Free Speech and Sexual

Harassment
Jessica Murphy

Case Background
Green River College
Liberal-arts college
Values being a teaching & learning
community
First year residence requirement

Rockwell Residence Hall

Premier campus computer lab
Hall government annually
upgrades equipment

Main Characters
Gaby

undergraduate engineering student

Embraces GRCs philosophy of
holistic education

Female lab assistant

Male student
Sam

Rockwell Hall Director

champions free speech & diversity

Erika

Dean of Students
strong proponent of student activism

Case Events
9:00 pm
Rockwell Residence Hall
Gaby goes the hall computer lab to work on an engineering assignment and
witnesses a male peer visiting pornographic websites and newsgroups. Gabby
asks a female student worker to prevent the classmate from viewing
pornography. The student worker responds that such an intervention is not a
part of her job function and does nothing.
10:45 pm
Engineering Hall
Gaby arrives at another computer lab. After a 53 minute wait she is able to use
a computer.
2:30 am
Engineering Hall
Gaby leaves the computer lab on a ten minute walk across campus. On her
way to her room, Gaby passes the Rockwell computer lab and sees that the
student is still there.
7:45 am
Rockwell Residence Hall
Gaby meets with Rockwell Hall director, Sam.
2:30 pm
Dean of Students Office
The dean explains that no policy abuse has occurred. Gaby persists in her
assertion and the dean reads GRCs sexual harassment policy and asks Gaby if
she was sexually harassed according to the schools definition. Gaby is
reluctant to label her experience as sexual harassment.

SWOT Analysis
STRENGTHS

WEAKNESS

OPPORTUNI
TY

THREAT

GRCs commitment
to holistic learning

Erikas response to
Gaby

Assess use of
pornography by
students

Effect of pornography
on students and
educational
environment

Community member
buy in

Inadequate campus
policies regarding
sexual harassment
and technology

Develop better
technology use and
sexual harassment
policies

Censorship, legalities
for private and public
institutional rights

Poor student worker

training

Conversation starter
for difficult topic

Legal Concerns:
Sexual Harassment,
outdated policies,
access providers for
internet

Erikas psychological
contract

Decision Issues
Pornography and its effects

Legal Components

First Amendment Rights

Assessing Approaches
Structural
Right and formal arrangements minimize
problems and maximize performance.

Human Resource
Requires a sensitive understanding of people and
their symbiotic relationship with organizations

Political
Asserts that interdependence, divergent interests,
scarcity, and power relations inevitably spawn
political activity

Symbolic
Focuses on how humans make sense of the
messy, ambiguous world in which they live

(Bolman & Deal, 2003)

Desired Outcomes
Support & learning opportunity for
Gaby, lab assistant, male student
Leverage incident for positive
community development
Update campus policies

Poor Approaches
Pornography Effects

Not acknowledge third-person effect of pornography

Disregard effect of pornography on educational
environment
Ignore student complaints

First Amendment Rights

Tightly censor internet usage

Assume computer use policies violate free speech
rights
Allow continued use of computers without
accountability system

Legal Components

Negligently enable a hostile environment in labs and on

campus
Discount responsibility as an Internet provider
Not take preventative measures against student
violence and sexual aggressiveness

Well Informed Approaches

Pornography Effects

Express GRCs values

Avoid alienating political constituencies
Equip student workers and employees with training
Send a pro-student message

First Amendment Rights

Protect free speech rights and academic freedom
Reflect appropriate stance for a public or private school

Legal Components
Enact up-to-date policies that discourage sexual harassment
Safeguard students from obscene material
Assert the institutions prerogative as internet access
providers

Pornography
Habitual abuse of pornography introduces a number of
negative
consequences to the campus community.

