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I VERY MUCH ENJOYED David Plotz’s words of satiric conventional wisdom regarding George Washington University’s recent courtship of a convicted sexual offender (“Buy, George: Helpful Hints for GWU’s New Scholarship Program,” The District Line,6/30). It was also nice to note that the university did finally abandon this controversial recruitment, albeit after intense and prolonged criticism.
In his piece, Plotz excellently suggests GWU provide, among other things, free remedial courses for another priapic male of recent ignominious fame, John Bobbitt. However, some may find it interesting, and equally amusing, that such classes would actually be superfluous. For earlier this year, the university showed John Wayne Bobbitt Uncut, a film in which Bobbitt bared all in the wake of his unusual public attention. After the screening, Bobbitt then spoke to an audience of university students. Thus, Bobbitt could already be considered an adjunct faculty member.
Acquaintances at the school explain this unusual event, ostensibly at least, as an attempt by the university to “discuss problems of modern society.” From a more objective point of view, this explanation (or excuse?) seems to lack substance. And on some of my better days, I might be inclined to suggest that GWU is actually in collusion with significant figures in Congress and Hollywood in an attempt to produce students with a unique stance on sexual relations. Too bad they can’t rely on Jeffrey Dahmer as a consultant anymore.
Graduate student, George Mason University, Fairfax, Va.