FemSex at Marquette

Now happening at Marquette, according to a flyer posted around the campus two weeks ago:

The Female Sexuality Workshop (FemSex) is a 12 week co-facilitated, student-led workshop that aims to create a mindful, safe, respectful, and open environment for participants to validate their experiences, challenge their ideas, and learn with and from others. Evolving from long-running courses at UC Berkeley and Brown University, FemSex seeks to bring values of empowerment, diversity, and collective learning to Marquette University and the Milwaukee community.

Mission: To provide a safe space for exploration, encourage honest dialogue, facilitate collective learning, engage and grapple with the social forces that inform individual experiences, and build allyship. The workshop is free and open to the community.

Workshop topics: health, gender, identity, body image, sexuality, desire, power and privilege, spirituality, pleasure, communication, consent, relationship, empowerment, and more!

Workshop Activities: large and small group discussions, speakers, readings, in-class activities, and take-home exercises

When: Monday evenings, 6 p.m.-9 p.m. the first session is Monday, February 4th. The last session is Monday, April 29th.

Who: We welcome people of all genders, sexualities and sexual orientation, ethnicities, religious affiliations, political inclination, and abilities. All participants must complete an application and sign a participant contract.

Interested in Learning More? Attend an Information Session.

Dates: Tuesday, January 22nd or Thursday, January 24th

Time: 8 pm. – 9 p.m.

Location: The Gender and Sexuality Resource Center, AMU 425

Come to learn more about the workshop, complete the application, review the workshop syllabus, and ask questions. All are welcome!

If you have any questions, please contact Rachel Bruns at Rachel.bruns@marquette.edu or Claire Van Fossen at clairevanfossen@gmail.com .

*FemSex is sponsored by the Marquette Gender and Sexuality Resource Center*

So just what is FemSex? Since it started at Berkeley, an article in the Berkeley student newspaper may be a good place to begin.

According to facilitator Amelia von Gerer, two queer women started FemSex in the spring of 1993, after taking a class called Feminism and Pornography. Inspired, they spent the semester learning to orgasm and later sought to teach a Decal course on the matter, initially titled “The Orgasm Class.”

The pair ended up broadening the curriculum to include additional topics in female sexuality, and the DeCal has continued to evolve since then. Today, FemSex is a space for free discussion of power and privilege related to gender, women’s health and sexual practices, among other things.

FemSex students (fondly called “FemSexies”) are instructed to be open-minded, non-judgmental and respectful when discussing the controversial issues put forth by facilitators. Discussions range from views on pornography and sex work to gender-based violence and having healthy relationships.

Of course, if women have trouble having organisms, it would seem that a licensed sex therapist would be the person to see, and hard to see how the undergraduates who typically lead these discussions would be much help.

At Berkeley, the students leading the class all seem to major in Sociology, Psychology, Ethnic Studies, Gender and Women’s Studies, with minors in related fields. In other words, they know all about how to talk about how women are victims, but actually know little about sex.

So it’s not surprising that the description goes on to add an explicitly political dimension:

The pair ended up broadening the curriculum to include additional topics in female sexuality, and the DeCal has continued to evolve since then. Today, FemSex is a space for free discussion of power and privilege related to gender, women’s health and sexual practices, among other things.

How you help women have better sex by telling them that men are evil exploiters isn’t clear, at least if we are talking about women who aren’t lesbians.

A more complete account of what the typical course involves can be found on a syllabus used at Carleton University, and on a syllabus from the FemSex website a Berkeley.

Some of the entries seem innocuous enough, for example “Communication in Relationships” (Carleton) and “Women’s Health and Menstruation” (Harvard). But most involve hot-button moral and even political issues. For example:

Carleton:

• Porn and Erotica
• Reproductive Choices (including abortion)
• Exploration of sexual practices and lifestyle
• Orientation of sexuality and gender
• Power and Privilege

Berkeley:

• Pornography, Erotica, and Sex Work
• Self-Love, Pleasure, and Orgasm
• Sexual Practices and Orientation
• Contraception and Sexually Transmitted Infections
• Power & Privilege
• Womyn’s [sic] Empowerment & Final Projects

A syllabus for Femsex at the University of Nevada-Reno is quite similar.

At Cornell an even wider variety of subjects is discussed:

Topics include: anatomy and physiology, cultural influences on sexuality, body image, STIs and safer sex, reproductive choices, solo sex, partner sex and relationships, gender identity, orgasms and inhibitors to orgasms, pornography, kink sex practices, BDSM, and more ...

If the syllabi of these course suggest some rather provocative topics, the actual activities are far more provocative. The student newspaper at Berkeley gives some examples:

In 2002, Female Sexuality-as well as the male version of the course-faced scrutiny by administrators after a Daily Californian article cited illicit sexual behavior in class. The incident sparked new guidelines for faculty oversight of student-run courses, but both DE-Cals have endured.

“Some people have a negative impression, but it’s not like that at all,” said senior Christie Santos, who took the course last semester. “The total goal is empowerment.”

For one project, students were asked to pen their own erotic story. Facilitators have also aired pornography clips in class to counter negative preconceptions about the industry’s treatment of women, Raymond said.

“Before the class, I would be really hesitant to use porn,” Santos said. “I think as women, we have a lot of hang-ups about porn and self-pleasuring ... I think it’s really interesting, because it’s exciting, it’s arousing-there is a lot of porn out there that isn’t degrading.”

Speakers in the DE-Cal have included sexologist Carol Queen-co-founder of the Center for Sex and Culture-as well as midwives, porn performers and members of the transsexual community.

The course has also held optional field trips to bondage clubs to allow students to explore alternative sexualities, Santos said.

The version of the course at Harvard was hardly less outrageous. As described by a woman blogger who was not at all sympathetic to the project:

Some of the topics being discussed don’t seem that outrageous to me and instead are worthy of discussion: portrayals of women in popular media, body image, women’s health, motherhood, and communication and relationships. But another glance at the syllabus and my jaw dropped. Assignments include coloring an anatomical diagram from the C*** Coloring Book, doing an erogenous exploration exercise, and let’s not forget the creative writing exercise—writing your sexual fantasy (don’t worry, it’s anonymous).

Each of the speakers will bring something valuable to the table: a midwife, someone from the BDSM community, a professional dominatrix named Princess Kali, a speaker on open relationships, the two leaders of Harvard’s Office of Sexual Assault and Prevention Response (an organization whose existence I’ve lamented in other posts) and sexologist Carol Queen. If that’s not enough fun, there is a writing workshop on pornography and erotica, a guided tour of Good Vibrations of Boston (a women-owned sex shop), and other field trips involving a porn night and a strip club visit.

Of course, one could quite plausibly argue that all these things are worth discussing. And indeed, they are. But the strong emphasis is that any discussion must be “nonjudgmental.” Indeed, an email sent out to advertise the event at Harvard said participation required the “suspension of judgment.”

In the first place, one can’t imagine a workshop that takes a nonjudgmental attitude toward things the organizers really believe to be evil. One can’t imagine a workshop on rape, or drug abuse, or racism that would be taught in a “nonjudgmental” way.

But far worse is the fact that FemSex is not nonjudgmental at all. It is littered with strong moral judgments. For example, Carleton students “discuss ways in which we learn about sex in sexist and heteronormative terms. Personal stories as well as media portrayals will be welcome.”

What about prostitution? What about pornography? The Berkeley syllabus promises to discuss “. . . the taboos that surround pornography and sex work.” Taboos, of course, are a bad thing.

Abortion? What would one expect when a speaker is from Planned Parenthood? Of course, no version of FemSex that we can find ever invited a speaker from a pro-life group.

Promiscuity? A look at the Berkeley website shows featured readings titled “Slut! Growing up Female with a Bad Reputation,” and “He’s a Stud, She’s a Slut and 49 Other Double Standards Every Woman Should Know.” Of course, from a Catholic, or indeed any Christian perspective, a double standard is a bad thing. But the proper response is not to encourage women to be promiscuous.

It’s odd that feminists think you can stick it to the patriarchy by making it easier for guys to get laid!

Indeed, when guys respond to female promiscuity in the predictable way, the feminists get huffy about it. An article in the Columbia Spectator gripes:

May we remind you that the joke “Columbia girls to wed, Barnard girls to bed” is still not funny? Barnard women have been immortalized as sluts and sex objects that aren’t worth a guy’s attention for a serious relationship, and the tradition is passed on every year to the next generation of students.

Moralism on Steroids

FemSex, in sum, is not nonjudgmental. It’s intensely moralistic. But the morality is a secular morality that says “if it feels good do it,” and “any sex act one wishes to engage in is OK.” Harsh moral judgment is reserved for anybody who says differently.

A woman blogger at Harvard saw this quite clearly. Contemplating enrolling, she observed:

I thought, perhaps naively, that I would be able to participate. That I could go in each time, listen to other women’s stories without judging, and then give my own perspective. That abstinence until marriage is the best way to avoid STD’s and is in fact a pretty liberating thing (I won’t have to compare myself to my husband’s previous partners, I don’t have to listen to society telling me what to do, I don’t have to deal with the emotional baggage of premarital sex). That sex work and pornography objectify women. That women wouldn’t need to be empowered if they stopped calling themselves victims and instead worked alongside men.

I’m not sure what their reactions to my opinions would be. I’m not sure if my views would be tolerated. I wonder if I’d inadvertently violate the contract I’d have to sign, which requires that I contribute to making the space safe and comfortable. But I do know that as long as we’re watching a film entitled “When Abortion Was Illegal,” being told how great polyamory is, and discussing self-love and masturbation, it can never be a safe, comfortable space for me.

And of course, a questionnaire that women wanting to lead sessions at Carleton have to submit makes clear the rigid political correctness of the enterprise. The women are required to explain:

What can you do to make sure issues of privilege are addressed in class? Have you had experience working with diverse communities or dealing with issues of diversity/privilege?

Femsex at Marquette

The program at Marquette is similar to those elsewhere. This is, after all, “monkey see, monkey do,” and administrators and activists on college campuses ape each other. And of course, those folks at Marquette ape what is done on secular campuses (or on “Catholic” campuses which, like Marquette, are not really Catholic).

Here is the syllabus for the Marquette program.

It has a few concessions to the supposed Catholic nature of Marquette. For example, among the “models of sexual behavior” to be discussed alongside “fantasy, kink, fetish, and more” are “asexuality” and “abstinence.” And it promises “both negative and positive views of masturbation.” And they have stuck in a discussion of “Sexuality and Spirituality.”

But then, projects at the end of the syllabus include:

• Cunt Coloring: Color an anatomical picture from The Cunt Coloring Book.
• Affirmation Assignment: Affirm someone in a manner of your choosing.
• Birth/Adoption Assignment: Talk to your parent(s)/guardian(s) about the experience of your birth, adoption, or how they came to have you.
• Erotica: Create an anonymous piece of erotica exploring fantasy and desire.
• Pleasure Point: Find a new pleasure point or pleasurable activity, and write about (or express in another medium) the experience

Then finally, probably the most interesting:

• Empowerment Object: Bring in something that you find empowering to share with the group.

The last one is particularly interesting. Do they want a sex toy, perhaps? We’re guessing that no woman in the group will bring a pistol for which she has a concealed carry permit!

Quite obviously, a program that endorses implicitly (and often explicitly) abortion, sadomasochism, prostitution, homosexuality, masturbation and promiscuity is way beyond questionable at a Catholic university — and even at a university that pretends to be Catholic.

But even from a secular liberal standpoint, the program is questionable. As a woman writing in the Harvard Crimson put it:

Oddly, the focus of FemSex is purely sexual liberation. Despite the numerous other issues confronting the modern woman, the class focuses eight out of 10 sessions on sexual and/or anatomical exploration. The syllabus seems to suggest that sexual liberation is a woman’s only path to empowerment—funny, I thought that was law school. Where are the seminars focused on women in corporate America, or women in the military? By diversifying its syllabus, FemSex might lose its shock value, but it would be able to address a broader range of concerns and appeal to more students.

Even worse, in its attempt to force its members into an archetype of what liberation should be, FemSex’s approach overpowers the individual instead of empowering her. Empowerment is about making your own choices, not about adhering to the FemSex agenda. I wonder how a class member who made the liberated choice to abstain from sex would be received in this group.

According to its information e-mail; “this class requires dedication, openness, willingness to communicate, suspension of judgment, and BRAVERY.” Bravery? It is difficult to understand what bravery has to do with attending field trips to porn shops or listening to a dominatrix give a lecture, both of which are potential offerings of a FemSex curriculum. Bravery would be having these conversations and trips out of your own curiosity, not as some sort of misguided attempt at finding a pre-determined “liberated” identity.

At the information session earlier this month, one FemSex alum recounted her favorite assignment from last term: taking a speculum and a light and getting intimate with her own private parts. Nothing could serve as a better example of FemSex’s misguided philosophy: while its participants are searching their own insides, they’re missing what’s going on outside. We live in a world with those other people — you remember them, the men — and until we can stop judging our liberation as women (sexual or otherwise) by how separate we are from men, we will never be truly empowered.

The image of college women one gets from FemSex is that of whining neurotics. Really, which would be better for the cause of women’s equality: studying to make a good grade on a Physics exam, or attending a feminist hen party to obsess on sex? FemSex, in reality, is the ultimate way of treating women as sex objects.

Marquette Pulls Support of Bawdy FemSex Workshop

Kudos to former Marquette College Republican president Ethan Hollenberger for demanding some response from Marquette about the FemSex workshop that we blogged about right here. On February 17, he wrote several people in the Administration (including Father Pilarz) and asked them to respond to the following questions:

During the opening of the Gender and Sexuality center, you said the center will “create a community rounded in personality and will delve into issues of gender and sexuality with respect, sensitivity, academic rigor, and a concern for social justice.” As a supporter of the center, do you support the FemSex workshop as written?

If you were advising a Catholic student who was saving herself for marriage, would you recommend this workshop?

Can you defend the discussions on safer sex, masturbation, sexual desire, or the use of the “cunt coloring book”?

Reading the syllabus of the workshop, the premise of the workshop is understanding the body. Giving into sexual desires and lust are both expressly regarded as sin. Do you defend FemSex as consistant with Jesuit and Catholic teachings?

What do you see as the purpose of this course? Why is it written with vivid sexual overtones?

Marquette is often criticized for not providing contraception (as it shouldn’t) in student health services, largely because abstinence is key to the Catholic feelings on pre-marital sex. Do you see Marquette moving away from that policy?

Why isn’t the Center teaching Catholic traditions on sex and marriage in a seminar?

The University’s mission reads, “Marquette University is a Catholic, Jesuit university dedicated to serving God by serving our students and contributing to the advancement of knowledge. Our mission, therefore, is the search for truth, the discovery and sharing of knowledge, the fostering of personal and professional excellence, the promotion of a life of faith, and the development of leadership expressed in service to others. All this we pursue for the greater glory of God and the common benefit of the human community.” Where does this workshop fit into that?

Lastly, what is your response to a donor who may stop giving to the University because of this course?

Having gotten no response, he wrote again three days later, noting “I am still seeking comment from the President’s office regarding the Gender and Sexuality Center’s FemSex workshop.” He further observed that “Historically and culturally, Marquette is a Catholic university. Seemingly, by hosting this workshop Marquette is caving to current cultural pressures.”

Finally, later that afternoon (yesterday afternoon) Provost John Pauly responded:

Dear Mr. Hollenberger

In response to your inquiry to the President’s office, I wanted to provide some additional information.

We recently became aware of the student-led Female Sexuality program. After reviewing its content, we found that aspects of the program did not fulfill the expectations set out in the charter of the Gender and Sexuality Resource Center. Because of this, the center is no longer sponsoring the program. To be clear, this was not an academic course and was not led by faculty. It was student programming that took place outside of the classroom.

We support the Gender and Sexuality Resource Center and the goals set forth in the center’s charter, and have done so since its inception. The center plays an important role within the university, allowing us to delve into issues of gender and sexuality with respect, sensitivity, academic rigor and concern for social justice. It also provides educational programming related to sexual violence, harassment and discrimination, better equipping our students to be able to respond society’s complex cultural issues.

Sincerely,

John Pauly

Provost

Marquette University

Translation: the workshop had created a firestorm of criticism after local conservative talk radio publicized it in the wake of our blog post. One could say we are thankful that Marquette finally “saw the light.” But that would misrepresent what happened. In this issue, as was the case with the aggressive lesbian Arts and Sciences Dean candidate that Marquette was about to hire, but then declined to hire under pressure from local Catholics, Marquette caved in. A genuinely Catholic university would not need to cave in to pressure on an issue like this, because they would not approve something like this to begin with.

The Gender and Sexuality Resource Center was set up precisely as a sop to gay student and faculty activists and their liberal allies. It was entirely predictable that it would do something like this. In fact, many of their other activities have had a similar politically correct focus, including a discussion of a feminist screed that demonizes males and Christians, and publicizing the appearance of lesbian comedienne Julie Goldman at UWM.

