Lilith
10-02-2003, 02:32 PM
By STACI HUPP
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Ames, Ia. - Jayme Howard spends his days at computer science class. At night, the Iowa State University freshman learns how to tie up and spank partners.
He gets his nighttime lessons from Cuffs, a campus club that teaches students about bondage and other sexual fetishes.
The club, after dissolving last year, is trying to make a comeback at ISU. Today, Cuffs leaders plan to ask the ISU student senate for $100 from the student fee fund, mostly to pay for promotion.
"It's always been interesting to me," said Howard, 18, who got involved in Cuffs after he met the club's president. "I'm learning more."
A Christian family advocate said Tuesday that the group shows a need for lessons in morality among ISU students.
"This is an alarm bell," said Chuck Hurley, president of the Iowa Family Policy Center in Pleasant Hill. Hurley says rape is vastly underreported on college campuses.
"I think for the university to condone this act in the light of the rape problem is like throwing gasoline on a destructive fire. It's just going to make it worse," he said.
The highlight of a Cuffs meeting this week was the film "Secretary," about an attorney and his assistant who find a common bond in masochism, or inflicting physical pain for pleasure.
Howard and a dozen other students watched it in a small room at the ISU Memorial Union. Instead of popcorn, they snacked on "S&M's": a mix of Skittles and M&M's candies.
Leaders hope membership will more than double for the next meeting, a how-to session that could involve paddles, leather, ropes and a fur-covered "flogger."
Clothes stay on at meetings, said Duane Long Jr., an ISU senior who is Cuffs' president and primary instructor.
"It's almost clinical," said Long, who also talks to ISU human sexuality classes. "You can show people without it being sexual."
ISU's 27,000 students will pay about $8.6 million in mandatory fees this year. About $1.5 million will go to campus clubs.
University officials and the Iowa Board of Regents don't monitor spending on student clubs.
"I have a high level of confidence in the ability of students to deal with these types of matters," said Regent Bob Downer of Iowa City. "It does strike me that this is a matter that is of a sufficiently unusual nature. It should be ascertained that there is no unlawful activity."
If Cuffs receives student money, it wouldn't be the first time. An ISU senior organized Cuffs in 2000. Long then was the group's treasurer.
Student senators initially denied the group money because they said some club meetings were closed to sexually inexperienced student members. The club opened meetings to all students and won $33 for the following year.
Student senators were divided over the club's worth to a college campus, said David Boike, who oversees the senate's books.
"Some people thought they actually provided a legitimate service and served the university community well and deserved money for it," said Boike, a senior from Dike.
Cuffs was the target of jokes, ridicule and letters to the student newspaper in its first year.
The fanfare on campus has died since, aside from the Cuffs posters that disappear within a day of their distribution across campus.
"To me, that's kind of what college is about, to be liberal and to do what they want to do," said Adam Bosman, an ISU sophomore from Madrid. "I think any club has the right to be here. It's not any different from the Hackey Sack Club and the Gay and Lesbian Alliance."
Cuffs dissolved last year when Long became too busy to organize meetings.
Cuffs already had qualified for more than $1,500 of student money, most of which would have been used to pay the members' admission costs to a leadership conference.
Long gave it all back, and the group lost its free office space in the Memorial Union.
The club also gets some money from dues, which pay for guest lecturers and field trips to home-improvement stores, where members have looked at rope, clamps and wooden dowels.
The club isn't all about sex talk, Long said. At least twice a year, guest lecturers have talked about preventing sexual assault and sexually transmitted diseases, he said.
Student senators, who decide who gets the club money and how much, are expected to give Cuffs an answer within a month.
Hurley urged student leaders to deny club financing.
"While the argument is made that this is consensual . . . sadism is disrespectful and masochism is self-disrespectful," Hurley said. "To fund something that is degrading or sexually violent can only lead to heartache."
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Ames, Ia. - Jayme Howard spends his days at computer science class. At night, the Iowa State University freshman learns how to tie up and spank partners.
He gets his nighttime lessons from Cuffs, a campus club that teaches students about bondage and other sexual fetishes.
The club, after dissolving last year, is trying to make a comeback at ISU. Today, Cuffs leaders plan to ask the ISU student senate for $100 from the student fee fund, mostly to pay for promotion.
"It's always been interesting to me," said Howard, 18, who got involved in Cuffs after he met the club's president. "I'm learning more."
A Christian family advocate said Tuesday that the group shows a need for lessons in morality among ISU students.
"This is an alarm bell," said Chuck Hurley, president of the Iowa Family Policy Center in Pleasant Hill. Hurley says rape is vastly underreported on college campuses.
"I think for the university to condone this act in the light of the rape problem is like throwing gasoline on a destructive fire. It's just going to make it worse," he said.
The highlight of a Cuffs meeting this week was the film "Secretary," about an attorney and his assistant who find a common bond in masochism, or inflicting physical pain for pleasure.
Howard and a dozen other students watched it in a small room at the ISU Memorial Union. Instead of popcorn, they snacked on "S&M's": a mix of Skittles and M&M's candies.
Leaders hope membership will more than double for the next meeting, a how-to session that could involve paddles, leather, ropes and a fur-covered "flogger."
Clothes stay on at meetings, said Duane Long Jr., an ISU senior who is Cuffs' president and primary instructor.
"It's almost clinical," said Long, who also talks to ISU human sexuality classes. "You can show people without it being sexual."
ISU's 27,000 students will pay about $8.6 million in mandatory fees this year. About $1.5 million will go to campus clubs.
University officials and the Iowa Board of Regents don't monitor spending on student clubs.
"I have a high level of confidence in the ability of students to deal with these types of matters," said Regent Bob Downer of Iowa City. "It does strike me that this is a matter that is of a sufficiently unusual nature. It should be ascertained that there is no unlawful activity."
If Cuffs receives student money, it wouldn't be the first time. An ISU senior organized Cuffs in 2000. Long then was the group's treasurer.
Student senators initially denied the group money because they said some club meetings were closed to sexually inexperienced student members. The club opened meetings to all students and won $33 for the following year.
Student senators were divided over the club's worth to a college campus, said David Boike, who oversees the senate's books.
"Some people thought they actually provided a legitimate service and served the university community well and deserved money for it," said Boike, a senior from Dike.
Cuffs was the target of jokes, ridicule and letters to the student newspaper in its first year.
The fanfare on campus has died since, aside from the Cuffs posters that disappear within a day of their distribution across campus.
"To me, that's kind of what college is about, to be liberal and to do what they want to do," said Adam Bosman, an ISU sophomore from Madrid. "I think any club has the right to be here. It's not any different from the Hackey Sack Club and the Gay and Lesbian Alliance."
Cuffs dissolved last year when Long became too busy to organize meetings.
Cuffs already had qualified for more than $1,500 of student money, most of which would have been used to pay the members' admission costs to a leadership conference.
Long gave it all back, and the group lost its free office space in the Memorial Union.
The club also gets some money from dues, which pay for guest lecturers and field trips to home-improvement stores, where members have looked at rope, clamps and wooden dowels.
The club isn't all about sex talk, Long said. At least twice a year, guest lecturers have talked about preventing sexual assault and sexually transmitted diseases, he said.
Student senators, who decide who gets the club money and how much, are expected to give Cuffs an answer within a month.
Hurley urged student leaders to deny club financing.
"While the argument is made that this is consensual . . . sadism is disrespectful and masochism is self-disrespectful," Hurley said. "To fund something that is degrading or sexually violent can only lead to heartache."