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Reflections

Knock Three Times on the Ceiling?

by Ralph R. Reiland,
Professor of Free Enterprise

The lesson this week is to be careful in the men's room at the Minneapolis airport if you have restless leg syndrome (RLS).

There's "an irresistible urge to move about" when you have RLS, according to the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS). Moreover, the ailment's "triggering situations are periods of inactivity," such as "long-distance flights."

Those with RLS "often keep their legs in motion," explains NINDS, "especially when sitting," as on a toilet. Side effects include "impairment of daytime function."

An estimated six million guys have RLS, "often underdiagnosed," a disorder "more common with increasing age." There's no cure but what helps to "relieve symptoms," according to NINDS, is a "massaging of the legs."

So there's the defense for Sen. Larry Craig, allegedly caught trolling for sex via foot tapping in the men's room at the Minnesota airport -- even if he had asked the undercover cop in the adjoining stall to massage his leg, which he didn't.

Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pennsylvania, said Craig should fight the charges: "I've had some experiences in these kinds of matters since my days as Philadelphia district attorney, and with the evidence, Sen. Craig wouldn't be convicted of anything."

Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, concurred: "It's Craig's story versus the policeman's. He never propositioned anyone."

But let's say he did. It's still not the government's business, said conservative columnist, economist, actor, lawyer and professor Ben Stein: "Suppose he was soliciting for gay sex. Gay sex is not illegal in the United States. The Supreme Court has said that. If it were illegal, it would be a different story. It's not illegal. He didn't do anything illegal."

Stein is referring to Lawrence & Garner v. Texas, the November 2003 case in which the Supreme Court, establishing new legal ground for privacy, struck down a Texas sodomy law that banned private, consensual sex between adults of the same sex.

"The petitioners are entitled to respect for their private lives," wrote Justice Anthony Kennedy for the court's 6-to-3 majority. "The state cannot demean their existence or control their destiny by making their private sexual conduct a crime."

The state, in short, got out of the business of picking appropriate partners for adult sexual activity, and the solicitation of same. With solicitation, if an act is legal, such as consensual sex between adults of the same sex, then the soliciting of that act isn't illegal, so long as things remain relatively noncommercial and private.

In the Craig case, the invasion of privacy came from the state, not from Craig. "I don't like the idea that people are sitting in the next stall from you at a public bathroom listening to whether or not you tap your foot," said Stein. "These are Gestapo tactics. Gestapo, Gestapo, Gestapo. It's not America."

Back in the day before sex signals were illegal, how innocent it seemed when Tony Orlando and Dawn sang "knock three times on the ceiling if you want me, twice on the pipe if the answer is no." Nowadays, the person upstairs might well sue under harassment law and take a shot at collecting up to $300,000 per knock

In November 1998, the Georgia Supreme Court threw out the state's sodomy law, a law that applied to both heterosexual and homosexual acts.

"We cannot think of any other activity that reasonable persons would rank as more private and more deserving of protection from government interference than consensual, private, adult sexual activity," wrote Georgia Chief Justice Robert Benham in the court's 6-1 decision.

"The Georgia Supreme Court in issuing the sodomy ruling affirmed a Georgia citizen's right to privacy under the Georgia Constitution, and that privacy is not just in your home," said Debbie Seagraves, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Georgia. "A private conversation between two people, even if it is in a public place, should still be private."

Even if the solicitation takes place in public, said Seagraves, it should not be illegal if the sexual activity is to take place in private.

What is illegal is being a pest.

In Craig's case, assuming the police report is correct, the real trouble comes if he kept playing footsie even after the other guy showed no interest. That's when flirting, or solicitation, turns into sexual harassment.

At the White House, assistant pastry chef Franette McCulloch, 53, sued her pastry boss, Roland Mesnier, claiming he excluded her from designing top-line desserts after his repeated and unwelcome sexual advances were spurned. Additionally, McCulloch claimed that Mesnier retaliated for rebuffs by once assigning her to peel eight crates of kiwi.

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Ralph R. Reiland is an associate professor of economics at Robert Morris University in Pittsburgh.

Ralph R. Reiland
Phone: 412-884-4541
E-mail: rrreiland@aol.com

"Ralph R. Reiland is the B. Kenneth Simon Professor of Free Enterprise at Robert Morris University, the owner Amel's Restaurant, and a columnist with the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review."