{"id":4635,"date":"2025-01-15T19:26:56","date_gmt":"2025-01-15T19:26:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/empathygap.uk\/?p=4635"},"modified":"2025-01-15T19:26:56","modified_gmt":"2025-01-15T19:26:56","slug":"title-ix-for-all-jonathan-taylor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/empathygap.uk\/?p=4635","title":{"rendered":"Title IX for All: Jonathan Taylor"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

One of the more significant of the unsung heroes of the movement for men and boys has been the USA\u2019s Jonathan Taylor. For nearly 15 years Taylor has been toiling away on what might most simply be described as \u201cadvocating for fairness\u201d. With his background in teaching at higher education level, Taylor has always focused on matters pertaining to education. But for a long time now \u2013 longer than the last three presidential terms \u2013 his focus has been on assisting those accused of sexual misconduct at college via his Title IX for All<\/a> site. In a brief personal record Taylor summarises its purpose,<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201c\u2026to make knowledge about the Title IX world more accessible to the general public by talking about what would otherwise only exist in obscure court records, and creating databases to track court cases, regulations, and OCR investigations. That\u2019s also why I decided to be an advisor for accused students, many of whom have no money tree to shake and are in need of affordable options<\/em>.\u201d (OCR = Office for Civil Rights).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I shall clarify below what Title IX is. It is timely to raise this issue now because of a recent court ruling in the States which is, for once, good news. I\u2019ll come to that. Whilst I focus on allegations against students, Title IX and Title IX for All<\/a> also cover allegations against faculty.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Readers of this blog will not need me to spell out the egregious nature of the status quo on university campuses as regards the handling of complaints regarding young men\u2019s sexual conduct. The problems of gross gender bias and the flouting of due process are endemic across the \u201cwestern\u201d world. In the USA these are specifically associated with a piece of Federal legislation, universally referred to as \u201cTitle IX\u201d. It is ostensibly about equal opportunities of the sexes in the context of education. The following is the opening of the text of Title IX<\/a>, which is followed by several exceptions and clarifications:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cNo person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any education program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As always, the devil is in the detail \u2013 and in the interpretation and implementation of the statute. UK readers will be familiar with how legislation which appears to promote equality (e.g., the 2010 Equality Act) can be very effective in lending legitimacy to the opposite in the hands of activists \u2013 and the bias always goes one way. As an example, Title IX became infamous for its impact on men\u2019s \u00a0college sports. Huge numbers of closures, or reductions, in men\u2019s sports teams on campuses across the USA arose as a result of Title IX<\/a>. But it has been in the context of allegations of sexual offences in universities that Title IX has been most destructive. \u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The interpretation and implementation of any legislation is everything, and the interpretation and implementation are products of the prevailing culture. As regards sexual offences within an educational context, the dominant sentiment<\/a> which ran \u2013 and still runs \u2013 throughout virtually all influential bodies is that \u201cwhen students suffer sexual assault and harassment, they are deprived of equal and free access to an education\u201d. The prevailing sentiment became manifest in virulent form in April 2011 in the form of the now-infamous \u201cDear Colleague Letter\u201d, issued by the\u00a0Department of Education’s\u00a0Office for Civil Rights<\/a> during the Obama administration. It reminded us that \u201cthe sexual harassment of students, including sexual violence, interferes with students’ right to receive an education free from discrimination and, in the case of sexual violence, is a crime\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As always with political policies deploying moral coercion, there is a legitimate issue here \u2013 though there may be some overstatement. But what is unacknowledged is that allegations are only allegations. The prevailing ethos was \u2013 and still is \u2013 to believe the accuser (often referred to immediately as a \u201cvictim\u201d). It fails to acknowledge that being thrown out of university on the basis of an unproved allegation also \u2013 and rather more directly \u2013 \u201cinterferes with a student\u2019s right to receive an education\u201d. And here the prevailing culture impacts on political policy which in turn impacts on collegiate policy, namely that their broader obligations to truth and justice can be ignored – for young men.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The \u201cDear Colleague\u201d letter stated that it is the responsibility of institutions of higher education to “take immediate and effective steps to end sexual harassment and sexual violence” and makes clear that, should an institution fail to fulfil its responsibilities under Title IX, the Department of Education can impose a fine and potentially deny further institutional access to federal funds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

