当女性主义者被控性骚扰，“我也是”运动走向何方

The case seems like a familiar story turned on its head: Avital Ronell, a world-renowned female professor of German and Comparative Literature at New York University, was found responsible for sexually harassing a male former graduate student, Nimrod Reitman.

本案看起来是一个熟悉的故事，但当事人的性别颠过来了：世界知名的纽约大学日耳曼文学和比较文学女教授阿维塔尔·罗内尔(Avital Ronell)，被发现对自己之前的男研究生尼姆罗德·莱特曼(Nimrod Reitman)进行性骚扰。

An 11-month Title IX investigation found Ronell, described by a colleague as “one of the very few philosopher-stars of this world,” responsible for sexual harassment, both physical and verbal, to the extent that her behavior was “sufficiently pervasive to alter the terms and conditions of Mr. Reitman’s learning environment.” The university has suspended Ronell for the coming academic year.

经过长达11个月的教育法修正案第九条(Title IX)调查发现，被一位同事称为“当今世上为数不多的哲学家明星之一”的罗内尔，要对身体和语言上的性骚扰负责，她的行为“频繁到足以改变莱特曼学习环境之条款与条件”。大学暂停了罗内尔在即将到来的新学年的教职。

In the Title IX final report, excerpts of which were obtained by The New York Times, Reitman said that she had sexually harassed him for three years, and shared dozens of emails in which she referred to him as “my most adored one,” “Sweet cuddly Baby,” “cock-er spaniel,” and “my astounding and beautiful Nimrod.”

根据《纽约时报》拿到的第九条调查最终报告的摘录，莱特曼说她对自己进行了长达三年的性骚扰，并且公开了数十封电子邮件，她在邮件里称他为“我最宠爱的人”“甜蜜可人的宝贝儿”“猎鸡鸡犬”和“我惊人的美丽的尼姆罗德”。

Coming in the middle of the #MeToo movement’s reckoning over sexual misconduct, it raised a challenge for feminists — how to respond when one of their own behaved badly. And the response has roiled a corner of academia.

在“#我也是”运动对性行为不端的反思中，这起案子给女性主义发起了一个挑战——当她们自己行为不端时，又该如何回应。此案所带来的反应已在学界掀起了轩然大波。

Soon after the university made its final, confidential determination this spring, a group of scholars from around the world, including prominent feminists, sent a letter to NYU in defense of Ronell. Judith Butler, author of the book “Gender Trouble” and one of the most influential feminist scholars today, was first on the list.

就在该校于今年春天作出最后的保密决定后不久，一群来自世界各地的学者，包括一些著名的女性主义者，给纽约大学写了一封信，为罗内尔辩护。署名排在第一位的，是《性别困惑》(Gender Trouble)一书的作者、当今最有影响力的女性主义学者之一的朱迪斯·巴特勒(Judith Butler)。

“Although we have no access to the confidential dossier, we have all worked for many years in close proximity to Professor Ronell,” the professors wrote in a draft letter posted on a philosophy blog in June. “We have all seen her relationship with students, and some of us know the individual who has waged this malicious campaign against her.”

“虽然我们无法看到这份机密卷宗，但我们都与罗内尔教授有着多年的密切接触，”这些教授在一份6月发表在一个哲学博客上的草拟信函中写道。“我们都看到了她与学生们的关系，而且我们当中一些人知道究竟是谁发起了这场针对她的恶毒攻击。”

Critics saw the letter, with its focus on the potential damage to Ronell’s reputation and the force of her personality, as echoing past defenses of powerful men.

批评人士认为，这封信跟过去那些为权势男性的辩护如出一辙，把重点放在了事件对罗内尔的声誉和人格力量可能造成的损害上。

“We testify to the grace, the keen wit, and the intellectual commitment of Professor Ronell and ask that she be accorded the dignity rightly deserved by someone of her international standing and reputation,” the professors wrote.

教授们写道：“我们可以证明罗内尔教授的优雅、机敏和智识担当，我们要求，她理应得到与其国际地位和声誉相当的尊严。”

Reitman, who is now 34 and is a visiting fellow at Harvard, says that Ronell kissed and touched him repeatedly, slept in his bed with him, required him to lie in her bed, held his hand, texted, emailed and called him constantly, and refused to work with him if he did not reciprocate. Reitman is gay and is now married to a man; Ronell is a lesbian.

