Friday, April 11, 2003

INCORRECT JOCULARITY

The language censors have been sighted again at one of their favorite campuses - the mammoth University of Michigan. A student got in trouble there this fall for writing a term paper. More accurately, he got in trouble for the paper's vocabulary.

The undergraduate has been accused of harassment by a female teaching assistant on the basis of a hypothetical example he put in a term paper. The crime? It seems the hapless student was unwise enough to ignore the political science department's "Checklist for Nonsexist Writing."

Here's the offending passage, written by sophomore Shawn Brown for Political Science 111, Introduction to American Politics: "Another problem with sampling polls is that some people desire their privacy and don't want to be bothered by a pollster. Let's say Dave Stud is entertaining three beautiful ladies in his penthouse when the phone rings. A pollster on the other end wants to know if we should eliminate the capital gains tax. Now Dave is a knowledgeable businessperson who cares a lot about this issue. But since Dave is "tied up" at the moment, he tells the pollster to "bother" someone else. Now this is perhaps a ludicrous example, but there is simply a segment of, the population who wish to be left alone. They have more important things to be concerned about - jobs, family, school, etc. If this segment of the population is never actually polled, then the results of the poll could be skewed."

Now, it seems to us a sensible referee would see that what we have here is a wash: "Dave Stud" may strike some as a 15-yard penalty, but note that the student did use the sexless "businessperson" as well. In any event, Mr. Brown's point about the reliability of polls today is an interesting one. But none of these considerations caught the attention of his teacher, Debbie Meizlish. Instead, Ms. Meizlish was horrified at what she perceived as Mr. Brown's verbal assault on her. She wrote:

"You are right. This is ludicrous & inappropriate & OFFENSIVE. This is completely inappropriate for a serious political science paper. lt completely violates the standard of non-sexist writing. Professor Rosenstone has encouraged me to interpret this comment as an example of sexual harassment and to take the appropriate formal steps. I have chosen not to do so in this instance. However, any future comments, in a paper, in a class or in any dealings w/me will be interpreted as sexual harassment and formal steps will be taken. Professor Rosenstone is aware of these comments - & is prepared to intervene. You are forewarned!"

Thus threatened, Mr. Brown made a sensible decision. He dropped the course, presumably in the hope of finding a political scientist at Michigan who was interested in teaching him political science instead of political correctness.

No comments: