A L S O_ T O D A Y

Enough with the "male gaze"!
By Camille Paglia
Trouncing feminist film criticism and its cadre of ass-kissing puritans

Comics
Keith Knight: The joys of mentoring

T A B L E_ T A L K

Flunking out? How do you cope with failure? Who/what do you blame? Join the discussion in Table Talk's Education area

R E C E N T L Y

Scholars of smut
By Carina Chocano
World Pornography Conference: Academics cheer as porn stars theorize
(10/05/98)

Escaping college poverty
By Hank Hyena
If this campus parasite can make money and get laid, you can too
(10/02/98)

Playboy goes limp without feminist vice grip
By Nicole Nolan
Playboy's flaccid College Girls issue
(09/30/98)

As American as ethnic studies
By Joan Walsh
Strange bedfellows: Can ethnic studies survive a marriage to American studies?
(09/28/98)

Recess
A one-stop playground for weekend frivolity and fun
(09/25/98)

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THE SEVEN DEADLY SINS | BY DAN STERN
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Mother Nature must really want to put an end to this human race of ours. Why else would she have infested our population with so many sexually transmitted diseases? After all, if you can't do the deed, you can't plant that seed (all techno-medical procedures aside).

But while STDs such as HIV and hepatitis C threaten to bring our reproductive days to a halt, I'm currently more plagued by how other, non-life-threatening venereal microbes have seriously disturbed the lives of college folk who fantasize of waterfalls and pool bars and sunny days and naked souls all merged into one. That's why I think the less media-hyped STDs (genital warts, nongonococcal urethritis, scabies) could merely be the result of Mother Nature's resentment rather than her ploy to jeopardize the perpetuation of humankind. Aging Father Time might not have been giving it to her, so she figured, "Well, if I'm not getting any, then no one's getting any."

I know a virgin who fooled around with this guy the first week of her freshman year and received from him a present. Actually she received many, all of which were tiny, clawed things that dwelled in her pubic hair. She went a year and a half refusing to accept so much as a high-five from another guy. These small-time VDs don't amount to death sentences, but damn if they don't take the ho out of horny. Eros, oh Eros, goddess of one-nighters, ruler of the G-spot, take me away from this filthy planet.

It's a tragedy: How's a college male or female, as virile or nubile as they respectively may be, finally on parole from the erotically void prison of Mom and Dad, supposed to figure out who is safe to jump into bed with? And I'm not even talking about intercourse. Oral sex, nude grinding, even kissing can expose us to the degradation of becoming the walking petri dishes for a host of bacteria, fungi and parasites.

Practice abstinence. Use a condom. Be honest with your partner. Get tested together. That's what the educators say. But does this advice work for all STDs, and how realistic is it?

The honest approach. Ha! To see how that plays out come game time, let's take a look at a male favorite -- the blow job. No guy wants genital herpes. But how does that guy approach the woman whose lips are inches away from engulfing what at that moment is his sole reason for living? What's the protocol for querying whether the wielder of such sensual power has these highly contagious, and inconveniently often inconspicuous, blisters and sores? The wrong approach might offend her, and she could leave. And in light of how difficult it is for most guys to attain this sacred rite, this option itself is high-risk. And let's say it's the guy who secretly has genital herpes. I know of no man who, after finally getting a girl back to his place, would honestly admit to having this taboo disease. Remember, guys at this point are being governed by an entity about three feet south of, and 10 times more childish than, their brain. The ability to rationalize long-term benefits over short-term gains simply isn't available.

N E X T_ P A G E .|. Meaningless rhetoric and real, quivering situations