Michigan messes up another sex/race scandal
NewsDr Mark Schlissel has been fired as president of the University of Michigan after attempting to seduce a staff member with the promise of a Jewish delicacy.
Schlissel, 64, is married and Jewish. The university has published 100 pages of emails and texts with the object of his affections.
Administrators said his behaviour was ‘particularly egregious’ in light of his many statements against sexual misconduct.
But Michigan has a recent history of getting these things badly wrong.
It suspended composer Bright Sheng for showing Olivier’s Othello.
It ignored years of sexual abuse by violin professor Stephen Shipps.
It dithered over claims of sexual assault by countertenor David Daniels.
And more. The campus was notorious for mismanaging complaints of a sexual or racal nature.
But a few jokey emails by its president and he’s gone. The first anonymous complaint about Schlissel, who was unpopular with his board, was received only last month. This is lightning-fast for Michigan. Whispers of antiseimitism may not be entirely unfounded.
Which Jewish delicacy?
Latkes, Cholent, Mufletta, Kugel, Rugelach…?
Knish
you are of course being facetious, a knish is the opposite of a delicacy, it’s sold at every NY corner hotdog stand
I think it was karnetzlach.
100 pages ranks as a great deal more than “a few jokey emails”. However, it was idiotic of him to have used the university email system. Such idiocy is grounds for dismissal, whatever his religion.
Sure. No extenuating circumstances for stupidity.
Employee rules in higher education have moved almost entirely to barring new relationships among staff where there is a supervisory role.
NBC reports that in a 2019 email, Schlissel emailed his subordinate a copy of an article in The New Yorker titled “Sexual Fantasies of Everyday New Yorkers.” “Just for fun,” he wrote in the email.
In another email, dated December 2020, Schlissel forwarded the employee a receipt for an online food order. He wrote, “to whet your appetite and tell you what’s for dinner too.”
The email communication between the two appears to be entirely consensual. This has nothing to do with race and everything to do with abuse of power.
He was rightly fired. But if he was fired, how can others who do undoubtedly much, much, much (did I say much?) worse still go unscathed?
A little dribble of context here:
https://www.newyorker.com/humor/daily-shouts/sexual-fantasies-of-everyday-new-yorkers
The ‘Sexual Fantasies of Everyday New Yorkers’ article is a joke which has nothing to do with sex when you actually read it.
If the offences cited, “and more,” occurred on his watch, it is not surprising that spending that much time chasing a staff member — presumably on company time — was the last straw.
You say, “The campus was notorious for mismanaging complaints of a sexual or racal [sic] nature.” By “the campus,” combined with “mismanaging,” implies the very top.
If someone else has ultimate responsibility for what goes on at “the campus,” than Dr. Schlissel joins the list of victims of mishandled sexual or racial misdeeds or perceived misdeeds.
But I did not see you racing to a conclusion of anti-Chinese prejudice, nor to anti-whatever the cultural claims of the others you name. Why do you suppose anti-Semitism and not simply “Let’s get this one right” based on past experience and criticism?
In the past it ignored and dithered and then suspended (ludicrously) so the move to firing the next one is hardly a surprising progression.
Don’t flirt, date, and especially have a romantic relationship with subordinates. End of story.
And Schlissel should be fired for his idiocy alone. As a public research university, it’s very easy to obtain any employee’s emails through an open records request — and the university president is a prime target of these requests.
Now, there’s a few more in the School of Music. Someone should look into the conducting department.
‘a few jokey emails’… wow, way to victim blame Norman! I’m sure the staff member will be thrilled to see that you’re completely invalidating her experience.
The object of his affection was not the anonymous whistle blower.
There is no “victim”, alleged or otherwise.
He violated long standing and clear university policy, policy he was charged with enforcing for the entire campus.
Simple and straightforward.
In the New Yorker Article, the joke is that the NYCers’ sex fantasies are *not* sex…
“I find a lunch in Midtown that costs less than ten dollars. ‘Yes!’ I cry out. ‘Oh, God, yes!’ The cashier hands me a surprisingly substantial sandwich.”—Liz, works in Midtown
I doubt he got fired for the emails.
I presume he got fired for the reason stated… the affair with a subordinate, which, it seems, no one is denying. That is a clear violation of a rule that he would be responsible for enforcing on all the other U employees. I don’t see how they keep him after that.
