vote (as opposed to an absence from the meeting) was given the same weight as a no vote, this meant that both actually had received three negative votes--evidence that the faculty was seriously divided. "So tell me what was said."
"These two dossiers brought out all the divisions within the department--young vs. old, male vs. female, research vs. service, and political science vs. public administration."
Ruth shuddered. It was this last division that concerned her the most.
Trond continued: "Let me start with Ann. Those for her pointed to her record of service to the department. They argued that she had put in her dues, and that she was owed tenure. And while it wasn't said explicitly, it was clear that those who favored her most strongly were the female members of the department."
This didn't surprise Ruth. She knew from her own experience that being female and carrying a heavy service load usually went together.
"But those against her argued quite strongly that her research record was woefully insufficient, and that awarding her tenure would be an embarrassment to the department. At a time when other units in the university are raising their standards, our voting to give her tenure would signal that this department is not doing so."
Before becoming acting chair, Ruth had--like most professors--focused on her own department and was barely cognizant of what went on in others. Since attending the monthly meeting of College of Arts and Sciences department chairs, she had begun to perceive that there was a hierarchy among departments in terms of how favorably they were regarded by the dean's office as well as the central administration. And the Political Science Department, Ruth had come to realize, was not at the top of that hierarchy here at NDU.
What all departments always wanted from the dean and the central administration was new faculty positions. What had been brought home to her through her interaction with other chairs and the college dean, Dominic DiSola, was that new faculty positions did not necessarily go to departments with the largest enrollments, like political science. They tended to go instead to the departments that brought in the most grant money, such as psychology, economics, and those in the natural sciences. Indeed, the fact that these departments were bringing in ever larger grants was a testament to President Michaelson's policy of seeding them with the bright young professors who were now bringing them in; the older faculty--teachers, not researchers--had not done much of this.
Ruth remembered how Trond had constantly exhorted the political science faculty to aggressively seek research grants. Doing this, it had appeared to Ruth before becoming acting chair, was extremely difficult for a professor with a heavy teaching and service load who barely had time to work on her own individual, unsupported research. It was, she realized now, a vicious circle: the department would not be able to raise its status at the university without establishing a record of regularly winning major research grants, but it was unlikely to win such grants unless it could somehow raise its status and acquire the necessary resources from the dean and central administration that would allow it to acquire the additional bright young professors who were most likely to win these grants.
This, Ruth thought, was yet another reason why she was annoyed with Rob Barnes. Winning himself an individual fellowship to go up to Harvard last year had allowed the department to redeploy most of his salary (Trond and Dean DiSola, she had learned to her amazement, had allowed him to keep part of it), but did not bring in any funds, including the all important overhead which major research grants came with, to the department or the university. Rob was someone who could--was in fact, she remembered, hired with the expectation that he would--bring in research grants. His winning an individual fellowship which benefited him personally but not the department or university was just one more sign of his unwillingness to be a team player.
"The fear was expressed," Trond continued, "that a strong vote from our department for a marginal candidate would be reversed by the college P&T committee. Instead of helping Ann, we would only be worsening our own reputation.
This was a consideration. Since becoming acting chair, Ruth had learned that while political science was not considered to be one of the best departments in the college, it was not considered to be one of the worst either. The departments which tended to get little or no additional resources were low enrollment ones like philosophy, religion, sociology, and geography, or worse still, high enrollment but low research productivity ones like foreign languages and communications. These last two departments in particular had a reputation for awarding tenure to time servers--and for having their decisions reversed at the college level. Ruth realized that it was crucial that the Political Science Department not let itself fall into this category.
"I think Ann would have gotten fewer votes than she did," said Trond, "except that the public administrators in the department were afraid that if she didn't get tenure, the department would eventually lose her position to the new Public Policy Institute."
This, Ruth knew, was a possibility to be taken seriously. No department had a rock solid claim to a faculty position once it was vacated. The dean could reallocate it to another department. Far more likely in this case, though, was the prospect that the provost could take the position away from the College of Arts and Sciences altogether and give it to the new Public Policy Institute that was being formed.
"By the way," asked Trond, "have you been able to learn anything more about how the search for the institute directorship is going?"
Ruth shook her head. "Ever since the provost decided that the initial screening should be done by an outside headhunting firm instead of the search committee, there's been no news. I heard that even the members of the search committee are not being shown the list of applicants until the headhunters present them with a short list of ten."
