Leslie: Ruth, I’m sorry, but for a college professor to hire such an individual, they would have to be the most careless, irresponsible oh no, I think I just invoked her.
Robin: Sup, I just felt the overwhelming urge to sprint over here holding a job application for some reason.
If Ruth was going to have Jason confess to another facility member about his guilt Robin would have been the most likely to offer help or advice if only because she doesn’t take the schools ethics seriously.
She may not take the school’s rules seriously, but she might be wary of someone who might have pressured an unwilling student into sex for grades. (it didn’t exactly happen like that but she doesn’t know the details.)
Archieve
Good point.
thejeff
For all of Robin’s faults, when she found out about Ryan she took it seriously. Fired her staff for suggesting she cover it up for political expediency.
The other option is that Jason brings up how failing to fulfill the terms of his visa means he goes back to his bond-villain father, which Leslie might have sympathy for
I hadn’t thought Leslie could summon Robin the way Dorothy should (by all rights) have been able to summon Becky, but now I’m totally on board with it.
I don’t get it. Why is grading her pages not corrupt? Isn’t the entire problem that grading pages of somebody you’re sleeping with affects whether you can grade them fairly?
He’s saying he should’ve at least boosted her grade if he was gonna be fired anyway. It was corrupt no matter what. Grading her paper fairly was just to make himself feel like less of a knob.
I always felt like, at least at first, Jason just assumed the sex he was having had nothing to do with him grading the papers. Which is why Sal was shocked that he graded her papers fairly and he was sorta like “why wouldn’t I?”. Like it hadn’t even crossed his mind that’s why sex was happening to him.
Meagan
Wait I don’t remember this scene. When did Sal get a paper back from him?
Thank you. I forgot that she straight up said she did it for a grade improvement. That’s kinda lame. In the actual porn comic, she say’s something like, “You’ll do,” and I never got the impression that she was doing it for a grade during the sex. In hindsight I could see how it was implied, but he definitely never agreed to such an exchange.
Vukodlak
It was almost a decade ago so not surprising you’ve forgotten.
Sirksome
Yeah that’s part of the reason I don’t care for him. He’s a bland mix of stuck up and stupid.
Yotomoe
Hehe might be why I like him. I don’t know much about stuck up but I can RELATE to twitter.
BBCC
Jason knew. He made it very clear in the Slipshine preview that he knew EXACTLY what Sal meant. He said that boosting her grade would be immoral, Sal said ‘yeah’ and Jason kissed her. She took that as a yes, and he later clarified that he meant yes to the sex, not the grade boost.
Yotomoe
Ah damn. I guess I shoulda checked that slipshine 😛
Also “Say Yes to the sex” is my favorite spinoff of “Say yes to the dress”
BBCC
I know right? Best spin off.
Taffy
From memory, as I recall…
Sal takes her top off, knocks some stuff off the desk, climbs over it, and straddles Jason. The following exchange happens:
“Ya said it yerself– Effort don’t matter. Ah’m only bein’ judged against my marks.”
“This–this is unethical in a staggering number of ways!”
“Yeah.“?
Then he looks shocked and then he kisses her. And then they fuck.
Joy
The thing about that scene that gets me Is that… It felt like sal wasn’t new to doing this? Implying that she had this sort of thing as an underaged teenager while in a Catholic boarding school that she wasn’t allowed to leave, with the intention of isolating her from society.
So… Even more cult abuse in this webcomic
thejeff
I think there’s another hint to that somewhere, but I don’t remember enough about it to try to track it down.
Sirksome
She says something to Danny here, post Jason that I think is in reference to him specifically but it could apply to her past in general.
I think most of the relationships she’s had the partner’s only been interested in her physical appearance and she’s internalized to believe that’s what most guys want from her and she uses that to “stick it to the man” I think she said. To be fair, that is what Jason wanted from her. He immediately leered at her the first time they met and made a sleazy pickup line.
Joy
Sirksome, that’s totally true! Jason came across as predatory from the start.
Yotomoe
I’ll be honest, as a touch starved guy who hasn’t dated in a decade if Sal Walkerton started stripping and hopped on my lap it’d take a Herculean feat if willpower for me to not act on it.
