The University of Pennsylvania gave itself a black eye last week when the media got word that the university was unfairly prosecuting a student for publishing photos of a couple having sex up against a dorm window. Penn backed down in the wake of national media mockery, and dropped charges against the student photographer who was being illegitimately accused of sexual harassment, among other things. Now the question is what, if anything, does this unsettling window into the usually confidential operations of the Office of Student Conduct reveal about that office's own conduct?

Alan Charles Kors, a Penn history professor with a long history of defending the expressive rights of students against repressive and censorious administrations, suggests that where there is smoke, there is fire. In the comments to a Daily Pennsylvanian piece on the case, Kors argues that the focus should not be on either the student photographer or the student whose erotic activities he exposed. Rather, the focus should be on the Office of Student Conduct itself:

The deepest question here is whether or not Penn students have the rights and the protections from capricious power that are their moral due. Students should be alarmed by the behavior of the Office of Student Conduct. This one undergraduate had the integrity, dignity, and force of character to say no. (He also had a graduate student advisor, Andrew Geier, who is the true hero in this, and whose concern for undergraduate rights is a great gift to Penn.) Many students---bullied by an OSC that clearly has lost its judgment, its common sense, its belief in equity, and its respect for students' rights---simply would have signed a terrible and immoral settlement in order to avoid worse punishment. If this had been a fraternity student exposing himself sexually above Locust Walk, and a young woman had photographed it and posted in on a blog about Penn and her life at Penn, the photographer would have been deemed an official hero and the fraternity student (or perhaps the whole fraternity) would be gone. I also would beg the Penn community to leave in peace the individuals who were photographed. Enough is enough. It's fun to be young; it's terrible to bring irresponsible charges against someone rather than to assume responsibility for one's own choices and behaviors; and it's awful to suffer unduly. Let's put this particular event behind us quickly, and let's focus on the real issue: the powers of an apparently unfair and indecent OSC that has such control over your lives and your futures.

Thanks to Maurice Black for the link.

"I also would beg the Penn community to leave in peace the individuals who were photographed. Enough is enough. It's fun to be young; it's terrible to bring irresponsible charges against someone rather than to assume responsibility for one's own choices and behaviors; and it's awful to suffer unduly."

I am confused by the last sentence. I've been young, and had fun, and I've never had sex in an open window. If it's terrible to bring irresponsible charges rather than assume responsibility, then we need to help the person doing this to mature beyond this behavior by allowing lawful consequences to take place. Otherwise why will he or she ever stop? And who exactly has suffered unduly?