Why Is Obama Ruining College Sexiness With All These Dumb Sexual Harassment Rules?

You may have been under the impression that conservatives are mostly worried about too much sexxytime, anywhere -- at least for other people -- but it turns out that at least a few conservative stalwarts don't worry as much about sinful fornicatin' so much. Instead, some fear that Barack Obama is secretly just a big old fun-hating 1970s-style Dworkin-MacKinnon feminist who wants to "de-eroticize" campus life and criminalize even the most innocuous expression of sexual thinking as "sexual harassment." And he probably won't allow ladies to shave their armpits, or tilt their heads charmingly when they laugh, either. He's already forced everyone to buy health insurance -- can mandatory Birkenstocks be far behind?

See, what happened, as Kumar Ramanathan details at Think Progress, is that after a series of outrageous sexual assaults, the University of Montana instituted some new sexual harassment policies, as part of the resolution of investigations by the Justice Department and the Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights. And now, before the new rules have gone into effect, lovers of liberty are Very Upset because obviously these draconian measures will ban fellas from asking girls out on dates, because feminists hate fun and freedom.

The agita stems from language in the agreement that recognizes that, in some instances, speech can be harassing, and therefore a violation of federal Title IX prohibitions on gender discrimination. Well if MERE WORDS can be harassment, then arglebargle-PC speech codes-first amendment-BENGHAZI! Ken Masugi, in the not at all weirdly-titled piece called "The De-Eroticized University," is totally worried that we are about to embark upon a dark time, or maybe we 're already soaking in it:

The acts that keep Diversity Offices at full employment can range from telling a dirty joke to reading Anna Karenina. Similar directives go back into previous administrations, so, once again, the battle is not about a personality (even a powerful one such as Obama) but about the Administrative State.

Since American universities are obviously going to become exactly like Iran, only patrolled by PC Enforcers instead of Morals Police, Masugi recommends we all learn from Reading Lolita in Tehran (a really good book, even if he likes it) about what the future holds, because soon any campus mention of sex or romance will be forbidden, and students will all have to hide away to read Jane Austen. That is really not going to go over well at the kegger.

As Ramanathan notes, while some critics worry that free speech is over, man, OVER, anti-rape advocates are calling the U of Montana agreement maybe a timid start at taking sexual harassment seriously. The Education Department has clarified that, no, this is not a prohibition on holding hands or reading Jane Austen, get real you maroons. Nevertheless, groups like the "Foundation for Individual Rights in Education" (FIRE -- You know, like the Torch of LIBERTY) continue to insist that a modest attempt to make colleges a bit less harassy for women constitutes "a breathtakingly broad definition of sexual harassment that makes virtually every student in the United States a harasser."

First they threw the sexual harassers under a train, and really, the campus was a much friendlier place after that.

Also, enjoy this audio from a really bad training video (there are NO GOOD TRAINING VIDEOS on this topic), plus poneez ( dialogue NSFW, which is weird, considering that it is from a workplace training video )

[ ThinkProgress / Atlantic / Jezebel / Library Of Law And Liberty ]