Alumni and members of my esteemed current institution of higher learning (not the one where I am a hall director, but the one where I am an annoyed graduate student) have published a book.  An intellectual and dry academic exercise, it is entitled “Boink: College Sex by the People Having It.”

“Boink” was, up until this point, a magazine featuring partially naked, mostly naked, oh-what-your-poor-mother-must-think-of-these-utterly-naked pictures of, I’m pretty sure, Boston University students.  I am unsure because I only saw one copy once where a guy I interviewed to be a Resident Assistant had his own, uh, spread.  I was traumatized, seeing this child of but 19 years of tender age unclothed in print, I immediately hid in my room reading Augustine’s City of God until I was bored enough to feel cleansed.  I can’t say I’ve ever researched Boink’s pages again.  Though I hear most people get it for the articles. 

Anyway, Boink has a book out.  And I read this review of it on another blog, and there it is described as “a beautifully produced, glossy paperback goldmine of gorgeous sexy photos, sassy erotica, and deeply truthful essays by young people . . .”

The other day I was discussing Boink’s new book with one of my undergraduate students when I stated my disbelief that “college sex” is erotic at all.  Her argument was that I was a Christian, and therefore knew nothing of the ways of the erotic, and could never understand the blush of passion enjoyed by the supple youth around me.  Actually, her exact words were, “Um, no offense, but I think everyone knows you haven’t got any, like, ever.  You’re, like, married to God.”

This was a fascinating argument.  Three separate responses came to my mind: