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| Sex: The Sure Barometer |
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| Really? You don't know why? |
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This is Dark Cloud on Wednesday, February 11, 2004. We are haunted by sex. In talking to a friend about Nora Jones, my friend thought her wonderful, as did I, and we chatted about her first album and her new songs which led to a discussion of the previous songs that made her famous. It soon became obvious that my friend was unclear on the meaning of the song called “Don’t Know Why I Didn’t Come.” She seemed to think it about the protagonist not accompanying her lover somewhere, as if the words were ‘don’t know why I didn’t go’ rather than the more sordid biologic reality which, if you’re too young to have had it happen to you, folks, just wait. It’s a phrase that’s been uttered to me once, maybe twice in my life of godlike ability to satisfy women, and it usually defines a moment in the relationship for ill or sometimes as a crowbar into the deeper discussions necessary. Usually for ill, though. And maybe more than twice…… The song is an admission of this moment, followed by a split up and no discussion but the singer worries around the obvious trying not to say goodbye. Sex does that: it is the sure barometer of how things are going. After commercials featuring animal farting and drunken, beer-lover humor, Janet Jackson bared a breast at last Sunday’s SuperBowl, exposing no more than on Baywatch or any of the Vegas crime shows or any girl in a t-shirt at the 7-11 next warm day. This had the misfortune to be on CBS, which bans bad movies that don’t show President Reagan as a beam of divine light, and refused the highly clever and effective MoveOn commercial for the Super Bowl because it was, well, anti-Bush, although you might see that they don’t want to start playing political ads. And as it showed in this grotesquely hypocritical example, it not only bends over backwards for the social conservative elements, it bends over forwards. Even though Janet Jackson’s breast was actually the most tasteful aspect of the whole half-time show, Michael Powell, head of the FCC, has treated this non-event as if it were a partial birth abortion followed by cannibalism live on camera. To say either CBS – which has no trouble programming gross-out autopsy re-enactments or its revolting pseudo ‘reality’ shows – or the NFL – which is largely composed of spoiled mesomorphs keeping the nation’s stripper clubs afloat – to profess concern for the family values dear to both is absurd, because they have none. As a nation, we are conflicted about sex, and where the line is between family fun and obscenity, healthy sexuality and rape. CBS fears that it and the nation inadvertently shared a moment, and the barometer looks low to them. And here in Boulder, we are a-swamp as two big local lobby groups – rah-rah football boosters and the feminist lobby – come into conflict over many years of corrupt recruiting practices at CU which, at best, needed the willing ignorance of those in authority who have spent no time preventing it but have clearly engineered avenues of deniability. The Republican choice to co-chair the Regent’s committee immediately went to the media and said that among her first questions would be to ask the women who have claimed rape what they were doing going to a football recruitment party? I need to say, that’s a question worthy of asking, and one I have asked, but it is irrelevant to the issue actually at play. Even if a well known party girl says ‘no’, or is so drunk she is unable to say ‘yes’, or is unconscious, and the males present proceed, it’s rape. This comes as a shock to many men, but women have the right to get falling down drunk and not be ravaged absent clear acquiescence just like, oh, men have that right. According to at least two escort services, CU – unofficially like all the other colleges with football teams - utilizes their services, especially around recruitment time. Our DA apparently told the university in the person of both the Athletic Director and the Football Coach that CU had better clean up its recruitment act. It was suggested this would put CU at a competitive disadvantage. This was verified by the sworn testimony of a former and highly regarded CU athletic employee. Thus far, the only supportive evidence offered up for CU is to say it ain’t in the behavior manual, so it’s not CU’s fault if the manual wasn’t followed. If CU invites and hosts underage people, it is responsible to see that they stay out of trouble. Instead, they just turn them loose and coincidently, player hosts provide alcohol and paid for women, who are not cheap. Who is the deep pocket for these expenses? Surely not the player hosts, be assured. Follow the money. Or comp tickets to games. The problem here is that the football program, as it is virtually everywhere, is utterly out of control and has been set outside the law by the pressures of wealthy alumni and a self justifying athletic department, expanding football to the detriment of other sports and academics. That’s why Boulder Police assigned a cop to be a liaison to the football team, and he is now immediately under examination for having busted several investigations by the DA’s office. That’s the very definition of police corruption, by the way, if true. The barometric pressure is very low, right now, in many of CU’s relationships, and they know the reasons why as surely as these female escorts, no matter what they say. |
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