I just read a piece of literary pornography for class. Then I checked my school email to find that someone else was sexually assaulted in a residence hall last Monday. "The only person responsible for sexual misconduct is the perpetrator," these emails say. I have it memorized.
Last time I was assigned erotica, I just didn't show up to class. I knew that the issue would come again--I'm in the Creative Writing program of the University of Iowa, for crying out loud. And I knew that I wouldn't be able to just not show up every time it did.
My teacher gave us a "trigger warning" in class last week. She warned us that it would be "heavy stuff." It wasn't heavy, really. It was actually excruciatingly shallow, but that's a problem for another post. "If there's a problem, please feel free to talk to me, and we can work something out." What, an alternate reading like my mom would ask my high school for? Then what am I supposed to do for the class discussion? Maybe I do just need to have the guts to walk up to a teacher and say, "I'm not going to read this." At least then I wouldn't have to read this stuff.
I don't just want out of the reading anyway though, because me getting out of the reading doesn't solve the problem. The problem is that every student on campus is assigned stuff like this.
Maybe I could go to the teacher or the dean or the whoever else in the department, offended and indignant, but I honestly don't think I'd be the only one, and I honestly think that my voice would be muffled.
Sexual assaults happen because we live in a sexual culture. We idolize sex, we dwell on sex, we fantasize about sex, we glorify pornography as expressive artwork while we push the realm of creativity to the breaking point until we're a bunch of jaded philosophers who believe in nothing but meaninglessness. And then we sacrifice our morality on the alter of academic respect.
Do you know why sexual assaults are out of control in your dorm rooms, University of Iowa? Do you really want to know what you can do to help?
You can stop assigning your students subject material that forces them to spend so much time and intellect on sex.
There's all of this feminism floating around campus, but it's self-defeating. Feminists run around trying to "empower women," but no one is teaching all these guys on campus how to be men, they're just assigning erotic readings as if these poor guys need more sexual content to wallow in and never teach them a word about self-control.
If you really want to respect and empower my gender, quit pointing at sex every time a female shows up.
If you really want to stop sexual assaults in your dorm rooms, quit teaching your students how to do it in the classrooms.
And writers: we have a power to make people think differently. Every piece you write that tells your audience that there is no meaning, that the closest you will ever come to meaning is through drugs and sex, you are abusing and wasting that power, and I am ashamed to be one of you.
Help me show the world that we can be more than that... and then maybe the world can be, too.
Isn't the message of the author the critical part of the story? Why should an entire segment of literature be removed because certain, already pre-disposed, people may misinterpret or misuse it?
ReplyDeleteMy point is not about interpretation or use, my point is about what the University is assigning its students to dwell upon. Garbage in, garbage out. It's like profanity: if you're around people who curse, you will start to curse. If the University wants sex to be less rampant on their campus, they have to quit letting it saturate their classrooms. There is so much more to literature, so many other things to discuss, that we shouldn't have to spend a week every class dealing with erotica.
Deleteyour argument is fragmented and lacking complexity. your correlation is too generalizing. think outside your cultural box and understand that sexual assault has been happening since ancient times, in the bible, no less, and places where sexuality is repressed by religious society (my friend from a small traditional Islamic Sudan society will attest to this) sexual assault is rampant within families themselves bc that's the safest place to act on those desires. also teachers raping kids bc kids have no power in society and their grades are threatened.
ReplyDeleteI agree that our culture is sexually obsessed and sexuality has become a pretty shallow interaction in mainstream UI culture. but I feel that your reaction is also shallow, attempting to treat mere surface expressions of a much deeper social individual and spiritual issue.
repressing sexual material is not going to solve anything. the sex drive is biological and goes beyond media influence. I think it would help to build a stronger family based society that venerates and consecrates the repercussions of heterosexual engagement: children. but that's not going to completely control temptation. that's something that must occur on an individual basis. self control can and should also be taught, but no one will be perfect, no matter how perfect the society. and I think it should be ok to allow people to explore sexuality for themselves if they wish to seek truth without bias. a stable society and family that respects both genders and those in between that are open to new ideas but never get lost in the shallow materiality of it will be the best environment to curate this exploration. we have a long ways to go
all I'm saying is be careful when you judge things, consider the wider world before you jump to conclusions with large generalities.
much love, may God grow you in his infinite wisdom as you continue to seek truth
You do raise some good points. It is a problem that has to be taken on an individual basis, and the family structure could also use some help.
DeleteI don't think my argument was shallow, as it was not intended to be that broad. Cutting explicit material out of universities isn't going to globally solve sexual assault, obviously. But what a person dwells on, they will act on. On a campus where students are being raped in the dorms, I don't think it's a very wise idea to require them to experience literary sex for class.
There is no one solution that will fix a social ill as huge and gnarly as sexual assault, but if we aren't willing to take small steps to help the problem, then we aren't really that interested in solving the problem.