Unwanted Advice

While not in response to a specific question, Dan Savage stumbled upon some deeply profound advice in the most unlikeliest of places.. graffiti on a men’s room wall.

Color Changing Urinals- Write your own sex tips

I’d really like to meet the person responsible for some graffiti I spotted in the men’s room at the Cornerstone: “Don’t Raw Dog A Random.”

That has to be the most effective peer-to-peer safer-sex message I’ve ever read while taking a piss in Maryland. It did take me a second to work out exactly what it meant, as I’m old, so here’s a quick translation for other olds: “Don’t raw dog a random” means “For heaven’s sake, don’t engage in unprotected vaginal intercourse—don’t have sex without a condom—with a woman you’ve only just met, particularly if you met her in this drinking establishment. Bro.”

It’s not a failsafe strategy for avoiding sexually transmitted infections—people can get very specific STIs from completely nonrandom sex partners—but the number of STIs could be cut dramatically if all male college students everywhere refrained from raw-dogging those lovely lady randoms and vice versa. (I realize that “random” is not gendered… but if you saw this bar, you would know that an exclusively heterosexual clientele can be safely assumed. A straight boy wrote that message, and he was addressing other straight boys, and “random” refers to female pickups, not male pickups.)

I want to add that I was particularly impressed by the use of the word “random” in place of, say, “bitch,” “slut,” “whore,” or any of the other sexist/hostile/demeaning terms that college-town-bathroom-stall-graffitiing types typically use in place of “woman,” “female,” or “young lady coed.” Well done, DIY safe-sex educator!

Well done for sharing, Dan.  You nailed it!

Nailed It! features are like “Best Of” categories, for when when my fellow advice giver’s answer is so spot on, I couldn’t have said it better myself.