Sex on college campuses requires more than same sex dorms
Tuesday, June 14, 2011
By Megan Sweas
Comments (17)
One line particularly struck me in the Wall Street Journal editorial (subscription required) announcing Catholic University of America’s same-sex dorms: “I would have thought that young women would have a civilizing influence on young men,” wrote John Garvey, president of CUA.
Whether you think the same-sex dorms will solve CUA’s hook-up culture problem or not (former managing editor Heidi Schlumpf says it’s just a PR move over at NCR), this mentality concerns me.
We have to get past the assumption that all women are perfect and pristine, while “boys will be boys.” This puts the onus on women to protect their modesty, it is unfair to both men and women, and it perpetuates the lies of hook-up culture as well as its dangers.
In her study of hook-up culture, Donna Frietas explains that there are alpha males and alpha females on each college campus, and these are the people that tend to thrive off of hook-up culture. Most students, however, generally don’t participate in hook-up culture and don’t like it—and that goes for men as well as women.
The big problem with hook-up culture is that students think everybody else is doing it. They may make a mistake (hence guilt and depression), but hook-ups are far less common among the average college student than they are among the alpha males and females.
It gets really dangerous to reinforce the ideas that “boys will be boys” is when a woman literally cannot protect herself, such as in the two tragic stories of rape this past school year at Notre Dame, one of which ended in a suicide. No young woman should feel that it’s her responsibility to civilize a young man. He must own his responsibility of civility whether girls are living next door, down the hall, or across campus.
Instead of reinforcing the idea that boys need civilizing, why not teach both young men and women that there’s a different way to relate to each other than getting drunk and maybe going home together (or more likely going home alone while you think that everybody else is going home with others).
Same-sex dorms might be a good step, but there’s a lot more Catholic campuses can do. This didn't make the cut of the interview, but Frietas also suggested a much more radical rethinking of dorms, which essentially force you to entertain people of the opposite sex in your bedroom.
But the first step, she said, is to acknowledge that sex and sexual assault happens on Catholic college campuses. An editorial by the president of CUA in the WSJ shows you how far we've come since we interview Frietas three years ago.
Hopefully, this move is not just PR, but the beginning of establishing policies and programs that help these hormone-filled teenagers mature into young men and women who respect and love each other.
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It appears from Mr. Garvey’s
By Jerry D (not verified) on Friday, June 24, 2011It appears from Mr. Garvey’s statement that he underestimates the domination of the Left in media and universities has influenced women to act against their natures (IN GENERAL!). Your linked Donna Frietas interview shows how the Leftist domination at Catholic colleges has destroyed their Catholic identities and mores:
How prevalent is hooking up on Catholic campuses?
The reality is that Catholic colleges are like secular colleges. Everywhere I’ve been, students say the same thing about hook-up culture. The only exceptions are evangelical schools.
Where do young people’s sexual ethics come from?
That’s a good question. Unless they’re evangelical, it doesn’t come from their faith tradition as a rule. …Even if parents raise their kids with values, these standards seem to get squelched in college....
In our interviews Catholics didn’t say a lot about their faith… They have no idea how to bridge the disconnect between their lives and what the Catholic Church teaches. They don’t know what the Catholic Church teaches about anything aside from volunteering and social justice...
I didn’t hear anybody say that they felt the Catholic Church was right about sex. Nobody brought up Pope John Paul II’s theology of the body. I asked every Catholic what the church teaches about sex. Generally people laughed in my face. I got sarcastic remarks: “What do you mean? Nothing.” Or I got two three-word answers: “Don’t do it,” and “Don’t be gay.”...
I graduated from Georgetown in 1994, and... hooking up... wasn’t pervasive. …Now this Animal House, frat-boy behavior is the norm on many campuses.
I taught a course on my study last year, and I had the most left-wing students you can imagine. Their favorite book was A Return to Modesty (Free Press) by Wendy Shalit, who wrote the book right out of college. …My students didn’t know they could have boundaries other than at sexual assault and rape.
A ray of hope
By Jerry D (not verified) on Friday, June 24, 2011The Donna Freitas interview shows Catholic college students are well indoctrinated in the Leftist version of Social Justice, and demonization and simplistic denuciations of Catholic teaching on sexuality. They are not taught the basis of Catholic teaching on sexuality such as the Theology of the Body.
Ms. Frietas is most likely left of center, so I applaud her for introducing a booked praised by Conservatives, A Return to Modesty, which was liked by her most left-wing students. If conservatives can overcome the purges of the the Leftist dominated faculty and introduce students to Catholic teaching and conservative thought, they can impact the culture.
coed dorms
By Helen Welter (not verified) on Tuesday, June 21, 2011As having raised two young adult sons, I guarantee you that having same sex dormes will not affect pre marital sex one bit. They just find other places, and maybe less safe places, to have sex! Our young people are very creative and will always find a place to have sex if that is what they want to do. Let's not burry our heads in the sand. There may be many reaason for having same sex dorms but I doubt that not having sex is a realistic one. Teaching our yung people to respect their own bodies and the bodies of others might be a place to start.