How much you wanna bet the anonymous whistle blower was a high level member of IT, with access to the president’s work email account?
How stupid can otherwise smart people be, to use his official work email account to carry on an affair? Chutzpah of the highest order.
Between the Music School and the Administration Building, it would look like UofM is the best place to send your child for college if he/she/they are oversexed and looking for a school, in this world of political correctness, that caters to this behavioral defect.
There is no better way to produce future Wolverines who may want to attend the school as Legacy Applicants.
Schlissel screwed up. Not Michigan. Think it was quick of Michigan to fire him? Try keeping him. Oy.
In the old days he would have sent her handwritten notes on engraved stationary. Hers would have come back scented with her favorite perfume. No one would have been the wiser, or if others knew, they would have thought it sweet.
And electronic media are supposed to be a positive development?
I think the Old Days also had ways to detect such cheating which is the basis of many Mozart operas.
The only difference is it unfolds much faster in our Modern Days.
David Daniels has been accused but not found guilty of anything as of yet. Please correct your post.
This is really just getting to be too much, isn’t it? It’d be comical if it wasn’t so horrible, and it just makes the blood boil. How many scandals are we talking about now? I lost count at around three. And you know, it’s at the point where it’s almost like there are degrees of unethical and illegal horribleness among these supposed educators. By far the worst example of all this was Stephen Shipps. I mean one of the worst of all time in the classical music world.
I mean a true crime documentary series level of horrible. He taught at UM with no problem for three decades. Now, it’s actually difficult to tell for sure about any of these men, but it must be Shipps that was able to coerce the most victims over the greatest amount of time. Here I’m just basing things on the reporting itself. Forty years, three separate institutions, numerous victims, rumors of victims supposedly killing themselves over it, indictment, conviction, federal prison and complete rule by fear. Power often corrupts and there are degrees of how it can be abused, but he evidently came out funny from day one and used his power to continue on with his pedophiliac scheme.
This being a classical music news website, I think it’s important to just keep hammering home how f’ed up it was to keep him at U of M. I really can’t emphasize enough how it sets the tone for the culture of a whole school to protect total sociopaths. It’s hard to believe how all of it could be normalized by the professors that just sat there while that was all going on right down the hall from them (and by god they knew it was). It makes you wonder, was it all just sociopathic self interest? Was there even a speck of consideration for all the people that were not only victimized by this lunatic, but also the ones that were threatened and cowed into submission for the reason of protecting that man’s very open secret? The answer is no, and again no: because the main point became to try to one-up him in various ways, but it didn’t work because no one could. That country club pedophile viciously attacked his students over and over—did anyone read that public instagram post? What was described was absolutely sickening. And then the press and school comes down on the students for questioning the choices of a composition professor last semester. Ha. And for any of the old guard yes-men and thugs and female professors that try to promote themselves as quasi-feminists that let him rape girls down the hall in his office, if you have never asked yourself an intelligent question in your entire lives about the egregious breaches of ethics you treated your students to that entire time, then please, think of one. Sure, this is a rant, and it’s not even about Schlissel’s affair. But it’s really time to ask some serious questions about Michigan as a whole, and the SMTD in specific. Let’s try to make this a more equitable world for a change.
You suggest possible antisemitism.
Jordan Acker is one of the eight Regents who voted to fire Schlissel. He has made it his mission to combat antisemitism:
https://thejewishnews.com/2019/03/21/jordan-acker-fights-against-anti-semitism/
Mark Bernstein is another. He is a former Board member of the Jewish Funds for Justice.
Ron Weiser is another. He is a member of the Republican Jewish Coalition.
It’s SD. Interpolating whiffs of anti-Semitism are de rigueur on this site. Often it’s a case of “crying wolf” too many times, which is actually counterproductive.
I agree with Mr. Lebrecht, this is blatant balderdash. Thankfully, the Michigan example is not followed by its neighbors. At the very heart of the Midwest, in a glorious city, lies a glorious institution that not only does not chastise having sexual relationships with a subordinate; it actually underwrites such a behavior, finances it, and shields it from all interference.
This luminous organization, guided by impeccable family men, has been setting the ethical standards of the future for all professional arts organizations to follow.
Name the institution.
Anti-Semitism? Please. How did this guy get so far without knowing you don’t get yer meat where you get yer bread.
Precisely.
Such a bungler, sending a receipt. A real Master would email pictures of the actual delicacy!