Over at Cornell, sex ed got taken to a different level with “Anal Sex 101: Everything You Wanted to Know (But Were Afraid to Ask).” The speaker, sex expert Tristan Taormino, was invited by campus groups who had received a large number of questions about anal sex, and the event was funded by several groups as well as the Student Assembly Finance Commission.

Obviously, the College Republicans protested. In fact, they picketed. How could they not? Luckily, they made themselves sound ridiculous in the Cornell Sun.

“We’re protesting the event today because we believe the student activities fee is being used to teach people to engage in a physical act that we believe is not morally right,” said Ahmed Salem ’08, president of the College Republicans. “Our main issue is that even if that’s going to happen, it should not be paid for with our own money.”

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What’s sexier than sex?

As your resident sex blogger, I feel qualified to answer that question. And scanning the Inquirer today, I saw it: A huge, oversized, mouthwatering, potentially life-changing jar of Nutella.

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34th Street’s sex survey issue has certainly been a thumping success. Yesterday, I heard people talking about it all over campus, and multiple people asked me which part of it I was blogging about. The answer came when I spent an hour arguing with a friend about masturbation. (When else does inspiration ever strike?)

The Street statistic says that “the majority of guys … claim to have a wank 4-8 times per week.” Sounds about right to me. My friend, on the other hand, fixated on the high end of the scale. “Eight times a week?” he said. “That sounds excessive.”

My female friends all agree with me — guys masturbate more often than they eat, sleep, or breathe, right ? Every teen comedy we’ve ever seen has told us this. The guys I talked to, though, had the same opinion as said male friend. Excessive.

“If you’re jerking off 8 times a week, you’ve totally given up on your sex life. You’ve just accepted that you’re not going to get laid. And you’re not engaging in enough human contact,” they said.

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Apparently my semi-weekly web scavenger hunts for sex-related news failed me last month. Focused on promoting kinky sex, I missed an msnbc article about a major scientific breakthrough: hormonal birth control for men.

The good news: It’s feasible. Drugs in the trial phase are already working well. No fun side effects so far; now you don’t even have to get high to lower your sperm count!

The bad news:

“It is time for men to have some control. I think it would empower men and deter some women out there from their nefarious plans,” says [a trial participant]. “Some women are out there to use men to get pregnant. This could deter women from doing this.”

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Over at Columbia, apparently they’re not indulging in enough casual sex.

When I first read that blog entry, I thought it was a slightly confusing, laughably bad attempt to persuade Columbia girls to spread their legs a bit more often. Rereading, however, I found several morsels of truth that could’ve been written by any sexually frustrated Quaker.

Most guys here are woefully incompetent with women while the females themselves are viewing every hookup against the historical arc of their lives.

and just as accurate,

If you want to experience some pleasure then do it. Live in the moment! Can’t sex simply be fun? Maybe the idea is a little revolutionary for our activist student body.

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Condoms. Furry, intestinal, animal-derived little sperm-catchers. Wait, what?

For those with too much spare time (or a burning desire to learn about archaic methods of birth control), a new book has come along that innovatively allows one to waste time and read about weird sex without even touching the computer.

The Humble Little Condom: A History, by Aine Collier of the University of Maryland. Because you can probably work it into a paper somewhere, and apparently the creative synonyms are worth the price of the book.

Reading about condoms made from intestines and lead kinda makes you appreciate the new-fangled kind, huh?

Penn students’ parents have varying levels of involvement in the college application process. Some make a long list and drag their offspring to each school; some, like mine, glance over a list of the student’s making, nod, and remark upon a few choices. My parents looked at the schools I was considering and immediately approved of most, but hesitated over Penn and Columbia.

“Philadelphia and New York are big cities — are you sure you’d feel comfortable and safe there?” they asked.

“Of course,” I answered. “I know I’m used to Oklahoma City’s general friendliness and safety, but no one would go to those schools if they were that dangerous, right?”

Apparently, I was covering my ears and humming to not hear what I knew — the crime rate in big cities is high, and the sexual assault rate in American colleges is a statistic often cited but seldom really contemplated.

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Well, that’s it. According to the “expert” in (and inventor of the concept of) sex addiction, Patrick Carnes, most Penn Students are sex addicts. (You can take the test here to find out if your own thoughts and habits qualify you.) After all, just looking at boredatpenn.net shows that many Penn students “find themselves preoccupied with sexual thoughts,” “feel controlled by their sexual desires,” and definitely “have used the internet to make romantic or erotic connections with people online.”

And anyone trying to get in good with a rising Whartonite has “traded sex for money or gifts.”

Apparently, even dating around is a bad thing — the survey asks if the taker has ever “maintained multiple romantic or sexual partnerships at the same time”. But according to an MSNCB column this week, it’s pretty easy to score as a sex addict using the test, and it might not mean much.
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Oh, 34th Street shoutouts. How you show the maturity, sophistication, and integrity that got all of us into this school.

Well, okay, at least we’re witty.

The thing that struck me about the shoutouts this week was the commentary on Penn girls. Granted, few shoutouts are written to make people feel warm and fuzzy inside, but the 27-line attack on our physical appearance, when coupled with our apparent “pathological materialism and runner-up trophy wife aesthetics,” felt a bit over the top. Even if it was pretty nonsensical, some part of me (my primordial forehead? my turkey tits? what do these things MEAN?) felt like I should be offended.

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In the Brown Daily Herald last week, columnist Renata Sago objectively and unbiasedly wrote about “hooking up,” referring to it as “trite and tasteless.” She even mentioned the incredibly high possibility of getting oral herpes from making out with a stranger. (Luckily, no one in a relationship ever has oral herpes.) Fellow sophomore Sam Loomis responded yesterday with a defense of random hookups, citing arguments by John Stuart Mill and Jean-Jacques Rousseau. Only in the Ivies.

You might be unaware of this, but having done some investigatory research, I’ve discovered that Penn also has this “hookup culture”. Whether it’s making out at frat parties or the surprisingly complicated arrangement of friends with benefits, Penn students regularly show how little time and regard they have for actual “relationships.” It’s either long-term married bliss or casual, fun . . . mutual enjoyment.

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