Closing the book
As many have now learned, I have spent the last five years working to achieve accountability for the unwelcome behavior of a former advisor.
It is hard to understand what it is like to live with this such extreme doubt and uncertainty for so long. Empathy has a limit: We can sympathize with a tough moment or a tough day, but we struggle to relate to challenges experienced over months and years. We get bored of it. We become numb. The news cycles of our lives march on.
So before I bore anyone, I want to close the book on this era of my life. This past week, new actions have been taken by Yale’s administration to further sanction my abuser. As a result, it is time for me, the communities that I am a part of, my family, and my friends, to move on. To make this closure meaningful — to make it permanent — I wanted to explain what has happened since this situation became public, and then offer some closing thoughts.
The aftermath
Two months ago, an article was published in the Yale Daily News about abuse that I experienced throughout graduate school — abuse that was well-documented and validated by a year-long investigation. In the immediate aftermath, my abuser sent two emails on the department listserv, defending his actions and doubling down on the defamatory claims he'd been making about me for years. He sent at least three additional emails to colleagues who expressed concern or support for me on Twitter. In these emails, he portrayed himself as both a hero and a victim.
After the second email sent on the department listserv, the Chair of the Psychology department sent a reply, criticizing the use of the listserv in this way. I was shortly thereafter invited to make a formal complaint to the FAS Dean’s office, which I promptly did. I met with the acting Dean, Kathryn Lofton, one week later. After over a month of silence, I received their verdict this past week.
The Dean’s office determined that they found the emails to be inconsistent with Yale’s standards of conduct. They explained that appropriate action had been taken to sanction my abuser for a second time.
Prior to this recent ruling by the Dean, department leadership held at least one meeting with students. Though no details of the situation with my abuser were discussed, and though no meaningful actions have been taken by the department since, students who attended this meeting reported feeling heard.
I believe that students feeling heard is not enough. I believe that, no matter what the most recent sanctions were against my abuser, they must be acknowledged to the larger community in order to achieve the desired accountability. Students must know when and how accountability occurs in cases of misconduct. Otherwise, they will continue to assume that faculty members can act (mostly) with impunity, and they will feel afraid of bringing complaints forward in the future.
While I continue to be disappointed in how things have played out, I do not wish to live my life in a state of anger and resentment. I do not wish for the members of the Psychology Department at Yale to find themselves in a state of constant anticipation, wondering when the next shocking email will come. The community deserves closure.
I take Dean Lofton's recent actions to be an indicator that my abuser has been strongly warned against any further action. I believe that, due to the public nature of the situation, my abuser will no longer have the power to harm my career in ways that he has long threatened to do. Therefore, I am satisfied to let this situation rest. I hope that members of the Yale community see these latest sanctions, as I do, as a small but significant step toward accountability.
Why am I speaking publicly at all?
Secrecy and confidentiality are the modus operandi of university grievance procedures. Privacy has its merits, but public accountability has its place, too. The reporter Michael Balter captured this cogently in talking about a case at UC Santa Barbara:
In my view, UCSB, like so many other universities and institutions, was probably more concerned about its own reputation than the well-being of the students and its professor. I don't think I have to tell readers here that this is a consistent and endemic pattern that everyone who tries to fight abuses has run up against. The lack of transparency and the secrecy of disciplinary proceedings may be necessary in some cases to protect the privacy of students and others, but the end result is that misconduct is covered up and victims and survivors are often abandoned and isolated. I can assure everyone that survivors only come to reporters as a last resort, when all other avenues to justice and truth have been blocked.
My advisors and I just wanted people, in the Yale community and beyond, to be informed. (Dick Aslin wrote a longer blogpost explaining the situation in slightly more detail.) We thought this case was unique, and therefore provided valuable learning opportunities. Unlike many stories of abuse in academia in recent years, my story highlighted a puzzling form of bullying and retaliation. It was puzzling because it was irrational: Attacking me, threatening me, and demeaning me in the ways that he did, when all he had to do was leave me alone, only brought increased attention to his misconduct (and further harm to others in his orbit).
