Harvard investigates dickish behavior at one of its theaters

Don't let your misogyny get the better of you - if you're just standing there, it's no hate crime.

But funny you should mention Harvard Square, because that was the location of what turned into a failed challenge to the state's laws on public nudity.

A woman who was arrested one June 25 for protesting against Christmas commercialism by stripping nude (it's the anti-Christmas and, well, this is Harvard Square, so, yeah) challenged the state law that said you could be arrested if your nudity caused "shock and alarm" among bystanders.

Two workers at the information booth there told police they were shocked and alarm and off to the pokey, she went.

The Supreme Judicial Court ruled she could, in fact, face criminal charges because there was nothing wrong with state law as it relates to people not expecting to see normally clothed body parts - as opposed to, oh, people sitting in a strip club, or for the more high minded, a theater performance where they know in advance some performers will perform in what their mama gave them.

So, yeah, take off all your clothes in front of the newsstand and don't be surprised if you're arrested for open and gross behavior - unless you've plastered the square beforehand with fliers alerting people to your impending recreation of Michelangelo's David or whatever (and even then, you'd probably get some tourist from Alabama coming out of the T at just that moment who would get all shocked and alarmed).

So one of the questions in the current case is whether theater goers knew what they were getting into. Granted, he advertised the show by having a bunch of people walk around Harvard Square dressed like penises, but that doesn't mean everybody saw them, or that Harvard, which rented him the space, knew he'd be doing that.