现年34岁的莱特曼目前在哈佛作访问学者，他说罗内尔一再亲吻、触摸他，与他一起睡在他的床上，要求他躺在她的床上，握着他的手，不停地给他发短信、邮件、打电话，他若不做出回应，她就拒绝合作。莱特曼是同性恋，目前已与一名男子结婚;罗内尔也是一名同性恋。

Ronell, 66, denied any harassment. “Our communications — which Reitman now claims constituted sexual harassment — were between two adults, a gay man and a queer woman, who share an Israeli heritage, as well as a penchant for florid and campy communications arising from our common academic backgrounds and sensibilities,” she wrote in a statement to The New York Times. “These communications were repeatedly invited, responded to and encouraged by him over a period of three years.”

66岁的罗内尔对骚扰予以否认。“我们之间的通讯交流——莱特曼现在称之为性骚扰——是两个成年人，两个都拥有以色列背景的男同和女同，出于我们共同的学术背景和情感而产生的一种对浮夸的、坎普式的沟通方式的喜好，”她在给《纽约时报》的一份声明中写道。“在三年时间里，他一再要求、回应和鼓励这些交流。”

Two years after graduating from NYU with a Ph.D., Reitman filed a Title IX complaint against his former adviser, alleging sexual harassment, sexual assault, stalking and retaliation. In May, the university found Ronell responsible for sexual harassment and cleared her of the other allegations.

从纽约大学毕业并获得博士学位两年后，莱特曼对其前导师发起了第九条投诉，指控她实施性骚扰、性侵犯、跟踪和报复。5月，纽约大学发现罗内尔对性骚扰负有责任，并排除了其他指控。

Reitman’s lawyer, Donald Kravet, said he and his client have drafted a lawsuit against NYU and Ronell and are now considering their options.

莱特曼的律师唐纳德·克拉维特(Donald Kravet)表示，他和他的客户已经起草了针对纽约大学和罗内尔的诉讼书，现在正在考虑他们的选择。

Both Reitman’s and Ronell’s descriptions of their experiences echo other #MeToo stories: In Reitman’s recollection, he was afraid of his professor and the power she wielded over him, and often went along with behavior that left him feeling violated. Ronell said that Reitman desperately sought her attention and guidance in interviews she submitted to the Title IX office at NYU, which The New York Times obtained.

莱特曼和罗内尔对自己经历的描述都和其他“#我也是”故事相吻合：在莱特曼的回忆中，他害怕教授以及她可以对他施加的权力，经常要忍受让他感到受侵犯的行为。罗内尔在接受纽约大学第九条办公室问讯时称，莱特曼拼命吸引她的关注，要求获得她的指导，《纽约时报》获得了这份问讯记录。

The problems began, according to Reitman, in the spring of 2012, before he officially started school. Ronell invited him to stay with her in Paris for a few days. The day he arrived, she asked him to read poetry to her in her bedroom while she took an afternoon nap, he said.

莱特曼说，自2012年春季他正式入学之前，问题就已经开始出现了。罗内尔邀请他和她一起在巴黎待了几天。他说，在他到达那天，她让他去卧室，在她午睡时朗诵诗歌给她听。

“That was already a red flag to me,” Reitman said. “But I also thought, OK, you’re here. Better not make a scene.”

“这已经令我产生警惕，”莱特曼说。“但我也想，好吧，我来都来了。最好不要小题大做。”

Then, he said, she pulled him into her bed.

然后，他说，她把他拉到了床上。

“She put my hands onto her breasts, and was pressing herself — her buttocks — onto my crotch,” he said. “She was kissing me, kissing my hands, kissing my torso.” That evening, a similar scene played out again, he said.

“她把我的手放在她的乳房上，并把她的身体——她的臀部——压在我的胯部，”他说。“然后她亲吻我，吻我的手，吻我的身体。”那天晚上，类似的一幕再次出现，他说。

He confronted her the next morning, he said.

他说，第二天早上他质问了她。

“I said, look, what happened yesterday was not OK. You’re my adviser,” he recalled in an interview.

“我说，你看，昨天那种事是不对的。你是我的导师，“他在接受采访时回忆道。

When he got to New York, the behavior continued, he said, when after Hurricane Sandy in October 2012, Ronell showed up at his apartment because her power had gone out. He said that, despite his objections, she convinced him that they could both sleep in his bed together. Once there, she groped and kissed him each night for nearly a week, he said.

当他到达纽约时，这种行为仍在继续，他说，2012年10月的桑迪飓风之后，罗内尔出现在他的公寓里，因为她家停电了。他说，尽管他提出反对，但她说服他，两人可以睡在一张床上。他说，接下来的一个星期，她每天晚上都在床上抚摸并亲吻他。

“Professor Ronell denies all allegations of sexual contact in their entirety,” Mary Dorman, Ronell’s lawyer, wrote in a submission to the Title IX office. Ronell said she only stayed for two nights after the hurricane, at Reitman’s invitation.

“罗内尔教授彻底否认所有关于两人之间性接触的指控，”罗内尔的律师玛丽·多曼(Mary Dorman)在向第九条办公室提交的一份意见书中写道。罗尼尔说，在飓风过后，她只是在莱特曼的邀请下，在他家住了两晚。

The Title IX report concluded that there was not enough evidence to find Ronell responsible for sexual assault, partly because no one else observed the interactions in his apartment or her room in Paris.

第九条办公室报告的结论是，没有足够的证据证明罗内尔对性侵犯负有责任，部分原因是没有其他人目睹两人在莱特曼的公寓或罗内尔巴黎房间内的互动。

Reitman also said that Ronell retaliated against him for complaining to her about her behavior, in part by sending pro forma recommendations on his behalf, thwarting his job prospects. But the Title IX report found that her recommendation letters “were comparable to those for other former students” and he did secure two postgraduate fellowships.

莱特曼还说，因为他抱怨她的行为，罗内尔对他进行了报复，其中包括为他写的例行推荐信，从而阻碍了他的工作前程。但是，第九条报告发现她为他写的推荐信“与她为其他学生写的推荐信类似”，而莱特曼也确实获得了两份研究生奖学金。

Ronell and some who are backing her have attempted to discredit her accuser in familiar ways, asking why he took so long to report, and why he seemed so intimate with Ronell if he was, in fact, miserable. Maybe, Ronell suggested, he was frustrated because he just wasn’t smart enough.

罗内尔和一些支持她的人试图以熟悉的方式来诋毁原告，问他为什么过了这么长的时间才举报，还有，如果他真的有那么痛苦，他为什么看上去还同罗内尔非常亲密。也许，罗内尔说，他沮丧的是他不够聪明。

“His main dilemma was the incoherency in his writing, and lack of a recognizable argument,” Ronell said in a January 2018 interview submitted to the Title IX office.

“他的主要困境是他的写作缺乏连贯性，缺乏能得到认可的的论点，”2018年1月罗内尔在接受第九条办公室问讯时说。

In addition to the suspension, which the university never publicly announced, NYU is investigating further claims of retaliation related to the professors’ letter.

除了始终未公开宣布的停职，纽约大学还在调查与这位教授的信件有关的进一步报复行为指控。

John Beckman, a spokesman for the university, wrote in a statement to The Times that NYU was “sympathetic” to what Reitman has been through.

该大学发言人约翰·贝克曼(John Beckman)在致《纽约时报》的一份声明中写道，纽约大学对莱特曼所经历的事情表示“同情”。

But, Beckman added, “given the promptness, seriousness and thoroughness with which we responded to his charges, we do not believe that his filing a multimillion-dollar lawsuit against the university would be warranted or just.”

但是，贝克曼还说，“鉴于我们对他的指控作出了迅速、严肃和彻底的回应，我们认为他提出的针对本校提出的数百万美元诉讼是不合理、不公正的。”

Both Ronell and Reitman feel they have been miscast in this #MeToo story.

罗内尔和莱特曼都认为他们在这个“#我也是”故事中扮演了不适宜的角色。

Reitman said he never intended to become any kind of public figure in a national conversation about gender, and that he started the process before the movement took off. “It didn’t come from #MeToo,” he said.

莱特曼说，他从未打算在这场关于性别的全国性讨论中成为任何形式的公众人物，而且他在该运动开始前就开始了自己的投诉。“这不是受‘#我也是’的启发，”他说。

In March 2018, Ronell pointedly complained that Reitman had a penchant for “comparing me to the most egregious examples of predatory behaviors ascribable to Hollywood moguls who habitually go after starlets.”

2018年3月，罗内尔尖刻地抱怨说，雷特曼喜欢“将我和那些最严重的掠夺性行为相提并论，那些事都是惯于追逐小明星的好莱坞大亨才干的。”