… UD managed to wedge in, as a subject of conversation last night with a tableful of old friends at Cafe of India, a university issue. Maybe not the world’s biggest university issue, but one of interest, worth thinking about, etc.
UD‘s friend Bill had earlier that day sent her this piece from Minnesota Public Radio about Adam and Eve, an online sex shop (toys, films) which is among the many financial contributors to the University of Minnesota’s Sexual Health Education Chair.
Joycelyn Elders, the US Surgeon General for whom the chair is named, writes: “The most common cause of poverty is children being born to children. Sexuality makes up such a great part of our lives, and yet we spend so little time talking about it, teaching about it, and educating our young people about it.”
The public radio guy is way shocked that the university accepted money from the porn biz. He interviews the head of the sexuality program, who says this is a responsible, law-abiding company that already sponsors a variety of sexual education initiatives. As to whether hardcore porn, as the reporter puts it, “distorts a person’s view of sexuality,” the program director says that “many individuals and couples enjoy erotica as part of their healthy sex relationship, and we have evidence where that can be helpful. We’re also aware some people get lost, and we treat people who have problems with internet pornography. It’s just like gambling. … This can be used responsibly or irresponsibly. Fortunately, the gaming industry devotes a lot of effort to helping people learn .. and … promote responsible use, and that’s what [Adam and Eve’s] intention is as well.”
The consensus at Cafe of India? Bad idea. Embarrassing for the university. “Universities,” one diner remarked, “are supposed to operate on a higher level than other institutions. This lowers them.”
Other diners were yet more disapproving. “Pornography is disgusting. It demeans women beyond belief. It’s terribly socially destructive. I don’t watch it. Ever. For a university to align itself with this industry is unconscionable.”
Well, UD brought it up last night because she ain’t so sure.
Comments welcome.
July 31st, 2011 at 10:40AM
Elders: “Sexuality makes up such a great part of our lives, and yet we spend so little time talking about it, teaching about it, and educating our young people about it.” Really? She must live in a different country than the one I live in, or perhaps (as I’ve often suspected) a whole different universe. Seems to me that we as a culture devote a huge amount of time, paper, ink, and gigabytes to talking about sex.
July 31st, 2011 at 11:02AM
david: Well, yes and no. Talking about sex in a prurient way, absolutely.
July 31st, 2011 at 11:35AM
Adam & Eve sells porn? So does Marriott. So does Amazon.
It’s always nice to have a cheap and painless way to clutch one’s pearls and work up some moral dudgeon. Your friends should let you know when they decide to get serious about their ethical superiority and stop patronizing hotel chains, bookstores, cable companies, and internet service providers that make money selling porn.
July 31st, 2011 at 11:42AM
Good point, Dave. Lots of places purvey porn.
July 31st, 2011 at 11:44AM
The fact that this is even an issue is a sign that we’re not yet a mature society when it comes to sexuality. Porn degrades women? Adorable. I’d say you must be dining with old people, but my nana (rest her soul) had no issues with porn. I guess you run with a really prudish crowd.
July 31st, 2011 at 12:02PM
Well, since UM has apparently decided that the Sexual Health Education Department should seek external funding, it should not be hugely surprising that the question of the source of those funds has gotten all hot ‘n sweaty. D’oh. Sigh. If they only had a brain.
I think the actual problem is that Minnesota is the location of some sort of a rift in the spatio-temporal-politico-psycho-sexual continuum.
July 31st, 2011 at 1:19PM
“porn” seems like an awfully broad category to be for or against kind of like being for/against drugs, not sure what money is clean enough for the high standards of the ivory tower, lord knows what ties/karma those federal grant/tax dollars bear…
July 31st, 2011 at 1:55PM
My beef has to do with the: “It’s not illegal” angle. Given what has gone on around here for quite some time, this just indicates further business as usual. Post up at Chronicle: Adam and Eve Help Out at the University of Minnesota.
link: http://bit.ly/rbTt0R
August 3rd, 2011 at 11:49AM
@Dave Stone: Indeed, I’m always surprised, when I stay at hotels meant for businesspeople, by the well-advertised availability of pay-per-view porn, sometimes with the mention that it can be billed under an innocuous mention (presumably for men with nosy wives or, even more probably, for businessmen who bill their porn to their expense account).
Regarding the claims that porn is bad, it demeans women, therefore porn providers are bad, and universities should therefore not have anything to do with them.
1) Since the 1940s, American universities have done much work for the US military-industrial complex, a fact that was famously acknowledged by Dwight Eisenhower. Not all uses of American weaponry were beneficial to mankind, and this is euphemistic.
Therefore, I think that if one questions ties to companies like Adam & Eve, one should question DARPA and ONR funding, ROTC on campus, etc.
2) One may count porn as exploitive, but what’s wrong about sex toys?