Women are assigned overly sexualized roles

Social conscience of residence hall communities is indirectly
changed through personal exposure and social pressures
(Snyder, 2006)
Social inhibitions are eroded and there is diminishing fear of
disapproval by peers (Russell, 2006)
The 25% to 30% of male students who admit that there is
some likelihood that they would rape a woman if they could be
assured of getting away with it, increases to 57% after exposure
to sexually violent images, particularly sexually violent images
depicting women enjoying rape (Donnerstein, 1983).
Development of virtual dependencies such as online chat
rooms, instant messaging, gaming, shopping, gambling and
using pornography nurture increasingly unmanageable lives
among students (Young, 2004).

Pornography
Gaby

Establishing identity: This vector is especially

problematic for women and ethnic minorities who
may feel invisible in our society or have multiple
roles to play in different situations (Chickering,
1969).

Formation of moral self: moral self is embedded in a

broader socio-cognitive self theory encompassing
self-organizing, proactive, self-reflective and selfregulative mechanisms (Bandura, 2001).

Contemplative learning: the process of thinking

about an experience and reaching a conclusion
about it without necessarily referring to the wider
social reality. What distinguishes contemplative
learning from the process of thinking itself is the fact
that a conclusion is reached (Jarvis, 1992).

Pornography
Male Student

Using internet pornography indicates lack of

emotional intelligence (Goleman, 1997).

Heavy Internet usage correlated with impaired

academic performance, loneliness, staying up
late, tiredness, and missing classes. (Kubey,
Lavin, and Barrows, 2001).

Users of online pornography seek and find

ephemeral intimacy and decreased inhibitions
(DeAngeles, 2000).

Pornography informs a toxic contemporary

masculinity comprised of sex and aggression
by seeking images of women in demeaning
roles and scenarios. (Dines, 2005).

Pornography
Female Student

Pornography is a threat to womens

dignity and their right to be safe in
their homes, workplaces and
communities. With this lens,
pornography is seen as a
propaganda tool used by
patriarchy to legitimize, condone
and celebrate women in
subservient and powerless roles.
(Gillian, 2005), (Barak et al., 1999).

Pornography
Educational Environment

Use of pornography is likely to increase sexually

aggressive behaviors in men (Malamuth, 2000),
(Allen, Emmers, 1995).

Third-person effect and collectivism: cultural anxiety

is formed when internet pornography is
commonplace. (Lee & Tamborini, 2005).

Erosion of a safe and moral environment occurs

when members of a community are threatened by a
culturally acceptable practice resulting in far
reaching social implications (Chickering, 2003),
(Astin, 1997).

Evidence is abundant and consistent in indicating

that changes toward greater altruism,
humanitarianism and sense of civic responsibility
and social conscience occur during the college
years (Terenzini, 1993), (Kuh, 1993).

First Amendment Rights

Censorship and Free Speech

First Amendment protects the right to religious

freedom and freedom of expression free from
government interference. Freedom of expression
consists of the rights to freedom of speech, press,
and assembly.

Sex and nudity may not be exploited without limit by

film or pictures exhibited or sold in places of public
accommodation (Reese, 2003).

A conflict exists between the rights of students and

faculty to free speech and privacy, and the
obligation of universities, parents, and society to
restrict access of information deemed unsuitable for
our youth. The communal nature of academia
further complicates matter (Peace, 2003).

First Amendment Rights

Public and Private Institutions
Obscenity is not protected by the First Amendment (Reese,
2003).
Public institution administrators may use the Miller test to
determine material obscene and therefore banned.
(Kaplin & Lee, 1995)
Obscenity set forth in Miller v. California
(a) whether the average person, applying
contemporary community standards would find
that the work, taken as a whole, appeals to the
prurient interest;
(b) whether the work depicts or describes, in a
patently offensive way, sexual conduct specifically
defined by the applicable state law
(c) whether the work, taken as a whole, lacks
serious literary artistic, political, or scientific value

First Amendment Rights

Burbridge v. Sampson set forth an institutions right to
regulate the time, manner and place of speech and
advocacy on campus by students and members of the
public. (Mawdsley, 2004)

Legal Concerns
Sexual Harassment
Title VII of Civil Rights Act of 1964

Prevent sexual harassment in the workplace. Hostile

environment: sexual advances, abusive language,
demeaning behavior based on sex

Pornography creates a hostile environment for women who

want to deal with their fellow employees with dignity, free
from barriers created by sexual differentiation. When
pornography is displayed in common areas, it conveys the
message to many women that they are welcome in the
workplace only if they submit to the sexual stereotypes that
permeate that environment. The result is an environment
that would hostile to a reasonable person who seeks to
work with fellow employees with professionalism
(Oldenkamp, 1997).

