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Title IX Is a Dumpster Fire That Should Be Done Away With

Laura Kipnis—a liberal feminist professor—recently wrote an essay in which she suggested that students should be allowed to sleep with professors. As a result of writing that essay, she was accused of violating Title IX of the Education Act, a section of the law previously best known for killing college wrestling programs in the name of gender equality. With the war on minor men's sports almost won, Title IX apparatchiks are now shifting their sights to weightier issues. Specifically, they've used the law to empower kangaroo courts on college campuses to adjudicate claims of gender discrimination, venues where due process is a myth and The Feels matter more than The Facts.

Kipnis' latest essay is a bit overlong but worth reading in full. You can't really get a sense for the entirely awful, utterly Byzantine structure of a Title IX fight without going through the process with her step by step. Here's a taste:

I wrote back to the Title IX coordinator asking for clarification: When would I learn the specifics of these complaints, which, I pointed out, appeared to violate my academic freedom? And what about my rights — was I entitled to a lawyer? I received a polite response with a link to another website. No, I could not have an attorney present during the investigation, unless I’d been charged with sexual violence. I was, however, allowed to have a "support person" from the university community there, though that person couldn’t speak. I wouldn’t be informed about the substance of the complaints until I met with the investigators.

Apparently the idea was that they’d tell me the charges, and then, while I was collecting my wits, interrogate me about them. The term "kangaroo court" came to mind. I wrote to ask for the charges in writing. The coordinator wrote back thanking me for my thoughtful questions. ...

As of this writing, I have yet to hear the verdict on my case, though it’s well past the 60-day time frame. In the meantime, new Title IX complaints have been filed against the faculty-support person who accompanied me to the session with the investigators. As a member of the Faculty Senate, whose bylaws include the protection of academic freedom — and believing the process he’d witnessed was a clear violation of academic freedom — he’d spoken in general terms about the situation at a senate meeting. Shortly thereafter, as the attorneys investigating my case informed me by phone, retaliation complaints were filed against him for speaking publicly about the matter (even though the complaints against me had already been revealed in the graduate student’s article), and he could no longer act as my support person. Another team of lawyers from the same firm has been appointed to conduct a new investigation.

Kafka springs to mind.

Kipnis isn't the only one to point out the absurdity of using Sexual Star Chambers on college campuses. Emily Yoffe, writing at the well-known reactionary haven Slate, late last year published an extremely long, incredibly important piece on the way Title IX is being used to, more or less, violate the rights of those who are accused of sexual assault on campus. I'm not even going to excerpt it; you just have to read the whole thing. It's mindblowing.

Obviously, repealing Title IX is a nonstarter, politically, because identity politics trump everything else and any move made to kill this insidious provision would be met with howls of "ZOMG WAR ON WOMEN." But the situation we have now is an untenable horror show designed to stifle debate and punish people for no good reason whatsoever. The pseudo-judicial proceedings empowered by the law are prone to abuse, easily manipulated, and operate in a cloak of darkness.

In a just world, Title IX would be on the chopping block. In the real world?