How serious and offensive does an employee’s conduct need to be to rise to the level of unlawful harassment?

Here’s an example of behavior that doesn’t make the grade, according to one court:

Two female graduate students at a theological seminary sued the school, claiming to have been sexually harassed by one of its employees.

Allegedly, the man had aggressively pursued both women romantically for a long time. Despite being consistently rejected, he repeatedly requested dates with them — even though his behavior never involved any sexual language, inappropriate touching or other characteristics normally associated with harassment.

When the seminary failed to stop his behavior, the women sued.

Was it harassment? No, the court said. While he annoyed the students and made them uncomfortable, his conduct wasn’t severe enough to hold the school accountable.

As the judge said: “Persons who are socially tone deaf are not, by that characteristic, necessarily the equivalent of sexual harassers. It is important in that regard that neither of these women used her authority to tell [the accused] to go away. They cannot rely on the prospect of a money damages award from the Seminary to replace their own obligation to simply tell [him] that they had no interest in him romantically or even as a casual acquaintance.”

Cite: Godfrey v. Princeton Theological Seminary

Tags: Godfrey v. Princeton Theological Seminary, workplace romance