Michael Kimmel, evaluating porn use by college men, reports: “The guys I interviewed consistently spoke of women more with contempt than desire. Women were ‘hos’, ‘bitches’, and ‘sluts’…” (Kimmel, 2008, p. 182). Men’s attitudes were, “You don’t have sex with women because you desire them; sex is the weapon by which you get even with them, or, even, humiliate them” (Kimmel, 2008, p. 182).
Pornography is intricately related to other forms of commercial sexual exploitation, such as strip clubs, escort services and other forms of prostitution (see Jeffreys; Bray; Farley; this volume). Some commercial sexual exploitation is marketed particularly towards fraternities. For example, Centerfold Strips, an adult entertainment booking agency, tweeted in February, 2011 (an important month for fraternity spring recruitment): “Frat rush party specials available – impress your pledges with hot strippers from Centerfold Strips!” Fraternities throughout the nation incorporate ‘Stripper Nights’ into their ‘rush’ recruitment week, despite Interfraternity Council (IFC) regulations that ban such practices. One Website, Bachelor Party HQ, provides a list of colleges and universities where fraternity members have hired women to perform at rush events. The list includes over 80 campuses.
During these rush shows, women who strip typically engage in interactive behavior with highly pornographic themes. One performer, Nevaeh, who strips at Cornell rush parties, has described some of the acts in detail. “The guy will lay down,” she explained, “and we’ll get them into 69 position and someone will pour beer down my back and into their mouths.” In addition to the ‘anal butt chug’, the boys might also compete to eat a Hostess cupcake out of the performer’s crotch the fastest, or watch as the women engage in, or simulate, girl-on-girl conduct, such as oral sex (Ensign, 2007).
Pornographic themes do more than simply sexualize gender inequalities. They often work to sexualize racism and other forms of degradation as well. At Princeton, fraternity brothers were required to travel to Philadelphia for the express purpose of, among other things, “receiving a lap dance from a black stripper” (Westmoreland and Wolff, 2010). Similarly, the author of the USC email distinguished each potential ‘target’ by race: a ‘Blackberry’ is a ‘black target’, a ‘Lemon Meringue’ is Asian, a ‘Pumpkin Pie’ is Latina or Mexican and so on.
Racist references to women sometimes garner more public criticism than merely sexist ones, such as when the radio host, Don Imus, referred to the Rutgers women’s basketball players as ‘Nappy Headed Hos’, a term taken directly from pornography (Picker and Sun, 2008). Yet, the racist and sexist messages in mainstream pornography often escape critical analysis because they are about sex, thus deemed private sexual behavior, shielded from public scrutiny. However, we must breach this imaginary boundary in order to stop the perpetuation of the discriminatory attitudes expressed in pornography.
2 ‘Sorostitutes’ and Theme Parties: Pornography and the Party Scene
The party scene on college campuses provides an important lens into sexual relations. Fraternity-sponsored theme parties often dominate the social scene because of easy access to alcohol and social spaces. According to ‘College OTR: Your Online Frathouse’, “[w]hen it comes to frat parties, a good theme is everything. If the theme is right, the girls will get drunk, naked, and you’ll have more ass than you know what to do with” (College OTR, 2009). Furthermore, the ‘right’ themes have highly pornographic elements. One aspect of the seemingly infinite iterations of the ‘pimp and ho’ party remains constant: men remain in a position of power while the women are simply ‘hos’.
The nickname of sorority women as ‘sorostitutes’ says it all. This term directly equates sorority sisters with prostitutes. What do women do in response to being referred to as prostitutes? If they object, they risk being derided as ‘too serious’, unable to take a joke, or just not the right kind of feminist.10 In order to rationalize their designation as sexual objects for use by their male counterparts, they choose to believe that the men are just kidding, and can tell them apart from the ‘real’ prostitutes. They are the good girls having fun – and, as such, do not expect to be subject to unwanted sex or violation by their friends. Byron Hurt challenges the reality of the attempt to reconcile this conflict. In his 2006 film, Beyond Beats and Rhymes, Hurt looks at misogyny, homophobia and racism in hip hop music. The segment called ‘Sistahs and Bitches’ includes an interview with a woman who claimed that when men refer to women as bitches and ‘hos’ “[t]hey’re not talking about us. We know who we are.” But unbeknownst to this woman, just moments earlier, a man in the documentary had been talking about her and her friend when he discussed his plan to be “getting up on those bitches.” Hurt makes an apt comparison to racist remarks, stating that if “George Bush said something about all those N**s, you wouldn’t say, well, he’s not talking about me. He is. He is talking about you!” (Hurt, 2006).
Anne,11 a recent college graduate who was active in the Greek system, said:
Theme parties were the easiest way of coercion. Like my boyfriend’s fraternity would bring in a dump truck filled with sand and pour it all over the first floor of their mansion so they could get the girls to come over in bathing suits in the middle of winter. Another fraternity had a ‘Saran Wrap’ party where you literally had to create an entire outfit out of Saran Wrap. These were the cool guys, not just the dirtbags. It was really everyone, athletes, smart guys, everyone. Theme parties could be the conduit to sexual coercion, but at the time, you don’t think of it that way. It’s only if you step back (interview with Anne, on file with author, March 2011).
Jen, another recent Greek graduate, describes her sorority activities in a highly academic environment, like Anne’s:
Even in that environment… we gladly embraced pornographic messages. We sang songs about our willingness for sex and dressed as ‘playboy bunnies’ or any variation of ‘hos’ when the party called for it. One night, the sorority had a mixer with a fraternity. As with many fraternity parties, the police broke up the mixer due to noise complaints. When they arrived, they were horrified to find the girls in various states of undress. They questioned the boys, trying to discern what sexual coercion, harassment, or abuse must have occurred for the girls to be in this state. The fraternity boys were equally confused. ‘They came like this’ they desperately tried to explain. The unbuttoned shirts, the short skirts, and the exposed cleavage – that was simply how the girls dressed to attend the night’s themed party.
In light of the dominance of fraternity culture on so many college campuses, it is perhaps unsurprising that sororities tend to conform to the pornographic themes and stereotypes introduced by the fraternities. Sororities sing songs about sisterhood and friendship. Many, however, also rewrite these songs to sing drunkenly at mixers and formals, on busses and at frat houses. Alpha Sigma Alpha, for example, incorporates the language of pornography into their songs. In the following tune, they embrace the theme of women as willing and eager for sexual activity under conditions of questionable consent: