IP: Univ of Mass says professor's racy Web site was "harrassment?"

[David Farber <farber () cis upenn edu>]

> Date: Thu, 06 Apr 2000 17:52:24 -0400
> To: politech () vorlon mit edu
> From: Declan McCullagh <declan () well com>
>
>
> Seems to me it only is "harassment" if you're forced to look at it, 
> and maybe not then. Still, there's a long history of bogus 
> "harassment" charges being used to censor political speech:
>   http://joc.mit.edu/charges.html#7
>
> Harvey Silverglate and Alan Kors have covered this in their 
> excellent book The Shadow University:
>   http://www.shadowuniv.com/
>
> -Declan
>
> *********
>
> > From: "Volokh, Eugene" <VOLOKH () mail law ucla edu>
> > To: "Declan McCullagh (E-mail)" <declan () well com (Declan McCullagh)>
> > Subject: Another interesting cyber-academic freedom issue
> > Date: Thu, 6 Apr 2000 12:37:02 -0700
> >
> >         Have you been following this story?
> >
> >
> > http://www.nandotimes.com/nation/story/0,1038,500189353-500254677-501299019-0,00.html
> >
> > "University of Massachusetts removes professor's racy Web site," from the AP
> >
> >
> > A professor's sexually explicit Web site, which includes photos of 
> > topless women straddling his lap, has been removed from the 
> > University of Massachusetts computer server.
> >
> > "He was asked to take it down and he did," university spokeswoman 
> > Kay Scanlan said Wednesday. She said the administration felt the 
> > Web site violated the university's "acceptable use" policy for its 
> > computer system.
> >
> > Richard Burt, 46, a tenured English professor known for his 
> > scholarship on censorship and sexuality, did not return a message 
> > seeking comment. His wife, Betsy, who was featured in some of the 
> > revealing photos, declined comment and said her husband would not 
> > discuss the issue either.
> >
> > However, Scanlan said Burt took issue with the administration's 
> > view that the Web site, with an opening photo of the professor 
> > fondling the breasts of a blonde and links to porn sites, contained 
> > material that should be labeled as "objectionable" under the 
> > university's policy.
> >
> > "He disagrees with the policy and said that he will be taking it up 
> > with the administration," Scanlan said.
> >
> >
> >
> >         I'm not sure about this, but I suspect that the policy at 
> > issue is up at 
> > http://www.oit.umass.edu/ca/docs/use_policy.html 
> > ; it's interesting how little it says about what's "objectionable" 
> > and what's not.  (It may also be interesting that the 
> > "objectionable" speech paragraph is labeled "Harassment.")
> >
> >         FYI, I have on my own site links to material that some call 
> > pornographic, see the paragraph following 
> > http://www.law.ucla.edu/faculty/volokh/harass/breadth.htm#T81
>
>
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------
> POLITECH -- the moderated mailing list of politics and technology
> To subscribe, visit http://www.politechbot.com/info/subscribe.html
> This message is archived at http://www.politechbot.com/
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------