Flesh and the College

Campus Report ^ | April 22, 2008 | Deborah Lambert

[bs9021]

Flesh and the College

by: Deborah Lambert, April 22, 2008

The “Sex Workers Art Show” traveled to several campuses earlier this year, causing raised eyebrows at some venues and–an uproar at others like the College of William and Mary and Duke University.

Although the show’s founder claims that the purpose of their performance is to dignify and “humanize sex workers” and “dispel the myth that [strippers and prostitutes] are anything short of artists, innovators, and geniuses,” the descriptions of the show “make it sound prurient, degrading and, above all, dehumanizing,” says the Education Reporter.

Debate over the show at William and Mary may have accelerated the departure of the school’s controversial president Gene Nichol, whose support of the show and his role in removing the historic Wren Cross from public display, saying it was divisive and unacceptable at a public university was decried with outrage.

It also sparked outrage from William and Mary faculty like education professor John Foubert, who said that by promoting the porn industry, the “art show” “goes beyond a free speech issue” into an “issue of public nudity.”

Foubert said that while “in theory a former sex worker recounting his or her story on campus could be ‘a valuable learning experience . . . you don’t have to be naked to describe a past experience.’”

The show also evoked reactions at Duke University where memories of the Duke rape case prompted objections from students and others to using school funds to bring strippers to campus.

Students for an Ethical Duke spokesman Kenneth Larrey viewed it as the ultimate in hypocrisy. And Jay Schalin of the John William Pope Center of Higher Education Policy noted that as long as strippers are invited–not to “titillate men” but to trash American mainstream values—it passes muster with the school...

[Eurale]

Let’em go on Facial The Nation.

[Billthedrill]

Anyone who thinks the kiddies dealt with this sort of thing as an intellectual proposition also believes that people buy Playboy for the articles.

Well, I do, anyway...

[Joe 6-pack]

"Let’em go on Facial The Nation."

I was thinking they might appear on Press the Meat, or maybe I Dream of Beaver.

[massgopguy]

I’ve seen this woman on some chattering skull shows. She’s one sex “worker” that should be Unemployed.

[murdoog]

the show’s founder claims that the purpose of their performance is to dignify and “humanize sex workers” and “dispel the myth that [strippers and prostitutes] are anything short of artists, innovators, and geniuses,”

This really tripped my bogon detector. I'll concede they are not bad people. I'll certainly admit that they are no worse than the men who patronize them. I'll even throw the feminists a bone and consider the possibility that they are trapped in these jobs for want of better opportunities.

But Leonardo Da Vinci they ain't.

[MrB]

Is she one of those “sex workers” that uses the phrase “my good boob”?