Which brings me to my next thought. It wasn’t crazy inappropriate for sal to do what she did. She basically starts tearing her clothes off and climbing on top of him. Up until Jason consents as far as I’m concerned that’s basically sexual assault. And I don’t wanna sound like I’m victim blaming but I feel like if Joe did that with Penny I’d find that skeevy in a way it doesn’t feel like this moment with sal is portrayed. Now at the time it just felt like porn acting. That sorta thing in shows and movies where everyone sorta just acts on their arousal in the moment because it’s more dynamic and dramatic. Which is fine a lot of couples in the comic are made through dynamic passionate kisses and stuff without the verbal contract of consent coming up until a bit later. But since were taking the actions of the characters very literally now I can’t help but think “Wait Sal actually did that. And I can’t recall if there’s been any conversation really of why that’s not an ok thing to do.”
And Jason himself, to his credit, didn’t let her having sex with him effect her test grades and also began giving her tests to a 3rd party to grade. He literally was relinquishing power over her, probably out of guilt. But he definitely made it as clear as possible “fucking me wont change your grades” I can say what he did was wrong but honestly he probably did the best version of that wrong thing. And I’m probably being charitable because he’s not rich or significantly older, or a professor or ,let’s face it, stronger than sal. In fact I’d argue that Sal has more power over him in this instance because if they get found out she might fail the class or at worst be expelled while he gets actually deported. It doesn’t help that sals mom is super good pals with the dean, racist favoritism not withstanding. I dunno I know it was wrong for him to do but I just can’t really even see him as a predator I’m this situation. It just sorta fell into his lap. Literally.
Yotomoe
“It was crazy inappropriate to do what sal did”
One little typo can mess Up the whole thesis of my post.
Sirksome
I think maybe you’re confusing predatory with abuse of power here. Jason isn’t a predator, he didn’t assault Sal, in fact as you bring up in a certain light one could argue the opposite although I think the truth is a gray area like most social/sexual interactions can be when people don’t directly express consent cause that’s not how humans think when they’re horny.
The problem is that Jason’s position as TA gave him power over Sal in that Sal has no actual control over her grades and he does. As shown by him not actually improving them after she slept with him. He got everything out of the deal and Sal didn’t and Sal just has to hold that L. In fact it could get worse. If Jason wanted he could have used Sal’s grades as leverage for more sex. “Have sex with me or you fail”. That power imbalance doesn’t go away just because Sal initiated the hookup. Jason knows this. As a professional it is his obligation not to conduct such behavior. But he was equally horny so he did it. Handing over her work for some else to grade is like dialing 911 after your house has been burning for 40 minutes. Good move but the damage is done.
This is all before you even get into the muddy waters of the he said, she said, nature of these interactions. Who would be believed? The rich white dude with authority and a sterling reputation. Or the mixed black girl some people including Jason would consider a “troublemaker” at first impression.
That’s the issue from my perspective, but it does get kind of ambiguous in the details. I just don’t think those details matter.
Yotomoe
“He got everything out of the deal and Sal didn’t” sorta inherently implies that sex wasn’t as pleasurable for her as it was for him. I dunno maybe it wasn’t but I guess that’s sorta my issue. I’m caught between the sex positive rhetoric of “sex isn’t a big deal and is much too demonized in society” and “Sex isn’t ok unless very specific parameters are met”. Two consenting, similarly aged adults had sex and one went through the effort to make sure this coupling didn’t effect his scoring of her test and it’s still bad because he COULD have. By that same metric Jason didn’t get anything out of the sex either (except Fired.)
Someone below mentioned taking bribes down there but that seems more cut and dry. Like that’s a clear “someone is gaining money and someone is losing money”. Is the sex a zero sum game? Like if Jason and sal had played super smash bros together instead would that have been as bad? Like if he was obsessed with smash and used his position as a TA to play a few matches with him, would that be grounds for firing? It might be. But as someone who has never Had sex I often feel like I don’t understand how this works.
Sirksome
@Yotomoe. I like that Smash comparison. That’s probably perfect for this. Ironically the sex probably isn’t what matters here. Not the physical act two consenting adult participated in. But yes if Jason was challenged by Sal to a round of Smash, final destination, 3 stocks, no items, in exchange for an A that would still be a problem. That’s what I mean here. Sal didn’t get the A. That was the deal vaguely implied. Because off Jason’s position as TA he does not have to give that to her regardless of if she fucks him, smashes him, or chooses to like bow ties. Plus it sets a precedent that Jason will pass people who beat him in Smash which undermines the system. His integrity as a TA is compromised.
