Thursday, April 03, 2003
Copyright © Las Vegas Mercury

We want change--yesterday!

Group protests UNLV's sexual health policy--but does it need to?

By Andrew Kiraly

Robbie Keeley's speech was strongly worded. "This is a form of social control," she said of the Student Health Center's "Body Talk" reproductive health education program. "This is how they see us, as passive and acquiescent. The Student Health Center's policy is insulting and irresponsible."

Keeley and a handful of other activists with Choice UNLV rallied last Wednesday at UNLV's Valerie Pida Plaza to denounce the Student Health Center's policy, which requires students to attend a reproductive health class before receiving condoms, getting a pap smear or taking a sexually transmitted disease test. As members of Choice UNLV tell it, students--predominantly women--must attend a "Body Talk" class, a policy they say is sexist and needlessly oppressive, not to mention inconvenient. Among other things, they want the mandatory "Body Talk" program customized for women of different ages and experience levels, and eventually replaced with an enhanced website that will allow students to get sex ed on their own terms.

So does Student Health Center director Tina Saddler. As Saddler tells it, she thought she was working with Choice UNLV on these issues as early as last semester, when Keeley, a graduate student, penned a research paper addressing just those issues.

Saddler says she was "shocked" to learn about the rally--and doesn't understand why the group would hold one. A meeting held a day after the rally was cordial enough, both parties say--but then Choice UNLV fired off a press release afterward saying Saddler "refused to revamp the center's sexist reproductive health policies."

Call it a she-said, she-said dispute. The disconnect between the Student Health Center and the newly formed activist group points to a rift between the university's mandate to educate and students' sensitivity to gender issues, activist impulse and the real world of college budgets and bureaucracy. Change is coming, Saddler says, but Choice UNLV wants it yesterday.

Saddler agrees that "Body Talk," a densely packed 45-minute program that covers everything from the pill to breast self-exams to STDs, could be less "one-size-fits-all," but says its policies aren't sexist. It's not that the program discriminates against women, it's just tailored more toward women.

"It's true that, historically, women are bigger consumers of health care than men," Saddler says. "I'm aware of [Choice UNLV's] criticism that it's 'one size fits all.' There's a big difference between an 18-year-old student and a 45-year-old one with children. It's not a perfect program. I have a copy of the paper [Keeley wrote]. Everything she talked about in there I was thinking about doing. As far as I'm concerned, we were making progress."

But apparently not fast enough--though Choice UNLV prez Christina Young says the post-rally meeting was productive. "We sat down with Tina and expressed our concerns, and I think we really got through to her. She realizes that changes need to be made."

But a quote from Young in the press release sent out after the meeting suggests otherwise: "We are very disappointed with Saddler's unwillingness to commit to broadening these services so that women's reproductive health care is not withheld."

Young says Choice UNLV wants Saddler to drop the program immediately and set up an interactive website--immediately. "We want change now," Young says.

Saddler says she's open to changes, but it's not possible to do at Choice UNLV's pace--and under current budget constraints.

"They asked me to commit to changing 'Body Talk' as of yesterday, but I won't commit to dropping that requirement," Saddler says. "My whole purpose in being here is to support the university's mission to educate students. Without acting on a whim, I would really want further student input on this."

Maybe that input will come as something other than a rally.