Judging the Private Lives of Others →

Why do people go along with behavior that makes them feel uncomfortable and violated?

This question appears to be at the heart of the latest #metoo scandal. Esteemed N.Y.U. philosopher Avital Ronell has been found responsible for sexual harassment and placed on unpaid academic leave for a year. Nimrod Reitman, the graduate student that accused Professor Ronell of harassment, assault, stalking, and retaliation, filed a Title IX complaint two years after graduating.

According to the New York Times, which acquired the Title IX interviews, “in Mr. Reitman’s recollection, he was afraid of his professor and the power she wielded over him, and often went along with behavior that left him feeling violated. Professor Ronell said that Mr. Reitman desperately sought her attention and guidance…”

Thursday, after Mr. Reitman’s attorney filed a lawsuit against Professor Ronell and NYU, the Chronicle published Professor Ronell’s press release which includes intimate messages from Mr. Reitman.

We cannot judge what happened between Professor Ronell and Mr. Reitman. We do not have all the facts. It is clear from the emails released by Professor Ronell and Mr. Reitman that both parties shared affectionate words with one another. But affairs, Platonic or otherwise, are remarkably private things. Held and kept in private, they can only appear in fragmentary form when dragged into public light. As an observer of this scandal who can never really know what surpassed between Ronell and Reitman, I find myself having conflicted sympathy for both parties.

This scandal is not a question of feminism, as the Times tried to suggest. And it is not about famous academics like Judith Butlerwho have come to Ronell’s defense. It is a question of learning and desire and the way the two often go hand and hand. It is a question about academic culture and the kinds of relationships that occur when two people work closely together over many years. It is a question of the political climate created by Title IX on college campuses, that makes it difficult for students to report offenses.

The forms of relationships graduate students have with their mentors are often complicated for a variety of reasons which have to do with power, politics, and the environs of academia that create vulnerable climates. Sometimes professors and students in working relationships fall in love with one another, or share affections for one another. There is nothing wrong with this. Graduate students are adults, fully capable of making informed decisions about what kind of behavior they engage in. And yet, the world of academia often makes the boundaries between friendship, flirtation, and professors unclear. This dynamic is troubled further by the high-stakes academics create for themselves, where everyone knows that one errant word in a letter of recommendation means no job after a decade of study.

Mr. Reitman’s situation sounds all too familiar to me. Most of the men I have worked with in academia have come on to me. My dissertation advisor asked me if I wanted to fuck in the middle of office hours and spent more time regaling me with details of his affairs than teaching me. My Plato professor often invited me to lunch to tell me how beautiful I was, while occasionally snapping photos of me, and sending me flirtatious emails about the outfits I wore to campus. A visiting professor stuck his hand up my skirt and grabbed my vagina after a faculty dinner party. When I attempted to report him to his home university his Dean called to tell me that he had a reputation for this kind of behavior when he drank, and that he had a family, and that he would be forced to attend an alcohol awareness class.

For the past several years I have been trying to sort out my own experiences. Often moving between attempts at understanding my own complicity, a desire to hold the men accountable, and a kind of anger that is difficult to put into words. I have drafted letters to universities, looked up lawyers, and after several years of gathering notes, emails, and documents, written a book manuscriptabout what it has been like for me to be a woman in academia. After a while, I realized I was hesitant to talk about my experiences because I did not want to be placed within an existing narrative framework. The current culture of political correctness often refuses individuals control over their own experiences once they are shared in public. It is not surprising that Mr. Reitman and Professor Ronell have both expressed frustration with being cast into the #metoo movement. But this is only part of the question.

I respect Mr. Reitman’s decision to filed a complaint. I understand the feeling of being violated and holding onto that feeling of violation for so long that it becomes unbearable. It is a kind of bitterness that lingers. At the same time, as Professor Ronell says in her statement, this behavior was encouraged and welcomed. Mr. Reitman bears fault too. And no, that is not victim blaming. That is trying to understand how these complicated situations unfold.

This strikes me as the crux of the problem. Once this kind of behavior begins, even if it leaves one with bad feelings, we often let it continue because we are uncertain of what will happen if we stop it. At first the attention is flattering; it means more time with people who could make or break our careers. Sometimes these relationships flourish, but sometimes something shifts. We realize that we are not fully in control of the situation. We realize that the attention is conditioned upon continued participation, and we cannot separate our desire to succeed from our desire for attention from those we rely upon and respect.

For me these dynamics often felt like an addictive, abusive relationship. I was continuously drawn back into flirtatious conversations, late night emails, and home visits. And there was always a mixture of disgust and delight. I cannot imagine the situation from the side of the professor. I can only imagine that if the behavior is encouraged in any way that the professor has no reason to assume something is wrong. And that lack of knowing, of not being able to read another person, should not end careers.

Still, professors have a professional responsibility to their institutions and to the students they mentor. And when you choose to cross a line, you know there is a risk. Many institutions prohibit relationships between faculty and students to try and prevent situations like these. But it is impossible to control for desire, and bureaucratic policies that try to police sex like Title IX are not the solution. They have devastating effects on campus climates, pedagogy, and one’s willingness to report.

Sexual harassment is a serious offense, but today it seems like any questionable word or gesture is thrown into that category. The language of consent does not take into account complicated situations and experiences. Instead of judging the intent behind an act, or the act itself, sexual experiences are judged according to how one perceives the after-effects of experience. And this sets a dangerous precedent. Mr. Reitman waited two years after graduating to bring his Title IX complaint and lawsuit. And his use of Title IX demonstrates how it is wielded instrumentally to hold people accountable for bad feelings after the fact. Certainly Mr. Reitman knew that if he brought charges during his time under Professor Ronell’s mentorship his career would be ruined before it began.

Ronell’s reputation might be blighted by this event, but her questionable behavior will not detract from her career brilliance. Mr. Reitman will be left with very little, which is perhaps one reason why he is seeking legal recourse. I have thought about doing this. I think about it on a regular basis actually. But I worry about the ethical consequences. Do N.Y.U and Professor Ronell bear all of the guilt? Is this really a question of guilt? What about personal responsibility? Is this the only way we have to hold one another accountable?

Arendt writes a lot about forgiveness. In The Human Condition she says that the web of human relationships requires forgiving because all action is boundless and unpredictable. Without forgiveness, there could be no action in the world. Forgiveness, she writes, “is the exact opposite of vengeance, which acts as the form of re-acting against an original trespassing.”

The alternative to forgiveness is punishment. Punishment and forgiveness both attempt “to put an end to something that without interference could go on endlessly.” Maybe some combination of forgiveness and punishment point the way forward, away from bureaucratic and legal policies that try to regulate sex and desire.

In beginning to parse this, we should ask what kind of punishment is appropriate for these kinds of situations. And we should ask why we continue to go along with behavior that makes us feel violated, especially when we think there is a short-term tradeoff being made.