Every semester, countless students are shut out of classes that fill up within minutes of opening. Academic departments simply lack the funding to pay for the extra teaching assistants and lecturers. While not directly related, lengthy waiting lists for courses like Arabic and Urdu can seem ridiculous when we consider that another portion of our tuition money continues to be funneled into the pockets of Sex Out Loud "facilitators," who hold under-attended lectures covering topics like "BDSM and sensation play" and how to go about "pleasing yourself and your partner(s)." Of course Sex Out Loud, a student organization with a recently doubled budget of $88,849, isn't going teach these pertinent skills without props — rest assured that our money is also going to the purchase of dildos and vibrators. President Reagan once wasted $44 billion in an attempt to use lasers to protect America from nuclear missiles. In 2003, amidst two under-funded and overly ambitious wars in Southwest Asia, President Bush allocated $1 billion to "protect marriage." And now Sex Out Loud needs a hundred thousand dollars to protect you from … um … improper masturbation technique? Every year, the Student Services Finance Committee becomes the most hated group of students in Madison as they sift and winnow through page after page of organizational budgets, searching out and deleting attempts to make students pay for gratuitous travel expenses and other questionable uses of tuition money. This year, Sex Out Loud did their best to abuse the segregated-fee system and ultimately succeeded, getting funding for brand new sex toys as well as rent for an expanded office on State Street (the most expensive address in Madison). With many years of experience gaining access to student segregated fees, Sex Out Loud has also mastered the PR game. Students who point out the absurdity of using student fees to teach blowjob tips are countered with prepared rants about Sex Out Loud's free condom distribution program, a service already provided by University Health Services and the Campus Women's Center. SSFC has already denied funding to the Polygon Engineering Student Council on the basis that their services were already provided by other campus organizations; there is no reason why Sex Out Loud should be exempt from this rule. Sex Out Loud is not altogether undeserving of segregated fees. The programs on Safer Sex and Relationships provide a much-needed opportunity to counter the inadequate and often inaccurate sexual education programs we all suffered through back in 10th grade. Sex Out Loud absolutely crosses the line by using seg fees to conduct "Pleasure" classes where attendees are supposed to sit around and learn how to get each other off with leather whips, rubber dildos and porn. You don't need to be a social or fiscal conservative to recognize the ridiculousness of sex-toy shopping sprees funded by the students of an institute for higher education. During a time of rising tuition, such absurdist humor is best suited for The Onion. The lavish excess demonstrated in the Sex Out Loud's budget is nothing less than a slap in the face of the students of UW-Madison. Daniel Tenenbaum ([email protected]) is a senior majoring in political science, international studies and history.