271 Comments
Commenting has been turned off for this post

"Is he guilty of “unethical and potentially illegal behavior,” as the school claims—or is he a brave champion of the First Amendment?"

You may wish to include, "or is he just some dumbass who just gets off on exhibitionism?"

Expand full comment

Meh, I’ve seen this before, and shocker, it has nothing to do with free speech. 25y ago I worked with a married couple that did something very similar as nurses. They ended up eventually leaving their jobs, but not before blowing up all over the news - and of course, increasing their income (subscribers) as a result. The professor said he was getting ready to leave soon anyways, now he’ll just do it richer, without wasting any of it on lawyer fees. Maybe they should rehire him as a marketing professor instead.

Expand full comment

Maybe I'll entertain myself with this.... one day. But not today, and likely not soon because I thinnk the rest of my life will need to be spent on far more important things. At a glance, I was curious, however, at the photo showing him ever so carefully, ensuring visual accuracy by bending down to glass level and measuring the pour of wine into the glass. :-|

Expand full comment

Ha. He doesn't give 2 sh*ts about the 1A. It's simply publicity for his side hustle as he moves into retirement. Maybe he overplayed his hand?

Expand full comment

This is not a First Amendment case. Gow wants to frame it that way to get sympathy.

He has a contract. He violated the contract. The contract doesn't care about your First Amendment rights. The end.

Aa an aside, I cannot imagine paying to watch these people and their porn fantasies. Icky.

Expand full comment

If you used their technology to create your videos, then I think you're hosed. If there's a reputational or character clause or the like in your contract, you're also likely hosed. The school is selling only one product, reputation. Your expression is making them afraid that product will be damaged by their association with you. It's not kids they have to reach; it's parents and they have to convince them that associating with the school's reputation will be good for those kids and that they'll well educate and care for them. Pornography production is not a value-added proposition to that arrangement. If you are expressing yourself on your own time and your own dime however, they shouldn't have a say. If their quest to get rid of you fails however, expect to see some updated employment terms in the near future.

Expand full comment
Jun 5·edited Jun 5

I believe pornography is a scourge on society. That said, Gow apparently didn't break any laws in making porn with his wife on his own time. I suspect if Gow had instead been encouraging students to attack Jews, occupy campus buildings and vandalize property is support of Hamas, he might very well have been lionized by the same university officials who fired him. Who knows? Perhaps if he had done the latter in addition to the former, he might have gotten a pass.

Expand full comment

The most "progressive" thing today is drag shows for children. Schools are proud to sponsor drag shows. They are usually only quasi-pornographic. But they do provide a "diverse" model for our children. Funny that I do not hear about drag shows for children the indignation expressed in these comments for an optional, paid-entry performance for adults.

Expand full comment
founding

One has to pay to view OnlyFans content. So how did the University officials discover Gow's videos on OnlyFans? Was there a paid subscriber among them? If so, punishing Gow for posting the videos is seems hypocritical.

With that said, I find his behavior creepy.

Expand full comment

This seems like a cut and dried contracts case. That the employment contract required "propriety" or "good judgment" may or may not be a difficult case to prove. Especially as this concerns merely expression/speech/artmaking. Need more details on the contract. I think the comments here claiming that voyeurism/exhibitionism/porn is unnatural or antisocial are very antiquated and scientifically illogical. These behaviors and urges are utterly human, completely natural to our species. It's how we've propagated for millenia. You could argue that they are "uncivilized," but you can't convince me they are unnatural or antisocial. Size, scope, and penetration of pornography into modern culture is the proof (pardon the pun).

Expand full comment

Taking a dump is an even more universal and frequent natural experience but who wants to watch other people do it?

Expand full comment
Jun 5·edited Jun 5

People have moral standards and yes those standards can always be questioned because they involve subjective judgments of human behavior. I cannot PROVE to Mr Gow or anyone else that pornography is immoral/unethical. I can only propose it and point out that most people share my values. Pornography is an activity that most people in our society want to suppress. Does "suppress" mean that you cannot do it al all? No, it is not an illegal activity. The people that compose most institutions like universities, corporations, non profits, etc. share the belief that pornography is illicit and have rules to suppress its expression. We all know that we would be fired if we watched pornography in the workplace. For decades, we've known that if we watch pornography at home during private time that we can STILL be sanctioned if we did so on employer-owned hardware. So I think Mr. Gow is being very naive to upload sex movies to public networks attached to this name and believe that his workplace would not sanction him for that activity. Some can call this "cancel culture" and it probably is but sanctions by institutions against well known and accepted taboos are not violations of either the spirit or letter of the 1st amendment. Having said all that, I would celebrate everything about Mr. Gow's lifestyle if he didn't share the videos on public networks. :-)

Expand full comment

This entire discussion is anachronistic.

I'm 76 and part of the Sex, Drugs, and Rock'n'Roll generation, married for a long time to my one and only wife.

While I've never even considered videoing ANY sexual encounter, EVER, (I'm not an exhibitionist), I find the entire concept of 'pornography' anachronistic. Sex is fun, drinking and getting high are fun, music is fun. As long as no one is exploited, what's the problem?

Younger generations seem to be FAR too uptight, no wonder they have high rates of depression. Chill and learn to party young people, chill and learn to party: If it feels good and doesn't hurt anyone, JUST DO IT!

Expand full comment

Let's see, in addition to his normal salary, he makes "a couple thousand dollars a month," and he had $80K to spend on a porn project...but he's too poor to afford an attorney?

