The Volokh Conspiracy - Scott Glover Defends His Description of Judge Kozinski's Files:

In this very interesting radio program on the LA Times' story about Judge Kozinski's fileserver, there's an interesting moment in which the LA Times reporter who broke the story, Scott Glover, defends his description of the video of a man running away from a donkey as a "video of a half-dressed man cavorting with a sexually aroused farm animal." I apologize for blogging about the topic, as I gather most VC readers have had enough of this story, but Glover's defense strikes me as so completely absurd that I wanted to comment.

In the radio segment, Glover argues that his description of the video does not in any way suggest that the video contained or suggested a sexual interest in animals. (Which it didn't, to be clear; I just watched it for the first time, and it's clear the man is trying his best to avoid such contact). Here's what Glover says, at around the 10:20 mark:

  Let's talk about the image of the farm animal, which I believe I described as a "video of a half-dressed man cavorting with a sexually aroused farm animal."
  This has caused quite a buzz, and I'm not sure why. If you look up "cavorting" in the dictionary, it talked about "to prance" or "to romp about." There's not a sexual connotation there. . .
  If I thought [the video] was an attempt at bestiality, I certainly would have described it as such if there was evidence to support that. I was just describing what is there, there was no attempt to make it seem like something else.

That strikes me as a remarkably lame explanation. When used to describe a group acting together, the word "cavort" means "to have lively or boisterous fun; [to] romp." True, there are many uses of the term that have no sexual connotation. But a man running away in fear to avoid being sexually assaulted by a donkey is not cavorting: he is not enjoying himself. And it's hard to imagine nonsexual ways that a half dressed man could enjoy himself with a sexually aroused farm animal. It seems to me that the sexual connotation is obvious, and that Glover's defense is absurd.

Thanks to Patterico for the link; he is also on the radio program together with blogfather Eugene.

	[Orin Kerr, June 19, 2008 at 12:51am] Trackbacks Scott Glover Defends His Description of Judge Kozinski's Files: In this very interesting radio program on the LA Times' story about Judge Kozinski's fileserver, there's an interesting moment in which the LA Times reporter who broke the story, Scott Glover, defends his description of the video of a man running away from a donkey as a "video of a half-dressed man cavorting with a sexually aroused farm animal." I apologize for blogging about the topic, as I gather most VC readers have had enough of this story, but Glover's defense strikes me as so completely absurd that I wanted to comment. In the radio segment, Glover argues that his description of the video does not in any way suggest that the video contained or suggested a sexual interest in animals. (Which it didn't, to be clear; I just watched it for the first time, and it's clear the man is trying his best to avoid such contact). Here's what Glover says, at around the 10:20 mark: Let's talk about the image of the farm animal, which I believe I described as a "video of a half-dressed man cavorting with a sexually aroused farm animal." This has caused quite a buzz, and I'm not sure why. If you look up "cavorting" in the dictionary, it talked about "to prance" or "to romp about." There's not a sexual connotation there. . . If I thought [the video] was an attempt at bestiality, I certainly would have described it as such if there was evidence to support that. I was just describing what is there, there was no attempt to make it seem like something else. That strikes me as a remarkably lame explanation. When used to describe a group acting together, the word "cavort" means "to have lively or boisterous fun; [to] romp." True, there are many uses of the term that have no sexual connotation. But a man running away in fear to avoid being sexually assaulted by a donkey is not cavorting: he is not enjoying himself. And it's hard to imagine nonsexual ways that a half dressed man could enjoy himself with a sexually aroused farm animal. It seems to me that the sexual connotation is obvious, and that Glover's defense is absurd. Thanks to Patterico for the link; he is also on the radio program together with blogfather Eugene.