WILL UNWOUND #78: “The 1992 Librarians and Sex Survey Results” by Will Manley
April 11, 2010You asked for it; you got it! These are the results of the 1992 Librarians and Sex Survey that Wilson Library Bulletin refused to run. They did run the initial survey questionnaire in the June ’92 issue in my “Facing the Public” column and then fired me and destroyed the unsold copies of the magazine. Over 5.000 librarians sent in their questionnaires to me. Here are the results:
Question 1 – Playboy, Playgirl, Playguy
40% of the respondents felt that Playboy should be included in libraries, 23% felt that Playgirl should be included, and 6% felt that Playguy should be included.
Question 2 Video Ratings
61 % felt that libraries should label their videotapes with G, PG, Pg-13, R, NC-17, and X ratings. 39% felt that they should not give labels.
Question 3 – R Rated Videos and Minors
22% of the respondents felt that libraries should check out R rated videos to minors not accompanied by adults.
Question 4 – X Rated Videos
17% of the respondents felt that libraries should carry X rated videos.
Question 5 – Condom Dispensers
22% of the respondents felt that libraries should have condom dispensers in their bathrooms.
Question 6 – Sexual Harassment by a Supervisor
14% of the respondents indicated they had been sexually harassed by a library supervisor.
Question 7 – Sexual Harassment by a Patron
78% of the female respondents and 7 percent of the male respondents indicated that they had been sexually harassed by a library patron.
Question 8 – Sex Without Love
20% of the respondents felt that sex without love is by definition bad sex.
Question 9 – Nuclear War and Roseanne Barr Arnold
30% of the male respondents indicated that if there were a nuclear war and Roseanne Barr Arnold was the only woman on earth to survive, they would have sex with her in order to propagate the species.
Question 10 – Nuclear War and PeeWee Herman
38% of the female respondents indicated that if there were a nuclear war and PeeWee Herman was the only man on earth to survive, they would have sex with him in order to propagate the species.
Question 11 – AIDS and God
6% of the respondents felt that AIDS is a punishment from God.
Question 12 – Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas vs. Anita Hill
82% of the respondents felt that Anita Hill told the truth in the Senate Judiciary Hearings. {Historical Note for Net Genners: Anita Hill accused Clarence Thomas of sexual harassment }
Question 13 – Shakespeare and “the 1st Time”
When asked to pick the Shakespearean title that best described their first sexual encounter, 28% chose Comedy of Errors; 23% chose Midsummer’s Night Dream; 22% chose Much Ado About Nothing; 21% chose All’s Well That Ends Well; and 6% chose Rape of Lucrece.
Question 14 – Genre Fiction and Sex Lives
38% of the respondents classified their sex life as a “romance”; 31% as a fantasy; 22% as a comedy, and 9% as a tragedy.
Question 15 – $$$’s for Posing Nude
51 % of the respondents would pose nude in Playboy, Playgirl, or Playguy for all the money in Fort Knox; 24% said they would do it for $1million.
Question 16 – Age and Virginity Loss
12% lost their virginity from 12 to 15; 22% between 16 and 18; 37% between 19 and 21; 17% between 22 and 25; 5% between 26 and 30; 2% between 31 and 35; 1% between 36 and 100; 4% are virgins.
Question 17 – Marriage and Celebrities – Men
Given a list of 12 celebrities, 27 % of the males preferred to marry Kathleen Turner; 25% Jane Fonda; 14% Dolly Parton; 13% Diane Keaton, 8% Diane Sawyer; 6% Madonna; 4% Prince; 2% Elton John; and 1% split between Marla Maples, Yoko Ono; Dianna Ross, and Tina Turner.
Question 18 – Marriage and Celebrities – Women
Given a list of 12 celebrities, 60% of the females chose Robert Redford; 18% Patrick Swayze; 7% Woody Allen; 5% Michael Jordan, 4% Martina Navratilova, 3% Cher, 2% Eddie Van Halen, and 1% was split between Prince, Dan Quayle, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Geraldo Rivera, and Michael Jackson.
Question 19 – Frequency of Sex
50% of the respondents reported having sex 1 – 2 times per week; 22% 3 – 4 times per week; 21% – 0 times a week; 6% 5 -7 times per week; and 1% have it more than 7 times per week.