I'm kind of disappointed that Olivia Reingold didn't pursue any awkward questions like that.

Different issue, but if part of their sex life includes others sometimes, I guarantee that one of them is unhappy, probably both. That stuff never ends well, almost always, one partner feels pressured into it.

Expand full comment

article didn't say too poor to afford an attorney. he said can not afford the level of legal team that a university system can. 80k over ~10 years is very different than what it takes to hire a top tier firm for a case that can drag on for a year. and the article implied that their content-making is also their vacations.

you make baseless budget assumptions and romantic ones about other people's relationships you couldn't possibly have data to support.

Expand full comment

Films of grown-up couples having sex are not necessarily porn, unless films of sex are always synonymous with porn. If you don’t want to know one way or the other, don’t watch.

If a couple offered to show me films of themselves having sex, I would say no. I don’t want to watch people I know (or don’t know) having sex. I have a right to say no. They have a right to offer to show me and then leave me alone.

This is a non-issue turned into a big case of nothing. More to the point, why does anybody care? He has a job other than filming himself having sex with his wife. So?

Are there children, babies or animals in the films? Are people being physically abused or imprisoned or in obvious states of duress? Is there torture? These are where the lines have been crossed. Sexual slavery is a real thing. It’s not this.

This is a married couple choosing to film themselves having sex. Have at it, I say. I’m going to stay home and watch The Food Network.

This couple is being persecuted by moralistic scolds. If you don’t like it, don’t watch.

Expand full comment

Your's was an intelligent, rational, comment to all this none sense.

Expand full comment

I tend to think that professors should be expected to adhere to certain standards of propriety and modesty, but if the University of Wisconsin at Eau Clair has not published said standards, I don't believe the University should invent them as a "Bill of Attainder."

How many professoratti at said University have in the past few months called for exterminating the Jews "from the River to the Sea"? Canoodling India Summer in a "master bedroom" pales in comparison.

Which brings us to India Summer. I note from the embedded link that India Summer is a "registered Republican." When you brush away the camouflage, I think you will see the true reason for the persecution of Gow and Wilson: they were shamelessly canoodling with the enemy. And by the way, what about the "master" bedroom? Didn't they get the memo? Nothing happens by coincidence. They were obviously dog whistling for white supremacy.

Expand full comment
Jun 5·edited Jun 5

This is "cancel culture" and sometimes such culture is appropriate and sometimes it is not. For me, the issue is whether the activity associated with the sanctions is a well known and accepted taboo. Sharing and even watching sex videos in public is a pretty well known and accepted taboo in our society. Perhaps you have a legal argument if it were not spelled out as such but I suspect there is a clause covering it somewhere. Polyamory and sex with subordinates are in the same category. Standards change and the last one is a newly added taboo in our society. I think the whole perspective missing from these discussions is how well known and accepted the taboo is to the person being sanctioned. A person knows they would be fired if they watched sex videos in the workplace so why would they think they would not be sanctioned for uploading sex videos and participating in them? This is gross naivety in my judgement.

Expand full comment

Points well taken, but it's hard to know what everyone understands to be the private (not on university time or equipment) standard of conduct these days. Is this standard well understood and respected at that university? In either case, it might be the time to issue Gow a stern warning and formally publish a code of private conduct after vetting it through the lawyers. Sad that it's come to this, but there you have it.

Expand full comment
Jun 5·edited Jun 5

I hear what you are saying and basically agree that it's important that a standard be well understood and clearly communicated. I just see something disingenuous in Mr Gow's acting as if he were blindsided by this university response. I think he expected it actually and wants to challenge the idea that sex videos should be a taboo. I may be wrong in which case he just seems like a very naive citizen... albeit in a very spicy monogamous relationship of which I heartily approve if there was less TMI.

Expand full comment

In today’s Free Press Hirsan Ayann Ali presents a conceptual framework of the subversion of our society. Coincidentally we have the porno professor story, one which was news several months ago.

One of the subversions we have experienced is our sense of propriety. The porno professors are a prime example. Maybe they have a first amendment right to display their copulations on the dinner table or elsewhere. Sex is healthy. Etc. etc.

As administrators and professors they need to understand the level of propriety in their lives that is part of their positions. Obviously, they have not.

In the words of that famous philosopher, “You’re fired!”

Expand full comment

Great observation. Along with the porn story, there is the defense of violent rap and the violent rappers that rap. Interesting.

Expand full comment

I have seen first hand our universities turn into far left propaganda machines, determined to snuff out Western civilization and replace the policies that made Western countries successful by policies proven over and over to snuff out justice, freedom, equality, and prosperity. This year's enthusiasm, the revival of Nazi ethnic policy, confirms the woke spirit. And you are alarmed at the impropriety of legal sexuality? Amidst the radical corruption of the universities, sexual exhibitionism is the least antisocial.

Expand full comment

Thank you Phillip for your response. While I agree with completely on the deterioration of universities, that was not the focus of my comment.

I responded to the story about the porno professors. Yes, I also realize the professors exist in the context you described. I loved teaching and research during my career, but know I would not fit in today, nor could I compose a DEI statement.

Expand full comment

I had a long career too, but the field that I loved has become unbearably woke Marxist, decolonialist, and vehemently Jew-hating, and my Department colleagues totally anti-academic ideologues. Complaints about this exhibitionist professor are like criticisms of the decoration on Gestapo headquarters.

Expand full comment