Make it Loud & Claim the Experience

The Daily Cal, an organization that I somehow now work for, had two great opinion and column pieces recently.

The opinion piece was written by a houseboy who gets housing in a sorority in exchange for helping in the kitchen. The piece describes his relationship with lunch chef, and how they connect over music. He ends the article with, “The chef and I connect through music… all you have to do is turnip the beet.” Music is one of those things that I didn’t get into until very late in my college career, and this compared to my peers who had been going to concerts in high school. Heck, I still have trouble talking extensively on music. But given that, I think Robert and myself (and everyone else) can agree: experience doesn’t matter. Music is transcendental.

The column piece was part of the “Sex on Tuesday” series, a series that I have devotedly followed for the past three years. While usually the articles aren’t especially enlightening and often feel uninspired, I appreciate a world where it’s okay to talk about these issues.

This particular article also brought up some excellent, excellent points, points that were uncomfortable. For example, when talking about how men compliment her, the author describes:

Many people — mostly men — tell me that I enjoy sex much more than other females and what a valuable quality that is. I’m not saying I don’t appreciate the compliments, because I do. But this implies that there is a hierarchy of sexual worth, which is problematic for many reasons.

Compliments are good. They make people happy. But it is also important to recognize that by using some specific compliments over others we reinforce societal expectations, and we should be conscious of that.