BOTH "STALLSMO" and "Max-um," the March 2007 gender-specific installments of the Stall Seat Journal, consist of 6-question sex quizzes along the lines of (obviously) Cosmopolitan and Maxim magazines. The last question in both asks: "Your personal motto regarding sex is: A) I gave my word to stop at third! B) No glove, no love! C) It takes too long to cover a schlong. D) Don't be silly, wrap your willy!"
Catering to collegiate caricatures, Stallsmo and Max-um feature the phrases "spread 'em and lube up" and "hot as balls," respectively. In both quizzes, each letter answer is worth either 1 or 0 -- good or bad, with nothing in between. I scored myself in Stallsmo, hoping to be deemed a "Safety Siren" with "the sass to insist on using protection," which sounds pretty strange but is probably better than being an "At-Risk Chick" whose "steamy make out sesh with a delicious hottie turn[s] into Big Time Action."
If one was to take the Stall Seat Journal very seriously -- which no one does, partly due to the fact that it sometimes calls itself Stallsmo -- it would appear that no more nuanced conception of sex is necessary. If there has to be a hot pink quiz, it should at least attempt to reflect the inevitable complications of the matter. Students' sexual habits are rarely consistent through time and circumstance or easily reducible into letters and scores. My personal motto about sex, if such a neat thing exists, is neither in verse nor includes anything about willies.
The Office of Health Promotion is clearly making a well-intentioned effort to reach its demographic. Stallsmo and Max-um are sincere attempts to catch the eye and differentiate the Stall Seat Journal from a throwaway Student Health brochure from the eighties. They're trying to speak the language of their at-risk students -- those bar-crawling "guru[s] of drunken condom use." But it's unsettling and potentially counterproductive to address serious issues in this manner -- a purportedly edgy manner reminiscent of HBO at best and your high school receptionist's secret romance novel at worst.
A Cosmo parody is an inappropriate paradigm. Students should not be addressed as if they were stupid in the hopes that they will act smart, and when sexually charged language is used to extol the virtues of not being sexually charged, these contradictions arise.
Sense does not have to be made sexy for it to make sense. At least, that's what I'd like to think. The alternate view is that we as college students actually won't absorb anything if it doesn't have a pop-culture reference and a sexy lens. This phenomenon has long been exploited by marketers, and it's growing -- even a look around Grounds will tell you that everything, every flyer, every organization, will try to make itself look like a beer commercial if it can.
The Candie's Foundation, working to prevent teen pregnancy, is publicized in this vein. Their print ads feature greased-up hot girls -- Rachel Bilson, for example -- wearing tight wife-beaters that say things like "I'm sexy enough ... to keep you waiting." The latest TV ad, which I thought was an Axe commercial at first, shows a couple in full hormonal heat, getting it on in a convertible which then turns into a baby carriage. Explaining the campaign in their mission statement, the Candie's Foundation says, "By using the dialogue that celebrities have with teens we feel that we can speak as peers and effectively communicate this message to the impressionable group."
The goal -- this difficult, sought-after goal -- is simply to get through to the target audience. And Candie's gets it right in one way -- the best way to do that is to speak as a peer. But peers don't speak like the editors of Cosmopolitan. Peers don't hide behind the coy veneer of celebrity.
It's my suspicion that the good intentions of the Office of Health Promotion will backfire. Stallsmo and Max-um might grab more attention, but the attention will be kept on a superficial level. We don't need to be talked to like that. It's tremendously important that we keep it this way, that we not cross the line into vapid "sheeple" who can't look at anything unless it involves a joke about genitalia.
Hopefully, someone will give us some credit and realize that college students, with all their shallow tendencies, are the least shallow when they speak to their friends on serious issues like sexual safety. The Stall Seat Journal should forgo the gloss and adopt more realism; if these campaigns are abrasive, they should be abrasive in their honesty. Until then, if your brain aches from too much thinking, go to the Newcomb bathrooms and read the March 2007 Stall Seat Journal.
Jia Tolentino is a Cavalier Daily Contribting Writer.
Read More
WILLIAMS: Donald Trump will be a threat to student loan forgiveness
By Ryan Williams | 12 hours agoTo be sure, this is not a problem of the University’s making. Nevertheless, understanding the uncertainty of financial accessibility in education, the University must step up to the plate.
PATEL: Personal development courses support students beyond the gradebook
By Heer Patel | 5 days agoThe University must rethink its approach to education beyond traditional major-specific requirements and mandate personal development courses.
EDITORIAL: Commercialization threatens U.Va.’s educational mission
By Editorial Board | 6 days agoAfter all, measuring the University’s worth in terms of accrued capital, operational efficiency and numerical rankings molds this space into just another cookie-cutter institution.
