UMass Amherst hosts 'Sex on the Lawn' featuring ‘transmasculine’ member of the ‘kink community’
The event focused on sex ‘inclusion’ for 'LGBTQ+ and disabled communities.'
The program also featured instruction by a self-described 'queer, non-binary, transmasculine' educator, a 'member of kink community,' and a 'co-parent to two neurospicy, gender creative children.'
On Sept. 26, the University of Massachusetts-Amherst hosted “Sex on the Lawn,” which is described as “an inclusive event” focusing on “sexual health, reproductive justice, consent, wellness, and pleasure.”
The event “particularly focus[ed] on the LGBTQ+ and disabled communities,” which, according to the website, “are often underrepresented in sex education.”
”Sex on the Lawn” featured “teach-ins” focused on sexual education such as “Loving Across Differences: Disability, Dating, and Sex,” led by Title IX Training Specialist Jules Purnell, who focuses on “topics such as consent, sexual violence, healthy relationships, human sexuality, LGBTQIA+ inclusion, and intersectionality.”
On the individual’s personal website, Purnell is described as “queer, non-binary, transmasculine, chronically ill/disabled, and currently resides in Western Massachusetts, land originally inhabited by Wabanaki and Pocumtuc people.” Purnell listed preferred pronouns as “they/them.”
“They identify as multiracial,” the biography continues, and “is a member of kink community, ethically non-monogamous, and co-parent to two neurospicy, gender creative children.”
“Jules’s approach is informed by an expressly intersectional, postmodern, existentialist, anti-racist, feminist, and queer theory-informed perspective,” and “adopt the pedagogical philosophies of progressivism, social reconstructionism, and humanism,” it concluded.
[RELATED: University of Rochester paper publishes ‘casual sex’ guide for students]
One Instagram flier by the UMass Students for Reproductive Justice advertising the event was decorated with cartoon male and female genitals, sex toys, contraceptives, and a bottle of cross-sex hormones.
”Sex on the Lawn” also distributed free “safer sex supplies,” menstrual products, and food to students.
Campus groups like UMass Students for Reproductive Justice and the UHS Sexual and Reproductive Health Clinic, and local organizations like Planned Parenthood League of Massachusetts and Tapestry Health, were represented.
”Sex on the Lawn” at UMass-Amherst is one of many similar events hosted at university campuses across the United States. Campus Reform has previously reported a ‘Sex in the Dark’ event at NC State University, a “Kink Across Diverse Bodies” workshop at CSU-Northridge, as well as workshops “Sex and Chocolate in the Dark” and a “P*$$y Fairy Dance Works” at Brown University.
Campus Reform has reached out to UMass-Amherst for comment. This article will be updated accordingly.
