Lana Whited at Roanoke.Com

When I was a college student, I had a T-shirt from a store called Athletic Attic, with the slogan "I get mine in the attic." My mother didn't like it at all. I insisted that the T-shirt merely advertised the fact that I bought my Adidas at Athletic Attic.

I thought of that shirt last week when Ferrum students unveiled the Spring Fling T-shirt logo: "Get Lei'd." Incorporated into a Hawaiian theme, the logo was meant to encourage students to have a flowery necklace placed around their necks -- at least that's what some students told me.

A colleague asked me what I thought of the logo and whether the college might be justified in intervening. (You get these questions regularly when you teach media.) I did not give a definitive answer. I suggested that the student committee that made the selection be reconvened to discuss how they would defend the decision if a controversy resulted. (This process has served our student newspaper staff well.) Another colleague suggested that the appropriate authorities might consider whether the T-shirt could, in any scenario, violate the college's Sexual Harassment Policy.

I spent a very enjoyable hour discussing these issues with my Professional Writing students, whom I regard as bright, mature and sensitive. Although they were divided in their reactions, for the most part they told me I was "making a mountain out of a mole hill."

We focused our discussion on three questions, in order:

1. Is the logo offensive?

2. Could the logo cause a person to feel sexually harassed?

3. Should the administration intervene?

We immediately had to revise question one to "Would some people find the logo offensive?" Whereas a majority of students in the class said they didn't take offense, they quickly pointed out that others undoubtedly would. These people, they predicted, would be older and more prudish than they are. Most of them felt their fellow students would laugh any objections away. (I should note here that two students said unequivocally that they found the logo offensive, and another told me so after class. My students' reactions weren't predictable, however. One of the offended students was male, and the two nontraditional students in the class -- both women closer to my age -- split.)

Because SOME people would be offended by the logo, my students said, we had to go on to question two: could anyone succeed with a successful sexual harassment charge? If so, they decided, the college administration would have greater reason to pull the plug on the shirts. We read the Ferrum College Sexual Harassment Policy and, after several definitions which did not seem pertinent, we found one which did: "sexual harassment is defined as ... any written communication which is sexually offensive."

Many legal standards of acceptable speech or behavior on school grounds are based on protecting the learning environment. In the landmark Tinker decision on student press rights (1969), the Supreme Court said student journalists are free to express opinions unless they disrupt the learning environment. Our Sexual Harassment Policy establishes a similar standard, identifying sexual behavior or communication as harassment "when it has the purpose or effect of 1) creating an intimidating, hostile, or offensive working / learning environment; or 2) substantially interfering with job or academic performance." A few years ago, an Iron Blade editor asked a fellow editor to change out of a "Big Johnson" T-shirt because it was creating a tense atmosphere in the staff room. I supported her decision, feeling that she was sparing her peers an "offensive working / learning environment." (The student in the T-shirt complied readily.)

After reviewing the Sexual Harassment Policy, my students decided it could definitely apply to a T-shirt logo. Initially, they felt that the "Get Lei'd" logo probably did not violate the policy. I pressed them to reconsider the question as "is it conceivable that a person might succeed with a sexual harassment claim based on the T-shirt?" I outlined a scenario. Suppose a female student is working with a male student in close quarters -- biology lab, the photography darkroom, tutoring. The male student is wearing the T-shirt, and the female student feels uncomfortable. She asks him to change or turn the shirt inside-out. He refuses, insisting that there is nothing wrong with his garment. Could she charge him with sexual harassment? Most students said possibly.

Then I changed the shoe to the other foot. Say the male student is interrogated by the woman about why he's wearing the "Get Lei'd" shirt. He shrugs it off, having never considered the T-shirt more than a memento of Spring Fling, but she is adamant, suggesting that she can't work with him because he probably thinks of her as a sex object. If she won't let up, can HE file a sexual harassment charge? Maybe, the students said. They were interested in the notion that the shirt wearer might be the object of the harassment. What if a man approached a woman wearing the shirt, said, "Okay, let's get lei'd," and became forceful? Interesting, my students said -- probably over the line.

We ran out of time with our discussion, but I got the impression that few, if any, students would say yes to question three -- would the administration be justified in intervening? I wish I'd had time to present them with this scenario: Suppose our local hardware store, Lynch's, printed a T-shirt with the logo, "Get Lynched" -- meaning "become a regular customer of Lynch Hardware." Would the racial overtones offend prospective customers? Almost certainly. Would people buy the T-shirt? I doubt it. Yet a few people I tested that analogy on told me it wasn't the same thing.

That reaction confirmed my hunch that two factors were feeding my students' reaction. The first factor is societal -- sexual innuendo is tolerated to a far greater extent in our culture than similarly offensive statements based on race. That's because women are usually the targets of sexual innuendo, and, unfortunately, women are still fair game.

The second factor is my students' youth. Many are still testing their own independence, so if authorities object to something, they gravitate toward it. If their parents or teachers don't like a shirt, they'll wear it in the yearbook photo. Young people don't yet grasp the concept of reputation. They don't realize that people draw conclusions about what's INSIDE us based on what they see on our OUTSIDES. Students don't understand that we aren't mad at them nearly as often as we're disappointed in their judgment.

The strength of my reaction against the logo really surprised me. The first words I thought when I heard about it were "I wish you hadn't done that." I felt dismayed -- not angry. If you still think a sexual pun is funny or cute, I thought, are we failing at your education?

My own answer to question three -- administrative intervention -- is that while it might have sent a strong message to students, it would probably have been the wrong message. My young friend Beth went to the circus last week, and she noticed groups protesting the circus animals' treatment. She took their handouts, watched the show, and afterward wrote a letter to the editor of The Roanoke Times to say that "some of the animals looked miserable and others tired." Later, a college student told Beth's father that maybe he shouldn't have let her go to the circus, if he thought it might upset her. His response was that of a good father: she saw the animals for herself, heard the protesters' arguments, and came to her own conclusion. She made an informed decision; she learned to form her own values.

An administrative order to pull the "Get Lei'd" logo would have been the equivalent of Beth's father prohibiting the circus. It would have pre-empted discussions like the one I had with my students. I don't know whether those discussions will have any lasting effect, but I will say this: Spring Fling was a week ago, and I have yet to see a student actually wearing a "Get Lei'd" shirt.

When I headed for the door wearing the "I get mine in the attic" shirt, my mom never said "don't" or "back to your room, young lady." What she said was, "I wish you wouldn't wear that." The decision, ultimately, was mine. And this is what I want to tell my students about their "Get Lei'd" shirts: I wish you wouldn't buy them, and I wish you wouldn't wear them. If you did buy one and you do wear it, I hope you'll think about how others might react to it and take their reactions seriously. And I hope you give it away sooner than I did my "attic" shirt. Also, I want to say to them, maybe this is not just a mole hill. Maybe there IS a mountain there -- maybe you just can't see the whole thing yet.

A mountain or a mole hill?