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WHY UC WOULD RATHER FIGHT WOMEN THAN DISCRIMINATION
There indeed exist options other than protracted legal battles. For example,
Smith College, lacking UC's enormous taxpayer funded resources, has successfully
dealt with entrenched patterns of discrimination among its lessenlightened faculty
members through mandatory sensitivity training and the censuring and reducing of
privileges of individuals and departments who violate university policy. Smith
College and other institutions move quickly into settlements with women who have
serious, legitimate complaints. UC, however, can afford to finance protracted legal
battles for which five to seven years duration is not unusual. By why would UC want
to do this?
The answer is twofold. First, it is easier. Faculty who hold lifetime
positions are not easy to discipline. Buying a way out of the problem is apparently
considered simpler than solving the problem. Second, most women do not have the
financial resources to sustain themselves and their attorneys through a protracted
case. UC administrators know that the harder it is, the more expensive it is for
women to fight for their rights, the fewer the women who will step forward to do so.
Women who fight the system for their rights have sustained incredible
personal hardships, from having to sell their homes to finance a tenure battle,
as did UCI ophthalmologist Dr. Marjorie Mosier, to enduring foreclosure or bankruptcy,
professional blacklisting, and serious stress-caused illnesses. UC administrators
know that gender discrimination is so rampant that each woman's victory could
encourage scores of other women to overcome their fear and file suit. UC
administrators would be overwhelmed by legitimate complaints from its academic
women.
-wage@wage.org-