A follow up to “Sex talk with Father Wild”

Unlike my blogging partner, I actually showed up on time to the Father Wild forum (…meaning that I didn’t have an evening graduate class with a sweet professor.  Jealous!). Anyways, as femmemeister stated, a round of us feminists showed up last Tuesday to smash some patriarchy.  Okay, not really, we just asked a couple questions.  The questions dealt with (1) the lack of stability and decentralized nature of sexual violence awareness and prevention programming at Marquette, (2) the confusing and inadequate “sexual contact/assault” policy, and (3) the fact that Marquette is one of only 3 other Catholic Jesuit universities in the nation not to have a Women’s and/or Gender Relations Resource Center.

We got some ‘Wild’ responses (har har har!):

(1)  Father Wild mentioned HAVEN and the fact that they existed because of a grant that has now expired.  Of course what Wild doesn’t seem to know is that Haven does still exist, it is just not very pronounced on campus.  Another fun fact—Haven was given money raised from charity performances of the Vagina Monologues that happened two years ago, which has probably contributed to their being able to continue on with their mission.  Of course these performances had to take place off campus because Marquette doesn’t like mixing charity and education.  And, well they don’t like Vaginas either.  But I digress, Wild had many positive things to say on this issue and mentioned a task force of faculty that are currently working to receive another grant that will help the school to establish a firm and stable prevention and response coordination program in regards to issues of sexual violence.  We weren’t told anything we didn’t already know though, but it was good to hear that the administration is receptive to these issues and recognizes the need (or at least I hope).

(2)  We got the best response with this question.  Concerning Marquette’s dated and confusing sexual assault policy, Wild conceded the fact that the policy does need to be reviewed, especially if it is confusing and does not adequately address the needs of the students.  We focused our question on the fact that, as the policy stands now, it is referred to “sexual contact/assault” policy and thus confuses consensual sex and sexual assault by including a sentence that reads “Marquette university, in its commitment to Catholic values, further expects that contact between persons will be a mutually voluntary expression of love taking place within the context of marriage.”  As I questioned in a previous post, why the hell is this statement in a sexual assault policy?!  Especially as the last thing someone reads before getting into the actual policy.  For shame, Marquette.  But anyways, the response to this question gave us some definite hope in the future of this university when it comes to issues of sexual violence.  Wild appeared most receptive to taking a look at this issue, and we’re glad that this question will now (hopefully) be on the minds of administrators.

(3)  This question was posed, in part, due to the fact that this is the 100 year centenary of women being admitted to Marquette, yet Marquette is still behind the times when it comes to offering a resource center that deals with women and gender issues.  This question was kind of glossed over since by this time, I think Father Wild just wanted us women to go back to the kitchen. (JOKE)  Not much was said about this issue, or not much that I can remember (any one else want to fill in on the response to this question? Chime in!) 

   

That’s the main summary of our sex talk with Father Wild, although I do have to admit, it wasn’t all that sexy.