Wisconsin’s Marquette University will host a 12-week workshop on sex, feminism and masturbation, despite concerns that the workshop’s themes and activities clash with the school’s Catholic identity.
The workshop is produced by FemSex, a student-led group with a presence on many college campuses, and will be hosted in university buildings by the University Honors Program for its 12-week run. Each week will feature a different topic, such as “Masturbation, Orgasm, and Pleasure,” “Power and Privilege,” and “Gender and Identity.”
Participating students will complete raunchy homework assignments, like coloring anatomical pictures in “The Cunt Coloring Book” and writing about their sexually pleasurable experiences, according to Campus Reform.
“Through group discussions, activities, and individual exercises, the workshop explores what it means to take ownership of one’s own sexuality, body, pleasure, language, and education,” according to the syllabus for the workshop.
But some students, professors, administrators and alumni of Marquette don’t think a Catholic university should play host to a sex workshop.
“It’s bad judgment on the part of the Honors Program to sponsor it,” wrote John McAdams, an associate professor of political science at Marquette, according to The Marquette Tribune.
The workshop was run last semester as well — attracting so much controversy that Marquette President Rev. Scott Pilarz forced the Gender and Sexuality Resource Center to drop it. The Honors Program adopted FemSex, however, and allowed it to continue there.
Many members of the Marquette community were uneasy about the return of FemSex.
“If this is truly student-led and this is truly student programming, let it be so and let the student organizations run it,” said Ethan Hollenberger, an alumni, in a statement to The Marquette Tribune. “When an academic program sponsors (FemSex), you see the (Marquette) Catholic identity eroding.”
A spokesperson for Marquette did not immediately respond to a request for comment.