Ladders
By Anonymous (not verified) on Monday, June 27, 2011For those without climbing skills they reach to the windows of women-only dorms.
hook-ups
By Margaret Glose (not verified) on Tuesday, June 21, 2011I have always objected to the stories of saintly virgins told by our Church wherein the female gives up her life rather than be raped. As if that rape would be some kind of a 'stain' on her virginity. Is your virginity worth more than your life? Would the fact that you were raped make you somehow less pleasing to God? Why are saints like Maria Goretti or St. Agatha held up as models to strive for to young Catholic girls? If we, Church and parents alike, would raise our girls to be strong in themselves instead of objects of delight for others we would have less worries about same sex or coed dorms.
Hook ups
By Anonymous (not verified) on Thursday, June 16, 2011My college son and his friends say that many college women are a word I can't say. They don't like the hook up culture. It puts them on the spot. It might sound sexist but there is something hard wired into us about males being the pursuers and females being the pursued. That's how it played when I was young. I think when females become the pursuers or are too easily pursued it interferes with some males' instincts. I am of course discounting any kind of aggressive forcing of males on females. I'm talking about the old game of courtship, dropping the hankie and picking it up.
I was not a virgin when I met my wife of 28 years. I had a lot of girlfriends and a few one night stands. I don't regret it. I had a lot of fun and heartache and was well prepared when I met my wife to know she was the one. Looking back I have no regrets, no "what if's", no wonderings about what it would be like to sleep with another woman. Marriage is the hardest thing I've ever done next to parenting but I wouldn't want to be single again. I liked being single but I'm glad I'm married. I've never even thought about cheating.
I don't think abstinance before marriage is realistic or even good for most people but hook ups don't sound fun to me. I'm glad I was young when I was.
Hi Anonymous non-virgin when married
By Jerry D (not verified) on Friday, June 17, 2011Your anonymous, so perhaps you can answer a personal question:
When you have sex with your wife, do you still visualize your past sexual encounters with your former girlfriends? Those visualizations are strong especially since their present older bodies don't get in the way of messing with the embedded vision of their young naked flesh in your mind.
That's what I'm told is the downside of past sexual encounters, at least for those with regret their past encounters and wish those visions didn't come to them when they are having sex with their spouses.
non-virgin
By Helen Welter (not verified) on Tuesday, June 21, 2011Are you serious? That people think about teenage sexual encounters after they are married? The real issue is feelings of having been used as a sexual object. Now that can remain an issue for the rest of ones life and can erode self esteem and worth. But remember young bodies?
No I don't
By Anonymous (not verified) on Friday, June 17, 2011Never.
I have fond memories of past girlfriends but I never think of them when I'm with my wife. When I'm alone and think of having sex with past girlfriends most to the time it morphs into having sex with my wife.
So, no, it's the opposite of what you've heard from others.
As a man I admire women I see in my life today but I don't imagine having sex with them. I drew that line when I committed to my wife.
I'm glad you asked the question. I don't know if I'm typical of most men but that's how it is with me. I don't block out memories of the past. I'm glad I have them. I remember the good times with past girlfriends, the bad times less. When I think of them it's with affection for old friends. I don't love them as lovers anymore. If I met them today I'd meet them as someone I grew up with a long time ago. We were young, in our teens and twenties, little more than kids. I'm middle-aged now looking into old age.
I'm glad I had the experiences of my youth. I'm glad I knew those young women in such a close way but I'm glad I'm with the woman I've been with for 28 years.
I think having other lovers before I met my wife had the opposite effect on me than what you've heard from others. For me it is a pleasant and bittersweet memory of youth. I'm glad I had adventure in my youth. It was fun. I don't have to wonder what it would have been like.
Leon Uris wrote in Trinity "If you're lucky enough to fall in love, that's one thing. Otherwise all that was ever truly beautiful to me was boyhood. It's the meal we sup on for the rest of our lives. Love puts the icing on life. But if you don't find it...you must call on your childhood memories over and over till you do."
I have my boyhood memories and young man memories of loves that made me glow and kicked me in the teeth. I'm glad I have them and I'm glad none of them worked out. God bless my old girlfriends but the best one sleeps beside me.
P.S.
By Anonymous (not verified) on Friday, June 17, 2011Maybe the problem with husbands who can't block out memories of other women when they're with their wives is that they regret them and try to block them out. I don't regret them and don't need to block them out. They stay where they belong. Trying not to think of something is a sure way to think of it.
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