Yotomoe
Hehe thanks. I just default to it cuz it’s my favorite multiplayer game. Though in this context “smash” is an apt double entendre. I guess the big issue here is that some important context is only in the slipshine. Going by what others have said I will at the very least say Jason is at fault because he didn’t outright deny “no, fucking me will not yield better results in your test scores.” Prior to the sex happening. I don’t know if that’d make it better but it certainly makes it worse that he didn’t.
Using the metaphor it would be like if Sal challenged him to smash bros and won and then got mad because she assumed that match would improve her grades. And Jason is just like “oh I just like playing smash. When Sal challenged him he didn’t clarify that this was just a game. He just thought she enjoyed platform fighters. If anything I’d be kinda put off if someone asked me to play a video game to decompress and then got mad if I didn’t reward them when they won. Sal kinda presented the sex as a “I’m sick of being here let’s fuck” but then recontexualized it as “I’m sick of being here so instead of tutoring me just fuck me to improve my grades” and Jason either didn’t catch on or didn’t acknowledge the paradigm shift. He just thought she wanted to smash bros.
Alex
It’s not like they were on a date and Jason just happened to be her TA. This all happened during his office hours, and Sal says “we both want to get out of here” before she initiates. There was some pretty heavy subtext going on. If you’re in a direct position of power over someone, you should assume there are motives beyond simple attraction. If she’d asked his favorite video game and agreed to play it with him, Jason should recognize that’s not in his job description and she’s probably attempting to build up good will in exchange for more lenient grading. That’s not normal or appropriate behavior between a student and TA in the middle of office hours.
Yotomoe
Not to be that guy but it was actually decidedly not his office hours. Sal basically dragged him by his collar into his office on his day off. He wasn’t there out of commitment to a student but by force more or less. Also sal preceded a lot of this by complaining how she hasn’t had any action in a while and was jealous that even her brother is getting some while she’s not. So at this time of she had asked to play smash he’d be well in his right to play. He’s not supposed to work today.
Yotomoe
Not to be that guy but it was actually decidedly not his office hours. Sal basically dragged him by his collar into his office on his day off. He wasn’t there out of commitment to a student but by force more or less. Also sal preceded a lot of this by complaining how she hasn’t had any action in a while and was jealous that even her brother is getting some while she’s not. So at this time of she had asked to play smash he’d be well in his right to play. He’s not supposed to work today.
Alex
I forgot that it was not his appointed office hours. But aside from the fact that Sal was out of line to physically drag him around, I don’t think that changes the situation all that much. The issue is not whether he was currently on the clock. The issue is that they were interacting in the context of a student and a TA. They weren’t spending time together socially.
HueSatLight
It doesn’t matter if it’s office hours. It’s inappropriate for a grader to start a sexual and/or romantic relationship (no matter the length) with one of the students in the class they grade. The grader/student context exists as long as the student is enrolled in the class.
If they were already in a relationship, that’s something that would need to be addressed beforehand, by having another grader or the professor grade their assignments/tests.
I asked the head grader for our department, if graders were allowed to ask students out, when I was a grader/TA as an undergrad.
Dr. Sharks
It makes it even more grey that he’s also a student, and likely about the same age. When I was in grad school, I was a TA briefly. It wasn’t something I planned on doing from the start, it was basically just a last-minute favor to a professor I liked who needed a new TA. The people in my classes were at most 2 years my junior, all of whom I saw around the building frequently anyway and some of whom I knew pretty well. I wasn’t involved in any inappropriate situations with any of them, but if one of them had thrown themselves at me, I don’t know that the potential impropriety of the situation would have crossed my mind, unless they had made it explicit that they wanted to trade sex for grades.
Actually, I remember one student did turn in a booty dance video for a project once (it was a video editing class). I gave her a bad grade for it because it didn’t follow the assignment prompt.
Thing is, whether there was a quid pro quo or not, even if nobody formally complains, it makes lots of trouble for the University if word gets out. There are several different problems all tangled up in this.
