It's a no-no here too, and I've seen someone lose a job over it (as well he should have). It's absolutely an abuse of power! There as here, however, people have done it, and I think much of the enforcement of rules against sleeping with students has come in recent years. Helen's affair with Stephen would have been in the late 1990s, and I think it not completely improbable he'd have known of another faculty member (Matthews) who had slept with students at that time. My impression is that on both sides of the pond, it's really in recent years authorities have been enforcing rules against. (I have a couple of British colleagues who have complained about faculty having affairs with students and just how long they got away with it, some retiring at a ripe old age with no repercussions for what they'd done.)
I'm not saying it's common, and I am most certainly not saying it's all right. I was furious at the end of 1.06—with Helen. I've ranted about it elsewhere (apparently not on my own LJ, since I can't find my comments now). The characters seemed clearly not to view Helen's original affair with Stephen as we do, which I fear is also realistic: where I've known of affairs or eve incidents between faculty and students, a lot of blame has been targeted at the student. That's completely unfair, but I've seen it happen more than once, sadly.
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Date: 2010-07-08 11:50 am (UTC)I'm not saying it's common, and I am most certainly not saying it's all right. I was furious at the end of 1.06—with Helen. I've ranted about it elsewhere (apparently not on my own LJ, since I can't find my comments now). The characters seemed clearly not to view Helen's original affair with Stephen as we do, which I fear is also realistic: where I've known of affairs or eve incidents between faculty and students, a lot of blame has been targeted at the student. That's completely unfair, but I've seen it happen more than once, sadly.