You see how that works? There is no threat of fines or withdrawal of funding if a university expels a young man without due process and without any meaningful examination of the allegations. Emanating from the highest Federal levels, the threats push the college in only one direction. As Taylor\u2019s advisory guide<\/a> for accused students puts it,<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cSome accused students think that their situation will work itself out if they just tell the school the truth about what happened because schools generally prioritize truth and fairness. Unfortunately, this is not how Title IX proceedings work. A school\u2019s primary interest is not in determining the truth of what happened but in minimizing its potential liability. This bias exceeds the rest<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Taylor\u2019s Title IX for All<\/a> has been active in supporting accused students for over a decade. The site maintains database of nearly 900 lawsuits raised by former students (or faculty) who consider themselves as unfairly dismissed, plus a database of nearly 1,000 resolved OCR Title IX investigations. There is also a database of about 1,800 US attorneys who have assisted accused students and school employees in Title IX grievance proceedings and litigations. The site also hosts a range of valuable relevant information, articles and advice. (My own February 2015 article \u201cFeminism and the Decline of Physics A Level<\/a>\u201d appears on the site, here<\/a>, under authorship \u201cJohn Doe\u201d – presumably they lost the authorship).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And so to the recent developments. The first Trump administration made various changes to Title IX guidelines that were implemented during the Obama administration. These changes shifted the standard of evidence used in Title IX investigations from “preponderance of the evidence” to a “clear and convincing” evidence standard. Trump\u2019s administration sought to limit the scope of Title IX to sex only, excluding gender identity and sexual orientation, and in February 2017 the Departments of Justice and Education  withdrew the guidance on gender identity.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

On 22 September 2017, US Department of Education Secretary Betsy Devos rescinded the Obama-era guidelines which had prodded colleges and universities to more aggressively investigate campus sexual assaults. On 7 May 2020, the U.S. Department of Education released regulations governing campus sexual assault allegations and investigations under Title IX, the first Title IX guidance published by the OCR to go through a formal notice-and-comment process since 1997.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the area of sports, the first Trump administration’s Department of Education contended that the rights of biological women were being infringed by transgender women and so started to withhold federal funding from schools which \u201caffirmed the identities\u201d of transgender athletes, i.e., allowed them to compete in women\u2019s teams and\/or against women.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Most importantly, the Trump administration imposed due process protections, perhaps the most important change of all to the interpretation under Obama given that the principal method of unfair dismissal was simply to disallow any meaningful investigation or defence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Contrary to any idea that the Trump era changes to Title IX were legally unsound, they have actually withstood five legal challenges by state attorneys general, women’s groups, and accuser advocacy groups<\/a>. One is tempted to conclude that the previous (Obama) rules were those that were legally fragile.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Unsurprisingly, the Biden administration which followed Trump\u2019s first term sought to reverse the changes his administration made and to further entrench the authoritarianism, bias and injustice that had been the direction of travel hitherto. Under the Obama administration, Title IX had been interpreted as applicable also to transgender students, so that a self-identified trans women must be treated as a woman and a self-identified trans man must be treated as a man. These interpretations had been reversed under Trump. But in June 2022 the Biden administration issued a proposed rule to reverse the changes made under Trump and to expand coverage regarding gender identity and pregnancy.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

But most seriously, the Biden proposed \u201cFinal Rule\u201d, which was due to come into force on 1st<\/sup> August 2024, was to introduce further assaults on due process, such as (paraphrasing Taylor\u2019s own account<\/a>),<\/p>\n\n\n\n