Question 20 – Public Places where librarians have had sex at least once
63% in a car; 57% in a sleazy motel room; 52% sleeping bag; 43% kitchen floor; 32% hot tub; 20% library; 7% airplane; 8% elevator.
Question 21 – Number of Sexual Partners in their lifetime
30% – 2 to five partners; 22% – 1 partner; 17% – 6 to 10; 16% – 11 to 20; 7% 21 to 50; 4% more than 50; 4% – none.
Question 22 – Sex and Presidential Elections
72% of the respondents said they would not let a candidate’s sex life influence their vote in an election for President.
Question 23 – X Rated Movies
61% of the respondents had rented an x rated movie.
Question 24 – Librarians and Sex Books
91% had read The Joy of Sex; 29% had read How to Make Love to a Man; 14% had read Human Sexual Inadequacy; and 3% had read Macho Sluts.
These are the results you asked for. Now let me ask you to comment on these 3 questions or anything else that strikes your fancy: 1) Should I have gotten canned for this? 2) Are the results surprising to you? 3) Would the results be significantly different today? 1 extra credit question: Should we update the survey through an anoymous computer survey program on Will Unwound?
NO, NO, and NO.
No, no, and abso-fucking-lutely.
1) Hell, NO!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Excuse the obscenity but this survey doesn’t even seem all that risque. You didn’t ask how many had AIDs, you didn’t ask pornographic questions, you didn’t ask how many were assaulted by their library director (or, perhaps more pertinently, the head honcho of WLB). I could go on and on. The questions are fun or occasionally slightly disgusting (I mean, Pee Wee Herman?!!!!) or quite interesting from an academic point of view.
2) results are not surprising to me…other than aforesaid Pee Wee. And that 18% of librarians didn’t believe Anita Hill. I’d have thought that only 5-10% would have disbelieved her in an overwhelmingly female profession. Much more female than now. There is a change I would expect to see if you had checked on gender. I suspect the vast majority of respondents were female, and that the number would be quite a bit lower today.
3) I suspect Question 22 might be answered quite differently today considering the implosion of John Edwards’ campaign. A question on question 5: Coin operated or free? I would hope that sexual harassment by supervisors is much less. I’m reasonably sure the number would be similar today as regards the public and sexual harassment.
I assume the famous 7% and elevators belonged to Q 20? I think you’d have to update your selected book titles for #24, other than Joy of Sex. I guess your celebrities would need updating too.
Good grief, THIS got you fired? Why did they allow the questions to run in the first place? Someone high up hadn’t seen it and vetoed it I suppose till too late.
Thank you Will for running this. You made my weekend and put to rest something I had always been curious about!
Joan…I’ve been noodling through the issue of being fired and I think, going through my notes from 20 years ago, that I have a pretty good theory. It will be in tomorrow’s post. Like any librarian I am a pack rat and I kept a lot of notes at the time back in 92. A lot of it I had totally forgotten about but now that I’ve sort of reviewed old documents I can put together a pretty good theory. Stay tuned tomorrow. PeeWee was picked specifically because he’s not a matinee idol so to speak. “Would I really want him to be the father of the human race…a whimsical thought. Thinking back…’92 was the year of Clinton and Gennifer Flowers ergo question 22. The survey clearly is dated but it’s kind of fun to look back at it and remember the times in general.
Ah yes, Gennifer FLowers and Clinton. OK, that really does explain #22, but Bill managed to ride that one out. Edwards crashed. My suspicion is that a large part of it had to do with his wife’s cancer, but also, John simply didn’t have Bill’s knack to ride through it. If you recall from much the same time, Gingrich drew a lot of scorn for the despicable act of serving his dying wife with divorce papers. Now I’m curious to see what prizes of both sexes you pick to update 17 and 18!
That should be fascinating. Thanks for sharing your hypothesis.
BTW have you made up your mind about a repeat survey?
I am looking into something called Poll Daddy. So the answer is yes. It would depend upon whether people want me to do it or not. I don’t want to waste my time on it if there’s no general interest in it.
Yes, I’d love to see a new survey! What kinds of questions WILL you come up with NOW!??
