NYU Suspends Lauded Professor For Sexually Harassing Male Student

WEST VILLAGE, NY — A world-renown female professor of german and comparative literature at New York University has been suspended for the coming academic year after an 11-month Title IX investigation determined that she had sexually harassed a former male student, The New York Times reported.

The final Title IX report on Professor Avital Ronell, 66, found her responsible for both physical and verbal sexual harassment of a former graduate student, Nimrod Reitman. In the complaint, Reitman claimed that his professor had harassed him for three years beginning in 2012. He shared dozens of emails in which she referred to him as "my most adored one," "sweet cuddly Baby," "baby love angel" and "my astounding and beautiful Nimrod," the newspaper reported.

Reitman, who is 34-years-old and 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 return her favor.

In one June, 2012 message Ronell wrote to Reitman, "I woke up with a slight fever and sore throat. I will try very hard not to kiss you — until the throat situation receives security clearance. This is not an easy deferral!” Then in July she emailed him stating, “time for your midday kiss. my image during meditation: we’re on the sofa, your head on my lap, stroking you [sic] forehead, playing softly with yr hair, soothing you, headache gone. Yes?," reported The Times.

Reitman is a gay man, who is married to a man, and Ronell is a lesbian.

The university found Ronell guilty of sexual harassment, but ultimately cleared her of other charges including sexual assault, stalking and retaliation.

Ronell denied any harassment in a statement to The New York Times.

"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," Ronell wrote.

"These communications were repeatedly invited, responded to and encouraged by him over a period of three years," the statement continued.

Several scholars, including famed feminist and gender theorist Judith Butler and philosopher Slavoj Zizek, have rushed to Ronell's defense and sent a letter to the university defending the professor.

"Although we have no access to the confidential dossier, we have all worked for many years in close proximity to Professor Ronell and accumulated collectively years of experience to support our view of her capacity as teacher and a scholar," the letter reads, as reported by The Times.

"We have all seen her relationship with students, and some of us know the individual who has waged this malicious campaign against her...We deplore the damage that this legal proceeding causes her, and seek to register in clear terms our objection to any judgment against her," the letter continued. "We hold that the allegations against her do not constitute actual evidence, but rather support the view that malicious intention has animated and sustained this legal nightmare."

Critics were quick to call the letter out as hypocritical victim-blaming.

Reitman is considering filing a lawsuit against New York University and Rovell, The Times reported.

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