This had never been done before at NDU. Up to now, search committees for high academic administrative positions (deans, their equivalent, and above) had been carried out solely by search committees. Although supposed to conduct their business in private, information about who all had applied for whatever position was being filled had always leaked out. Individual professors would then lobby committee members they knew either for or against particular candidates. News of what was happening would sometimes reach some of the candidates themselves, who would then actively--and usually unsuccessfully--lobby the committee too. Creating a short list of ten from a hundred or more candidates was difficult enough by itself, but doing so in such a public manner made it more so. By entrusting this task to an outside search firm, the provost ensured that the short list of candidates for the institute directorship would definitely be conducted in secret.
"I also heard," she continued, "that after the search committee narrows the short list down to the four or five who will be interviewed, the names of those coming to campus won't be released until the day before each one actually arrives." What this meant was not only would there be no opportunity for any of the faculty to lobby to include someone on the short list, but there would be no time for anyone not on the committee to bump a candidate off the short list before being interviewed either. Since this new institute was likely to impinge more on her department's turf than any other, Ruth regretted more than ever that the Political Science Department had not managed to get one of its faculty members onto the search committee for this position.
"Rob's strengths and weaknesses were assessed rather differently," said Trond. "Those for him emphasized his stellar research record. His teaching evaluations also show that he is popular with the students--as do Ann's, I should note. On the negative side, there was some complaint about his going up early and not having all that strong a service record, but these weren't considered serious problems by the majority."
Ruth understood that Trond was one of Rob's supporters, as were virtually all the men in the department. Many of them, of course, had published little but served the department and the university much before getting tenure in their sixth year. Ruth thought it strange that they--unlike the women in the department with similar records--did not seem to resent Rob for going up early without having performed much service. But since there were only three women in the department besides herself who had tenure (undoubtedly the source of the two no votes and the abstention that he received), Ruth knew that what the department's tenured females as a group thought about Rob mattered little in this process. But what she as chair thought about him, she knew, would matter much in it.
"As you might imagine," Trond continued, "those most opposed to Rob focused on this statement about him that was printed in the student newspaper--`Prof. Barnes touched me inappropriately.' And on this, Ruth, the faculty divided strictly on male-female lines. The men argued--quite heatedly--that such a statement written in a lavatory stall was meaningless. Just because such a statement was written there doesn't make it true. Indeed, statements written in lavatory stalls, by their very nature, must be considered suspect. The three women in the meeting, by contrast, argued just as heatedly that no woman would write such a thing if it was not true--or, at least, if she did not believe it was true. They thought that since Rob was going up early anyway, he should withdraw his application for promotion and tenure until this matter could be investigated and cleared up. That, of course, was a ridiculous suggestion."
"Was it?" asked Ruth.
"Of course it was," said Trond, obviously irritated. "Look, I've spoken to Rob at length about this matter. He told me that nobody has notified him about any sort of complaint being filed against him. He said he's had absolutely no problem with any of his students and that he has no idea who would have written anything like this about him in a lavatory stall or anywhere else."
"But wouldn't he say that even if--especially if--he did touch some girl `inappropriately?'" Ruth inquired.
"Rob says he cannot think of any incident that could have remotely inspired any student to write such a statement about him. He thinks the whole think is some sort of malicious prank perpetrated by someone who wants to derail his tenure application."
"That seems a little farfetched," commented Ruth. "I doubt if any of the students even know he's going up for tenure." She realized that just as Trond had revealed his support for Rob, Ruth was revealing her lack of it for him. "I suppose I could try to find out whether a complaint has been filed against him. The trouble, though, is that it could have been done at any of a dozen different offices--the NDU police, the dean's office, the Sexual Assault Services Office, the Minority Student Affairs Office, or several other places."
Trond looked increasingly annoyed. "Even if a complaint has been filed," he said, "that information is confidential. If a negative finding is made in the case of a faculty member, it is referred to the provost who is responsible for deciding upon any disciplinary action."
"Oh, so the chair is not automatically notified if a complaint against someone in her department has been filed?" she asked.
"No," said Trond. "The only way you would know is if the faculty member informed you--or if the complaint was made to you in the first place."
Ruth was relieved that nobody had filed a complaint about anyone in the department with her--yet. It would obviously be a nuisance to have to deal with.
"Some of these offices are so byzantine," Trond continued, "that they might not even inform the person accused that a complaint about him or her has been filed for months--if at all."
"So a complaint could have been filed against Rob without my knowing it," observed Ruth. "You know what bothers me most about Rob's case? It would be one thing if a sexual assault charge had been filed against him and I didn't know about it--or even if I did but it was kept confidential. Because of this damned `unwanted' poster, though, the whole thing is so public. If we recommend him for tenure, we'll be sending a message that we're not concerned about whether he gropes the girls here. It really would be better if he withdrew his application and submitted it again next year after everything has either been cleared up or forgotten."
