'Far from a vile act, rape is a magical experience that benefits society as a whole . If it weren't for rape, Western Civilization might not exist as we know it today."
Bet you never thought you'd see these words on the hallowed pages of The Daily Pennsylvanian.
Luckily, they aren't mine. They're part of a joke column written by John Petroski, an opinion editor at the Recorder, the oh-so-politically-correct student newspaper at Connecticut Central State University.
Petroski published the column - eloquently titled "Rape Only Hurts if You Fight It" - last week. Within a few short days, the kid had already been crucified in media outlets across the country.
Students at CCSU rallied in protest last Thursday, calling for the resignation of Petroski and other top editors at the Recorder. Pride -CCSU's gay and lesbian advocacy group - also had some more specific demands: a refund of women's student fees for the semester, for example, and that Petroski participate in a rape prevention program.
The whole shebang that followed is exactly what you'd expect: the university's president issued a statement condemning the topic but affirming Petroski's right to free speech and CCSU's student government held a forum for discussion.
The story is all over the local news, and as of Tuesday, had made it as far as CNN.
Petroski, of course, apologized.
"It was a stupid thing to do and a stupid topic to even tread on, and I apologize to everyone I've hurt," he wrote. "I should have used a much less touchy pseudo-subject to do this with. Like animal rights or something like that."
He sure sounds sorry.
But even if his apology rings a little bit false it's not clear he needs to be doing it.
Petroski's is the latest in several recent cases of humor-gone-wrong on college campuses, cases gobbled up by cable news channels and bloggers all over cyberspace.
My friends from Tufts University and I compared public relations debacles from our respective schools a couple months ago.
Here in Philadelphia, we had right-wingers calling for Penn President - and apparent terrorist sympathizer - Amy Gutmann to step down.
In Boston, another holiday-themed satire enraged liberals instead. A conservative campus publication at Tufts printed a Christmas carol mocking affirmative action:
"O Sing, gospel choirs,
We will accept your children,
No matter what your grades are, F's, D's, or G's,
Give them all privileged status; We will welcome all.
O come let us accept them,
O come let us accept them,
O come let us accept them,
Fifty-two black freshmen."
My friends from Tufts told me the incident generated more news coverage for their school than they had ever seen. Like all of us at Penn last November, my friends suffered through well-intentioned town meetings, public apologies and an endless stream of stories in their campus paper and on cable TV channels.
All this for some people who thought they'd challenge the politically correct establishment and ended up sticking their feet in their mouths.
It's not that we need to lighten up. These jokes are rude, they're crass, they're offensive. They make a mockery of very serious issues. They are not particularly funny, even to those raised in the South Park school of humor.
But ultimately, they're a huge waste of our time.
In the five minutes it took you to read this far, an average of 6.5 women were raped in the United States. In the time it took students at CCSU to organize a rally against Petroski's column last week, countless others were attacked. That's what we should be fighting against, not some student with bad judgement about humor.
The same goes for us here at Penn. With all the energy they devoted to accusing Gutmann of being anti-Israel last fall, those right-wing groups probably could have solved the crisis in the Middle East themselves.
It's tragic that it takes scandals like these to get college students riled up. Where are the anti-rape workshops and the protests about affirmative action when there isn't a media frenzy?
Petroski, Engineering junior and would-be Halloween terrorist Saad Saadi and the editors at Tufts who let that Christmas carol get through - they aren't the real problem. They're just distracting us from it.
Mara Gordon is a College junior from Washington. Her e-mail address is gordon@dailypennsylvanian.com. Flash Gordon appears on Thursdays.
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