If the University really minded stuff like this, they would never institutionalize the worldview that produces it. But the trouble is that they don’t really mind it.

The workshop, Pauly made clear, can continue to meet as a purely unofficial group of students. And of course, if any group of female students wants to get together for a bawdy hen party and talk about sex, that’s their right. But the University should never endorse or officially condone a program whose express purpose is to oppose Catholic teachings on sexuality.

But given the nature of the Marquette administration, look for such programs to happen again with regularity.

Politically Correct Marquette Faculty Rally Behind FemSex

From the Marquette Tribune, an open letter from faculty who support the FemSex workshop, from which Marquette recently pulled support.

The letter engages in the standard blather about how great the workshop was. It further makes a few absurd claims, such as:

By affirming the worth and importance of female desire and fostering people’s understanding and appreciation of their bodies and sexuality, the curriculum also cultivates a campus climate in which the sexual assaults that brought Marquette under public scrutiny two years ago can become less likely.

How this would supposedly happen is a mystery. How writing pornographic stories, or coloring pictures of female genitalia (both part of FemSex at Marquette) might prevent rape is something only a feminist could imagine.

But what is interesting is the list of faculty who signed the letter:

Eugenia Afinoguenova, Lauren Applegate, Tara Baillargeon, Danielle Beverly, Amy Blair, Omega Burckhardt, Gerry Canavan, Roberta Coles, Ed de St. Aubin, Eric Dunnum, Ellen Eckman, Jenn Fishman, Leah Flack, Kristen Foster, Stephen Franzoi, Melissa Ganz, Barbara Glore, Beth Godbee, John Grych, Angelique Harris, Steven Hartman-Keiser, Heather Hathaway, Heather Hlavka, Jim Holstein, CJ Hribal, Andrew Kahrl, Astrida Kaugars, Laurieann Klockow, Lezlie Knox, Christine Krueger, Robert Lowe, Timothy McMahon, Jodi Melamed, Dawne Moon, Sameena Mulla, Kristy Nielson, Rebecca Nowacek, Debra Oswald, Tony Peressini, Anthony Porcelli, Sareene Proodian, Krista Ratcliffe, Heidi Schweizer, Mary Anne Siderits, Angela Sorby, James South, Peter Staudenmaier, Meghan Stroshine, Theresa Tobin, Robert Topp, Sarah Wadsworth, Elizabeth Wawrzyniak, Amelia Zurcher

This is pretty much a Who’s Who of the politically correct secular caucus on campus, full of the names of the people who wanted to hire aggressively lesbian dean candidate Jodi O’Brien. Among the signers is a psychology professor who demeaned the Bible as “sexist” by ripping a passage out of context.

Then there is a philosophy professor whose class was approvingly described by a student acolyte:

I just finished up an entire class on how patriarchy controls every structure in our society and how women are systematically prevented from being equal to men (Capitalism and Catholicism are among the most guilty parties).

Then there is James South who, as chair of the Philosophy Department tore down from the door of a graduate student a quote from humorist Dave Barry of which he disapproved!

This, in other words, is part of the “we don’t really like Catholicism, and want to undermine it when we can” lobby at Marquette.

Marquette Honors Program Will Not Sponsor FemSex

We have it from Andy Brodzeller, of the Office of Marketing and Communication: the Honors Program will not be sponsoring the FemSex Program this semester. This reverses an earlier decision of Honors to do exactly that.

Brodzeller explained that “the context from last semester” was “shared with the Honors Program,” by the Office of the Provost, and the Honors Program “decided” not to sponsor FemSex.

Was the “Honors Program” — meaning Director Amelia Zurcher — hiding in a cave last semester, such that the program didn’t know the context?

Or were they flatly ordered by the new Acting Provost, Margaret Faut Callahan, not to sponsor the program.

Last semester, the program was to be sponsored by the Gender and Sexuality Resource Center. After an uproar in the local media, and numerous complaints, the Administration canceled the sponsorship by that Center.

Brodzeller said that the women who wanted to mount the program had been in discussions about other ways of getting it on campus, for example, via Student Affairs. Presumably this would mean that a recognized student organization might sponsor it.

[Update]

Andy Brodzeller sends the following response to this post:

I did notice you have a blog post up already, and want to clarify it was academic leadership in the college that met and shared the context from last spring with the Honors Program. – Andy

[Update]

Chris Miller, Vice President for Student Affairs says:

We have received no inquires with regard to this program.

This, of course, does not mean that it won’t happen.

[Update]

The University released the following statement about the decision:

As a Catholic, Jesuit university, Marquette supports the educational and intellectual exploration of issues regarding gender and sexuality. Early this week, a student-led Female Sexuality workshop was promoted on campus with sponsorship from an academic program. Following a discussion with the program about academic sponsorship, including the requirement of faculty presence, the program chose not to continue sponsoring the Female Sexuality workshop.

While it was evident that changes to the workshop outline were made since spring, additional changes were needed to align with Catholic teaching. We understand that our students engage in discussions on gender and sexuality, but when they happen as part of a university-sponsored event, we must address these topics in the context of our Catholic faith. We continue to be confident that we will find mutually respectful ways to engage in these important discussions in a way that is consistent with our mission and identity.

That is quite a good statement, so far as it goes.

The problem is that this program got as far as it did, first getting sponsorship from the Gender and Sexuality Resource Center, and then (when that was pulled) from the Honors Program.

So when subject to extreme provocation, and when an attack on the Catholic nature of the University creates enough of an uproar, the Administration will come down on the side of Catholic teaching.

But it remains disturbing that several parts of the University (Honors and the Gender and Sexuality Resource Center are far from the only ones) are flatly opposed to Catholic teaching on sexuality, and will undermine that teaching when they can get away with it.

Virulent Response From FemSex Crowd

We broke the story right here: the FemSex workshop, a very politically correct exercise, founded at Berkeley, brought to Marquette by the Gender and Sexuality Resource Center.

The uproar caused Marquette to cancel the official University sponsorship of the program (although the students remain perfectly free to meet and talk, but without the official university imprimatur).

Some of the reaction has been pretty virulent.

Another virulent reaction has come from one of the organizers of the workshop, Claire Van Fossen. She wrote and sent to the Journal-Sentinel an op-ed piece that called for us to be punished for having the effrontery to speak up. In it, she said:

As a Marquette student, I demand punitive action on McAdams and am prepared to convene any and all students who have been hurt or slandered by him in order to ensure that he is held accountable.

Interestingly, she said students have been “hurt” by our blog posts. What kind of “empowered” women start whining about being “hurt” when somebody disagrees with them, and criticizes them? Get out the smelling salts.

She further claimed we should be forbidden to use the name “Marquette” in the title of our blog “unless Marquette is willing to stand behind his messages as reflecting the official views and opinions of the university.” This is a somewhat bizarre claim, since Marquette University has no trademark on the word “Marquette.” At least dozens (if not hundreds) of business firms use the word, which after all denotes a famous explorer, a town in Michigan, a building in the Chicago Loop, and much else.

Interestingly, she believes in the right of feminists to talk about sex with the official imprimatur, but rejects our right to talk about their talking about sex as a purely independent voice.

She goes on:

McAdams and his blog . . . are regular sources of oppressive, hateful content and blatant misogyny, not to mention homophobia, racism, and slander of Marquette students.

This deranged rant is an splendid example of the mind of the politically correct.

They don’t see legitimate differences of opinion. When faced with opinions with which they disagree, they see only oppression, hate speech, misogyny, racism and slander.

The worst part of this is that the students do not come up with this stuff on their own. They get it from faculty.

Writer of Bizarre Anti-Police Tirade Was Mover of Femsex at Marquette

It created quite a stir:  a column in the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel where one Claire Van Fossen demanded the abolition of police!

Titled “A just and free world means a world without police,” the lede paragraph sets the tone:

Whether we call them because of a dispute between neighbors or a robbery, a shooting or sexual violence, the police rarely meet our needs. They don’t help us heal. And they don’t prevent future harm. Rather than serve as advocates for true justice, they use their nearly limitless power to reinforce the oppressive status quo. They threaten us with violence and incarceration and target the most oppressed and vulnerable people in our society. By blaming “crime” and “criminals” instead of systemic oppression for society’s ills, the police exacerbate societal problems, harm citizens, and bar the people from liberation by maintaining the capitalist social order.

And further:

What’s perhaps worse is the fact that, because the police do not keep us safe, their predominant role in society is maintaining a social order that enables people in power to operate with the least amount of disruption possible and thus continue to exploit and oppress the already disenfranchised. By targeting low-income individuals and people of color, the police maintain a racial and economic system of social stratification that is profitable and beneficial only for the ruling class.

Yes, it’s a left-wing tirade.

Van Fossen, however, is not a stranger to Marquette. She was one of the organizers of the Femsex Workshop at Marquette in 2013. We exposed the event here, and Marquette eventually decided it was so over the top in terms of the way it dealt with female sexuality that the university ordered the Gender and Sexuality Resource Center to cease its sponsorship.

Van Fossen responded with a deranged rant. She sent the Journal-Sentinel (which covered the story) an op-ed saying:

As a Marquette student, I demand punitive action on McAdams and am prepared to convene any and all students who have been hurt or slandered by him in order to ensure that he is held accountable.

And further:

McAdams and his blog . . . are regular sources of oppressive, hateful content and blatant misogyny, not to mention homophobia, racism, and slander of Marquette students.

All this is the standard politically correct denunciation of any politically incorrect ideas, showing the nasty authoritarianism of campus leftists.

But demanding the abolition of the police is extreme even by the standards of campus leftists.

[Note:]  As of right now, the Van Fossen column is online.  There is a report that the Journal-Sentinel has decided to withdraw it and take it offline.  If so, an archived copy can be found here.

More from Leftist Marquette Faculty on Cop Killer Mural: Whine, Moan, Bitch

Very few people have been willing to defend the mural, in Marquette’s Gender and Sexuality Resource Center, honoring convicted cop killer and fugitive from justice in Castro’s Cuba Assata Shakur. But predictably, a few dozen leftist Marquette faculty have done so.

There were two petitions urging Marquette not to fire Susannah Bartlow, the Director of the Center who approved the mural.

Then there was a petition, signed by “about 60” faculty and staff protesting the removal of the mural.

Then there was a meeting of aggrieved Arts and Sciences faculty (and some who were merely interested) with Dean Rick Holz, where objections to the removal of the mural were aired.

And now we have yet another statement, with further objections to the removal of the mural. It is as bad as all the others, but it offers further insight into the mentality of the hard core politically correct faculty at Marquette.

Just to deal with a few excerpts:

This most recent incident is another in a pattern (see the firing of Jodi O’Brien and the FemSex controversy) of non-consultative decision-making that has caused the university public notoriety and significantly deteriorated both student and faculty morale.

And what is the evidence that student and faculty morale has deteriorated? Apparently just that the leftist faculty (and a few of their student sycophants) are unhappy. Only a few dozen of several hundred Marquette faculty and staff have signed these petitions. And the only body with any claim to represent students (Marquette University Student Government) has supported the university’s decision to remove the mural.

But apparently for these leftist professors, they are “the faculty” and their student acolytes are “the students.”

Student Opinion

First and foremost, the decision not to engage the leadership and members of the sponsoring sorority, Alpha Kappa Alpha, sends the very clear message to students that their opinions and concerns are irrelevant to the administration.

Just how should the women of Alpha Kappa Alpha have been engaged?

They should have been confronted and asked “what were you thinking?” But that’s not what these leftist faculty have in mind.

And the message that “students” in Student Government apparently got was that Marquette had acted responsibly. Since student government tends to be dominated by more liberal and politically activist students, the message from the entire student body would have been an even more emphatic “what kind of idiots thought this was a good idea?”

Expertise?

Second, we find it deeply troubling that in a university—a societal institution explicitly designated to exchanging ideas and advancing knowledge—no efforts were made to consult faculty or staff with expertise in the area in order to understand the context and content of the mural itself from intellectual, cultural and historical perspectives. Instead, the reactionary rhetoric of a single faculty member who is currently suspended by the University took precedence over the knowledge of faculty in Africana Studies, Women’s and Gender Studies, History, Sociology, Criminology and Psychology, to cite only a few relevant academic disciplines, who possess years of training and valuable insights into the complexities surrounding race and gender studies generally, and the case of Assata Shakur specifically.

Translation: we leftist faculty were pretty much ignored.

And they should have been ignored.

Here is the dirty secret of academia: disciplines and subdisciplines are not merely repositories of expertise. They are little cottage industries where people tend to think alike. Sometimes there is genuine expertise: astrophysicists can tell you a lot about the universe. But often they are dominated by narrow ideological biases, the result of both self-selection (only feminists go into Women’s and Gender studies) and group think. And if you think independently, you’ll have trouble getting tenure.

So this statement is asserting that Marquette should have gone to the most narrow and biased centers of politically correct thinking to ask for advice about the mural. Given that this statement comes from those places, this is not a surprise.

Instead, the reactionary rhetoric of a single faculty member who is currently suspended by the University took precedence. . .

These, of course, are the same leftist faculty that have been demanding that Marquette fire us, and it must gall them terribly that they have not succeeded in shutting us up. Nasty authoritarians often have been successful in cowing and bullying into silence people whose views they dislike, but it didn’t work this time.

academic freedom; or the cold climate surrounding race, gender and sexuality in which we must work and live at Marquette.

Irony alert!

People who wanted us fired are talking about academic freedom? When they use the term, they apparently think it only applies to ideas of which they approve.

As for “cold climate:” what has actually happened is when they push too hard on their anti-Catholic, secular agenda, they get pushback. Since they are absolutely convinced in the righteousness of their cause, they consider this unfair. But anybody who thinks Marquette should try to be at least a little bit Catholic will have doubts about an aggressively lesbian dean candidate (Jodi O’Brien) and a Femsex seminar where women color pictures of female genitalia, produce a piece of pornography, and participate in a “non-judgmental” discussion of abortion and prostitution.

Catholic Identity a Sham?

Apparently, these secular faculty leftists have gotten the idea that a “Catholic identity” at Marquette is just a sham marketing ploy. One can easily see why they might think that, given that it’s mostly true. But then when Marquette is forced into a corner and has to reject something radically at odds with any notion of a “Catholic identity,” they whine and moan.

We expect to contribute our expertise in this process and challenge you to invite that of Marquette’s most important constituency, the students themselves, as you chart a new, inclusive and collaborative path for the University.

Of course, these leftist faculty have no “expertise” that would allow them to say that honoring a cop killer is acceptable. They have only leftist ideology.

Including all faculty would be a dandy idea. Including all students would be too. As noted, they are doubtless less likely to condone a cop killer mural than is MUSG. And alumni should be included, something the faculty leftists don’t like, having already lamented “that the university satisfies the Catholic, conservative base of alumni and donors.” But these folks are real stakeholders, the value of whose degrees are dependent on the reputation of Marquette, and whose contributions heavily support Marquette.

A genuinely inclusive and collaborative process would find these few dozen leftist faculty outnumbered and marginalized. Which is why they don’t want any such process. They simply want Marquette to cater to them.

Fundraising Support for Susannah Bartlow

For those who have not been following this blog, Susannah Bartlow is the former director of the Gender and Sexuality Resource Center at Marquette, who was summarily fired when it was found that she had approved a large mural on the wall of the Center honoring cop killer and terrorist Assata Shakur.

A fund raising effort on her behalf can be found here:

http://www.gofundme.com/susannahbartlow

The appeal starts with some silly statements:

On Monday, May 18th, Dr. Susannah Bartlow was fired as Director of the Gender and Sexuality Resource Center at Marquette University. She was fired suddenly and swiftly, without input from the GSRC Advisory Committee, after pouring her heart and soul into bringing excellent programming to Marquette over the last three years. She was fired seemingly for doing her job: providing a safe space for students to express themselves and engage in thoughtful dialogue (more information below).

No, the purpose of the Center was to promote a gay lifestyle, and push leftist political causes, as its Facebook page shows.

But then, we get some new and rather disturbing information:

When she was fired, Susannah was not offered any severance. She was paid only through her last day of work on May 18th, and was not expecting, at that moment in her professional life, to face the job market. Additionally, when she was terminated on May 18th, Susannah had already missed the 2015-2016 hiring cycle for positions in higher education. She continues to contribute to her community by accepting a temporary position at Pathfinders in Milwaukee, which pays a modest hourly income, but it is going to be hard to make ends meet and cover some of the basics, including health insurance. Her friends, colleagues and well-wishers ask that you consider donating to a fund to support Susannah as she transitions into a new (permanent) professional role. We want to give her the time to find the right placement for herself. Please consider donating; even a small amount helps. Funds will be used to cover her living expenses, health insurance, and any legal fees associated with an unemployment claim. Susannah has also pledged to donate any funds above our goal to Pathfinders and plans to blog about what’s going on in her life, especially related to job searches, work at Pathfinders, and writing projects on a weekly Wednesday blog called Work in Progress.

So how do we feel about this?