What would be? Like, for real. What the punishment for two fully consensual sexual encounters between consenting adults, which involved zero actual quid pro quo? So far, it’s Jason losing his job and possibly getting deported. Are you proposing jail time or skipping straight to a firing squad?
Like, for real, continuing to bar him from a position of power over students so he can’t have this lapse in judgement again. The fact that this was framed as being as consensual as possible doesn’t remove the reasons the rule is there.
Losing his job and not being allowed to get it back is a fully reasonable consequence for violating his job ethics. It’s sad that that can result in deportation, but that’s not a draconian, unfair consequence.
Alex
Yes, this. The immigration law is the fucked-up part. Jason shouldn’t be a TA anymore after making that kind of decision. Sal initiated because she wanted better grades. He didn’t shut it down. Reneging on his part of the deal doesn’t make him honorable.
Yotomoe
I wouldn’t say reneg. He never formally agreed. It may have been implied but the circumstances around it made it kinda tenuous. She never openly said “hey if we fuck you’ll give me As, right?”
As far as I know anyway it’s been almost a decade since I read that slipshine.
Alex
Okay, saying “I never technically agreed to that” doesn’t make him honorable.
Psychie
The immigration thing seems kinda dubious to me as well, like TA isn’t really a job that people get externally recruited for, y’know? He shouldn’t be here on a work visa to be a TA, he should be here on a *student* visa and working as a TA might be part of his agreement with the school, but he was probably just recruited by the professor like any other TA after having been a student in their class.
Also, it’s my understanding that while work visas are generally restricted to certain kinds of work, I don’t think it’s usually that specific, AFAIK they are usually by category, like non-faculty employment with a university might even be too specific. If he can get hired by the university in basically any position, he should be fine, even if it’s serving food in a dorm cafeteria or mopping the floors in the library’s lobby.
I could easily be wrong about how work visas work, but even if I am it’s still a moot point since he should *definitely* be in on a student visa, not a work visa. I also wonder if he’s still been attending classes or if he just assumes he was expelled the way he assumes he’s been fired.
I don’t think he needs to be punished more than he has, but being sorry doesn’t mean he deserves his job back or a new teaching position at IU. That would be such a huge privilege flex to reinstate him in a teaching capacity when it’s known he breached ethical protocol.
Yeah, but isn’t it supposed to be inherently predatory for the one with the authority and inherently degrading for the one without, now? I thought we were supposed to be promoting equal power dynamics, as close to 50/50 as possible.
thejeff
Inherently? Maybe not. The potential for abuse is far too high though.
Of course, if people want to play at authority and power dynamics that’s up to them, but when the power imbalance is real, how can the one with the power ever really know the subordinate is actually into it or is just pretending because of that imbalance?
Yotomoe
I think the best thing he could do (other than not shagging Sal at all) is immediately and be very upfront about outsourcing Sal’s grades to someone else. Because as far as I can tell that’s the only power he as a TA had over her.
155 thoughts on “Accusation”
Doctor_Who
Leslie: Ruth, I’m sorry, but for a college professor to hire such an individual, they would have to be the most careless, irresponsible oh no, I think I just invoked her.
Robin: Sup, I just felt the overwhelming urge to sprint over here holding a job application for some reason.
Stephen Bierce
Really, Robin is related to Lenny and/or Squiggy. “HELLO!”
merbrat
*giggle-snort*
StClair
It’s been years, decades, and I can still hear this.
Cholma
Definitely. Great reference!
drs
That’s very unrealistic.
Robin wouldn’t bother with a job application.
Chaucer59
I also have difficulty imagining Robin “sprinting.”
Azhrei Vep
I have difficulty imagining her locomoting in any other way.
Wizard
She momentarily morphed into Walkyverse Robin.
Archieve
If Ruth was going to have Jason confess to another facility member about his guilt Robin would have been the most likely to offer help or advice if only because she doesn’t take the schools ethics seriously.
Segnosaur
She may not take the school’s rules seriously, but she might be wary of someone who might have pressured an unwilling student into sex for grades. (it didn’t exactly happen like that but she doesn’t know the details.)