"He's not going to do that, Ruth."
"Well, then, it will be his own fault if he's turned down as a result."
Trond sat back in his chair. "I can tell you this," he said. "The memo from the tenured faculty in the department that I am writing will make no reference to any anonymous, unsubstantiated charge made against Rob either in a woman's lavatory or the student newspaper. The memo from the faculty will be based on the material in his dossier alone. If you, in your memo, should choose to cite such a charge as a reason to turn Rob down for tenure, you will be leaving yourself open to a lawsuit from Rob later if he is denied tenure."
Ruth wondered: Was this a threat?
"And if and when the time comes at the end of the academic year for the dean to decide whether or not an acting chair should be confirmed for a full four year term," he continued, "I sincerely doubt that he would look favorably on her if she were facing a lawsuit filed against her by someone with an absolutely stellar dossier but whom she recommended not receive tenure on the basis of an anonymous, unsubstantiated complaint."
Yes, Ruth realized, this was definitely a threat. "Thank you for your report about the meeting, Trond," she said in an icy voice. "I will expect to receive your two memos after the meeting next week. That will be all for now." Looking surprised, he immediately got up and left.
The problem with Trond, Ruth decided, was that he didn't seem to understand that he was no longer chair of this department.
After this meeting, a professor designated during it would draft a memo stating what the vote on the candidate had been and summarizing the discussion held. A second meeting would then be held a week later to review the draft and propose any modifications. This second meeting, though, was usually less well attended as the draft memo was available several days ahead of time for the faculty to review and informally suggest changes to its author--something most professors preferred to do privately rather than in front of others. After being revised by its author (without any further recourse to the rest of the department), this memo would be placed in the candidate's dossier, which already contained both the material he or she submitted as well as letters received from external reviewers. Unlike these outside letters which the candidate wasn't supposed to see, he or she would receive a copy of the memo written at this and all subsequent stages of the review process--the next step in which would be the memo from the department chair. The chair would also receive copies of the memos about the candidate generated at later stages.
As Ruth knew, the memo from the chair would have the greatest impact if the vote of the faculty was divided. In other words, if the faculty unanimously supported a candidate for promotion and tenure, a chair who recommended against this would be seen as out of touch with his or her department at later stages in the process. Similarly, if the faculty voted heavily against a candidate, a chair's positive recommendation would probably not do much good. It was when the tenured faculty was divided on a candidate that the chair's recommendation--whether positive or negative--was most likely to carry crucial weight later on.
As Ruth anticipated, it was Trond Knutsen who came into her office and closed the door behind him. He looked exhausted; it was clear that the meeting had been difficult.
"Our colleagues decided to punish me for my past sins as chair by appointing me to write memos for both Barnes and Sweezy," he said, trying to sound jovial.
"I'm not surprised," said Ruth. "After all, you had a lot of practice at this when you were chair. So what happened? What was the vote?"
"The vote was the same for both of them," Trond informed her. "Thirteen for, two against, and one abstention."
"That's not good," Ruth observed. As she well knew, one vote against a candidate for tenure was usually not harmful. Two votes against, though, was considered evidence of the faculty being divided. And since an abstaining vote (as opposed to an absence from the meeting) was given the same weight as a no vote, this meant that both actually had received three negative votes--evidence that the faculty was seriously divided. "So tell me what was said."
"These two dossiers brought out all the divisions within the department--young vs. old, male vs. female, research vs. service, and political science vs. public administration."
Ruth shuddered. It was this last division that concerned her the most.
Trond continued: "Let me start with Ann. Those for her pointed to her record of service to the department. They argued that she had put in her dues, and that she was owed tenure. And while it wasn't said explicitly, it was clear that those who favored her most strongly were the female members of the department."
This didn't surprise Ruth. She knew from her own experience that being female and carrying a heavy service load usually went together.
"But those against her argued quite strongly that her research record was woefully insufficient, and that awarding her tenure would be an embarrassment to the department. At a time when other units in the university are raising their standards, our voting to give her tenure would signal that this department is not doing so."
Before becoming acting chair, Ruth had--like most professors--focused on her own department and was barely cognizant of what went on in others. Since attending the monthly meeting of College of Arts and Sciences department chairs, she had begun to perceive that there was a hierarchy among departments in terms of how favorably they were regarded by the dean's office as well as the central administration. And the Political Science Department, Ruth had come to realize, was not at the top of that hierarchy here at NDU.