Skip…do you have any suggestions?
Count me in. I’d be curious to see the changes, if any. I strongly suspect it would mirror today’s society. I hope you don’t mind but I forwarded today’s blog to librarians that I think might remember the event and be interested in the results.
Thanks…it does take you down memory lane.
You asked…:-)
1. No, you should not have gotten canned for this. It is a humorous survey, and nobody made your respondents take it. Consenting adults, as it were.
2. Some of the results are surprising– the logistics of elevators and sex, for example. And Pee Wee Herman– 38% were that determined to save the human race?
3. The results would be different today, but so would the questions.
I got a chuckle out of the ‘sex as genre’ and ‘first sex as Shakespearean plays’ questions
As to whether to do the survey again, interest in anything related to sex, for any group of people, appears to be high. Should get you a lot of hits on your blog-counter.
Jeanne…those were my 2 favorite questions: Shakespeare and genre fiction. Thanks for the input.
Thanks for bringing us up to date. I don’t think this should be cause for being fired! As Jeanne said, it is a humorous survey. My, oh my, have times changed, or is it a case of “The more things change, the more they stay the same”.
Good point, Louise!
1) No.
2) No.
3) Marriage and celebrities: The names would change.
Sue…any suggestions for names of celebs?
You’d need to ask a teeny-bopper about the current heartthrobs. (What’s the feminine of “geezer”? C’est moi.)
Despite his acting like a spoiled brat when Murdoch traded him, Mike Piazza would be high on my list. Eric Karros, definitely.
I’m probably old enough to be the grandmother of most of today’s ballplayers.
Thanks for sharing! The only thing I found surprising was that ANY woman would actually consider having sex with PeeWee – Hah!
Clair: we’re talking about the future of the human race after a nuclear war!
I believe, if it were up to me, we would soon have “The World Without Us.”
1) I look forward to reading your theory. Ahh, politics.
2) 20% have done it in a library? I need to look into this…
3) I imagine question 23 will be something like half what it was – and in another ten years, zero.
And now that I’ve gone back and answered the questions above, I think there’ll be less library hijinx (thanks a lot, security cameras!)…
Tim…you are correct. Most of the video rental retail stores are history.
Like others I would have to say No, No & No. A survey like this would get much more risque responses in this day and age. I remember the hoo-ha from when you got fired and I thought that at the time it was quite petty. Now that I have seen the answers again, I would have to say that petty is far too timid.
Guy, if “petty” is too timid, what word would you use today?
Cowardly? Malicious? Idiotic? Those all seem like good adjectives to me! Cancel idiotic. Brain dead is a better description.
In response to your questions:
1) No, you should not have gotten canned for this. Promoted maybe?
2) Now the results aren’t surprising to me. I do wonder if they’d have been surprising to me back when the survey was written?
3) I have no idea if the results would be different today. Maybe the number of partners, question 21, would be higher?
Yes, I’d love to see an updated survey, and would be happy to answer those questions.
And PeeWee Herman? I don’t know……
And after reading the other questions and responses, my imagination runneth over.
Thanks for a funny, thought provoking read.
Carrie, who would you put in place of PeeWee?
Questions 17 & 18 for Women Johnny Depp would be on the list.
Susan, thanks…I could use some more suggestions for the next survey.
You need to take into account the large percentage of LGBT folks in the profession. Maybe just one list of celebs that everyone can respond to?
Martina Navratilova should still be on the list, Rachel Maddow, Ellen DeGeneres. Sigourney Weaver…
Nancy…this is an excellent point, which I will definitely use on the next survey.
Will,
1) The Clarence Thomas – Anita Hill hearings were held on Columbus Day weekend (October), 1991. That was a long time ago, another time. So, for those that don’t remember, the world stopped for the entire three-day weekend for that must-see TV event. On the heels of those hearings, which served to focus much attention on the topic of sexual harassment, the presidential election year of 1992 became known as “the year of the woman” – so named for the many women candidates on ballots for major public office. Sexual harassment was a very big deal, back then. (And was, at least until 1998, which, thanks to Bill Clinton, became know as the year of “THAT” woman.) Anyway, in 1992, it was very politically incorrect to even allow for an implication of doubt in the veracity of Anita Hill’s testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee. And that attiitude extended to women and sexual harassment, in general.
