A sociology professor at Penn State University suggested during a class that straight students should watch gay porn to open up their sexuality.
In a lecture from his Sociology 119 course from the end of the fall semester, Penn State Sociology professor Sam Richards challenged students to watch same-sex pornography and confront the fact that they might be aroused by it. Richards claimed that every person has bisexual feelings, and that each individual might be more comfortable being bisexual.
“If you’re straight, watch gay or lesbian porn and see how quickly you feel aroused,” he said in the lecture, originally held on December 6, via Fox News. “And how you can’t control that. You’ll realize that, ‘Oh, d***, I could be sexualized by people who are like me.’”
“We are all at some level nonbinary,” Richards added, in what he claimed was a summary of the views of many sociologists. “We’re all, very much, easily bisexual.” It is not clear to what research Richards is referring, but a 2015 study conducted by researchers at Cornell University claimed that both men and women were aroused when they watched porn of the same sex. The researchers claimed that this was evidence that sexuality is not strictly limited.
“I might have hit a nerve there. Did I hit a nerve?” the professor asked when the class fell silent in response.
Richards then doubled down on his challenge, specifically pointing out straight students, and especially men.
“Watch gay porn,” he reiterated, to laughter from the class. “See if you feel that feeling. If you feel that feeling, look in a mirror, and say huh, maybe I’m just feeling some things that I’m just afraid to release. And maybe you release that and maybe you’d be surprised that maybe you actually are fine being more bisexual.”
The video was posted to the SOC 119 YouTube page, but Richards has since made the videos private after news reports.
Speaking to Campus Reform this week, Richards defended his lecture. “When I discuss these issues, I generally do so as a sociologist, since that shapes how I see the world,” he said. “From this perspective, ‘sexuality’ is actually quite complex.”
“I have friends/acquaintances who’ve spent a long time in prison and they have homosexual sex,” he added. “They’re ‘straight’ until they need or want intimacy and then they have homosexual sex.”
According to Richards’ faculty web page, the SOC 119 course is immensely popular, attracting some 725 students every single semester. The course offers students the “opportunity to re-examine the world and challenge what they believe to be their place in it from a new perspective,” it says. The page claims that the course is “the largest race and ethnic relations course in the country,” and praised by both students and faculty on both sides of the political spectrum.
The college also defended the course in a statement to Fox News. “Professor Richards purposefully teaches in a manner designed to promote discussion across a spectrum of opinions,” Penn State commented. “His class is not mandatory but is a popular elective that students choose to join. Dr. Richards and his course colleagues take time to discuss opinions from many perspectives — from liberal to conservative — and delve into topics from different viewpoints to create conversation, challenge beliefs and encourage students to explore uncomfortable and complex topics.”