Archieve
Good point.
thejeff
For all of Robin’s faults, when she found out about Ryan she took it seriously. Fired her staff for suggesting she cover it up for political expediency.
Thag Simmons
The other option is that Jason brings up how failing to fulfill the terms of his visa means he goes back to his bond-villain father, which Leslie might have sympathy for
Slartibeast Button, BIA
Do we know anything about his DoA father specifically? I see the wiki talks about previous universe father.
thejeff
We know he’s a “cruel and powerful captain of industry”.
With an eyepatch.
ValdVin
I hadn’t thought Leslie could summon Robin the way Dorothy should (by all rights) have been able to summon Becky, but now I’m totally on board with it.
Ana Chronistic
“We can’t fire him! He QUIT!”
wait no
Mikey
I don’t get it. Why is grading her pages not corrupt? Isn’t the entire problem that grading pages of somebody you’re sleeping with affects whether you can grade them fairly?
deathjavu
I *think* he means that he shouldn’t have put in the effort to grade them properly, and just marked them as A’s
Yeet
I think he means actually graded as opposed to giving her an A
Sirksome
He’s saying he should’ve at least boosted her grade if he was gonna be fired anyway. It was corrupt no matter what. Grading her paper fairly was just to make himself feel like less of a knob.
Yotomoe
I always felt like, at least at first, Jason just assumed the sex he was having had nothing to do with him grading the papers. Which is why Sal was shocked that he graded her papers fairly and he was sorta like “why wouldn’t I?”. Like it hadn’t even crossed his mind that’s why sex was happening to him.
Meagan
Wait I don’t remember this scene. When did Sal get a paper back from him?
Yumi
https://www.dumbingofage.com/2013/comic/book-3/03-answers-in-hennessy/robust-2/
Roe
let’s just all be glad he grew his hair out
Meagan
Thank you. I forgot that she straight up said she did it for a grade improvement. That’s kinda lame. In the actual porn comic, she say’s something like, “You’ll do,” and I never got the impression that she was doing it for a grade during the sex. In hindsight I could see how it was implied, but he definitely never agreed to such an exchange.
Vukodlak
It was almost a decade ago so not surprising you’ve forgotten.
Sirksome
Yeah that’s part of the reason I don’t care for him. He’s a bland mix of stuck up and stupid.
Yotomoe
Hehe might be why I like him. I don’t know much about stuck up but I can RELATE to twitter.
BBCC
Jason knew. He made it very clear in the Slipshine preview that he knew EXACTLY what Sal meant. He said that boosting her grade would be immoral, Sal said ‘yeah’ and Jason kissed her. She took that as a yes, and he later clarified that he meant yes to the sex, not the grade boost.
Yotomoe
Ah damn. I guess I shoulda checked that slipshine 😛
Also “Say Yes to the sex” is my favorite spinoff of “Say yes to the dress”
BBCC
I know right? Best spin off.
Taffy
From memory, as I recall…
Sal takes her top off, knocks some stuff off the desk, climbs over it, and straddles Jason. The following exchange happens:
“Ya said it yerself– Effort don’t matter. Ah’m only bein’ judged against my marks.”
“That is not what I meant and you know it!”
“Yup, Ah do. Ah’m totally misrrpresentin’ yet words. Y’got me.”
“This–this is unethical in a staggering number of ways!”
“Yeah.“?
Then he looks shocked and then he kisses her. And then they fuck.
Joy
The thing about that scene that gets me Is that… It felt like sal wasn’t new to doing this? Implying that she had this sort of thing as an underaged teenager while in a Catholic boarding school that she wasn’t allowed to leave, with the intention of isolating her from society.
So… Even more cult abuse in this webcomic
thejeff
I think there’s another hint to that somewhere, but I don’t remember enough about it to try to track it down.
Sirksome
She says something to Danny here, post Jason that I think is in reference to him specifically but it could apply to her past in general.
https://www.dumbingofage.com/2022/comic/book-13/01-bring-me-to-life-drawing/girlfriend-2/
I think most of the relationships she’s had the partner’s only been interested in her physical appearance and she’s internalized to believe that’s what most guys want from her and she uses that to “stick it to the man” I think she said. To be fair, that is what Jason wanted from her. He immediately leered at her the first time they met and made a sleazy pickup line.