We are actually hoping that the campaign raises the target amount ($3,800) for Bartlow. Yes, she is a leftist extremist (as her blog posts about Shakur show) and should never have been hired as a director of any program at Marquette.

But we have seen no evidence that she ever concealed or misrepresented her political views when interviewing for the position. And indeed, Marquette seems to have approved (if only through inattention) of her leftist activism in the position (with Femsex being a large exception).

That being the case, Marquette owed her a reasonable severance package. We won’t contribute, although only because we would accused of some nefarious purpose if we did so. But we think certain Marquette administrators should step up and see that this campaign reaches the goal.

Dan Maguire Comments

Among those who commented and gave a relatively generous gift ($200) was Dan Maguire, who said:

Another example of heavy-handed non-collegial authoritarianism in the Lovell administration. Another example of the lack of appropriate faculty participation in university governance as recommended by the AAUP and other academic agencies.

Maguire is making a principled argument here, although it’s one to which we have never been sympathetic. It has always sounded to us a bit like wanting the inmates to run the asylum. This has been especially true given that the “faculty” who want to participate in “governance” have been a highly self-selected bunch of activists.

But then, what about the case where the people supposed to be running the asylum are corrupt?

Marquette has not had a president whom we could respect since John Raynor, who served from 1965 until 1990.

In this case, however, we don’t think Marquette had any choice but to take the mural down, and to fire Bartlow. Had the issue of the mural been opened up for “discussion” with some faculty defending it, and others (probably many fewer, since conservative professors keep their heads down) opposing it, the public relations fallout would have been monumental. Unlike in academia, in American society as a whole murdering cops is not only viewed as evil, it’s not even viewed as something that can be defended.

Campus Mural of Cop Killer: Marquette Responds

It has been a massive public relations fiasco, and Marquette had to engage in damage control.

The University just supplied the following statement to Fox News. This, presumably, is what they will tell all media outlets:

Marquette University statement:

Our university’s senior leadership just became aware of a mural that was created and displayed in a remote area of campus. This is extremely disappointing as the mural does not reflect the Guiding Values of Marquette University. It is being removed immediately. We are reviewing the circumstances surrounding the mural and will take appropriate action.

Since they could hardly defend the mural, this statement is not surprising.

It’s possible they just heard of the mural, since they can hardly keep track of everything that occurs on campus. In fact, the bureaucrats who run the University spend most of their time holed up in Zilber Hall, talking to each other, and don’t get out much.

But they should not have hired the sort of leadership for the Gender and Sexuality Resource Center that would allow this to happen.

Further, the office is on the 4^th floor of the union. That’s not some “remote area.” The Union is smack in the center of the campus. It’s true there is not a huge amount of foot traffic up to the 4th floor.

What Marquette has done is to install bureaucracies to cater to the demands of politically correct victim groups — or more properly people claiming to represent politically correct victim groups. In those places — the “diversity” bureaucracies, Student Affairs, Campus Ministry and so on — a very narrow and insular worldview prevails. Those folks don’t seem to realize that glorifying a cop killer is a bad thing.

Gender and Sexuality Resource Center

But worse still, the higher administration doesn’t fully comprehend what they have put in place. Rather, the top administrators are proud of their “initiatives” about “diversity” and “inclusion” and “gender and sexuality.”  They have pandered to the politically correct, and now are embarrassed at what the politically correct have done.

The Gender and Sexuality Resource Center has already embarrassed Marquette once, with the Femsex Workshop, a program that runs roughshod over virtually every Catholic teaching about sex, in addition to having the participants do very silly things, like color pictures of female genitalia. Marquette had to cancel university sponsorship of the program.

It’s interesting that, when the Gender and Sexuality Resource Center was first established, Marquette officials were touting it as a major initiative with huge value to the institution.  Now they are saying it has been relegated to a “remote area of campus.”

Who Knew?

Literally dozens of people had to know about the mural. There were, first, all the staffers at the Gender and Sexuality Resource Center. Then there were the members of Alpha Kappa Alpha, who sponsored the project. Then there was everybody who visited the Center since the mural was installed in March. Finally, there was everybody who visited the Facebook page of the Center since March 24. And none of these people found the whole enterprise sufficiently objectionable to raise some hell.

This incident is thus a window on the culture of political correctness at Marquette.

Marquette Backing Away From Inflammatory Anti-Israel Program

We blogged about this a month ago: a rather virulent program on the Marquette campus that labelled Israel an “apartheid state.”

It was not particularly surprising that Marquette’s Palestinian student association would sponsor such a program — although it certainly doesn’t speak well for the students that they would want to use such inflammatory rhetoric.

More surprising was the announcement that two offices at Marquette — Intercultural Engagement in the Office of Student Development and the Office of International Education — were cosponsoring the program.

Is it now Marquette’s position that Israel is an “apartheid state?”

It seems, however, that the university has now backed off its support for this program.

We queried Vice President for Student Affairs Chris Miller about this, and he responded “Student Development is not sponsoring the event. It is purely student sponsored.”

Terence Miller, of the Office of International Education, was not immediately available for comment. But it appears that they too have withdrawn their sponsorship.

The issue here is “what were they thinking?”  What kind of bureaucratic culture prevails among mid-level bureaucrats at Marquette such that declaring Israel an “apartheid state” seems like a good idea?

We have seen this before, most recently with the Femsex seminar, which was approved by the Gender and Sexuality Resource Center. When the true nature of the program was revealed here, Marquette’s top administrators withdrew support.

But the fact that things like this can happen at all is terribly revealing.

Gender and Sexuality Resource Center: Politically Correct to the Max

The following comes via e-mail from the College of Arts and Sciences:

The Department of Social and Cultural Sciences Colloquia Series concludes this year with the following presentation. We hope to see you all there.

Friendship, Fiction and the Dream of Disloyalty:

White Women Telling Tales of Racial Justice Collaboration

Dr. Susannah Bartlow, Director, Gender and Sexuality Resource Center, Marquette University

From Uncle Tom’s Cabin to The Help, white women have centralized their own participation in civil rights and racial justice work and characterized their roles as benevolent, transgressive, or transformative. But the narratives and experiences of women of color (particularly African American women) belie this fantasy. What stories are white women telling themselves as they create and consume this work? Reading The Help through a critical race and queer feminist lens, this paper outlines the parameters of a project on interracial collaborations in pursuit of racial justice.

Friday, 26 April 2013, 3 PM LL 272

Gosh, of course the way to interpret any text is through a critical race and queer feminist lens. And of course, any notions that any whites have about helping blacks achieve equality must be bogus. We all know that whites are evil . . . even those who thought they were helping black people.

This, of course, is from the Director of the Gender and Sexuality Resource Center — that is, the Gay, Lesbian and Any Kind of Sex That Catholic Teaching Considers Illicit Resource Center.

Yes, the same Center that sponsored the FemSex seminar, until Marquette came to its senses and cancelled the sponsorship.

The mentality that pervades the Center is typified in a course the Director, Susannah Bartlow, taught at Dickenson College before she came to Marquette. Titled “Justice,
 Ecology, 
and 
Gender,” it is described in the syllabus as follows:

Ecofeminism analyzes how the same paradigms and historical inequalities devalue and oppress both ‘women’ and ‘nature,’ leading to the oppression and denigration of both. This course is meant to open theoretical, historical, and scientific avenues into your ability to analyze and understand the ways that, in Western society, women are treated as inferior to men, ‘nature’ is treated as inferior to ‘culture’, and humans/men are understood as being separate from, and often superior to, the natural environment/women.

Through a lens which acknowledges the connections between sexism, racism, class exploitation, and environmental destruction, the class will explore and undermine many of the common conceptions which balance technology, culture, progress, innovation, and might, against the traditionally feminine circularity, connectivity, tradition, sustainability, and community innovation. As we learn to understand the misguided, anthropocentric, and engendered frameworks which have led to both personal injustice and global disasters from dangerous climate change to dangerous eye makeup, we can begin to see how solutions to environmental problems require a feminist perspective, and feminist theory and practice require an environmental perspective – in other words, how we can be warriors for the many environment(s) such as forests, waterways, communities, and our own bodies, that we care for, and do so in radically more ecological way than patriarchal norms ever have documented or allowed.

The actual content of the course is exactly what one would expect, given the description.

What topics are covered? All the ones you would expect in an uber-politically correct course. And some that seem a bit odd even to people familiar with politically correct academia:

• Toxicology in the body / nail salons / The beauty industry
• Ecofeminism and environmental justice / agrojustice issues [yes, agribusiness is evil]
• Women and Meat [Don’t you dare enjoy that hamburger!]
• Dismantling oppression: An analysis of the connection between women and animals
• Discourses of racial difference in ecofeminism [we can’t pass up an opportunity to invoke race]
• Native Peoples and the Environmental Crisis [we all know that Indians were huge environmentalists]
• Uses of the Erotic [got to work in sex here]
• Boygasms and Girlgasms [ditto]
• Why Agricultural Biotechnology Will Not Feed the World or Save the Environment [apparently feminism will]
• Toxic Tampons and Coming of Age
• Reproductive Justice [of course these folks are pro-abortion]
• Reconstructing the Hiroshima Maidens
• Climate Change & Gender Development
• Gender, Militarism, and the Environment [yes, every bad thing is connected to every other bad thing]
• Rherotic [sic], Rape, and Ecowarefare [sic] in the Persian Gulf [can’t we get another two or three bogie men in that title?]
• Sick of Man‐Made Chemicals [obviously, only the natural kind are any good]
• Ecofeminist Organizational Tools [what we really want you to do is get out and push our political agenda]

So what we have is a course that has shoehorned into it every obsession of the obsessively politically correct. The possibility of any substantive discussion is virtually zero. Any skepticism about global warming, or inconvenient facts about unsavory practices among “native peoples” or any arguments that technological advances have radically reduced hunger in the world are simply ruled out of bounds.

The requirements for the course are as vacuous as everything else about it. One is:

Reflect on your relationship to your body. How is your body both gendered and not gendered? How do you relate to your body? Is your body gendered? What are the other dualisms which dictate your fundamental associations to your body.

We’ve heard certain exercises described as “naval gazing” but never seen that concept so explicitly mandated in a college course.

Why in the world would Marquette hire a director of the Gender and Sexuality Resource Center who buys into all this? Particularly, why would they hire somebody who is pro-abortion?

The answer is simple. Marquette is radically over-bureaucratized, and university bureaucrats think like this.  Any that don’t think like this know it’s prudent to placate certain constituencies: gays and lesbians, feminists, humanities faculty, liberal media outside the university. Thus we have an institution with only a thin veneer of Catholicism. Underneath, the place is saturated with the secular ideologies that prevail in academia generally.

Marquette’s Gender and Sexuality Resource Center: Glorifying a Black Militant Cop Killer

Marquette’s Gender and Sexuality Resource Center was set up as a sop to the campus gay lobby in the wake of Marquette’s refusal to hire aggressively lesbian Arts & Sciences dean candidate Jodi O’Brien. Not surprisingly, it has consistently pursued a leftist secular agenda including, for example, the Femsex Seminar, which was so raunchy and so opposed to Marquette’s supposed “Catholic mission” that the Administration ordered that sponsorship be withdrawn.

But now we have yet another case of the extreme leftist agenda of the organization. An entry from its Facebook page:

(Click on image to enlarge)

Yes, it’s a mural, in the offices of the Center, celebrating one Assata Shakur.

(Here is a larger view of the image.)

So who is Assata Shakur? A black militant who was convicted of murder and fled to Cuba, where she is still protected by the Communist government. According to Wikipedia:

Assata Olugbala Shakur (born JoAnne Deborah Byron on July 16, 1947[1]), whose married name was Chesimard,[2][3] is an African-American activist and member of the former Black Panther Party (BPP) and Black Liberation Army (BLA). Between 1971 and 1973, Shakur was accused of several crimes and was the subject of a multistate manhunt.[4][5]

In May 1973, Shakur was involved in a shootout on the New Jersey Turnpike, in which she was accused of killing New Jersey State Trooper Werner Foerster and grievously assaulting Trooper James Harper.[6] BLA member Zayd Malik Shakur was also killed in the incident, and Shakur was wounded.[6] Between 1973 and 1977, Shakur was indicted in relation to six other incidents—charged with murder, attempted murder, armed robbery, bank robbery, and kidnapping—resulting in three acquittals and three dismissals. In 1977, she was convicted of the first-degree murder of Foerster and of seven other felonies related to the shootout.[7]

Shakur was incarcerated in several prisons in the 1970s. She escaped from prison in 1979 and fled to Cuba in 1984 after living as a fugitive for a few years, and received political asylum. She has been living in Cuba ever since. Since May 2, 2005, the FBI has classified her as a domestic terrorist and offered a $1 million reward for assistance in her capture. On May 2, 2013, the FBI added her to the Most Wanted Terrorist List; the first woman to be listed.[8] On the same day, the New Jersey Attorney General offered to match the FBI reward, increasing the total reward for her capture to $2 million.[9]

More information on her can be found here.

Yes, this is the sort of person the “sexuality” bureaucrats at Marquette feel deserves to be honored.

[Update]

With a hat tip to Charlie Syles (who Tweeted this), the wanted poster for Shakur.

Marquette’s Bizarre Training on “Harassment”

Like everybody else at Marquette, we have been required to take an online Title IX training session, addressing sexual violence and sexual (and other) harassment.

We’ll leave the sexual violence issue for another post, and for the moment outline what Marquette has to say about harassment.

On the face of it, the rules aren’t too bad. For unlawful harassment to occur, the following conditions must be met. The action must be:

•Related to a protected category.
•Unwelcome.
•Offensive to a reasonable person in the recipient’s position.
•Severe or pervasive.

That would seem to set the bar reasonably high for a finding of “harassment.”

Unfortunately, the content of the online training module makes hash of any and all the reasonable limitations the announced standards imply.

The Politically Incorrect Office

Consider, for example, a picture of an office, included in the module, in which one has to pick out all the potentially offensive or harassing objects. It’s loaded with them.

(You can click on the image to view a larger version.)

First, one that makes sense: an “adult” magazine is said to be out of bounds because it can contribute to a “hostile working environment.” Fair enough. But it goes downhill from there.

A sign saying “men working” is said to be unacceptable because a Kentucky human rights agency ruled it to be discriminatory, implying the exclusion of women. Might a feminist object to this: of course. Might a reasonable woman? No.

The Kentucky agency should knock off for a day and enjoy a little of the state’s excellent Bourbon.

Also out of bounds is a supposedly risqué photo. What does this outrageous, unacceptable picture show?

A couple at the beach in bathing suits. But the legend notes that “harassment complaints have been filed against workers who display photographs of their spouses in swimsuits.” Somehow, the folks who put this together think that attire that would be acceptable on any beach in the country, and indeed at the pool at Marquette’s Recreation Center, is offensive in an office.

Likewise, a computer screen saver showing a man bare from the waste up (but fully clothed from the waist down) may (it is claimed) create a hostile environment.

And while we are on scanty clothing, we are told that “some courts have required worksites to remove sculptures or painting that contain nudity.” Apparently, some other courts haven’t.

It adds, “what might be appropriate for a museum or an art class may not be acceptable for an office.”

Why not?

We can imagine something truly gross that some deranged professor might choose to display, but if a professor of Greek Culture has a model of “Venus de Milo” or a professor of Renaissance Art a model of Michelangelo’s “David,” no reasonable person would complain.

The sculpture pictured seems bland enough.

And how could a student making an occasional visit to a professor’s office and seeing his wife in a swimsuit or a classic piece of sculpture face “severe” or “pervasive” harassment?

Of course, if a conservative Christian student complained about the public display of nude art on a university campus, she would be derided as a narrow-minded prude. But a different standard apparently applies to feminists.

And it’s not the case that feminists are put off by naked genitals. When Marquette’s Gender and Sexuality Resource Center sponsored a program called Femsex, one of the exercises required participants to draw in the Cunt Coloring Book. Yes, that’s exactly what it sounds like.

Other Protected Groups

Of course, the groups who are “protected” (at least in theory) extend beyond women. A sign saying “Over the Hill” is said to “contribute to a hostile work environment on the basis of age.” We are pretty confident that only old guys would ever display such a sign. Can one harass oneself?

And a token nod (more like a head fake) is given to veterans. An anti-war poster is declared unfit because “extreme anti-war postings could contribute to an environment of harassment based on military or veteran status.”

While we like the idea that the doctrine of “harassment” equally covers both politically correct groups and politically incorrect groups, the poster in question is clearly in the area of protected free speech.

Further, on any college campus, military people have doubtless learned to “suck it up” and put up with leftists. So seeking redress is going to be absurdly rare. If they were the sort who whined about every hardship, they would have never joined the military.

Suppose it Isn’t Actually Unwelcome

People working through the module are quizzed: “Jokes welcomed by the recipient are never harassment. True or false?” The answer: “false.”

It is explained: “jokes related to protected categories can still be harassment, even if they don’t offend the recipient.” So you can be harassed without thinking you are being harassed.

Protection for Groups that Aren’t Protected

Finally, behavior that might be tacky, or even gross, is said to be harassing, in spite of not being addressed by Federal law nor directed at any protected category.

For example, we are told that ringtones that involve weapon sounds are “inappropriate.” But people who don’t like loud noises are not a “protected category.” Neither are liberal weenies who don’t like guns. Private employers may have rules about this, but the Federal government does not (yet).

Punishment for Politically Incorrect Speech

One little sequence in the course involves two women coworkers (Becky and Maria) who discuss their opposition to gay marriage. Another coworker (Hans) overhears them and is offended at their opinions. He reports them to Human Resources.

The conclusion of this little tableau is that Hans did not have to participate in the discussion to be offended by it, and the two female coworkers could be guilty of harassment.

Of course, political liberals are not a protected category, and all Hans was subjected to was hearing opinions that “offended” him. But like so many liberals, he believed that opinions he disliked should be shut up.

Thus Marquette University, in this “training,” has endorsed that view. Notwithstanding that the Catholic Church disapproves of gay marriage, merely endorsing Church teaching in a university setting can be harassment.

Would the two women have been able to complain if Hans had been spouting off about how he favored gay marriage?

Fat chance. Even if the rules claim to protect people in an evenhanded way, everyone knows they don’t.

How Far Do We Take This?

Thus employees of Marquette are clearly warned that expression can be harassment even if it’s:

•Unrelated to a protected category.
•Not Unwelcome.
•Offensive only to an unreasonable person in the recipient’s position.
•Not Severe or pervasive.
•Discussion of a political issue

Since just about anything that somebody might happen to dislike seems to be included under the rubric “harassment,” isn’t the logical endpoint that any objection from anybody is sufficient to shut up any speech or expression?

Thus one is not surprised to find, in the course, the following statement:

Liability Avoidance Tip
It is best not to discuss any of the protected categories at work

So you better not discuss the relations between the sexes (a protected category), anything about race relations (protected category), anything about the status of veterans, anything about getting old (age is a protected category), anything about religion (yet another one) and so on.

In short: stifle.

Conclusion

This, it seems, is the logical endpoint of the bureaucratic mentality. And the bureaucratic mentality dominates the administrative ranks of Marquette University. Like bureaucrats everywhere, they supinely accommodate the demands of special interest groups (feminists, gays and lesbians) and of overbearing government regulators (especially the Obama Justice and Education departments).

They will mouth silly things if they are being said elsewhere in academia. Whatever “initiatives” are fashionable elsewhere, they will mimic.

The current “training” module, for example, is a generic one from an operation called Workplace Answers, which specializes in providing cookie-cutter programs (each one just like the previous one) to places like Marquette. Complete with tacky stock photos.

Bureaucrats don’t much care for free expression, since that creates problems (although they will protect it if failing to creates bigger problems).

What is the Practical Import?

It is not clear how this will play out at Marquette. Perhaps the university is just going through the motions, and reasonable sorts of free expression will prevail.

For example, when some feminist in one of our classes claimed we had sexually harassed her by telling the class that feminists grossly exaggerate the incidence of date rape, the University dismissed the complaint. The fact that we were obviously willing to raise hell at any other outcome might have been the deciding factor.

But when a graduate student in Philosophy posted an innocuous political comment by libertarian humorist Dave Barry on his door, somebody complained to department chair James South. South decided the comment was “patently offensive” and tore it down. The University backed South.

So enclaves of authoritarian intolerance exist at Marquette, and doctrines of “harassment” are a tool they will happily use.

A genuinely Catholic university would be tough on real harassment (and without being bullied by the Federal Government), but would tell the perpetually offended and aggrieved “people are going to disagree with you; live with it.” And it would honestly say so.

But that’s not the Marquette we have.

New Director of Gender and Sexualities Center Was Assata Shakur Supporter

Marquette’s misguided sop to the campus gay lobby, the Gender and Sexuality Resource Center, caused the Administration a ton of trouble. First, it sponsored the bawdy Femsex seminar, which had women students creating pornography, coloring pictures of female genitalia in the Cunt Coloring Book, and engaging in “non-judgmental” discussions of abortion and prostitution. Marquette had to distance itself from the program, and cancelled the official university sponsorship.

Then there was the mural of black militant murderer and terrorist Assata Shakur, painted on a wall at the Center. When we outed that, Marquette quickly had it painted over, and fired the Director of the Center, Susannah Bartlow. Bartlow, it seems, was simply too politically extreme.

In the wake of this fiasco, Marquette split the Center in two, with one of the pieces being a center with a scholarly focus. According to a Marquette news release:

Center for Gender and Sexualities Studies will support research, teaching

A new Center for Gender and Sexualities Studies will be housed in the Klingler College of Arts and Sciences and will support research and teaching on the topics of gender and sexualities. Directed by Dr. Angelique Harris, associate professor of social and cultural sciences, the CGSS will also hold the Women and Gender Studies major and minor. The CGSS will be located in Sensenbrenner Hall.

“I am pleased that the CGSS will enjoy the leadership of Dr. Harris, who brings deep professional experience and dedication to the center and its mission,” Myers says. “She and I have already had many productive discussions about how we can enhance and grow the major, as well as provide additional academic programming and course development and research support.”

But it seems that Angelique Harris has political views similar to those of Bartlow, at least were Shakur is concerned.

The following is an e-mail that circulated around the campus this past summer:

Dear Colleagues,

As members of MU faculty who teach in Africana Studies or related fields, I’m hoping you might be interested in being a part of a new study collective forming inside and outside of MU. Your insights, histories, research and commitments would enrich it enormously! In addition, it would be wonderful if you’d take a moment to forward the call below (and readings attached) to anyone you think might be interested in your communities and networks. Please email with questions, and I hope you are all having productive, inspiring, refreshing summers.

Yours, Jodi Melamed

Dear One and All,

* In the wake of the firing of Marquette’s Director of the Gender and Sexuality Resource Center and the destruction of a student-created mural of Assata Shakur, a major figure in contemporary Black political activism

*Following 20 years of neglect, zero budget, and no institutional support for Africana Studies at Marquette and in affirmation that Black intellectual history matters

* To support the rise of student and community activism around policing, racism, economic inequality, mass incarceration, detention and deportation, sexual violence and other issues

* Feeling the need to gather to experience the learning that happens when we create knowledge and resist unequal power dynamics in the learning process itself

We send this call for all who are interested to come together in a study collective - name to be determined - inspired by freedom schools and the undisciplined learning collectives of social movements that gave rise to Black, Ethnic, American Indian, and Women’s and Gender Studies.

The name and purpose of the study collective will emerge from our conversations together. Given recent events, we think it makes sense to begin with Assata: An Autobiography by Assata Shakur, a book that has come to represent (once again) the dangers associated with oppositional thinking.

Our first event will take place on July 26th (Sunday) from 3:00-5:00pm at Cudahy Hall (1313 W. Wisconsin Ave) Room 114. Come join us to discuss Assata: An Autobiography, whether you’ve read the whole book, part or none. RSVP not necessary, but appreciated! (To RSVP, email [redacted])

You can also find details on facebook at: https://www.facebook.com/events/841626975905901/

We’ve attached Angela Davis’s Introduction and the first and last chapters of Assata to this email to get you started. The whole book is available on Amazon and in many libraries, including UWM’s and Marquette’s (print and online version available). Please come whether you’ve read the whole book, part or none.

We’re also attaching a short essay entitled “The Whiteness of Police,” which examines policing as a form of racial management which “determines who requires discipline so that others can be secure enough to pursue their self interest.”

Looking forward,
Susannah Bartlow
Angelique Harris
Brianna Hawkins
Jodi Melamed
Sameena Mulla
(Study Collective Co-Facilitators)

This whole project seems as radical as the things that got the Gender and Sexuality Resource Center in trouble. Of course, leftist academics can get together and discuss anything they want, even “The Whiteness of Police” or the deep thoughts of Communist Angela Davis.

And the center that Harris heads is focused on scholarly things, and may be involved only in arcane stuff published in obscure gay and feminist journals (if at all). But, on the other hand, it may be that Marquette has failed to learn a lesson it should have.

Harassing E-Mail About FemSex Debacle

Dear Sir,

I am surprised that you hold such contempt for gay and lesbian people and yet pretend to be educated. This is completely at odds with the treatment I was assured when I chose to attend Marquette. It is contrary to the promises the University continues to make to those students that pay your salary. Do you really expect anyone to believe, after reading your posts, that you treat all your students equally?

