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LETTERS continued from. Page 6
priate places over the course of nearly a year is a clear ex- ample of “poor taste and bad manners”. Such behaviour is unprofessional, to say the least.
Resistance to a policy on sexual harassment comes in many forms. Smear cam- paigns, ridicule and_ over- statement are but a few methods used to oppose what does not bear a more honest opposition.
Hopefully, students are more critical readers than that.
Sincerely,
Vaugn Jelliffe
i
Dear Editor, RE: Harassment by Ex-
perts; Sex under surveillance
I was quite amazed & shocked by the article writ- ten by Prof. Rahman in the March 10th issue of GEM.
His article was both ar- rogant and condescending in its attitude towards sexual feminism, the respondents to the survey, and to the psychologists who conducted the survey.
Prof. Rahman’s representation of the intent and purpose of the Sexual
harrassment,
-mis-
Harassment Survey and his dismissal of its authors as “voyeuristic” does a_ great
Dear Editor:
“Cheap and dirty!” those were the first words that come to mind when I read Professor Rahman’s at- tack, in last week’s (Thurs- day, March 10th) GEM, on the sexual harassment search project.
re-
On further reflection, I added “crafty.”
At first I was appalled to think that a well-known uni- versity professor could strike such low blows against his own colleagues-members of his own department. pro- fessor Rahman’s attack is personal, despite his begin- ning and ending the arti- cle with vague gestures to faults in the social sciences
disservice to his Dept. to his colleagues.
and
I found it insulting that Prof. Rahman should sug- gest that the solution to what he calls “bad manners” is to distribute Ms. Manners’ Eti- quette Book. This line of reasoning all too well illus- trates the sort of pervasive attitudes that one might find in a survey of sexual harass- ment.
' Finally, that Prof. Rah- man so readily displays con- tempt for social psychology leads me to wonder if he is not in the right profession.
Barb van’tSlot
To the Editor,
I applaud your attempt to focus your readers’ con- cerns upon intellectual and moral issues affecting our common life together here at UPEI (“Harassment by Ex- perts”, - Thursday March 10), but am disappointed in Prof. Rahman’s contribu- tion.
His article is character- ized by vague insinuations, unwarranted extrapolations, and a depressingly frequent use of loaded terms (e.g. “Social scientific forms of voyeurism”, “research an- tics”, “pseudo scientific sur- “manipulative”, ‘“eth- ically questionable”, “scien- tific practice”, “treating peo- ple as hollow objects to be manipulated”, etc). These loaded terms cloud, and do not clarify, the intellectual and moral issues. serve to hurt feelings and raise tempers.
yey.
- Speaking as an analyt- ical Philosopher and _logi- cian for (too) many years,
They only
and having composed survey |
forms myself, I was person- ally impressed by the fac-
ulty. version of the survey- |
questionnaire I completed. Contrary to Prof. Rahman’s suggestions of dupery, sneak- iness and pandering to gulli- bility, I found that the sur- vey prompted me to do some hard thinking about the con- cept of sexual harassment. It also sensitized me to sub- tle ways in which behavior which seems so unobjection- able to ourselves may be up- setting or offensive to the other party.
I think that Prof.’s Perci- |
val and Mazer are to be com- mended for devoting their re- search energies toa project which increases our under- stnding of ourselves and our sensitivity towards those around us.
Philip J. Koch Dept. of Y °°
Philosophy U.P.E.I. .
& r
> casm,
themselves. He repeatedly uses innuendo, understate- ment, overstatement, sar- cliche, and faulty analogy to vilify his col- leagues. How can his words be taken as anything but calumny when he (twice) refers to his colleagues’ re- search as “voyeurism,” talks of their collected data as “gossip” and “quantified gos- sip”, lumps them together with social scientists who “indulge in research antics,” and calls their research in- strument a “pseudo-scientific survey”?
The more I thought about the article and its lan- guage, the more upset I be- came. Why? Professor Rahman chose his tone and expressions carefully. He writes in a style that shows he believes his readers are unfair and immature; he as- sumes these readers will be eager to jeer with him at the work of his colleagues.
The article a mas- terly (almost) orchestration of sneers and smirks. He fre- quently trivializes the sub- ject of sexual harassment and at the same time shares a knowing wink with his read- ers. He thinks he knows his audience—and this assurance
is
shobid make us all very un- comfortable.
Look, for example, how neatly he disposes of the credibility of his colleagues, shares a laugh with his reader, and at the time paints himself as a most sympathetic and sensi- tive soul. He takes his col- leagues’ phrase “most mem- orable” and turns it into a joke. There is a locker-room snicker behind his sugges- tion that the word “memo- rable” should refer to “sex- ual escapade,” ment. The snicker is quickly, artfully masked behind the intended heart-stirring in the next There learn that harassment is “not worth of being remembered, but recalled only with a heavy heart.” Sigh. The message is unmistakable; the quick changes of tone are skillful. Clearly, he says, these researchers can’t even write well; they obviously don’t know what they are do- ing and certainly cannot be trusted to understand all of us sensitive, lively intelligent people out here.
The middle of the article is full of smirking word play. Professor
same
not harass-
clause. we
Rahman is evi-
dently counting on his audi-
ence’s love of a good time~a spicy controversy. Why else would he pretend that his colleagues didn’t know the difference between “amorous glances or advances” (the rhyme there is a nice, dis- missive touch) and_harass- ment? Why else would he pretend that his colleagues would care to spy on the comings and goings from the coffee shop? Professor Rah- man, with another of his winks, assures his readers that HE knows what they are up to in the coffee shop. Doesn’t he say it all in an- other of his dismissive lit- tle formulas—“‘coffee, tea, or sympathy?”
Professor Rahman’s arti- cle is vicious, and I fear it may do great harm. Many readers may not take the. time to see how unfairly he treats his colleagues; they may not see his innuendo, sarcasm, and flippancy for the affront they surely are to his reader’s sense of justice and to the spirit of free de- bate.
Professor Rahman should have come to the Friday afternoon ses- sion where his colleagues ex-
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