The psychological well-being of the victim should be

considered under the circumstances along with a number of
other factors, none of which is necessarily conclusive
(Harris v. Forklift Systems, Inc)

Legal Concerns
Sexual Harassment
Title IX of Education Amendment of 1972

No person in the United States shall, on the basis of

sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the
benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any
education program or activity receiving Federal financial
assistance

Unwilling viewers of pornography should not be forced

to bear the burden of avoiding pornography in facilities
established for academic purposes. (Oldenkamp, 1997).

Colleges and universities must have an employee whose

job duties include helping to regulate Title IX policies on
campus. This should include Title IX policies in computer
labs.

Legal Concerns
Acceptable Use Policy

To assure equal access to educational facilities, universities

need to adopt policies to protect students from
pornography that leads to a hostile environment.

AUPs are a regulatory body for schools and users that

protects users and the school from violations of law. An AUP
should include rights and responsibilities of computer and
network users, notice of legal issues, information of
acceptable content and conduct on network, description of
behavior that can result in punishment and potential
disciplinary action (NCES).

California Polytechnic State University at San Luis Obsipo,

faculty suggest that clear implications are made by ready
availability of sexually explicit and deeply offensive
imagery as falling below ethical standards held by the
university (ONeil, 2003), (Foster, 2000).

Legal Concerns
Sexual Harassment Policy

Under Title IX, universities have statutory

responsibilities to their students that are similar to an
employers responsibilities to its employees under
Title VII. Universities should draft provisions into their
student conduct codes to incorporate Title VII hostile
environment sexual harassment law and allow
students to bring student-to-student hostile
environment claims when their peers behavior
unreasonably interferes with their academic
performance or otherwise creates a hostile academic
environment (Oldenkamp, 1997).

Davis v. Monroe County Board of Education

established the affirmative duty to protect students
from sexual harassment inflicted by their peers if
school personnel with the power to do something
about the harassment have actual knowledge of the
behavior (McCarthy and Eckes, 2005).

Legal Concerns
Internet Access Providers

Institutions relying on monetary support from

outside sources may need to incorporate awareness
of the censorship debate into their financial publicity
considerations (Peace, 2003).

Underage users of internet pornography

Technological, legal and monetary concerns are also

pertinent to the school

Capabilities of computer system to filter

accessible sites

Cost of filtering software

Freedom of speech and academic freedom

Desired Outcomes
Support & learning opportunity for
Gaby, lab assistant, male student
Leverage incident for positive
community development
Update campus policies

Suggested Approach
Pornography
Individual counsel with Gaby, male student and
lab assistant through campus counseling service
Engage the community with educational
programming on pornography and its effects
Research the issue of internet addictions and
effects on college students

Theory
Chickering: identity development
Bandura: self-efficacy
Boyers: creating campus community

Suggested Approach
First Amendment Rights
Create a computer use policy that protects academic freedom as
well as students welfare
Form a committee on academic freedom and internet use
Asses the use of pornography at other institutions in a
benchmarking process
Legal Concerns
Revise the sexual harassment policy
Research responsibilities of the college as an internet provider
Investigate cost of installing an internet filter
Theory
Bolman and Deal: Organizational Frames
Structural
Minimize problems and maximize efficiency
Human Resource
Account for peoples influence on the organization
Political
Consider constituencies and their reactions
Symbolic
Consider messages sent to students and faculty

Free Speech and Sexual

Harassment
Jessica Murphy
EDA 5370