Joy
Sirksome, that’s totally true! Jason came across as predatory from the start.
Yotomoe
I’ll be honest, as a touch starved guy who hasn’t dated in a decade if Sal Walkerton started stripping and hopped on my lap it’d take a Herculean feat if willpower for me to not act on it.
Which brings me to my next thought. It wasn’t crazy inappropriate for sal to do what she did. She basically starts tearing her clothes off and climbing on top of him. Up until Jason consents as far as I’m concerned that’s basically sexual assault. And I don’t wanna sound like I’m victim blaming but I feel like if Joe did that with Penny I’d find that skeevy in a way it doesn’t feel like this moment with sal is portrayed. Now at the time it just felt like porn acting. That sorta thing in shows and movies where everyone sorta just acts on their arousal in the moment because it’s more dynamic and dramatic. Which is fine a lot of couples in the comic are made through dynamic passionate kisses and stuff without the verbal contract of consent coming up until a bit later. But since were taking the actions of the characters very literally now I can’t help but think “Wait Sal actually did that. And I can’t recall if there’s been any conversation really of why that’s not an ok thing to do.”
And Jason himself, to his credit, didn’t let her having sex with him effect her test grades and also began giving her tests to a 3rd party to grade. He literally was relinquishing power over her, probably out of guilt. But he definitely made it as clear as possible “fucking me wont change your grades” I can say what he did was wrong but honestly he probably did the best version of that wrong thing. And I’m probably being charitable because he’s not rich or significantly older, or a professor or ,let’s face it, stronger than sal. In fact I’d argue that Sal has more power over him in this instance because if they get found out she might fail the class or at worst be expelled while he gets actually deported. It doesn’t help that sals mom is super good pals with the dean, racist favoritism not withstanding. I dunno I know it was wrong for him to do but I just can’t really even see him as a predator I’m this situation. It just sorta fell into his lap. Literally.
Yotomoe
“It was crazy inappropriate to do what sal did”
One little typo can mess Up the whole thesis of my post.
Sirksome
I think maybe you’re confusing predatory with abuse of power here. Jason isn’t a predator, he didn’t assault Sal, in fact as you bring up in a certain light one could argue the opposite although I think the truth is a gray area like most social/sexual interactions can be when people don’t directly express consent cause that’s not how humans think when they’re horny.
The problem is that Jason’s position as TA gave him power over Sal in that Sal has no actual control over her grades and he does. As shown by him not actually improving them after she slept with him. He got everything out of the deal and Sal didn’t and Sal just has to hold that L. In fact it could get worse. If Jason wanted he could have used Sal’s grades as leverage for more sex. “Have sex with me or you fail”. That power imbalance doesn’t go away just because Sal initiated the hookup. Jason knows this. As a professional it is his obligation not to conduct such behavior. But he was equally horny so he did it. Handing over her work for some else to grade is like dialing 911 after your house has been burning for 40 minutes. Good move but the damage is done.
This is all before you even get into the muddy waters of the he said, she said, nature of these interactions. Who would be believed? The rich white dude with authority and a sterling reputation. Or the mixed black girl some people including Jason would consider a “troublemaker” at first impression.
That’s the issue from my perspective, but it does get kind of ambiguous in the details. I just don’t think those details matter.
Yotomoe
“He got everything out of the deal and Sal didn’t” sorta inherently implies that sex wasn’t as pleasurable for her as it was for him. I dunno maybe it wasn’t but I guess that’s sorta my issue. I’m caught between the sex positive rhetoric of “sex isn’t a big deal and is much too demonized in society” and “Sex isn’t ok unless very specific parameters are met”. Two consenting, similarly aged adults had sex and one went through the effort to make sure this coupling didn’t effect his scoring of her test and it’s still bad because he COULD have. By that same metric Jason didn’t get anything out of the sex either (except Fired.)
Someone below mentioned taking bribes down there but that seems more cut and dry. Like that’s a clear “someone is gaining money and someone is losing money”. Is the sex a zero sum game? Like if Jason and sal had played super smash bros together instead would that have been as bad? Like if he was obsessed with smash and used his position as a TA to play a few matches with him, would that be grounds for firing? It might be. But as someone who has never Had sex I often feel like I don’t understand how this works.
