While the article in your Oct. 7 issue, “Racking up a Score — Not Really So Cool Anymore,” far exceeded the humor of Chris Alexander’s previous article, “Take the Back Door to Unexpected Pleasure” (Daily Nexus, Sept. 30, 2009) — I’ll take a surprisingly good pun over anything that uses the phrase “‘O’ face.” Alexander still didn’t measure up to even passable standards of common sense and decency, try as he might. I suggest before you take up more space with another similar piece, you should run these sorts of articles through UCSB’s Women’s Studies Program. I doubt they would agree with your editorial decisions.
Opinion
Sex Columnist Doesn’t Quite Measure Up
Published Friday, October 9, 2009
Zach Ferguson is a third year economics and philosophy major.
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Posted by
Saturday, October 10, 2009 at 07:43 PM
As a former student (‘08), I had several years to take in "Wednesday Hump" articles. Is it just me, or does it seem like every time a male writes the Hump column, he is derided as sexist, sophomoric, etc. while the females don’t seem to get the same kinds of comments?
The last time the Nexus tried to start the year off with a male columnist (Alex Shlyakhov in ‘07), he got a lot of negative feedback and only had three articles published before being replaced by Dana Olsen. The next year, Jenni Perez wrote the column and made it through the whole year.
Is it because the males truly are sexist, sophomoric, etc.? Chris Alexander’s article on the topic of anal sex (Volume 90, Issue 7) didn’t seem to go over so well receiving negative comments in both print (Volume 90, Issue 8) and on the message board. However, Nina Love Anthony’s Column in ‘06 (Volume 86, Issue 75) also covered anal sex and mentioned the same safety and comfort issues but did not receive any negative feedback. Chris proposed that a female’s opposition to anal sex could be due to an unfortunate accident involving a cucumber. Nina argued that males enjoy anal sex, because they enjoy inserting their penises into anything including "bizarre household objects." I guess I just don’t see the difference.
While I acknowledge that the feedback on Alexander’s first column was about the perceived "sex sells" attitude of the Nexus’ editorial board, Zach Ferguson’s comment (Volume 90, Issue 14) most definitely references the mindset of the writer and those of the editorial board that allowed the column to be published. On any other day, I would have let the comments pass, but Zach just had to mention running the columns through the Women’s Studies Program.
I know, I know, it’s the ultimate irony for a man to cry sexism. But maybe the Nexus board should lose a little journalistic integrity and print a "Wednesday Hump" column written by a male with the name of a female in the byline to see what kind of comments it receives. Either that, or just start the year with a female writer and avoid the problems altogether.