AND ANOTHER THING
Sexual harassment in a cold Oxford climate
PAUL JOIINSON
In one university in Ohio, where Political Correctness reigns, male students, in their sexual transactions with females, must observe a question-and-answer code to avoid the fatal charge of 'harassment'. Posi- tive verbal assent must be given to each for- ward move. 'May I undo the top button of Your blouse?"Yes'. 'May I undo the second button?' Well . . . yes', etc. The code, reported in the British press, has aroused sneers at Yankee naivety, lack of propor- tion and humourlessness. But those who laugh are obviously unaware of what is going on here.
At Oxford, for instance, there are now 267 'harassment advisers'. There are 93 university departments — ye gods! — and each has two. There is a central panel of seven. Sexual harassment advisers are com- pulsory, for instance, even for the Universi- tY Parks, the University Archives, the Transport Studies Unit and — perhaps with some justice here — the dreaded The- ology Faculty. To be a SHA is not a sinecure. You must fill out a form, every year, listing the cases you have dealt with. If there are too few delations, or worse none at all, it is assumed that the girls — sorry, Wo-men — are too scared of you to report, so you are a bad, i.e. unenthusiastic, SHA. If, on the other hand, there are a lot, then the case is made out for more SHAs and the system expands. To be a SHA is a constant temptation to become an inquisitor, spy and informer, indeed a blackmailer. The system ignores all the Rules of Evidence and the tenets of natural justice. In a typical case, a female student returns to college after the vacation — perhaps nine months after the event reports it for the first time and demands, with noisy student backing, that the accused person be excluded from the col- lege at once. For male tutors the matter is no joke since, even if they are entirely inno- cent, they may find themselves involved in heavy legal expenses and with no chance of wholly clearing their name. `Harassment' is so widely and vaguely defined by the code as to make any would- be Torquemada rub his — or more likely, her — hands in lip-smacking anticipation. It is 'unwarranted behaviour towards another person, so as to disrupt the work or reduce the quality of life of that person'. Such behaviour includes not merely `bully- ing' or 'verbal abuse' but 'otherwise creat- ing or maintaining a hostile or offensive studying, working or social environment' for the victim by 'physical contact or verbal behaviour of a sexual nature, or other hos- tile or offensive acts or expressions relating to people's sex, sexual orientation, religion or race'. 'Abuse of authority', e.g. by a tutor, is 'an aggravating feature of harass- ment'. It seems to me almost any variety of traditional undergraduate or donnish behaviour can be included under one or other of these heads.
It's odd to think that, exactly 100 years ago, women at Oxford were struggling to escape from over-protection. Oxford and Oxford Life (London 1892) includes a chapter on `Women's Education at Oxford' by Miss KM. Gent of Lady Margaret Hall.
She was anxious to show that the girls had a good time. They were not forced to go to chapel, though 'a sceptical tone about religion' would be 'considered the height of bad breeding'. Anyone coming to a women's college expecting to 'find long rows of pale, heavy-eyed girls bending over books on a lovely summer afternoon' would be 'breathless with surprise' to discover 'the greater number playing "Prisoner's Base" The grand old Duchess of York She had ten thousand men, She marched them up to the top of the hill And she marched them down again. on the lawn, with energy and enthusiasm'. Though hockey was regarded as 'too rough', the gymnasium was 'the scene of great festivity', and there were plenty of girls 'not altogether superior to a game of hide-and-seek all over the house, with the blinds pulled down'.
Sounds like Arcadia, doesn't it? No won- der, Miss Gent continues, 'the "masculine" or fast girl has been so rare that it would be almost personal to allude to her at all'. Of course, 'intercourse with male members of the university is not extensive'. But 'as long as she is with a chaperone approved by the Principal', a woman student 'is allowed the ordinary liberty in this respect'. If 'she knows men at Oxford' she can even go to their rooms, 'subject to the above condi- tions'. On the other hand, she can only have 'lady friends' to tea in her room, 'for even brothers are not admitted' but must be 'entertained in state in the drawing- room'.
Chaperoned girls may 'occasionally go to evening parties, dances always excepted as they are prohibited'. Most girls, concludes Miss Gent, feel that 'such a delightful peri- od of comparative liberty will never come to them again', and she quotes one departing student: 'I shall never be so happy — the pleasantest part of my life is over.'
I'm a bit sceptical about the last, even from girls with a passion for hide-and-seek. But it's not difficult to see that young and inexperienced women would be happier observing a set of conventions reflecting age-old tradition rather than a fierce new code imposed by gender-conscious fanatics. From my own experience, I suspect that most girls who go to Oxford, having swot- ted like mad to get there, are rather look- ing forward to a bit of sexual harassment. For, after all, what is harassment but a modern term of disapproval, coined by the sex-war puritans, for the ordinary give-and- take of love-making? How can a man get anywhere with a woman without harassing her?
And how can a woman know she likes it until she's harassed? I'm not surprised that the sex-codifiers recently censured a visit- ing professor at Harvard for quoting with approval Byron's line, 'Who, saying she would ne'er consent, consented'. But then, what woman in her senses, then or now, would have missed being harassed by Byron?
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