Feminist Accused of Sexual Harassment

This is a fascinating, jolting, unsettling book. Gallop makes a disturbingly persuasive (and entertaining) case for the essential harmlessness of sexual relationships between professors and students. Ultimately, I disagree with her thesis for reasons similar to those cited by the other reviewers -- despite her feminist credentials (which are first-rate), Gallop fails to see how the erotic nature of the power differential is a destructive one. It's not that she doesn't acknowledge the power imbalance between teachers and students -- she does -- but she suggests that the imbalance can be easily overcome by entering into consensual amorous relations. (As if once a student and a professor sleep together, all the elements of power are suddenly, uh, "stripped" away!) I am a young male college professor, and I see all too well the temptations in such relationships. But I believe sexual relationships with my students to be fundamentally unethical because if I do sleep with my students (as Gallop slept with hers), I am "trading on" my power, and viscerally reinforcing the notion that for young women sexuality is an appropriate means of getting what you want. I am glad that most professors are not like Jane Gallop. I am grateful, however, that we HAVE Jane Gallop -- and I sense, whatever her ethics, that she truly must be a marvelous teacher. I reject her thesis, but I applaud her daring and recommend this book enthusiastically, especially to graduate students and younger faculty!

Gallop's short book is a fascinating read of the consternations of an highly sexed woman trying to reconcile her nature with her profession. The book is a lucid yet torturous attempt to make it OK to infuse teaching with lots of hot sex. It is brought off by linking it all to feminism, which is supposed to make it OK to do what male professors would be fired for on the spot. Sure, Socrates merged eros with philosophy and most teachers get a charge out of lighting fires in the minds and souls of their students. But when explicit seduction takes over, things can get so messy that genuine professionals ought to restrain themselves more than Gallop has. Still, Gallop is dead right that much of the sexual harassment hoopla is about sex, not about harassment at all, and we are facing more of a puritanical trend than one of professionalism and decency with all the fuss about keeping sex out of college. All in all, this is a pretty good read.