Jay Friedman has spent much of his life educating college students about sex.
At “The J-Spot: A Sex Educator Tells All,” Friedman spoke of the myths, curiosities and his own personal advice on sex to an audience of students at the Union Ballroom on Monday night.
Students learned about pressures relating to sex, how to enhance their sexual experiences and the comparisons between education in the United States and other countries throughout the world.
Hilary Smith, a freshman, said Friedman gave great information and kept the event funny for the audience.
“I was surprised about the difference between sex education in other countries and here,” Smith said. “Also, I was surprised about how sexually ignorant our country is.”
Friedman first began speaking at college campuses 21 years ago, wanting to promote sexual health while preventing students from experiencing the personal hardships he did.
“I had a relationship that ended with an unexpected pregnancy,” Friedman said. “Ever since then, I wanted to learn more about sex and wanted to teach others so they wouldn’t have to go through what I had.”
His goal ever since has been to give talks to younger generations to educate them on the issues and pleasures involving sex.
Friedman came to the University when the Student Wellness Organization and University Activities Office reached out to him. Caroline Keller, president of the Student Wellness Network, had been working to bring Friedman to the University for over a year.
“Last year, our president liked the idea of talking to students about sexual health,” Keller said. “It is easier to get students to come and participate in events that revolve around sexual health.”
Another component to the talk was a clip from a video about sexual education from Scandinavia and countries in Europe. Friedman made a point to say that the video is censored here in the United States, despite being used to educate middle school children in Europe.
Derek Daniel, a sophomore, felt the event opened his eyes to the problems with sex education in the United States.
“It is a negative to our society to be so ignorant and keep sex in the dark,” Daniel said. “The video was 20 years old in Scandinavia but we still can’t show it here now.”
Both Daniel and Keller said they loved the event and what they learned from it.
“I personally learned a lot, both about censorship about sexual health,” Keller said. “It was amazing and I’m very happy with how it went.”
