Penn State professor challenges straight students in his sociology class to ... trends now
An American college professor has come under fire for telling straight students to watch gay porn to understand new sides to their sexuality.
Penn State professor Sam Richards aired the challenge to students during a lecture for his entry level sociology class in December - and was reportedly met with silence in response.
The awkward exchange came during a discussion billed on Richards' syllabus as 'A Conversation on Trans Issues, TERFS, and The Binary.'
Footage of the lesson - which was recorded live and posted to Richards' YouTube channel - has since stirred up sentiments of outrage from onlookers online. The stream has since been made private.
The school, meanwhile, is standing by its staffer's statements, telling DailyMail.com Thursday that 'academic freedom for faculty' is necessary to achieve 'critical thinking and discussion' within its student body.
Penn State professor Sam Richards aired the challenge to students during a lecture for his entry level sociology class in December - and was reportedly met with silence in response
Footage of the lesson - which was recorded live and posted to Richards' YouTube channel - has since stirred up outrage from onlookers online. The stream has since been made private
The problematic excerpt from the lesson - which, according to the now private video, was delivered on December 6 - begins with Richards, 62, addressing the 'straight folks' in his gender and culture class, which is the largest of its kind in the country.
'If you’re straight, watch gay or lesbian porn and see how quickly you feel aroused - and how you can’t control that,' Richards reportedly asked in the clip, which was viewed by Fox News.
Singling out his male students - 'especially men,' as the professor puts it in the clip - Richards explained: 'You’ll realize that, "Oh, d**n, I could be sexualized by people who are like me."'
Richards - who has won several awards over the course of his 32-year career at the taxpayer-funded school - went on to assert that 'we are all at some level nonbinary' and 'very much' bisexual.
Reportedly met with a wall of silence from the 700 or so students present, the professor continued to prod those in attendance with his theory - billing it as a common consensus among certain 'sociologists.'
'I might have hit a nerve there. Did I hit a nerve?' the professor reportedly asked after reading the room.
The awkward exchange came during a discussion billed on Richards' syllabus as 'A Conversation on Trans Issues, TERFS, and The Binary.' The school say that the course every semester reaches its cap of 725 students and is 'the largest race and ethnic relations course in the country'
At that point in the lesson, Richards again addressed straight students in the lecture hall - 'especially men.'
'Watch gay porn. See if you feel that feeling,' the professor said in the clip - reportedly over students' stifled laughter.
The instructor, according to Fox, proceeded to tell students to embrace feelings of homosexuality while viewing the material, calling them a commonality of the entire male population, regardless of orientation.
'If you feel that feeling, look in a mirror, and say:
