Flesh and the College

The “Sex Workers Art Show” traveled to several campuses earlier this year, causing raised eyebrows at some venues and–an uproar at others like the College of William and Mary and Duke University.

Although the show’s founder claims that the purpose of their performance is to dignify and “humanize sex workers” and “dispel the myth that [strippers and prostitutes] are anything short of artists, innovators, and geniuses,” the descriptions of the show “make it sound prurient, degrading and, above all, dehumanizing,” says the Education Reporter.

Debate over the show at William and Mary may have accelerated the departure of the school’s controversial president Gene Nichol, whose support of the show and his role in removing the historic Wren Cross from public display, saying it was divisive and unacceptable at a public university was decried with outrage.

It also sparked outrage from William and Mary faculty like education professor John Foubert, who said that by promoting the porn industry, the “art show” “goes beyond a free speech issue” into an “issue of public nudity.”

Foubert said that while “in theory a former sex worker recounting his or her story on campus could be ‘a valuable learning experience . . . you don’t have to be naked to describe a past experience.’”

The show also evoked reactions at Duke University where memories of the Duke rape case prompted objections from students and others to using school funds to bring strippers to campus.

Students for an Ethical Duke spokesman Kenneth Larrey
viewed it as the ultimate in hypocrisy. And Jay Schalin of the John William Pope Center of Higher Education Policy noted that as long as strippers are invited–not to “titillate men” but to trash American mainstream values—it passes muster with the school.

However, Duke’s vice president for student affairs, Larry Moneta, “defended the administration’s decision to allow the Sex Workers’ Art Show on campus. While the strippers at the lacrosse team party ‘served the purpose of personal gratification,’ said Moneta, the Sex Workers’ Art show had ‘educational value’ and ‘raised issues for discussion.’”

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Deborah Lambert writes the Squeaky Chalk column for Accuracy in Academia.