Sexile

Banishment by a roommate desirous of privacy for an intimate encounter – i.e., sexual exile.

In The Los Angeles Times, Robin Abcarian and Kate Linthicum reported on Tufts University’s recently imposed “no-sexile” policy:

This year’s dorm dwellers have a new rule to live by: “You may not engage in sexual activity while your roommate is present in the room,” says the book on residential life. “Any sexual activity within your assigned room should not ever deprive your roommate(s) of privacy, study or sleep time.” …

Tufts, a liberal arts college near Boston founded in 1852, is believed to be the first university to explicitly forbid sex in the presence of roommates (unless, presumably, the other person is the roommate).

Some observers have questioned whether such a policy needed to be formalized, especially given the hyper-connected status of modern students:

But Ellen Kan, a Tufts sophomore who broke the story about the new policy in the campus newspaper, the Tufts Daily, said: “My general sense is that people here don’t think it’s necessary. And people don’t really think it can be enforced.” …

UCLA sophomore Matt Ishibashi said his friends text code words – say, “panda” – and “everybody will know to avoid the room.” …

Ishibashi said that, like many other students, he has been “sexiled” – a neologism of “sex” and “exiled” – to accommodate a roommate. It was no big deal. “My roommate comes back from a frat party or something with a girl and says, ‘Can you guys just leave for awhile?’ At college, it’s hard to find alone time.”