Sirksome
@Yotomoe. I like that Smash comparison. That’s probably perfect for this. Ironically the sex probably isn’t what matters here. Not the physical act two consenting adult participated in. But yes if Jason was challenged by Sal to a round of Smash, final destination, 3 stocks, no items, in exchange for an A that would still be a problem. That’s what I mean here. Sal didn’t get the A. That was the deal vaguely implied. Because off Jason’s position as TA he does not have to give that to her regardless of if she fucks him, smashes him, or chooses to like bow ties. Plus it sets a precedent that Jason will pass people who beat him in Smash which undermines the system. His integrity as a TA is compromised.
Yotomoe
Hehe thanks. I just default to it cuz it’s my favorite multiplayer game. Though in this context “smash” is an apt double entendre. I guess the big issue here is that some important context is only in the slipshine. Going by what others have said I will at the very least say Jason is at fault because he didn’t outright deny “no, fucking me will not yield better results in your test scores.” Prior to the sex happening. I don’t know if that’d make it better but it certainly makes it worse that he didn’t.
Using the metaphor it would be like if Sal challenged him to smash bros and won and then got mad because she assumed that match would improve her grades. And Jason is just like “oh I just like playing smash. When Sal challenged him he didn’t clarify that this was just a game. He just thought she enjoyed platform fighters. If anything I’d be kinda put off if someone asked me to play a video game to decompress and then got mad if I didn’t reward them when they won. Sal kinda presented the sex as a “I’m sick of being here let’s fuck” but then recontexualized it as “I’m sick of being here so instead of tutoring me just fuck me to improve my grades” and Jason either didn’t catch on or didn’t acknowledge the paradigm shift. He just thought she wanted to smash bros.
Alex
It’s not like they were on a date and Jason just happened to be her TA. This all happened during his office hours, and Sal says “we both want to get out of here” before she initiates. There was some pretty heavy subtext going on. If you’re in a direct position of power over someone, you should assume there are motives beyond simple attraction. If she’d asked his favorite video game and agreed to play it with him, Jason should recognize that’s not in his job description and she’s probably attempting to build up good will in exchange for more lenient grading. That’s not normal or appropriate behavior between a student and TA in the middle of office hours.
Yotomoe
Not to be that guy but it was actually decidedly not his office hours. Sal basically dragged him by his collar into his office on his day off. He wasn’t there out of commitment to a student but by force more or less. Also sal preceded a lot of this by complaining how she hasn’t had any action in a while and was jealous that even her brother is getting some while she’s not. So at this time of she had asked to play smash he’d be well in his right to play. He’s not supposed to work today.
Yotomoe
Not to be that guy but it was actually decidedly not his office hours. Sal basically dragged him by his collar into his office on his day off. He wasn’t there out of commitment to a student but by force more or less. Also sal preceded a lot of this by complaining how she hasn’t had any action in a while and was jealous that even her brother is getting some while she’s not. So at this time of she had asked to play smash he’d be well in his right to play. He’s not supposed to work today.
Alex
I forgot that it was not his appointed office hours. But aside from the fact that Sal was out of line to physically drag him around, I don’t think that changes the situation all that much. The issue is not whether he was currently on the clock. The issue is that they were interacting in the context of a student and a TA. They weren’t spending time together socially.
HueSatLight
It doesn’t matter if it’s office hours. It’s inappropriate for a grader to start a sexual and/or romantic relationship (no matter the length) with one of the students in the class they grade. The grader/student context exists as long as the student is enrolled in the class.
If they were already in a relationship, that’s something that would need to be addressed beforehand, by having another grader or the professor grade their assignments/tests.
I asked the head grader for our department, if graders were allowed to ask students out, when I was a grader/TA as an undergrad.
Dr. Sharks
It makes it even more grey that he’s also a student, and likely about the same age. When I was in grad school, I was a TA briefly. It wasn’t something I planned on doing from the start, it was basically just a last-minute favor to a professor I liked who needed a new TA. The people in my classes were at most 2 years my junior, all of whom I saw around the building frequently anyway and some of whom I knew pretty well. I wasn’t involved in any inappropriate situations with any of them, but if one of them had thrown themselves at me, I don’t know that the potential impropriety of the situation would have crossed my mind, unless they had made it explicit that they wanted to trade sex for grades.
