A University of Kentucky professor took to the op-ed pages of a local newspaper this weekend to decry a “sexual misconduct” punishment tied to lyrics by the Beach Boys.
Journalism professor Buck Ryan claims his China-inspired rendition of 1965’s “California Girls” at Jilin University in 2015 landed him in hot water with colleagues. A complaint was filed with charges of inappropriate behavior with two students, which sparked a three-month investigation. Those students were never interviewed, but Mr. Ryan was banned from receiving international travel funds and stripped of an award.
“When I inquired about my due process rights, I was told by the provost that I didn’t have any,” the professor wrote Saturday in the Lexington Herald Leader. “Here’s the quote: ’There is no constitutional right to represent the University of Kentucky abroad. Nor is there a constitutional right to teach a particular class. Accordingly, the University has no obligation to provide you with due process.’ As a result, I was convicted without trial of inappropriate behavior, which never occurred, with two women students. They wanted to defend me, but they were never interviewed by university officials.”
Mr. Ryan went on to excoriate University of Kentucky’s Title IX coordinator, who ruled that “California Girls” includes “language of a sexual nature.”
“As for the song that begins, ’Well Shanghai girls are hip; I really dig those styles they wear,’ what kind of mind views it as offensive for using ’language of a sexual nature?’ ” the professor wrote. “Unfortunately, for the wrongly accused, it is the same kind of mind that can see innocent acts as perverted ones.”
A redacted letter on the incident by the University’s Office of Institutional Equity and Equal Opportunity was released in October 2015. It stated that an unnamed individual was seen wearing one of Mr. Ryan’s shirts one morning as they walked together.
Patty Bender, the school’s assistant vice president for equal opportunity, claimed he told a faculty member, “We aren’t at U.K.,” when he was eventually confronted.
“The University of Kentucky’s Title IX office not only can’t tell the good guys from the bad guys, but it also doesn’t know the difference between ’evidence’ and ’allegation,’ ” Mr. Ryan told The Washington Post via email on Monday. “The university is yet to present to me any evidence. It can start with its evidence that the Beach Boys lyrics are offensive.”
Jay Blanton, a spokesman for the University of Kentucky, told the newspaper that Mr. Ryan was being “manipulative of the facts.”
• Douglas Ernst can be reached at dernst@washingtontimes.com.
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