‘The Obama administration has stepped up its enforcement of sexual harassment rules since 2010, starting with investigations that led to voluntary resolution agreements with Armstrong’s institution and Eastern Michigan University, escalating with high-profile inquiries at Yale University and the University of Notre Dame and a 2012 letter with regulatory guidance, and peaking this spring with a settlement with the University of Montana. The Montana case drew significant attention because, in a letter trumpeting the expansive and unusually aggressive agreement, the Justice Department characterized the settlement there as a “blueprint” for other colleges.’
I’m reminded of Sandra Fluke, and the rights-based victims, the Left-of-Center activist types, able to find common ground with this administration and its extension of civil rights logic as far as it will go:
The FIRE.org had a response. Full post here:
‘Among the forms of expression now punishable on America’s campuses by order of the federal government are:
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Any expression related to sexual topics that offends any person. This leaves a wide range of expressive activity—a campus performance of “The Vagina Monologues,” a presentation on safe sex practices, a debate about sexual morality, a discussion of gay marriage, or a classroom lecture on Vladimir Nabokov’s Lolita—subject to discipline.
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Any sexually themed joke overheard by any person who finds that joke offensive for any reason.
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Any request for dates or any flirtation that is not welcomed by the recipient of such a request or flirtation.’
This can make bad, overbroad law, and create incentives to use our Federal Government as an enforcer of activism, awash in patronage, constantly expanding, and pursuing the rather narrower ideological aims of those seeking more power.
Related On This Site: Greg Lukianoff At FIRE.Org: ‘Emily Bazelon And The Danger Of Bringing “Anti-Bullying” Laws To Campus’
From Volokh: ‘Conservatives, Libertarians, and Civil Rights History’…Libertarianism In The Mainstream?: Rand Paul In The Spotlight…Thomas Sowell archives here.
What about black people held in bondage by the laws..the liberation theology of Rev Wright…the progressive vision and the folks over at the Nation gathered piously around John Brown’s body?: Milton Friedman Via Youtube: ‘Responsibility To The Poor’……Robert George And Cornel West At Bloggingheads: “The Scandal Of The Cross”…