Writer’s Sexual Invitation Angers Moorpark College

The former editor of Moorpark College’s student newspaper has been reprimanded by college officials for writing a column in which he jokingly invited the women’s basketball team to join him at a local motel for the weekend.

College officials have warned Robert E. Chaffin Jr. in a July 26 letter that he could be suspended, expelled or otherwise disciplined if he continues publishing “offensive expressions which interfere with the college’s primary educational responsibility.” They also have decided not to rehire him as a part-time publicist for the college’s athletic department.

Chaffin, 35, issued his invitation to the 11 members of the Lady Raiders basketball team in a sports column published in the June 7 edition of the biweekly campus newspaper, The Moorpark College Reporter.

‘Favorite Team’

“Now, to my favorite team of the season, the Lady Raiders of basketball, I have only one suggestion,” Chaffin wrote. “Meet me at the Travelodge in Simi on Friday, June 16 at 9 p.m. We’ll get a room with a Jacuzzi. For the weekend.”

The column, published in the last edition of the school year, infuriated many in the campus community who were already annoyed by some of Chaffin’s previous pieces, said Stanley L. Bowers, Moorpark College president. Chaffin had referred in his columns to the cheerleading squad as “Dancing Delights” and had written such statements as the women’s volleyball team “played their tiny little hearts out” and “I freely admit I am a sexist pig.”

In addition to the formal reprimand, Chaffin will not be rehired as an athletic department student publicist because “keeping him on would be tacit acceptance of his views,” Bowers said.

Chaffin, a journalism major who was editor-in-chief of the paper for the spring semester and intends to write for it in the fall, said he will appeal the formal reprimand to the governing board of the Ventura Community College District. He said he believes he did a good job publicizing sports on campus, including women’s basketball, and should be rehired as an athletic department publicist.

“They’re trying to intimidate me, to get me to write benign columns about the grass dying on the football field,” Chaffin said. “In China, one of the democratic freedoms students died for was freedom of the press, and that’s what we’re fighting for here at Moorpark College.”

Bowers said the college’s action was not an attempt to censor Chaffin, only to make him aware that his comments offended some people. Bowers said he received letters objecting to the column from the Faculty Senate and about 25 individuals, including college administrators and women’s basketball team members.

Katie Krause, 18, a guard for the Lady Raiders, called Chaffin’s last column “completely disgusting.”

“We’re out there to play basketball, not to look good and be written about like we’re the type of girls that sleep around,” Krause said. “It’s a free country and you can say what you want, but it was aggravating not to be able to answer back because he printed it in the last edition of the paper.”