As a non-librarian, I know nothing about the Wilson Library Bulletin. But could it be that the political incorrectness of even posing the Anita Hill question along with the other politically incorrect implication contained in the God and AIDS question was enough to get you canned? I don’t think it should have been….I’m just sayin’
Also, maybe the PeeWee Herman and Roseanne Barr nuclear war questions were viewed as a bit touchy. Very funny, but touchy.
2) The result that surprises me is that 1 in 5 librarians actually supported condom dispensers in the bathrooms, and also that it was OK to check-out R-rated videos to minors. Is it any wonder nobody has a problem turning bookstores into coffee houses?! Where are the boundaries??!!
3) Results today would probably skew more libertine.
4) An updated survey on Unwound would be a hoot…and you can’t get fired!
Bill, the one thing I enjoyed about dredging out the survey results was reviewing the historical context. You are right the Clarence Thomas…Anita Hill showdown was must see t.v. Ted Kennedy was on the Senate panel for some real comic relief. To watch Kennedy pontificate on sexual harassment was hilarious. Not sure I agree with your point number 3. I really think the times are more puritanical now then they were in the 60s, 70s, 80s, and 90s. STDs have had a lot to do with that as well as the fact that the dark side of the sexual revolution has been exposed. With what John Updike called the advent of the post pill paradise in his 1966 novel “Couples,” there was the Freudian expectation that free sex would lead to happiness. People see through that illusion now. No… the times are much more puritanical now than they were 20 years ago, Eldrick aside. Your turn.
The Thomas-Hill hearings were almost perfect self-parody, but still provided excellent fodder for the TV comics. SNL’s send-up (with Chris Farley as Senator Howell Heflin of Alabama) was memorable.
Thanks for mentioning Eldrick. I don’t want to put him aside. He’s my exhibit “A”. Eldrick is 34. Born in 1975. What’s that, gen-x?, y?. His contemporaries in the library profession are busy establishing themselves in their careers. I would imagine that the respondents to your 1992 survey had a median age in the range of 35-45 (at that time). Baby-boomers.
Gen-x/y came of age in the nineties when the culture was fully enagaged in teaching the values of safe sex over any doctrines of traditional sexual morality. The dark side of the sexual revolution may have been exposed, but the media have not embraced that. The baby-boomers that now own and lead the media can’t quite let-go of their free sex ideal, lest they be called hypocrites. So the beat goes on.
And not only that, many of the questions in the survey pertain to activities and/or attitudes/values that the gen x/y respondents likely engaged-in or formed in the nineties – when they were coming-of-age! So I would not expect more puritanical attitudes to be refelected in a contemporary survey.
To Bill: You are missing one important piece…the rise of the women’s movement and their strong objection to the objectification of women. I also sense an increasing general societal revulsion toward pornography and how prevalent it has become.
Will,
I’m not sure that whole women’s movement thing has worked-out as planned. It seems to me that women are more objectified than ever in our culture. In fact, there is almost an exact correlation between the rise of the women’s movement and an increased objectification of women and the prevelance of pornography. Go figure.
But I sense an increasing revulsion by the general public toward the prevalence of porn.
NO, you should not have been canned! No the results are not surprising, but very interesting. Yes, I think the results today would be very different.
Thanks for printing the results!
Dear Will,
No I do not believe that you should have been canned for the “sex survey,” yet I can barely remember the American ethics regarding sex in 1992.
Question #7 was an eye opener. 78% of women and 7% of men indicated that they have been sexually harassed by a library patron. One time I was invited for a weekend to a clothing optional camp. I tried to steer the question back to genres read in clothing optional camps.
Also regarding Question # 20, sex in public places…has anyone ever considered sex in the park or on the beach.
BTW, I have been thoroughly enjoying your blog. Thanks so much for livening up my day.
All the best,
PTP
Patricia…speaking of clothing optional camps, I once had an employee get married in a naturist community, which was fine, but she insisted on displaying the wedding photos on her desk in the library workroom. That was a problem.
Dear Will,
Love your comment about the wedding photos from the naturalist community.
