Academic Incivility
...it's not funny....
It’s back-to-school time, so I thought I’d recycle this post from my old blog….
Like the last Academic Incivility post, this happened in my first semester at Pittsburg State. At some point, in November or so, the “Director of Graduate Studies”—let’s call him Dr. Dumbass, a squirrely-looking skinny little ball-headed tubercular guy who always dressed in black—asked me to visit his Intro to English Studies class, a class for first-semester MA students. And I said, kind of reluctantly, though still foolishly wanting to be a good departmental citizen—Sure, yeah, whatever….
It was an evening class. I had to stay late after my own very long day of teaching, and I stumbled into his class tired and worn out. I took a seat at the foot of the seminar table, near the door.
And Dr. Dumbass introduced me. “The newest member of our faculty...” blah blah blah blah whatever whatever fuck infinitum, “...a former gay male porn star.”
I sort of woke up at that. I asked, “What?”
He smiled. “A former gay male porn star!”
And—I didn’t do anything. Nothing! Didn’t say anything. I didn’t tell him to fuck off, I didn’t get up and march around to the other end of the table and punch him in his stupid fucking nose. I didn’t do anything. I was tired. Worn out, worn down. I just sort of thought—Fuck, whatever. I went on and talked with the class about teaching and writing and stuff. Whatever.
A couple of days later I encountered Dr. Dumbass in the hallway. He said, “Hey! Here’s our favorite former gay male porn star!”
I asked, “What the fuck are you talking about?
He made a surprised face. “Not that there’s anything wrong with that!”
I said, “Well, knock it the fuck off.”
He made another mocking, surprised face.
I said, “Seriously—knock it off.”
It wasn’t until a long time later that I learned that there’s a porn star named Mick Lovell (also known as Mick Phillips, google at your own risk—seriously NSFW). No doubt Dr. Dumbass was trying to google me prior to class and got my name backwards and misspelled and was—dumbassedly—amused. Or maybe he spent all his time in his office looking at porn and sending dick-pics to people!
Who knows?
Anyway. This was rude, of course, but it was a rude department, and what happened to me is nothing compared to how badly other people in the profession are treated—especially women, and people of color. Academia is like life in that it is too often full of people in power (or “power”) who enjoy stepping on anyone they can.
Book plug: My novel Normal School is an academic noir filled with all kinds of academic incivility, as well as murder, embezzlement, and other entertaining bad behaviors. You can buy it on Amazon in paperback and in Kindle!
