Let’s talk about sex, Northwestern.
The fourth annual Sex Week, hosted by College Feminists, kicked off Monday with Assistant Weinberg Dean for Academics Lane Fenrich discussing the policing of gay sex and the Larry Craig scandal. Chicago sex shop Early to Bed held a workshop called “Quintessential NU: Flirting for Geeks, Nerds and Everyone Else” on Monday, offering help on landing a date, a relationship or a night with that special someone.
“The goal of Sex Week is basically to get people talking about sex,” said Alex Russell, director of the program. “A lot of people get the misconception that we just want people to have sex, but we want a forum.”
Many NU students had little or no sex education in high school or came from backgrounds where it wasn’t acceptable to talk about sex, the Weinberg senior said.
“We’re trying to show that it’s okay to talk about sex,” he said.
Other events this week include a speech by Ph.D. candidate Theo Greene about the sex landscape in Chicago, how to throw a “sex-filled fun fest,” a sexual health resource fair called Sexpo!, a panel discussing abstinence, an evening of sex-themed spoken word poetry, a presentation about how black and white fraternities differ in their approaches toward women and a speech by Gloria Feldt, the former CEO of Planned Parenthood, about body politics and America’s unhealthy relationship with sex.
Sexual Health & Assault Peer Education is co-sponsoring Sexpo! with College Feminists. About 15 organizations from NU and the surrounding area will set up booths at Norris University Center on Wednesday afternoon to pass out information and answer questions, said Kate Weisshaar, a member of SHAPE’s executive board and one of the event co-chairs.
“Our general stance is that the more information people know about healthy sexual habits, the better their sexual experiences will be,” the Weinberg senior said.
Laura Stuart, coordinator of Sexual Health Education and Violence Prevention at Searle Hall, will be representing Health Services at Sexpo!.
“My hope would be that people realize that there is a really broad range of opinions about sex practices,” Stuart said. “I hope we foster a community of respect where people understand and respect each other’s decisions.”
Stella Fayman (Weinberg ’09) started Sex Week her sophomore year.
“One of my main goals was to really encourage people and empower people to make opinions based on facts and based on their own thinking rather than just following what was popular and stereotypes lying around,” she said.
Though Fayman received some negative feedback, which she attributed to openly talking about sex being controversial, the overall response was positive, she said.
“Some people misread our mission statement and think that we’re trying to have Northwestern have sex all at once,” Russell said.
Russell said there have been negative reactions in the past, but the overwhelming response from both students and professors has been positive.
“I hope NU students realize from the number of different events and the spectrum of events that sex isn’t just one single act,” he said. “There’s so much that surrounds sex, and it affects every aspect of our lives, and we need to start thinking about it in a lot of different ways.”
