News Flash: College "More hanky than panky," says Post

This article on the Washington Post's website was pretty funny. Saying that tons of sex doesn't happen in college is a bold stance -- radical, even. Somehow, either through wishful thinking, urban legend, or actual experience, the popular perception of college -- as American as apple pie and breast implants -- is that it's a hedonistic cesspool of drugs, liquor, and indiscriminate lovin'; convincing people otherwise is about the same as saying the moon is made of ham.

I will, if I may, offer a rebuttal:
First of all, it seems like the Post's argument against collegiate no-pants dancing isn't especially well-researched: "By e-mail and instant message, we canvassed some friends for our blog," write our heroes. Far be it for me to judge complete strangers, but I don't think it's entirely outside the realm of possibility that the lack of sex noted by these "friends" has more to do with their -- let's say "personal shortcomings" -- than with the actual amount of bumping taking place on the average college campus.
Some highlights:

• "The average for the engineering school is probably like once a semester" [my emphasis].

(I don't think I need to point out the cruel irony here. Based on most of the engineers I know, the engineering school is a hell of a poor choice for a case study of sexual aptitude; might as well get statistics on steroid use by canvassing the Special Olympics.)

• "Either I missed out or everyone else in college isn't having sex at all."

(To whom it may concern: hate to be the bearer of bad news, but I think it's very likely that you did, in fact, miss out -- just as you apparently missed out on Proper Syntax Day in high school.)

And the finale:

• "At night people just go back to their rooms and finish their homework, or maybe heat up a Hot Pocket" [my emphasis].
  

...dear sweet bleeding Jesus H. Christ. Who the hell are these people?

The article goes on to cite some figures from Zogby, the gist being that only (only?) 60% of students in the U.S. are sexually active, and that about half the student populations of Harvard, Princeton, and M.I.T. still haven't gotten down and dirty. I'd venture that this is partly due to the fact that the average student at those three schools is already so close to a stress-induced coronary meltdown that anything more strenuous than holding hands and talking about Linux might be fatal.
The article notes that the statistics haven't been "adjusted for homosexuality," which brings the numbers down a bit; it's also worth keeping in mind that these numbers reflect people who aren't having sex, but doesn't account for why. I'm sure at least a third of that 40% aren't abstaining because of morals or chastity: these people would love to be banging like screen doors in a hurricane, but just can't seem to make an opportunity for themselves. For example, I'd be willing to bet that the guy at the party who introduces himself to girls by asking them where they live while breathing heavily -- you know, That Guy; everybody knows of at least one -- is squarely in that national 40% demographic, but not because he chooses to be.

I particularly enjoyed the "landmark study" which reported that the average student has 1.35 hook-ups per semester. I'm not sure what .35 of a hook-up would be, but I'm sure it makes for a fascinating and thoroughly awkward story.

For me, this was the clincher for how lopsided this article is:

• "I've kind of got a girl right now, but we're both too busy to actually have sex" [my emphasis].

I may be completely off-base here, but judging from my own personal experience since coming to college, this whole thing seems unnatural to me. My friends shag like rabbits on Ecstasy. I've heard reliable stories about threesomes and full-on orgies. For some of the people I hang out with, 1.35 hook-ups is a quiet Tuesday evening -- forget a whole semester. As far as being "too busy to actually have sex," anybody who said that would be met with strange looks and hysterical, uncertain laughter. Too busy to study, maybe; too busy to drink -- slightly less believable, but still possible; but too busy to have sex? That kind of talk will get you tarred and feathered in my corner of the world. Maybe I just hang out with a crowd of deviant sex-crazed degenerates, but even so, I don't think the average college student is as cold and lonely as the article would like us to believe.

This just in: maybe it's worse than I thought. According to Durex, the whole country is in a coital recession. Granted, this article is just a glorified condom ad, but if this data is even close to accurate, then we're getting beat out by -- Mother of babbling God! -- the Canadians. With their guys averaging 23 sexual partners in a lifetime -- Good Lord, can that be accurate?! -- to our measly 13, and Canadian females' average of 10 also one ahead of American woman's 9, the Great White North is making us look like... well, like a bunch of engineering majors.
So are the English.
Oh, and the Mexicans.
...and here we've been thinking we were responsible for global warming.

The moral of this story is that we've got a lot of work to do. As college students, the future leaders of the world, it's our obligation -- nay, our duty -- to lead by example and get our Great Society back on top. If you know what I mean.