Safe Sex At College: Masturbate

UNIVERSITY OF GEORGIA - "Safer sex, condoms, dental dams and masturbation — welcome to college!” Such is the cheerful greeting parents and students arriving for fall classes at the University of Georgia from Sexual Health Coordinator Michelle Cohen. She’s available for consultation, but has some advice for the general audience: “Condoms can be used for protection during oral, vaginal and anal sex (I recommend flavored condoms for oral sex)…. Dental dams (rectacular, thin pieces of latex) can be used when performing oral-vaginal or oral-anal sex (these can be found in the Health Promotion Department)” where she works. Free condoms, too. “Remember,” she concludes, “safer sex is better sex!”.
When asked later about the reaction of parents and whether it’s appropriate for a university official to recommend flavored condoms for oral sex, Ms. Cohen said she’d received no negative reaction from parents or anybody else. “To the contrary, I have received positive feedback regarding the information I shared” in the Red & Black campus newspaper. She continued:
“According to 2005 National College Health Assessment data, 68.9 % of UGA students reported engaging in oral sex, yet only 2.8 % report using a condom the last time they did…. Promoting use of flavored condoms encourages use of condoms for oral sex.”
Actually some parents did react negatively. “I was heartsick when I saw that,” said one. “That article —written by someone who I assume is paid by taxpayer money — was so unbelievable that I wanted to just pack my child up and take her home.”
OK, I’m conservative. But I’m with the parent. Here we have at Georgia Tech a university-imposed speech code that, until it was thrown out by a federal judge this week at the behest of two conservative students, prohibited dorm conversation school officials thought “intolerant.” So at one of the state’s flagship universities, officials are highly judgmental about what students say, but at the other are entirely non-judgmental to the point of being promotional about conduct that will be far more consequential to their lives.
Most college students do engage in sex at some point and Ms. Cohen may be right about the percentage who engage in oral sex. They are, after all, of the generation that heard from the top that it’s not really sex. And yes, clinics should respond. But I really don’t want the university’s agent pushing flavored condoms for oral sex as a “welcome to college!” experience.
These are Thinking Right’s back-to-school questions: Should universities govern student speech? And how should state institutions approach issues of what students do, and the values they hold, in their personal lives?
from The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

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