The only sentence in the press release specifically about the decision to remove the lectures, afaict, is this one:
> Following broad consultation among faculty, MIT is indefinitely removing Lewin’s online courses, in the interest of preventing any further inappropriate behavior.
It sounds like they're worried that just having courses up (even if not offered) might encourage future interaction between students using the material and the person listed as instructor (e.g. by email), which they don't want to provide as an avenue. They do have an archive of past courses [1], so one in-between option might've been to remove them from the current MITx site and stick them in the archive. But it's possible they were worried that would be insufficient. (It's also possible I don't understand how MITx courses are organized, and what the archive is for.)
> It sounds like they're worried that just having courses up (even if not offered) might encourage future interaction between students using the material and the person listed as instructor (e.g. by email)
Another interpretation is that other current or future faculty could get ideas about sexually harassing online students. "... preventing any further inappropriate behavior..." sounds like they're worried about other current or future faculty being pervs, and want to nuke him from orbit.
> Following broad consultation among faculty, MIT is indefinitely removing Lewin’s online courses, in the interest of preventing any further inappropriate behavior.
It sounds like they're worried that just having courses up (even if not offered) might encourage future interaction between students using the material and the person listed as instructor (e.g. by email), which they don't want to provide as an avenue. They do have an archive of past courses [1], so one in-between option might've been to remove them from the current MITx site and stick them in the archive. But it's possible they were worried that would be insufficient. (It's also possible I don't understand how MITx courses are organized, and what the archive is for.)
[1] http://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/33970