The College Fix

‘BDSM Safety Panel’ canceled because of ‘credible information’ about disruption

Indiana University-Bloomington apparently doesn’t want the public to know that it teaches students how to spank women.

The taxpayer-funded university canceled the final day of its “SexFest” – and erased the Facebook page for the three-day event – after a student senator tweeted a video of Thursday’s flogging demonstration. Campus Reform also shared several photos.

It’s an official university event organized by the IU Health Center, the Indiana Daily Student reported last week. The student-run Sexual Health Advocacy Group, Residence Hall Association and Bloomington-based Community Capacity for Prevention and Education also collaborated.

The headline says the “educational” event offers “kink” but does not specify what was to be offered. It provides an extensive discussion of “voguing” and notes that SexFest now partners with an ongoing sexual health fair called “Cupcakes and Condoms.”

Matt Ahmann, a “congressman” for the student government, showed the public one of the “kink” examples: an older man paddling a pantsless young woman tied to a wooden cross. The paddling was “held in an open room of a dorm hall,” he said, accusing the university of funding “sexual violence.”

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https://twitter.com/realmattahmann/status/1225480218242113539

Campus Reform fleshed out more of the kink portion:

On Tuesday, Debbie Herbenick hosted Lexx Brown James, a licensed marriage and family therapist, on a panel titled “Kick-off to Kink.”

Wednesday’s events included a “Kink Workshop” and educational booths demonstrating the “safe use of different sex toys.” Students were also invited to a workshop on “contract development and boundaries.”

Other photos shows tables “full of whips, paddles dildos, and other sexual objects,” including several nipple-torture implements. Students were offered the chance to sign up for “cages,” collars, “electricity” and “mind fucks,” as well as state how badly they wanted to be spanked or flogged, with options ranging from “none” to a physical body mark that lasts “for the year,” according to Campus Reform.

The university canceled the final day of SexWeek, a “BDSM safety panel” that was scheduled to start Thursday at 8 p.m., according to a flyer posted by IU SexFest. Campus Reform said attendees at this panel were required to sign a nondisclosure form “where they will agree to not use any recording devices, maintain the confidentiality of the panelists, and to be respectful of all participants.”

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A screenshot of the IU Health Center’s announcement – since removed along with its entire event page – posted by Campus Reform does not give an explanation for the cancellation. The publication said the event was removed entirely Friday.

Before Thursday night’s off-the-record panel was canceled, university spokesperson Chuck Carney told Campus Reform that “BDSM safety” was among the “most requested” topics by students. After its cancellation, Carney told the publication that event staff had “received credible information about a planned disruption,” so the university canceled it “in the interest of safety.”

The College Fix has asked Carney to provide evidence that BDSM safety is among the most requested topics by IUB students and clarify the context of the assertion: whether it applies universitywide or simply to questions received by the Health Center. It also asked Carney to elaborate on the “credible information” that prompted the cancellation.

Read the Campus Reform reports.

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