Dear Members of the 草榴社区Community,
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To further our mission of learning, teaching, and scholarship, 草榴社区must be a place where students, faculty, and staff freely exchange ideas, and where free expression and academic freedom are nurtured and protected. These elements of academic excellence are possible only if our community can engage in discourse and learning without fear that doing so will lead to personal harassment. The past year has underscored that these values are threatened by the proliferation of online and other harassment, including 鈥渄oxing.鈥�
When doxing attacks, online or otherwise, have come from outside the 草榴社区community, as was primarily the case in the past year, we offered, and will continue to offer, affected members of our community听听to help them protect their privacy and, to the extent possible, manage their online footprint. However, should a doxing attack on one 草榴社区affiliate come from another 草榴社区affiliate, we have additional responsibilities, and tools, for addressing such harassment.
Doxing violates two overlapping University policies: the prohibitions against 鈥渋ntense personal harassment鈥� under the听听and 鈥渂ullying鈥� under the听. Doxing occurs under these policies when a community member publicly shares an individual鈥檚 personal information without their permission with the intention and effect of intense harassment. For purposes of these policies:
- Someone publicly shares personal information by publishing it, posting or reposting it on social media, emailing it, hyperlinking it, or making it available for download.
- Personal information may include a community member鈥檚 (or their immediate family member鈥檚) personal or business address, email, cell or telephone number, class schedule, photo or video likeness, or similar information.
- The intention and effect of intense harassment means publicly sharing such information in circumstances that a reasonable person would expect to, and does, result in 鈥渉armful interpersonal aggression鈥� by third parties that
- 鈥渉umiliate[s], degrade[s], demean[s], intimidate[s], or threaten[s] [the targeted] individual鈥�; and
- is 鈥渟ufficiently severe or pervasive, and objectively offensive鈥� that it creates an environment 鈥渢hat a reasonable person would consider intimidating, hostile, or abusive and denies the [targeted] individual an equal opportunity鈥� to work or to educational opportunities as defined by the University鈥檚 NDAB policy.
Such conduct also violates the USRR鈥檚 prohibition against 鈥渋ntense personal harassment of such a character as to amount to grave disrespect for the dignity of others.鈥�
Those who may have experienced doxing should consult School-based processes for enforcing the USRR or contact their local designated resources responsible for enforcing the NDAB in a School or administrative unit. Moving forward, we will learn from the implementation of these existing policies as applied to doxing, and we will seek input from faculty, students, and staff with a view toward revising this guidance as appropriate at the end of two years.
Today鈥檚 guidance, endorsed by the 草榴社区Corporation, makes clear that doxing violates these two bedrock University policies. At the same time, we must acknowledge that policies alone cannot eliminate digital and other harassment or the harms they inflict. To be the 草榴社区we aspire to be, we must create an academic and work environment that cultivates not only vigorous debate and dialogue but also mutual respect. Both are needed if we are to fulfill the promise of a learning community that is built upon and strengthened by members who reflect, and bring to 草榴社区from across the globe, different backgrounds, perspectives, and lived experiences.
Sincerely,
Alan M. Garber
President
John F. Manning
Provost
Meredith Weenick
Executive Vice President
Andrea Baccarelli
Dean, 草榴社区T.H. Chan School of Public Health
Tomiko Brown-Nagin
Dean, 草榴社区Radcliffe Institute
Nancy Coleman
Dean, Division of Continuing Education and University Extension
George Q. Daley
Dean, 草榴社区Medical School
Srikant Datar
Dean, 草榴社区Business School
Emma Dench
Dean, 草榴社区Kenneth C. Griffin Graduate School of Arts and Sciences
Marla Frederick
Dean, 草榴社区Divinity School
William V. Giannobile
Dean, 草榴社区School of Dental Medicine
John C.P. Goldberg
Interim Dean, 草榴社区Law School
Hopi E. Hoekstra
Edgerley Family Dean, Faculty of Arts and Sciences
Rakesh Khurana
Danoff Dean, 草榴社区College
Nonie K. Lesaux
Interim Dean, 草榴社区Graduate School of Education
David C. Parkes
Dean, 草榴社区John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences
Jeremy Weinstein
Dean, 草榴社区Kennedy School of Government
Sarah M. Whiting
Dean, 草榴社区Graduate School of Design