The fact that a clear-cut case of senseless abuse took so long to address — the fact that it has still not been fully resolved — shows just how much power and protection tenured faculty members have. (And for no reason; tenure should not be used as a mechanism to defend and enable abuse.)
This is all especially poignant and relevant for students right now, given the ongoing contract negotiations at Yale. Students need to know what they are fighting for. As those negotiations continue, I urge my friends and colleagues to continue to fight for third-party arbitration for all members of the community. This is the only way to properly incentivize faculty members and administrators to prioritize the fair treatment of students.
The fact that a faculty member has been sanctioned (again) sends a crucial social signal that students are respected and that their complaints will (sometimes, at least) be heard. It is important for members of the Yale community and for future students to know that the attacks against me — including the defamatory emails that were sent about me — were wrong, that this injustice was addressed, and that they have the option to speak up if they ever experience such unwelcome behavior themselves.
I asked the Dean's office if they would allow the Chair of the Psychology department to make a short statement to the community acknowledging that my abuser was held accountable for his inappropriate emails. For legal reasons, perhaps, they were unable to do so. That is why I am making a statement myself.
Dean Lofton deserves some credit. In the five years I’ve been confronting this problem, she is the only high-ranking administration official to have ever met with me face-to-face. Based on her ruling, she seems to have taken this matter seriously. Even though I am disappointed in some aspects of Dean Lofton's handling of my situation — as I have expressed plainly to her — I appreciate that she acted quickly, decisively, and in good faith.
A note of thanks
During my time at Yale, I felt lucky to be a part of a vibrant community of kind, thoughtful, intelligent people. Even when I was hurting, I always felt happy to be a part of that wonderful community.
I want the current members of that community to know how much I believe in it. I want the current students to know that they have, for the most part, good, trustworthy mentors and leaders.
In the five years since this saga began, I have dealt with many different Chairs and Directors of Graduate Studies. I want to thank Frank Keil, Gregory McCarthy, Jennifer Richeson, Jutta Joormann, and Melissa Ferguson. All of these individuals have spent countless hours listening to me and trying to help.
I have been quite vocal about my disappointments over the years. Ask any department leaders and they will tell you that I have never minced words. None of them handled my situation perfectly, as I think they would all admit, but they all genuinely went out of their way to support me. My gripes have not been with our department leadership, but instead with the administration that limited their ability to act.
I especially want to acknowledge Greg McCarthy, who was quoted in the YDN article in a way that made him sound dismissive of my complaint. That is not true. Like other department leaders, he took my complaint seriously over many years. He treated me with respect and understanding. It is true that he initially believed this situation would not escalate to this level, but, when it did, he responded appropriately.
I must also thank Frank Keil and Dick Aslin yet again. I have spent hundreds of hours, maybe thousands, on calls with them over the past five years. Most of that time was spent processing and managing the incessant, pointless abuse. In all that time, they never told me what to do or how to feel. They listened to me, they supported me, and they let me know when I wasn't thinking straight. They challenged me and made me better. I have several lifetimes worth of gratitude for each of them.
The hateful, demeaning, threatening way that my abuser treated me was deeply irresponsible, and it caused me great harm. But before that, he offered me a spot in his lab and an opportunity to pursue a dream. He taught me many things I wouldn't have anywhere else learned. He was good to me in many ways, and I will always have gratitude for that.
I wish to erase neither the good nor the bad. Both are true. I hope that others can see it this way, too.
I am optimistic that this situation will serve as a learning experience, not just for my abuser, but also for those who are watching this all unfold from the outside: Academic institutions handle cases of abuse and harassment poorly, but some accountability can be achieved with patience and determination.
Moving forward
I often joke with my students that everything that is bad is good. What I mean by this, usually, is that every paper rejection, every failed analysis, every imperfect practice talk, and every null result is part of learning something else. I really believe it: Nothing bad has ever happened to me that I haven’t learned from. And I have learned so much in these past five years — mostly thanks to the patience and wise counsel of Frank and Dick.
Today, I feel as optimistic as I’ve ever been — and I am ready, now, to move forward.
I will not comment publicly on this again. This post, as well as the others on my website, will remain available for some time longer, but will likely be taken down in the coming months.