Strange Bedfellows: Ron Jeremy Debating at Simmons College

You read that right. The self-proclaimed "hedgehog," "hardest man in show business," porn star, and occasional reality-show participant Ron Jeremy will be debating pornography at Simmons – a women's college.

As you can imagine, several Simmons Women are underwhelmed at the prospect of Ron Jeremy duking it out with author Susan Cole tonight.

A senior from Simmons told the Herald: “He’s a white male who is very rich and has gotten very rich from pornography, and because of that he doesn’t have the ability to speak accurately on the topic.”

Jeremy's definitely going to be biased. We don't have a problem with Jeremy himself. He seems like an ordinary dude who happened to get lucky – a lot. But we are surprised that Simmons chose Jeremy, who is a porn star and not a porn maker. The people in charge of making and distributing pornography are the ones with the real power in the business. They determine the whos, whats, whens, and wheres of pornography, not Mr. Jeremy.

We were also more rattled by this statement from Dr. Gerald Koocher, the School for Health Studies Dean and moderator of the debate – a man: “I don’t think he’s going to catch so much personal animosity, but he’s going to get some very thoughtful questions from some very smart girls who will have done their homework."

Uh, "girls"? If the situation were reversed and Simmons were an all-male college, would Koocher have referred to the students as "boys"? We think not. Male students at colleges and universities are commonly called "young men." And does anyone else find it absolutely hilarious that, given the situation, the guy moderating the debate has the last name of "Koocher"?

Image of Ron Jeremy from our brothers and sisters at Torontoist.