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[bbuckaroo]

I find this article to be...  well ... worthy of a tabloid but not something the Chronicle should be spending time on.

How does a story of a man in trouble with the law for fondling a 17 year old serve the needs and goals of higher education. 

Lets spend our energy reporting on issues that actually effect higher ed.

[gsawpenny]

Doesn't this belong in the brain size/penis bone discussion?

[spectacle]

Link?

[qrypt]

I find this article to be...  well ... worthy of a tabloid but not something the Chronicle should be spending time on.

How does a story of a man in trouble with the law for fondling a 17 year old serve the needs and goals of higher education. 

Lets spend our energy reporting on issues that actually effect higher ed.

Your concerns don't seem to be keeping you from expending energy on it.

[bander40]

I find this article to be...  well ... worthy of a tabloid but not something the Chronicle should be spending time on.

How does a story of a man in trouble with the law for fondling a 17 year old serve the needs and goals of higher education. 

Lets spend our energy reporting on issues that actually effect higher ed.

I don't know. Considering the professor in question is well known in the field of women's studies (of all things), the article would seem to have some relevance.

[voxprincipalis]

How does a story of a man in trouble with the law for fondling a 17 year old serve the needs and goals of higher education. 

Is this an essay question? Do I have to cite my sources? Do you have an extra blue book I can use? And a pencil?

VP

[fiona]

Ha ha. There's always been a genre of "this lurid stuff is unworthy of us," with the subtext, "Let's read more, more."

So where's the link already?

The Fiona

[busyslinky]

http://chronicle.com/article/Scholar-Who-Left-a-Tenured/128969/

Will probably be the most read article this year.

[fiona]

All right, now I've read it.

I'm unclear as to why his giving up a tenured job for love got special news coverage. Ahem, women do it all the time.

The Fiona

[ann05]

I find the whole thing troublesome. Apparently he originally merited an article because left his job for a female partner, so he is a rare and exotic bird worthy of discussing. Sigh. At the current moment I have three new female colleagues whose male spouses moved to be with them. None of them are holding press conferences.

Then they follow it up with an article about how he is accused of molesting his stepdaughter. What's the takeaway supposed to be here? Men who say they are feminists are lying? Academics will also excuse away a man's actions by debating the age of consent and/or assuming it was a mutual action even though there is no evidence for that? Lurid or not lurid, what are we supposed to be getting from these articles? 

[oldfullprof]

Yep, I'm debating the age of consent.

[ann05]

I didn't realize there was an age at which women consent to have people touch them where they don't want to be touched.

[oldfullprof]

I find the current agitation about sexual behavior a little too much of an ongoing moral panic.  You're right, no one should be touched when they don't want it.  But I really don't know why these things turn into national issues.

[fiona]

She has interesting tattoos. I don't know how to get the rest of the article.

Looks like she (the mom) is quite a bit younger than the male prof. So her daughter may have been young enough to be his granddaughter?

http://chronicle.com/article/For-Love-a-Scholar-of/66071/

The Fiona

[qrypt]

I didn't realize there was an age at which women consent to have people touch them where they don't want to be touched.

Very true -- but in fact he is in trouble not because she didn't consent but rather because her consent is deemed legally impossible.  I suspect that from her point of view her lack of consent ought to be what matters and she will be distressed to learn that it isn't.