An upmarket school in Manhattan has drawn major flak for discreetly promoting porn—without an option for kids to opt-out. Parents and students of the illustrious Columbia Grammar & Preparatory School were livid upon discovering how “Raunch”-related content was added to the curriculum without prior consent from either the parents or the pupils.
The educational institute, which is known for its exorbitant fee structure ($47,000 annually), had recently introduced a health and sexuality workshop that was originally thought of as an online course designed to help growing kids understand safe sex, condoms, or birth control.
But, students—roughly about 120 boys and girls— were in for a rude shock. The unconventional course, titled “Pornography Literacy: An intersectional focus on mainstream porn,” was being taught by Justine Ang Fonte, a wellness director, Fox News reported.
The course threw up many questions, as it primarily entailed explicit slide presentations, along with lessons on how porn takes care of "three big male vulnerabilities"; statistics on the "orgasm gap" showing straight women have far fewer orgasms with their partners than gay men or women; and photos of partially-nude women, some in bondage, to offer an in-depth understanding into “what is porn and what is art”.
According to New York Post, Fonte's presentation drew major wrath for including some of the most widely searched pornographic terms such as “creampie”, “anal,” “gangbang,” “stepmom” and more. What’s more, one of the slides also contained myriad porn genres such as “incest-themed,” “consensual or “vanilla,” “barely legal,” and “kink and BDSM” (which included "waterboard electro" torture porn as an example).
“We were all like, ‘What?'” recounted an aghast female student, adding, "everyone was texting each other, ‘What the hell is this? It’s so stupid.’ Everyone knows about porn. The worst part of it was that it took place not long before the AP tests and I had to miss both my AP classes for this.”
What was alarming to note was the presentation also offered insights into the workings of a new app called “marketability of Only Fans,” the hot new app that caters to sex work. One slide reportedly included a photo of a nubile woman who appeared to be promoting OnlyFans-type work.
Since classes were carried out on Zoom, due to the pandemic, it didn’t take long for parents to get a whiff of something being amiss. A young student’s mother spoke to the media on the condition of anonymity. “No one wants to be canceled or lose their livelihood and that can be done in an instant,” said the mother.
She added: “Most parents feel the same way I do about not going public but at the same time, we’re incredibly frustrated by what’s going on. None of the parents knew this was planned. We were completely left in the dark. It makes us wonder what else the school is up to.”
Thinking along similar lines, another parent of a middle-schooler, as cited on The Post, averred, “It’s outrageous that the school is introducing pornography into a mainstream classroom and starting to indoctrinate kids. The goal of this is to disrupt families.” She further questioned: “Why is the school making porn a priority as opposed to physics, art, literature, or poetry?”
A volley of irked parents urged school administrators to show them the content from the presentation after it took place, but requests were declined.
