During the three-day orientation in the middle of the summer, incoming University of Massachusetts freshmen attended a presentation in the Campus Center auditorium performed by the Not Ready for Bedtime Players. A substantial part of the presentation focused on "safe" sex and how to use a condom correctly. This was a shameless act by the performers and an embarrassing display of incompetence by the UMass administration that oversees these events.
We are told it is inevitable that many students will engage in sexual activity, so UMass felt the need to exhibit "realist" thinking in explaining how to put on a condom. There are two types of "real" life education. One is using the public forum to expose, publicize and encourage the practice of potentially harmful human behavior, like irresponsible sex. The other is within the private realm. The choice to have sex is a monumental one for both parties involved.
How do you go about getting educated if you are unaware how to use a condom or are unaware of the possible ramifications of sex? The same way you go about making other important decisions in your life. If you are a woman at UMass and want to get an abortion, are you going to wait for another performance by the Not Ready for Bedtime Players dissecting and analyzing how to safely abort the fetus of an unborn child? Or do you use the private realm to go about doing this, such as consulting your physician and reading articles and books about the social, medical and ethical implications of abortion?
The "realist" way of thinking would presume that it is inevitable that many women will be faced with the choice whether or not to abort the fetus, so it is necessary to use the public forum to educate them on the issue. In contrast, real "real" life education is taking the private initiative to inform oneself about the complexities of the decision you are going to make without depending on public bureaucracies to do so themselves. This means asking responsible friends who have had sex whether or not you should go ahead and engage in sexual activity. This means that if you do not know how to put on a condom, you go to a reputable Web site source or read a medical dictionary and find out the correct way to use one. This means that, however awkward it may be, you talk with your parents about sex.
It is the same principle regarding issues not related to sex and abortion. The next time you want to buy a car, are you going to thoroughly research the strengths and weaknesses of not just the car but how using it will affect you, like the amount of money you will have to use for gas and how many other people will be depending on you for rides? Or are you merely going to listen to the car dealer laud the benefits of the vehicle?
If UMass wants to engage in more "realist" education within the public forum, then next summer for orientation they should not merely show how to use condoms. They should also carefully explain the proper ways - the safe ways - to smoke a bong, since, by "realist" educational standards, it is inevitable that many students at UMass will smoke. How about revealing the best way to recover from a hangover?
Everybody knows the potential ramifications of irresponsible sexual activity. The point is that publicly explaining how to avoid irresponsible sex removes the private responsibility from the individuals engaging in such an activity.
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