As Dave Barry said, “You can make this stuff up.” Ahh..the joys of the
library profession.
All the best,
Patricia
Patricia…one of the embarrasing aspects of the wedding photo was that the minister weighed at least 350 pounds…not a pretty sight at all.
Considering the profession, couldn’t a book have been strategically left in front of the happy couple perhaps just showing neck up? Or was the bride insistent on the whole photo? Seriously, I seem to recall from mandated for all employees sexual harassment classes that if the objectionable photo is displayed in the employee’s own cubicle where it couldn’t be easily seen from outside the cubicle that the employee has the right to post material that some may consider offensive. But that 350 lb minister might be a problem. You’d think everyone would find that objectionable
Joan: the woman gets married in a nudist colony, shows everyone the wedding photos, and then puts the framed group shot on top of her desk in an open (non-cubicled) staff work room. That’s a situation where harassment laws trump religious rights. The overweight minister is my own editorial position. He has as much right to be nude in a naturist setting as the slim trim maid of honor.
The key phrase in what I said is “own cubicle”. If it is out in the open, then yes, harassment laws definitely trump religious freedom. As for the minister, well, sure he has every right to marry the couple, but she still doesn’t have the right to flash him at every unsuspecting employee who walks by (shudder). Of course, it just occurs to me this may have been before sexual harassment enlightenment. In which case, the boss could call the shots, I’d have thought, and insisted on the photo being elsewhere. Like the entrance to her house.
Will,
I just saw some video from spring break ’10 on TV. Upon further reflection, not only do I think that the results of a contemporary survey would skew more libertine, but that the questions in your ’92 survey may be viewed as hopelessly quaint. For example, Question 21: “Number of Sexual Partners in their lifetime”? Pffft! Based on the video, the better question today may be: “Number of Sexual Partners in one afternoon on the beach”!
Sorry, Bill, I can’t agree. You are getting sucked into the media’s presentation of spring break. The media caters to the bizarre and extreme in order to garner ratings. There is a growing disconnect between the media and real life. For every college student going wild in Cancun, there are probably 10,000 back in their dorm rooms reading Aristotle…albeit on an iPad
. Sorry, Bill. Don’t get sucked in by Hollywood.
I hope you are right. And if you are, God bless the iPad!
Bill…I am now embracing the iPad. I have worked out a new theory for it. The iPad will make it cool to read the classics again. It’s all about packaging, dude.
[...] Sweet. Madre. Dios. Dear Internet, Thank you. I am done now and can go in peace. Sincerely, George (From Sean C’s FB feed) You asked for it; you got it! These are the results of the 1992 Librarians and Sex Survey that Wilson Library Bulletin refused to run. They did run the initial survey questionnaire in the June ’92 issue in my “Facing the Public” column and then fired me and destroyed the unsold copies of the magazine. Over 5.000 librarians sent in their questionnaires to me. Here are the results: [...]
So does this mean you have picked up an iPad? Blog about it, Please! I’m hesitating but it sure sounds tempting to think about rereading Roots on the iPad instead of lugging that enormous volume around, as an example.
I had heard about the infamous survey. It all seems rather tame now.
As a gay librarian, and given the prevalence of gay male librarians, I wonder why the suggested celebrities were all hetero-centric.
They weren’t all hetero-centric. Read the list again. I totally agree, however, that in an updated survey there should be a greater diversity of choices. Thanks, Eric.
Playboy..check; Playgirl..check; Playguy? what publication was that?
1) no
2) no
3) yes
4) heck yeah, update that sucker
Lisa, Playguy is a publication for gay males.
No, you should not have been fired!
Yes, Yes, please update and survey with links from ALA site requesting answers!
No, no, I don’t know, and YES
I agree that technology such as the ipad will make the classics cool, or at least more accessible. I downloaded an app (Great Books) onto my iphone and am now reading The Republic, I probably would never have got round to buying it as a book. Not sure how that compares as an experience to multiple partners on a beach in Cancun, but if someone is prepared to fund the research …
Thanks, Mark, for validating my point that Plato on line is total coolness.
