From: jaw@owlnet.rice.edu (Joseph A. Watters)
Newsgroups: comp.admin.policy
Subject: Re: Display of nudes
Date: 12 Oct 92 22:47:45 GMT
Article-I.D.: rice.Bw15zM.92I
Organization: Rice University

In article <mumble>, plarkin@iphase.com (Patrick Larkin) writes:
|> 
|> Well, all this discussion about Nudes on Display terminals has been
|> limited to an Academic environment.  
|>
|> What is the general consensus in the Commercial environment
|> regarding the use of storage resources for the purpose of saving
|> images of what could be considered "offensive" material?  Of course,

From my experience in the commercial environment, the response could
be summed up in the inimitable expression of many folks these days:
Not!  Many companies, especially larger ones, have sexual harassment
policies and policies regarding use of company property for personal
reasons.   In a private office, display of potentially offensive,
though legally protected material may or may not be acceptable.  If
anyone else walks into the office, and it would be hard to imagine a
company office where this would not happen, the display immediately
becomes "public".  This puts it in the realm of sexual harassment, if
the display is of a sexually-oriented nature (this is pretty vague, and
is in the eye of the beholder), and the beholder feels that it creates
an intolerable work environment, and files a complaint.  Most companies
would seek to avoid being set up for this by demanding/requiring the
removal of the material from publc display if it is reported.

|> no company can dictate what an employee does on his own time, or his
|> own property (i.e. Employee's PC in his/her Office).  

Actually, I disagree.  Most companies can and will fire an employee
who is convicted of a crime, even if the crime took place on the
employees own time.  Most employers proscribe drug use or excessive
alchol use.  Many companies have policies regarding intra-company
sexual relationships.  An employer has the right to set employment
conditions that end up affecting what an employee does on his or her
own time.  This is not dictating behavior.  An employee is free to
engage in the acts proscribed by the employment conditions.
Conversely, the employer is free to not retain that employee.  It is
called employment at will and is the predominant employment doctrine
in this country.  However, most companies correctly recognize that if
they set too many employment conditions that affect employee's private
lives, no one will work for them.  For example, back in the Ross Perot
days, EDS would set all kinds of conditions, such as the kind of
people an employee could date, or that they could not cohabit with a
member of the opposite sex, unless they were that employee`s spouse.
I'm sure former EDS employees could contribute other stories.  EDS is
not alone on this either.

My experience is that the vast majority of companies provide employees
with the resources they need to do their jobs, especially items
such as computers.  So in most cases, the storage would take place
on company property.  Even if it was an employee's PC, the company
could quite reasonably argue that while they can't dictate what an
employee does with their own property, they certainly *can* dictate
what that employee can do in the company's office building or plant
site.

|>
|> My concern is two-fold:  Disk Space usage and a Sys Admin's removal
|> on sight of such images; and another employee bopping around looking
|> at images in say /usr/local/gifs and stumbling across something
|> he/she finds offensive.  

Most likely, a company will remove offensive and non-offensive
material under the "no personal use of company property" policy,
rather than any "offensive content" policy, because the latter is very
hard to define and runs into other issues.  Unless the company is
engaged in the business of producing and/or distributing those images,
there is almost certainly no defendable business need for the images
to exist on the system.  Therefore, sys admins may be empowered to
remove them on sight, and other employees discovering them may cause
them to be removed also.

|>
|> What is a company's "exposure" (sorry, couldn't find a better word)
|> in the second scenario?

That answer probably is best left to the company's equal employment
officer and/or legal counsel.  As a guess, if that employee had any
right or authorization to be in that directory, and they discover the
image, they may have cause for a sexual harassment complaint.  An
analogy would be inserting a photograph in a file folder that contains
other business material.  If a file clerk or secretary who has
legitimate access to the files takes out the folder and opens it and
discovers the photograph, they may have a harrassment claim if they
are offended by the photograph, or it creates an oppressive
environment.

-- 
Joseph A. Watters, Jr.		jaw@owlnet.rice.edu
Deputy Director, Owlnet
Rice University
Houston, Texas
Newsgroups: comp.admin.policy,alt.comp.acad-freedom.talk