NAKED TRUTHS RISD's Sex Club pushes the boundaries BY CRISTI LAQUER

Until recently, "sex" was considered a dirty word on the Rhode Island School of Design’s intranet system. Students had to type spaces between each letter to post such words as "porn" and "whore," or they would be blocked by the university’s foul-language barrier. Although the college years have long been a time of sexual liberation for many students, RISD’s built-in ban on sexual language reflects the less vocal stance taken by many institutions. Students, though, are continuing to press against these boundaries — sometimes in bold and salacious ways. "Sex" was removed from RISD’s list of forbidden intranet words, for example, as a direct result of the formation in January of a student-organized club that screens porn and discusses sexuality.

Students elsewhere are also bringing carnal pleasure out of the dorm room and into the light of publication and extra-curricular groups. Nine months ago, students at Harvard dropped H Bomb, an undergraduate-produced publication featuring nude photos of students and provocative articles. The magazine has a clearly intellectual bent and tries to distance itself from pornography, which its editors consider exploitative. In February, Boston University students pushed the envelope farther by publishing Boink, another sexy magazine filled with undergraduate models. This time, as co-founder and editor-in-chief Alecia Oleyourryk unabashedly told the Washington Post, "It is porn. There’s nothing wrong with porn. Porn has such a negative connotation."

It is the related connotations that sex-centered students groups are trying to dispel. Margaret Middleton, an 18-year-old RISD freshman and co-founder of the student-run Sex Club explains, "We’re trying to say, ‘This isn’t foul language.’ " Undergraduates conceived Sex Club (the club’s purpose, it should be noted, isn’t as literal as its name) because they wanted to show a pornographic movie in a university building. The group, which claims more than 40 members after its first meeting, plans to organize guest lectures and adult entertainment shopping trips, along with future "porn parties."

BU has disavowed any connection with Boink, but the stigma that often surrounds sex remains more deeply entrenched than institutional policy. Middleton believes opposition to Sex Club’s porn parties is part of a larger taboo. "We’ve all been used to sort of a feeling that it was unacceptable to watch pornography," she says. But the stance of groups and publications like Sex Club and Boink is that pornography is a normal part of arousal, which, like other aspects of sexual behavior should be shared rather than feared.

The student groups and publications concerned with sex are bound together by themes of openness, comfort, and inclusion. Boink features images of homosexual couples, and Fem Sex, a workshop at Brown University, uses group discussions to promote healthy relationships. (Participants at the latter use non-gendered language, like the pronoun "phe," instead of "he" or "she" to encourage open discussions.) Sex Club organizers feel their first porn party was successful because students eventually became more comfortable watching porn together. Middleton’s statement about porn applies to many larger sexual issues: "It’s something everybody shares and nobody talks about."

While their parents’ sexual revolution may have advocated certain behaviors, some of today’s college students are working to change the way that sex gets discussed. Advocates of more candid communication believe that talking is part of the solution to many sex-related problems, including unwanted pregnancies and sexually transmitted diseases. "Maybe students who are in Sex Cub now will be able [in the future] to talk to their kids more openly about it," Middleton says. "Hopefully, we’ll be able to raise kids who are not so ignorant about sex."