1) I really don’t think you should have been fired for this. Maybe you were to progressive at the time? Because I think your survey and the results would have gone over quite well if you had published it now. (As evidenced by the fact that your column is going viral on facebook as I type this.)
2) I find the results interesting rather than surprising as I am one of the Net Gen librarians and was only 10 years old in 1992. It was like a “snap shot of history.” Which leads me to point 3,
3) I think some of the results would be different, especially if you survey some of us Net Gen librarians, as we can be quite a frisky bunch. But you might want to consider updating your questions!
Examples: Should pornography be allowed on library computers? Answers, Yes, No, or Only in an “Adults only area”.
Have you ever had to assist a patron in using their online dating profile?
As for public places, a sleazy motel room isn’t public. Nor is the kitchen floor public, unless you are currently having a house party.
But please do the survey again!
More going viral updates: http://www.thefrisky.com/post/246-sexy-librarian-not-at-all-an-oxymoron/
http://www.upi.com/Odd_News/2010/04/19/Survey-Librarians-get-frisky-in-stacks/UPI-70101271707027
Love it! Thanks so much. To answer your questions:
1) absolutely not!
2) not in the least bit.
3) somewhat different
extra credit: hell yes!!
Rather than ‘Love your Library’, it sounds so much more fun to ‘Love your Librarian!’
I agree with your perception of spring break…most students are not like what the media feeds us. And when you think about it…why would we, often so stereotyped by the media, readily buy 100% what the media wants us to believe about students.
haha! so true. librarians are friskay!
A magazine survey in 1995 compared to an online survey in 2010?
Your results could be MASSIVE, both in participation and results among the library community.
well any chance of a updated version of the survey would definaly be fun to filled out, and the coment about lgbt folks can’t forget also that there are trans folks as well working in library’s as well
Will, I met you when you came to speak at a Washington Library Association convention in Spokane years ago. I remember you as such an arrogant son of a bitch.
Alas, times change. I’ll have to put you on my RSS feed now. Please do the survey. That would be fun. It would also be interesting to compare librarians’ answers to the rest of the population. Think big!
Michael…I’d rather be an arrogant son of a bitch than a candyass. Thanks for your input.
I have to agree with you there; and too many male librarians are!
Of course you should have been canned. Imprisoned. Flogged. It is depraved, revolting and, worst of all, unAmerican.
No, No, Holy Hell-Cat YES, and please, if you loved us, you would update the survey. YES.
Wow. *reads all of these* I’m disappointed you didn’t go beyond het, but that would’ve been even more certain to get you fired. You definitely should NOT have been fired, though, and if you update this survey I would take it with bells on.
This is a fascinating survey.
I cannot believe that you got fired for it – I admire you for creating and implementing it in the first place!
The answers don’t surprise me at all. I have several friends who are librarians and they are some of the most free-thinking, highly sexual people I know.
I think only people who don’t know librarians personally or who have a stereotypical view of librarians would be surprised by this. I think many librarians enjoy the fact that people perceive them to be buttoned-up or straight-laced when they tend to be pretty wild beneath their calm exterior.
I think anyone who is in a profession that requires them to seek out information is going to be more forward-thinking, open and accepting of all differences and walks of life and that extends to sexuality and sexual expression.
I would LOVE to see you update this survey!!! I would greatly enjoy reading the contemporary responses. I say, go for it!
This is all so interesting. I had just started library school in ’92, and one of our professors was a big fan of yours and frequently had us read your past WLB columns in class. Yet I never heard about this survey or your firing. And no, you should NOT have been fired for this. Whose decision was it to run the survey questions in the first place and did they keep their job?
Regarding the survey itself, I found it curious that in a survey about sex, you asked what celebrity the respondents wanted to “marry,” instead of with whom they wanted to have one steamy night of consequence-free passion – I imagine the responses would be different. Or is that just me?
Some suggestions for updated celeb choices: Johnny Depp, Brad Pitt, George Clooney, Jon Stewart, Liam Neeson, Denzel Washington, Jamie Foxx, Beyonce, Angelina Jolie, Scarlett Johansson, Heidi Klum, Tina Fey, Jennifer Lopez, Halle Berry,
I don’t know how the original survey was set up, but you shouldn’t provide different celeb choices for male and female respondents, just a list of celebs that include a mix of race, gender, sexuality, age etc.. and let everyone pick from the same list.