What all departments always wanted from the dean and the central administration was new faculty positions. What had been brought home to her through her interaction with other chairs and the college dean, Dominic DiSola, was that new faculty positions did not necessarily go to departments with the largest enrollments, like political science. They tended to go instead to the departments that brought in the most grant money, such as psychology, economics, and those in the natural sciences. Indeed, the fact that these departments were bringing in ever larger grants was a testament to President Michaelson's policy of seeding them with the bright young professors who were now bringing them in; the older faculty--teachers, not researchers--had not done much of this.
Ruth remembered how Trond had constantly exhorted the political science faculty to aggressively seek research grants. Doing this, it had appeared to Ruth before becoming acting chair, was extremely difficult for a professor with a heavy teaching and service load who barely had time to work on her own individual, unsupported research. It was, she realized now, a vicious circle: the department would not be able to raise its status at the university without establishing a record of regularly winning major research grants, but it was unlikely to win such grants unless it could somehow raise its status and acquire the necessary resources from the dean and central administration that would allow it to acquire the additional bright young professors who were most likely to win these grants.
This, Ruth thought, was yet another reason why she was annoyed with Rob Barnes. Winning himself an individual fellowship to go up to Harvard last year had allowed the department to redeploy most of his salary (Trond and Dean DiSola, she had learned to her amazement, had allowed him to keep part of it), but did not bring in any funds, including the all important overhead which major research grants came with, to the department or the university. Rob was someone who could--was in fact, she remembered, hired with the expectation that he would--bring in research grants. His winning an individual fellowship which benefited him personally but not the department or university was just one more sign of his unwillingness to be a team player.
"The fear was expressed," Trond continued, "that a strong vote from our department for a marginal candidate would be reversed by the college P&T committee. Instead of helping Ann, we would only be worsening our own reputation.
This was a consideration. Since becoming acting chair, Ruth had learned that while political science was not considered to be one of the best departments in the college, it was not considered to be one of the worst either. The departments which tended to get little or no additional resources were low enrollment ones like philosophy, religion, sociology, and geography, or worse still, high enrollment but low research productivity ones like foreign languages and communications. These last two departments in particular had a reputation for awarding tenure to time servers--and for having their decisions reversed at the college level. Ruth realized that it was crucial that the Political Science Department not let itself fall into this category.
"I think Ann would have gotten fewer votes than she did," said Trond, "except that the public administrators in the department were afraid that if she didn't get tenure, the department would eventually lose her position to the new Public Policy Institute."
This, Ruth knew, was a possibility to be taken seriously. No department had a rock solid claim to a faculty position once it was vacated. The dean could reallocate it to another department. Far more likely in this case, though, was the prospect that the provost could take the position away from the College of Arts and Sciences altogether and give it to the new Public Policy Institute that was being formed.
"By the way," asked Trond, "have you been able to learn anything more about how the search for the institute directorship is going?"
Ruth shook her head. "Ever since the provost decided that the initial screening should be done by an outside headhunting firm instead of the search committee, there's been no news. I heard that even the members of the search committee are not being shown the list of applicants until the headhunters present them with a short list of ten."
This had never been done before at NDU. Up to now, search committees for high academic administrative positions (deans, their equivalent, and above) had been carried out solely by search committees. Although supposed to conduct their business in private, information about who all had applied for whatever position was being filled had always leaked out. Individual professors would then lobby committee members they knew either for or against particular candidates. News of what was happening would sometimes reach some of the candidates themselves, who would then actively--and usually unsuccessfully--lobby the committee too. Creating a short list of ten from a hundred or more candidates was difficult enough by itself, but doing so in such a public manner made it more so. By entrusting this task to an outside search firm, the provost ensured that the short list of candidates for the institute directorship would definitely be conducted in secret.
"I also heard," she continued, "that after the search committee narrows the short list down to the four or five who will be interviewed, the names of those coming to campus won't be released until the day before each one actually arrives." What this meant was not only would there be no opportunity for any of the faculty to lobby to include someone on the short list, but there would be no time for anyone not on the committee to bump a candidate off the short list before being interviewed either. Since this new institute was likely to impinge more on her department's turf than any other, Ruth regretted more than ever that the Political Science Department had not managed to get one of its faculty members onto the search committee for this position.
"Rob's strengths and weaknesses were assessed rather differently," said Trond. "Those for him emphasized his stellar research record. His teaching evaluations also show that he is popular with the students--as do Ann's, I should note. On the negative side, there was some complaint about his going up early and not having all that strong a service record, but these weren't considered serious problems by the majority."
