Biggus Titus of Oxford University

[Forecastsayssnowbutthereisnosnow]

Sadly, not a Monty Python sketch.

Matt Rattley, a large bearded bloke who wears giant fake breasts, appears to be happily working at Oxford Uni.

I was really hoping this wasn't true but there is even a youtube video with him talking while wearing the giant breasts and red lipstick, applied to a degree any circus clown would be accused of overdoing it. The video includes a slide stating he works as a lecturer and tutor in the Biochemistry Dept at Oxford. He's also on LinkedIn.

I mean, how obvious can it be that this is a sexual fetish which he is involving unconsenting students and staff in???

Dr P on X has been (correctly) very robust on this case:

""This is Matt Rattley saying, "I can do whatever I please and nobody can stop me".

This is highly antisocial, abnormal, boundary-violating, paraphilic behaviour.

And we should not be afraid to say so."

Just for clarity (although I think you'll know I think this)... it absolutely should not be tolerated or, heaven forfend, encouraged. I realised, too late to edit, that the last para. of my above implicitly contradicted itself and was a bit unclear.

I wrote:

...Had you already considered how to balance these rights and come down on one side? Or did it not occur to you that any balancing was needed in the first place? (I'm honestly not sure which I'd find more disturbing).

What would be more accurate would be to say that there is a clear and easy way to enact a professional duty of care both to someone acting this way and his students: simply not to permit this. It's not a matter of a "balancing" of rights (the wrong phrase in this context), but rather that, in challenging this, an employer protects everyone in the long run. I think it's significant that, while we here would like any hypothetical action taken to be in order to prioritise student well-being, HR could just choose the strategic approach of having a discrete word "entirely in your interests" (perhaps warning of the potential for overly sensitive complainants / more conservatively-minded students / pick your cynical stereotype) so as to preempt what's now happening. That even this step increasingly isn't taken shows all the more the extraordinary level of capture - and how self-defeating it's been. I'm not an HR person, and recognise it would be a tricky path to tread whichever way you look at it, but feel there is surely a better way through.

Re: what more they could/should do besides that, including if there were health/well-being for the individual, I don't know. But it's immensely frustrating that whereas, in the recent past, this kind of behaviour would have indicated that something was seriously off, now it's seen as a sign of strength (stunning and brave, and all that). It feels as if we've rushed straight from denying or ridiculing this kind of thing (so it just keeps happening, but underground) to embracing it as admirable (meaning it just keeps happening, but in the office). All without stopping at a more responsible halfway point of thinking, OK, so as well as being hugely problematic for those affected, this sits so far at the far end of a spectrum that it may also justify some concern for the individual themself (who, in any case, has shown a problematic lack of awareness for how their behavior impacts others which needs to be addressed): as such, how do we actually respond to all this, from careful conversations with appropriate people at one end, to police involvement at the other?

I mean you could argue that Barbie Kardashian is vulnerable. He obviously had a difficult childhood. He's also clearly very dangerous. He also goes around with massive fake boobs.

Barbie Kardashian is convicted of having violently attacked his social worker and ripped off her eyelid. He has also made violent, graphic threats to hurt and kill his mother.

Institutions have a responsibility to protect women from men who may be a risk even if they are also vulnerable. This responsibility appears to have been forgotten.

In this context I'm honestly appalled that Barbie spent so little time in prison and is now free.

Barbie Kardashian is 100% vulnerable. Likely ought to be accommodated in a secure hospital. See also the late Tiffany Scott/Obi Wan Kenobi.

Society has gone from treating incredibly damaged and dangerous men like this as less than human, straight to lionising them. Swerving the sensible in-between path of ensuring both they and society are protected as much as possible.

At root I suppose its still a lack of ability to manage people who dont/cant follow societal norms.

Exactly that.

I wasn't happy with how I phrased the above, either (even reported it to try again, absurdly, as I'm finding this so hard to navigate - what a time-waster...) But yes, that's everything I mean, Arabella. And what we're supposed to say shows some seriously revealing swerving, too. 50 years ago, it was, Laugh it off (and don't worry, love). Now, it's Respect it (and shut up, poppet). What that's bypassed, notably, is women's right to speak their "truth" (based on devastating stats and a lifetime of experience): to say, This disturbs me immensely, and with good reason. And I think that history is directly reflected in my discomfort writing about it, actually. We've never been given or permitted the language to say that neither is this a belly-laugh pub joke, nor an admirable expression of deep-seated truth. It's fucking scary and/or degrading, is what it is - respect that, why don't you?!

Normal human nature is to avoid association and contact with people who are unsafe, lack boundaries and appropriacy, and give off every signal of instability and risk. For obvious reasons.