And about all these librarians getting naughty in the stacks, what I want to know is: during operating hours or after?
No way. No. Most likely. Which is why we need a new survey. Had a discussion w/another Librarian at lunch about being naughty in the stacks, and while we’ve been naughty together in Libraries [after hours] we’d never done the stacks! Time for a new survey and time for some more naughtiness…
No, you should not have been fired for that survey by any means, and YES, you should create a current web survey!
No, No, and Yes. And please, pretty please, do an updated survey!
Times are more puritanical. Also, I suspect since you aren’t doing this for publication in WLB (which always was pretty stodgy, so you can see how long I’ve been around), you can ask even franker questions than you could then.
One question you might consider asking is if you’ve had sex with more than one partner in a 24 hour period. The answers on that one might surprise you.
As for partners to propagate the human race following nuclear annihilation, Bill O’Reilly, Dick Cheyney, and Osama Bin Laden; females would be Congresswoman Michele Bachmann, Sarah Palin, and Lindsey Lohan.
As for partners to appeal to all tastes, definitely; and I agree with the person who suggested Rachel Maddow. Brains and wit are a turnon regardless of the sexual orientation!
In regards to Question 5 AND 6. A fourteen percent sexual harrassment rate in the library…Really? Geeze they may just have to stock condemns in the library restromms after all. lol.
PLEASE update and do this survey all over again.
Librarians are in need of a new image. The reason so many people are interested in this survey is because of the intrigue of the librarian. We’re supposed to be quiet, mild mannered, female, and always reading.
I’d love to get a little glimpse into the current world of librarians and sex.
Hi there – excellent to have the results published. Is there a chance for some efficient librarian to dig up and scan the original questionaire as it was published in the 1992 June edition? I’d really like to use this story as an example in my information literacy course – with the way the media are all over this right now, its a great great way to illustrate source credibility and so much more.
1. Definitely NO; 2. No; 3. Maybe (with responses being even higher percentages); Bonus: YES!
Will, For a great survey use surveymonkey.com. Hope you will do another survey for updated responses. You should NOT have been fired for doing this one. WLB censored the results. Shame on it.
[...] a sex survey to his bosses. Now, nearly twenty years later, Manley decided to post the results on his blog. Incredibly the results revealed that one out of every five librarians of the 5,000 that took the [...]
1) No – the questions aren’t really naughty, even by 1992 standards! 2) Not surprising – really like the ‘first sex encounter and Shakespeare correlation – funny. I am guessing you will get more responses with the next one. 3) Results might be different, but not significantly. Should include something that asks if food was ever involved with sex – that might be interesting. Or caught by kids (or parents). EC: please update and publish your results a little quicker this time (LOL)
Must get back to work…
The nuclear war / propagation of the species questions are disturbing to me. If there was some way, my genes and I would prefer to withhold reference questions from librarians who would decide not to propagate the species, even with unsavory partners.
I didnt think that was really you, Adam
[...] 19, 2010 by Larissa In one of his recent Booklist columns, Will Manley (who brought the world The Sex Lives of Librarians Survey along with all sorts of other interesting/quirky thoughts on librarians and librarianship from his [...]
Thank you, Will. At last I know the results of the survey. Those were the days. A new online survey would be great. Do It!
Mary Jo…welcome to the blog. This has been a lot of fun. Actually, I’m glad you found the blog because I am going to feature you in a future post. If you google “Will Unwound Mary Jo Godwin” you will find several references to yourself in this blog. Again…great to hear from you and welcome!
1)no
2)no
3)the celebs would be different, but no
4)why not? it’d be fun and you probably won’t get canned this time!
Time for you to write a book about it!
Would happily participate in a new survey!
3) Would the results be significantly different today?
They certainly wouldn’t have such a hetero-only slant.
[...] 20% de los bibliotecarios ha practicado sexo en la biblioteca. Este dato, entre otros, los dio Will Manley, un bibliotecario retirado, tras una encuesta que hizo en el año 1992 y que ha salido a la luz [...]
1-no. 2-no. 3-yes. 4-absolutely. and send me a link to it