Arizona Sharia University
Courtesy of Best of the Web comes this story, where the President of the ASU Student Body, Yaser Alamoodi, wants to make it possible to punish students who pose for Playboy. To quote:
I don’t want the name of ASU to be a joke anymore,
It’s not so much the name that’s the joke, its the basketball team.
Anyway, beyond the obvious, there is the historical nature of this story. What Alamoodi is calling for is a return to a time when colleges were free to do this anyway. Anyone remember Forrest Gump? Jenny was expelled for posing for Playboy. She acted shamefully and was treated accordingly, as the university didn’t want to be associated with her anymore. Nowadays that behavior practically brings a scholarship with it.
But Alamoodi misses the point. It isn’t enough for college governments to oppose the lewd behavior of students, the students must oppose it as well. If people will feel bad for posing naked, they won’t pose naked. If they feel they can gain popularity, riches, or some other benefit, no rule passed by anyone will stop them. If you want to stop people from posing for Playboy and redeem the name of your university (good luck on that one), you have to get them to not want to do it. It’s not enough to just put artificial barriers in their way. They have to have the heart to avoid Playboy.
That’s not easy to come by nowadays. But it can be done.