But I swear this is part of the control games; we've seen it. A chuckling chap gleefully sharing highly disturbed fantasies of sexual murder at the time time as demanding women shut up, come into an enclosed space with him and get their clothes off. The answer should from anyone with normal boundaries and a grip, be very short and largely Anglo Saxon.

Hey, Helen. I wrote a long reply to this above that I then wasn't happy with either (see my ongoing worritting above about navigating this!) But basically, it's words like "it" that I really find unpleasant (and self-defeating). I agree we must be able to call out unacceptable behaviour. (I also read about the posts you mentioned upthread and was disgusted by the Green guy. It says it all).

Input from Akua R:

https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/2049489384945107214.html

Thanks to sharing.

I don't understand this point:

If wearing the giant prosthetic breasts at work is connected to the man identifying as trans, it's arguable that it's conduct related to gender reassignment. If so, a woman employee must not be treated less favourably for objecting to it.

In the case of gender reassignment, I would assume the comparator is a man who doesn't identify as a woman. So a male (who identifies as a woman) should be treated no less favourably than a male who doesn't when it comes to standards of decency while working in the university. Presumably this means that it's fine for anyone to say they find it totally inappropriate for a trans-identifying male or a run-of-the-mill male to wear them.

Obviously IANAL and Akua R is... so I fully accept that I could be barking up the wrong tree.

I agree, a bit of a puzzle.
Maybe the comparator just relates to GR, and doesn't include the second PC of sex.
So, comparator of 'person' with GR is person without GR. In this particular case, the complainant is more likely to also be a woman.
IANAL though

If he habitually came into a class containing disabled students ( or even one that didn't) by leaning heavily on a crutch he didn't need and adopting an exaggerated lopsided walk, would they defend that as "Oxford eccentricity", I wonder?

I think ARs comments that a woman should not be treated less favourably for objecting to it is connected to the third kind of harassment not in connection with comparitors for discrimination on the basis of GR.

The third potentially relevant kind of harassment is where B is treated less favourably:

- because she rejected or submitted to the conduct, and

- the conduct was either of a sexual nature or was related to gender reassignment or sex

Yes, that makes sense thanks: it's harassment, not discrimination, so not about comparators.

This looks very promising:

Naomi C, in response to Akua R:

Excellent thread. My only point of disagreement is that I feel rather more confident than Akua that wearing giant prosthetic breasts at work (or indeed anywhere else) is "conduct of a sexual nature." I honestly can't think what on earth it would be.

https://x.com/LoudBonnet/status/2049501190149243141

Are there seriously women here arguing that men wearing giant plastic breasts at work don’t create a hostile or degrading environment for female students and colleagues?

Are they the daughters of the ninnies who a generation ago used to insist that the rugby teams and drinking clubs were ‘just having a laugh’ with their naked antics and joyless feminists should learn to find them funny?

Ahhhhh. Thank you.

Wow, what a stella collection, I wonder if they need someone to pour the wine. 🤩

I absolutely love this response on the Naomi/Akua thread:

What I can't get my head around is that you have to write learned, legal posts about this. He's wearing massive rubber tits. This isn't rocket science.

I imagine rocket science is simple compared to equalities law😁

The rocket scientist I used to know assured me that rocket science was one of the simpler applications of the science she had studied at university.

My only point of disagreement is that I feel rather more confident than Akua that wearing giant prosthetic breasts at work (or indeed anywhere else) is "conduct of a sexual nature." I honestly can't think what on earth it would be.

Exactly Naomi. The faux disingenuity is ridiculous. Wanking while Rome burns.

Edited to add: there are many more ways that men with issues 'get off' on behaviours than merely erections. Two minutes on the relationship board demonstrate: the heady boost of coercive control, boundary pushing, the kind of man who smirks knowing he's signalling to you that he could, and if he did you couldn't stop him, without ever laying a finger on you.

Some of it is purely 'I am doing something that pushes your boundaries, that is unacceptable and just obvious enough for you to be uncomfortable, but you can't say anything or prove anything or stop me'. Involving non consenting others and using them in a personal game that is certainly gratifying some part of him. And when I say 'others', obviously, it's all aimed at the young women he teaches.

I doubt there is any chance that this man is all about pushing boundaries where he has control and women are powerless to do or say anything. Even leaving negative feedback would be hard.

"It" in helen's sentence being "the behaviour" (that shouldn't be enabled) was how I read it? Sorry if I've got the wrong end of the stick there.

no fake sexual organs would be too broad - you don't want to accidentally catch female cancer survivors using prothestics in that.