Actually, I remember one student did turn in a booty dance video for a project once (it was a video editing class). I gave her a bad grade for it because it didn’t follow the assignment prompt.
Yotomoe
This is the most apt gravitar in history.
GUIGUI
I consider it still was the better option, once the deed was done. I really consider it would have made things worse.
Keulen
If I remember right, Jason still graded Sal’s papers properly, instead of unethically giving her As because she slept with him.
Mark
Thing is, whether there was a quid pro quo or not, even if nobody formally complains, it makes lots of trouble for the University if word gets out. There are several different problems all tangled up in this.
Sirksome
Being sorry doesn’t really make up for it though. That’s not nearly enough.
Dara
fully agreed.
Archieve
Sorry Ruth, but your boyfriends ‘break’ from the rules doesn’t elicit the same sympathy at all.
anonymsly
What would be? Like, for real. What the punishment for two fully consensual sexual encounters between consenting adults, which involved zero actual quid pro quo? So far, it’s Jason losing his job and possibly getting deported. Are you proposing jail time or skipping straight to a firing squad?
not someone else
Like, for real, continuing to bar him from a position of power over students so he can’t have this lapse in judgement again. The fact that this was framed as being as consensual as possible doesn’t remove the reasons the rule is there.
BBCC
Losing his job and not being allowed to get it back is a fully reasonable consequence for violating his job ethics. It’s sad that that can result in deportation, but that’s not a draconian, unfair consequence.
Alex
Yes, this. The immigration law is the fucked-up part. Jason shouldn’t be a TA anymore after making that kind of decision. Sal initiated because she wanted better grades. He didn’t shut it down. Reneging on his part of the deal doesn’t make him honorable.
Yotomoe
I wouldn’t say reneg. He never formally agreed. It may have been implied but the circumstances around it made it kinda tenuous. She never openly said “hey if we fuck you’ll give me As, right?”
As far as I know anyway it’s been almost a decade since I read that slipshine.
Alex
Okay, saying “I never technically agreed to that” doesn’t make him honorable.
Psychie
The immigration thing seems kinda dubious to me as well, like TA isn’t really a job that people get externally recruited for, y’know? He shouldn’t be here on a work visa to be a TA, he should be here on a *student* visa and working as a TA might be part of his agreement with the school, but he was probably just recruited by the professor like any other TA after having been a student in their class.
Also, it’s my understanding that while work visas are generally restricted to certain kinds of work, I don’t think it’s usually that specific, AFAIK they are usually by category, like non-faculty employment with a university might even be too specific. If he can get hired by the university in basically any position, he should be fine, even if it’s serving food in a dorm cafeteria or mopping the floors in the library’s lobby.
I could easily be wrong about how work visas work, but even if I am it’s still a moot point since he should *definitely* be in on a student visa, not a work visa. I also wonder if he’s still been attending classes or if he just assumes he was expelled the way he assumes he’s been fired.
Sirksome
I don’t think he needs to be punished more than he has, but being sorry doesn’t mean he deserves his job back or a new teaching position at IU. That would be such a huge privilege flex to reinstate him in a teaching capacity when it’s known he breached ethical protocol.
Nono
Wait, sleeping with someone you have a position of power over?
And you wonder if Ruth and Jason had anything in common.
Yotomoe
They have a type. And that type is “in a position slightly lower than me”
wilddeath
I thought Ruth’s type was “Miserable”
Thag Simmons
It can be both
woobie
It can be really spicy for both.
Taffy
Yeah, but isn’t it supposed to be inherently predatory for the one with the authority and inherently degrading for the one without, now? I thought we were supposed to be promoting equal power dynamics, as close to 50/50 as possible.
thejeff
Inherently? Maybe not. The potential for abuse is far too high though.
Of course, if people want to play at authority and power dynamics that’s up to them, but when the power imbalance is real, how can the one with the power ever really know the subordinate is actually into it or is just pretending because of that imbalance?
Yotomoe
I think the best thing he could do (other than not shagging Sal at all) is immediately and be very upfront about outsourcing Sal’s grades to someone else. Because as far as I can tell that’s the only power he as a TA had over her.