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Volume CXXXI, Number 21 |
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Smooth Words champions
To the Editors:
Two weeks ago, we dropped the Smooth Words contest on the Bowdoin community.
The contest challenged students, faculty, and staff to come up with the
best way to ask a partner for permission to have sex. Many states, including
Maine, require that males and females receive consent before engaging
in sexual activity. Verbal consent is the safest way to ensure that both
individuals understand each other's intentions.
Few people are aware of or consider the laws requiring consent. There are also those on campus who believe that having laws requiring permission is constraining and a hindrance to traditional relationships. We hope that the contest caused them to reconsider their views and realize that verbal consent is the best way to prevent a miscommunication from leading to disaster.
If you have trouble finding the smooth words while you're getting your
groove on, then you can take a hint from our winners. And the winners
are…(drum roll):
First Prize: "Mmmmmmm, ahhhhhh...you just turn me on, it feels so
good, and it also feels so good that we can talk about it, tell each other
how good it is without ever feeling stupid or embarrassed. I want to make
sweet lovin' to you mi amor!! I want to make love passionately, softly,
quickly, slowly, sweetly, wildly, endlessly, orgasmically, and in every
style and position we know and dare to do!! So what do you say, are you
up for the challenge? Want to come...along with me?" -Mayte Blasco
'02
Second Prize: "How you doing sweetie? (pause for response) You are
so beautiful. I love touching you-it makes me feel so good. (pause, a
kiss, slowly) I want to feel you inside me. (making eye contact) I want
to make love with you. (holding eye contact, gently) If you don't want
to we can just snuggle and you can sleep in my arms, or we can touch each
other some more until we both come if you want. I've already told you
I'm on the pill and I have condoms right here by the bed. What do you
want, sweetheart? Just tell me. (pause for response)." -Anonymous
(Note: It is also important to remember that the partner should also give
his or her partner the option of whether or not they want to cuddle.)
Third Prize: "This is amazing for me and I want to be sure it's
amazing for you too. Would it be OK if we had sex? I don't want this to
be any less incredible for you." -Margaret Magee '02
Thank you to everyone who submitted. We hope that our contest improved campus awareness and understanding of the issue of consent and has sparked meaningful conversation about sexual relationships. In addition, we hope that requesting consent becomes an accepted prerequisite to sex.
Peace out,
Alex Koppel '02
Jeni McDonnell '02
Mike Mavilia '04
Jess Zolt-Gilburne '05
Safe Space
Faculty took student opposition seriously
To the editors:
In last week's lead editorial, Belinda Lovett and Nicholas LoVecchio
compare the Faculty to a dog urinating on a tree. Indeed, they rate the
Faculty one lower than the dog, for Lovett and LoVecchio suggest that
the dog would stop urinating if the tree complained. And what was the
grave sin of the Faculty? What was the metaphorical equivalent the dog's
urinating? Simply this: the Faculty decided to add plusses and minuses
to the grading scale at Bowdoin.
Lovett and LoVecchio argue that "It is inexcusable that the Faculty
voted to institute a plus/minus grading system even though the change
is opposed by the students, the only people who are really affected by
the change." Their argument is evidently based on the following principle:
when it comes to decisions that mainly affect students, the Faculty should
not make any decision that is opposed by a majority of students.
It would be quite a college in which the curricular and instructional
issues were all decided by majority vote of the students. In fact, of
course, the Faculty make countless decisions which principally affect
students. We impose distribution requirements; we require that students
have a major; we determine the requirements for each major; we decide
what courses will be offered; we decide what material to put on course
syllabi; we give paper topics, problem sets and exams; and we give grades.
All of this is completely paternalistic. Most of it is far more important
than whether or not a "+" or a "-" appears as part
of your grade. And, strangely enough, none of it is decided simply by
polling the student body.
Every faculty member at the meeting took seriously the student opposition to the change in grading scale. We listened to the arguments, both by students and our colleagues. We evaluated the arguments. And then we did what we thought was best-both educationally for our students and for the purpose of reporting on student performance. Many students and a minority of the Faculty still disagreed; indeed, I myself moved to undo the action, for I thought that changes of this sort should be made only on the basis of a more solid majority of the faculty. But the Orient's comparison of Faculty to urinating dogs was needlessly inflammatory and completely unsupported by any cogent argument.
Scott Sehon
Associate Professor of Philosophy
Recognizing others' right to dissent
To the Editors:
Last week, Gil Barndollar expressed his view that America's colleges and universities are out of touch with the American mainstream. However, one wonders exactly how impartial, or even how credible, anything concocted by Frank Luntz actually is. Luntz is nothing more than a classic GOP hack.
In close coordination with then-speaker Gingrich, Luntz conducted extensive
polls, during which he floated a multitude of proposed Republican bills
toward those being surveyed. Those that received at least 60 percent support
were incorporated into the "Contact with America" program. Thus,
the survey was less a reflection of what the Republican Party fervently
believed than what it could sell to the public.
Dubious origin of the numbers aside, Barndollar is certainly correct
in that the majority of American people hold different opinions from educational
elites. Is this such a bad thing? I'm sure that Barndollar is quite concerned
about what he perceives as the trashing of the United States by a group
of ivory tower intellectuals, but is he really that afraid of different
points of view? Clearly, he must see value in going against the herd,
as that is what he attempts to do by using inflammatory Limbaugh-like
rhetoric to tell our student body and Faculty that we are terribly misguided.
In reality, Barndollar, as a some-time writer for The Patriot (Bowdoin's
self-proclaimed organ of conservative dissent) has no problem going against
the grain-he merely detests it when it results in the expression of opinions
different from his own.
Considering the relatively miniscule number of conservatives on campus,
Bowdoin has made a commendable effort to draw conservative speakers and
lecturers to the college. Barndollar seems to think he is being stifled,
as is conservatism, on this campus. I disagree with his politics, but
since his article was printed in the Orient, I fail to see how he is being
denied his right to self-expression.
Lastly, I consider myself a patriot, a title that, last time I checked,
did not force someone to agree blindly with governmental policy. Barndollar
seems to think that voicing opposition to U.S. policy is some form of
disloyalty. I can only say that I find this McCarthy-like approach to
politics to be extremely frightening. No one should tell me what I can
and cannot think-to do so is to disrespect every soldier or sailor who
perished to defend our freedom from such ideological fanaticism, to discount
the entire principle of freedom of conscience, and to ruin American democracy
under the guise of saving it.
I fully recognize and respect Barndollar's right to dissent. All I ask is that he recognizes and respects my own right to do so.
Michael Saur '02