Sexual Harassment in academic scientific context, why did it
shock us?    What we learned over the
last six months is that scientist male and female are still human.   Humans when placed in social context will
behave like social and sexual animals that we all are.  Schools are not a safe space from this due to
simple human nature.   That said, being
the thinking animals that we are we need to know how to control and at least
manage those impulses.  Now that the
shock has worn off, the veil has come off, and we know scientist are just
human.  Some common sense would’ve
avoided all of this.   If you would want
to beat someone up for doing it to your sister or mother then don’t do it to
someone else’s sister or mother.

Being transgender in academic and scientific context I have
had everything from a professor drooling over my enhanced chest to hearing my
body discussed.  I have had everything
from in lab flings and crushes to the awkwardness of those ending.  My trysts were mostly, admittedly only twice with tomboyish women.  I have been looked at as a sexual oddity and
discriminated against.  I have been
looked at as somehow above the strictures of gender.  I have had to explain to superiors that
students can and will act out in class and complain about me in part because of
who I am.  Transwomen are the acid test
of acceptance and liberality and I can say first-hand the academe is no better
than the Mosque or the Church for this.  
The religious may be easier even, the truly spiritual know they are not
perfect, a highly educated academic may not feel they have anything left to
learn.

Then there are the places where I have relative peace where
I am not open about who I am.  Whispers
maybe but that is it.  In 2016 we are
still in a world where a person needs to uphold a certain image of how gender
is supposed to be to have an easy time of things. 

The oldest and most vital human nature.  When it comes to certain basic drives modern humans are no different than Australopiths.  Most relevantly, even at that early stage, at least some of them, found intelligence in a mate super attractive.  This sexual selection is a likely reason we are intelligent enough to even think up things like sexual harassment. (Miller. The Mating Mind. ISBN 0-8058-5749-4.)

  Academia
reflects the society from which it is drawn. 

Academia can be the first point of change, a fountain of new ideas, but
simply being educated is no inoculation against acting like a brutal
Australopithecine when trying to mate with the smartest partner(s) available.

To eradicate this problem completely would require a
reengineering of behaviors that reflect the deepest hardest wired human
nature.  We seek mates who are on our
level intellectually.  At least that is
who we seek to procreate with.  We seek
mates who are as desirable as possibly physically.  We are the product of millions of years of
ape like Australopiths, then primitive Homo (habilis, erectus) having as much
sex as possible with the smartest fittest mates possible.  Trying to alter that is like trying to alter
the instinct to eat when food is presented that makes so many Americans
overweight (my self-included for the time being) and obese. 

For this reason, it is absurd to demand that people not
notice the anatomy that is on display. 
That is like a reflex.  What can
be controlled is what one does about that.

The only real solution, at the end of the day, is to train
men in science what it is like to be one of a few women in science.  To train them to control themselves and …unless that woman across the lab table from
them gives them a clear sign… simply seek their mates and expend their
sexual energies outside the lab/classroom/office.     

The kind of hostile environment created by explicit jokes
and images is clearly not appropriate.  As
for the “romance gone wrong” scenario the problem would be solved in science
and in academics if these guys would not crap where they eat.   Even if they clear initial signs are given,
and things go well for a while unless you two are the Curies in the making it will
end badly.   Then handle that bad romance with some
maturity on both sides.   Things go
sideways with a lab mate, emphasis on the mate, will not mean that they
disappear from the lab.   For that matter
if things don’t go sideways even then a lovey dovey couple being a bit too
touchy feely at work could also create a hostile environment.  

My three rules are a good personal policy and for any
organization.

Don’t date (or be in any way emotional about)
subordinates. 

If you date them keep everything above board and public no
sneaking around.

If things go south, as the superior person, either leave or
act to reduce the awkwardness for your former partner.

In short.  This is a
complicated problem that has plagued science since Ughugh the stone blade maker
took a fancy to Prr the fire maker/tender. 
There are no perfect solutions.    No finite list of rules can cover all
possible situations.  Just use common
sense.  A good bro-standable way of thinking of this...

If you would want to beat someone
up for doing it to your sister or mother, then don’t do it to someone else’s sister
or mother.