Anti-abortion exhibit as sexual harassment?

[Leslie Goldstein]

I reply to Mike,
I used to think the same way until I saw the film with Jack Nicholson
and (I think) Demi Moore.  I think it was "A FEW GOOD MEN"? In it he
harshly harasses her in a could-be-interpreted-as-jocular way using
sexaual innuendo.  It was a powerful scene for demonstrating how remarks
simply put into a transcript out of context might look like lame humor
but in context have a clearly hostile content.  If you have not seen the
film I recommend you rent it just to see that scene.
respectfully,
Leslie Goldstein

Michael McConnell wrote:
>
> Thanks to Lynne Henderson for her informative post. But I still find it
> difficult to understand the connection between being offended, being
> offended on the basis of gender, and being offended discriminatorily.
>
> Lynne writes: The "oversensitive woman" notion--or the humorless
> feminist--has been used
> by many courts to suggest that *all* or *most* women have to be offended,
> and that "ribaldry" in the work place is just something women have to put up
> with.  See Susan Estrich *Sex at Work* 43 (?) Stan. L .Rev.  The 9th Circuit
> OTOH in an opinion by Koszinski suggests the "reasonable woman"
> standard--would the reasonable woman" feel threatened or discriminated
> against in a hostile environment case.  *Ellison v. Brady*
>
> Why is "ribaldry in the workplace" something that "women have to put up
> with" rather than something -- like unpleasant odors or summer heat -- that
> *everyone* has to put up with? Why is "ribaldry" thought to be a
> gender-based problem? Is this an empirical observation: that more women than
> men object to ribaldry? (If so, this would seem to be a disparate impact
> issue.) Or is ribald speech illegal only when the speaker chooses his (or
> her) targets on the basis of sex, or perhaps chooses his (or her) subject
> matter for the purpose of making people of one particular gender
> uncomfortable? (If so, this would seem to be a disparate treatment issue.)
> Or is the problem based on the  view (which is controversial, and maybe
> wrong) that the subject matter of ribaldry -- sex -- is somehow hostile to
> women? (If so, what kind of discrimination theory is this?)
>
> Michael W. McConnell
> University of Utah College of Law
> 332 S. 1400 East Room 102
> Salt Lake City, UT 84112