Vanderbilt U. follows campus rape convictions with workshop titled ‘Want to be Brilliant in Bed?’

Vanderbilt U. follows campus rape convictions with workshop titled ‘Want to be Brilliant in Bed?’

Last week, the Tennessean reports, two former Vanderbilt University football players were convicted on multiple counts of sexual assault. “[B]ut a separate on-campus investigation last year,” the article goes on to note, “came to a very different conclusion”:

[S]hortly after the June 23, 2013, rape of an unconscious female student in a dorm, Vanderbilt’s Equal Opportunity, Affirmative Action and Disability Services Department found there wasn’t sufficient evidence to prove [Brandon] Vandenburg [who now could face decades in prison] had “nonconsensual sexual intercourse” with the woman. The report, reviewed by The Tennessean, concluded instead that Vandenburg was an “accomplice” and had violated the woman’s privacy.

The different findings by the campus disciplinary department and the criminal court about Vandenburg’s responsibility for the crime highlights a growing national concern about how campus officials handle allegations of sexual assault. [Emphasis added]

LU’s resident legal scholar Hans Bader has written a number of excellent pieces on this phenomenon (see hereherehere, and here).

But any outrage over possible injustice in the case of Brandon Vandenburg is likely to be eclipsed by reactions to a second Tennessean article, which notes that a workshop called “Want to be Brilliant in Bed?” is slated to be held on the Vanderbilt campus tomorrow.

The event, to be conducted by peer sex educators in the university’s sex ed program, promises on its Facebook page to offer a “crash course in sexy sex ed” that will be “great for everyone from sexual novices to full-blown [presumably no pun intended] sexperts.” The Tennessean piece emphasizes that the workshop has a serious purpose: “to draw students into a discussion on hooking up, consent and alcohol,” according Vanderbilt senior and event organizer Molly Corn. But if that is the case, why has “certified sexologist and sexuality educator” Megan Andelloux, been called in to lend her sexpertise as workshop overseer?

Granted, this class is nothing new on college campuses, which have been teaching how to have better orgasms, sculpt sex parts from Play-doh, and the like for some time now. Laws ridiculously requiring “affirmative consent,” on the other hand, are recent developments. If the administrators at Vanderbilt are going to allow an event like this, they could at least put some space between it and the trial of a possibly innocent man who may be headed to jail for a long time.

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Howard Portnoy

Howard Portnoy

Howard Portnoy has written for The Blaze, HotAir, NewsBusters, Weasel Zippers, Conservative Firing Line, RedCounty, and New York’s Daily News. He has one published novel, Hot Rain, (G. P. Putnam’s Sons), and has been a guest on Radio Vice Online with Jim Vicevich, The Alana Burke Show, Smart Life with Dr. Gina, and The George Espenlaub Show.

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