Ruth understood that Trond was one of Rob's supporters, as were virtually all the men in the department. Many of them, of course, had published little but served the department and the university much before getting tenure in their sixth year. Ruth thought it strange that they--unlike the women in the department with similar records--did not seem to resent Rob for going up early without having performed much service. But since there were only three women in the department besides herself who had tenure (undoubtedly the source of the two no votes and the abstention that he received), Ruth knew that what the department's tenured females as a group thought about Rob mattered little in this process. But what she as chair thought about him, she knew, would matter much in it.
"As you might imagine," Trond continued, "those most opposed to Rob focused on this statement about him that was printed in the student newspaper--`Prof. Barnes touched me inappropriately.' And on this, Ruth, the faculty divided strictly on male-female lines. The men argued--quite heatedly--that such a statement written in a lavatory stall was meaningless. Just because such a statement was written there doesn't make it true. Indeed, statements written in lavatory stalls, by their very nature, must be considered suspect. The three women in the meeting, by contrast, argued just as heatedly that no woman would write such a thing if it was not true--or, at least, if she did not believe it was true. They thought that since Rob was going up early anyway, he should withdraw his application for promotion and tenure until this matter could be investigated and cleared up. That, of course, was a ridiculous suggestion."
"Was it?" asked Ruth.
"Of course it was," said Trond, obviously irritated. "Look, I've spoken to Rob at length about this matter. He told me that nobody has notified him about any sort of complaint being filed against him. He said he's had absolutely no problem with any of his students and that he has no idea who would have written anything like this about him in a lavatory stall or anywhere else."
"But wouldn't he say that even if--especially if--he did touch some girl `inappropriately?'" Ruth inquired.
"Rob says he cannot think of any incident that could have remotely inspired any student to write such a statement about him. He thinks the whole think is some sort of malicious prank perpetrated by someone who wants to derail his tenure application."
"That seems a little farfetched," commented Ruth. "I doubt if any of the students even know he's going up for tenure." She realized that just as Trond had revealed his support for Rob, Ruth was revealing her lack of it for him. "I suppose I could try to find out whether a complaint has been filed against him. The trouble, though, is that it could have been done at any of a dozen different offices--the NDU police, the dean's office, the Sexual Assault Services Office, the Minority Student Affairs Office, or several other places."
Trond looked increasingly annoyed. "Even if a complaint has been filed," he said, "that information is confidential. If a negative finding is made in the case of a faculty member, it is referred to the provost who is responsible for deciding upon any disciplinary action."
"Oh, so the chair is not automatically notified if a complaint against someone in her department has been filed?" she asked.
"No," said Trond. "The only way you would know is if the faculty member informed you--or if the complaint was made to you in the first place."
Ruth was relieved that nobody had filed a complaint about anyone in the department with her--yet. It would obviously be a nuisance to have to deal with.
"Some of these offices are so byzantine," Trond continued, "that they might not even inform the person accused that a complaint about him or her has been filed for months--if at all."
"So a complaint could have been filed against Rob without my knowing it," observed Ruth. "You know what bothers me most about Rob's case? It would be one thing if a sexual assault charge had been filed against him and I didn't know about it--or even if I did but it was kept confidential. Because of this damned `unwanted' poster, though, the whole thing is so public. If we recommend him for tenure, we'll be sending a message that we're not concerned about whether he gropes the girls here. It really would be better if he withdrew his application and submitted it again next year after everything has either been cleared up or forgotten."
"He's not going to do that, Ruth."
"Well, then, it will be his own fault if he's turned down as a result."
Trond sat back in his chair. "I can tell you this," he said. "The memo from the tenured faculty in the department that I am writing will make no reference to any anonymous, unsubstantiated charge made against Rob either in a woman's lavatory or the student newspaper. The memo from the faculty will be based on the material in his dossier alone. If you, in your memo, should choose to cite such a charge as a reason to turn Rob down for tenure, you will be leaving yourself open to a lawsuit from Rob later if he is denied tenure."
Ruth wondered: Was this a threat?
"And if and when the time comes at the end of the academic year for the dean to decide whether or not an acting chair should be confirmed for a full four year term," he continued, "I sincerely doubt that he would look favorably on her if she were facing a lawsuit filed against her by someone with an absolutely stellar dossier but whom she recommended not receive tenure on the basis of an anonymous, unsubstantiated complaint."
Yes, Ruth realized, this was definitely a threat. "Thank you for your report about the meeting, Trond," she said in an icy voice. "I will expect to receive your two memos after the meeting next week. That will be all for now." Looking surprised, he immediately got up and left.
The problem with Trond, Ruth decided, was that he didn't seem to understand that he was no longer chair of this department.
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