As a gay student at Marquette, your recent ravings about “gay student and faculty activists and their liberal allies” demonstrates the exact type of intolerance that continues to plague the bigoted conservative movement on Marquette campus and elsewhere. Clearly, you are behind the curve in terms of academic progress and have contempt for those who don’t adhere to your own conservative world views.

Your blog clearly lacks any actual basis for knowledge. Instead you rely on the musings of conservative political interests and your own biased conjecture rather than the actual experiences of those who hold personal knowledge. Thus, you have chosen not to conform yourself to the important academic tradition of speaking from fact rather than bigoted opinion. Your opinions on why Gender and Sexuality are important to the University are “of course,” just opinions. The fact that you can’t come up with another explanation for why gender and sexuality issues are important beyond a conspiracy of the gay agenda just shows how out of touch you are. I, for one, am SORRY that I chose to come to a campus that on the one hand promotes bigoted ideals like yours while shutting down alternative views that empower woman and their personal freedom. That probably makes you happy as I can tell from your post that you don’t think that gay and lesbian people’s opinions should be on campus at all.

I can only hope that the recent exposure that your bigotry has gotten via the Journal Sentinel will yield the campus wide disgust that you would heap upon “gay student and faculty activists and their liberal allies”. I question whether you are really capable of discharging your duties in a manner which shows respect and acceptance of all those in the Marquette community, even those whom you clearly feel are less worthy than former members of the Republican student’s organization. It seems you are more interested in fostering an environment of hate.

I shall be doing my best to promote your bigotry to the Marquette administration and encourage them to look in to your student/faculty relationships. I certainly will reach out to the “gay activists” at the undergrad level and encourage them to warn their members about taking your classes.

Sincerely Yours,

Justin L. Singleton

Candidate for Juris Doctorate - 2014

Email: Justin.Singleton@marquette.edu

Phone: [redacted]

No comment required. It’s terribly convenient when somebody, thinking they are attacking you, illustrates the points you have been making all along.

FemSex at Marquette on Breitbart

Right here.

The photo with the story isn’t from Marquette, and may not even be from a FexSex workshop.

But it’s the kind of silly stuff that would happen.

FemSex is Back at Marquette

[Updated on September 16 - see below]

But not with the approval of the Marquette Administration.

The bawdy, promisculty-encouraging “workshop” where all sorts of things sexual are concerned, and nobody is supposed to be “judgmental,” will be held on campus this fall.

The version back in the Spring semester was sponsored by the Marquette Gender and Sexuality Resource Center. It was cancelled when an uproar over the program caused the Marquette administration to cancel it.

The program featured activities such as having the participants create a piece of “erotica,” and coloring in the “cunt coloring book.” We discussed the program in detail last spring. According to the course syllabus:

Themes include pleasure, health, gender, consent, boundaries, privilege, power, body image, communication, race, class, orgasms, masturbation, sex, kink, and sexual identities.

The version this fall will be sponsored by the Honors Program (although Honors provides no funding). This supposedly does not represent a reversal of policy by the University. Rather, academic departments are allowed to decide on their own programs (a matter of academic freedom), and sponsorship by a department does not constitute university endorsement.

The Honors Program is controlled by the English and Philosophy departments, two of the most politically correct departments on campus.

[Update]

Brian Farley has challenged one part of the above post, asking:

The Honors Program? Really?

So academic freedom allows departments to do whatever they want, no matter how academically dubious, anti-Catholic, etc.?

Brian has a point here.

None of the traditional norms about academic freedom say that anybody on a university campus has the right to say anything any time they want. And none of them say that a university (or any division thereof, such as the Honors Program) has to sponsor any particular speaker, workshop, or discussion group.

The traditional norms of academic freedom apply to faculty. And they protect faculty only when speaking in their area of professional expertise. Those norms would not protect a math professor who wanted to pop off about how evil the Tea Party movement is. They would mean, for example, that a professor, teaching a course on the Ethics of Sex would have a right to say that homosexual acts are perfectly moral and licit (contradicting Catholic teaching).    They would not require any department, program or division of any university to sponsor a program pushing that point of view.

Those norms do not apply to persons with no appropriate academic credentials giving a course that is not part of the curriculum, gives no academic credit, and doesn’t have any particular academic legitimacy.

In short, the Honors Program sponsored this program because they wanted to. And the University allowed it because they chose to, not because they had to. The Honors Program is run by Amelia Zurcher, a faculty member in English and one of the people who signed a statement supporting the hiring of the aggressively lesbian Dean candidate, Jodi O’Brien.

Marquette has allowed departments to sponsor “The Vagina Monologues,” which it has not allowed recognized student groups to perform with official recognition. That raunchy play has been sponsored by the Honors Program, and Social and Cultural Sciences (Sociology).

One could view Marquette’s acceptance as a principled respect for the autonomy of departments. Saying “the autonomy of departments” is a more precise formulation than “academic freedom.”

But then, one could view this as a cynical policy to distance the Administration from distasteful stuff, while not getting the politically correct crowd on campus too mad. But if this were truly a Catholic university, the Administration would be willing to make the politically correct crowd mad.

And it would not give control of the Honors Program to those folks.

Marquette Gender and Sexuality Resource Center: Demonizing Men

From Facebook, notice of an event that will be starting about the time we post this:

Come and join the GSRC and Dr. Gerry Canavan in a group discussion of Margaret Atwood’s “The Handmaid’s Tale.” “Offred is a Handmaid in the Republic of Gilead. She may leave the home of the Commander and his wife once a day to walk to food markets whose signs are now pictures instead of words because women are no longer allowed to read. She must lie on her back once a month and pray that the Commander makes her pregnant, because in an age of declining births, Offred and the other Handmaids are only valued if their ovaries are viable.”

This, of course, is from the Marquette Gender and Sexuality Resource Center, the same people who brought the campus FemSex.

“The Handmaid’s Tale” is a feminist dystopia. More detail is provided by a synopsis of the movie based on the book:

In this dystopian fable, a librarian wife and mother becomes the childbearing pawn of a Christian theocracy. In the near future, as war rages across the fictional North American Republic of Gilead and pollution has rendered 99 percent of the female population sterile, Kate (Natasha Richardson) sees her husband killed and her daughter kidnapped while trying to escape across the border. Kate herself is transformed into a handmaid -- a surrogate mother for one of the privileged but barren couples who run the country’s fundamentalist regime. Although she resists being indoctrinated into the bizarre cult of the handmaids, which mixes Old Testament orthodoxy and misogynist cant with 12-step gospel and ritualized violence, Kate soon finds herself ensconced at the home of the Commander (Robert Duvall) and his frosty wife, Serena Joy (Faye Dunaway). Forced to lie between Serena Joy’s legs and be penetrated impersonally each month by the Commander, Kate longs for her vanished earlier life; she soon learns that since many of the nation’s powerful men are as sterile as their wives, she may have to risk the punishment for fornication -- death by hanging -- in order to sleep with another man who can provide her with the pregnancy that has become her sole raison d’être.

This, of course, plays to all the prejudices of feminists -- the notion that “religious fundamentalists” (you know, those people who oppose abortion) want to oppress women, and further men want to reduce women to mere brood matrons excluded from all activities other than producing offspring.

Aside from the naked ideological bias, there is a huge irony here.

Just which males in American society oppress women? Those who want them to bear children? Those are the guys who want to marry a woman and create a family and be a father to the children.

But then we have the guys who just want sex. Perhaps they actively don’t want the woman to be pregnant, since that comes with all kinds of hassles (pressure to marry, child support, the need to leave the state). Or perhaps they just don’t care, knowing that they are not going to be responsible for the children they create anyway. Just have a good roll in the hay, and don’t worry about the consequences, which you can usually avoid.

Out in the real world (if not in the fever swamp of feminism) women are a bit more opposed to abortion being legal than men.

But feminists have blinders that won’t allow them to see this. Recognizing this reality would be to admit that women and men have a common interest in forming families. That’s not an effective way to demonize men.

Further, this kind of “knock her up and evade the consequences” mentality is especially common among black males. Over 70% of black babies are born out of wedlock. But blacks are a politically correct victim group, and admitting that black females are victimized by black males creates too much cognitive dissonance. Black males have to be victims too. Better that the oppressors are while males, especially Christian white males.

“The Handmaid’s Tale,” in other words, is hate speech. A similar book that demonized blacks, or illegal immigrants, or homosexuals would be instantly recognized as such. We think the First Amendment protects hate speech, but this doesn’t require that Marquette University promote it.

[Update]

Check out the comment from the leader of the discussion (which has been postponed) Gerry Canavan. He promises a more critical and nuanced view of the text than it typically receives.