University of Kentucky Punishes Teacher for Singing Beach Boys’ Song, Claiming it was “Sexual Misconduct”

After a three month investigation the university could find no complaints of sexual misconduct over thirty years of the teacher being on staff. His punishment was both unfair and uncalled for.

Under Administrative Regulation 6:1, Discrimination and Harassment, UK’s Title IX coordinator ruled that the song, “California Girls,” included “language of a sexual nature” and was somehow offensive, though no victims were identified.

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My punishment in this case-without-victims bans me from receiving international travel funds and strips me of a prestigious award worth thousands of dollars.

When I inquired about my due process rights, I was told by the provost that I didn’t have any. Here’s the quote:

“There is no constitutional right to represent the University of Kentucky abroad. Nor is there a constitutional right to teach a particular class. Accordingly, the University has no obligation to provide you with due process.”

As a result, I was convicted without trial of inappropriate behavior, which never occurred, with two women students. They wanted to defend me, but they were never interviewed by university officials.

The next time you read about the University of Kentucky’s struggle to handle Title IX cases, think about my Beach Boys song.

Now you know UK has a dean in a college with a First Amendment Center who doesn’t understand the right to free expression.

It also has a provost, or chief academic officer, willing to deny a faculty member due process in an academic freedom case.

As for the song that begins, “Well Shanghai girls are hip; I really dig those styles they wear,” what kind of mind views it as offensive for using “language of a sexual nature?”

Unfortunately, for the wrongly accused, it is the same kind of mind that can see innocent acts as perverted ones.

In this tiresome era of the offended, who decided what’s offensive and what’s not? And now that Donald Trump is in office, situations like this are going to get worst unless our President Elect does something about it. There needs to be an end brought to the idea of microaggressions. People are going to offend each other, that’s human nature.

Source: kentucky.com