The Student Assembly last night voted against discussing a proposal to pay for posters and fliers dealing with the visit of photographers from Playboy Magazine on May 8 and 9.
"I'm rather disturbed the Assembly would choose not to discuss it," Assembly member Bill Karta-lopoulos '97 said. Kartalopoulos and Sarah Johnston '97 co-sponsored the Playboy Response Resolution.
Their resolution called for the Assembly to allocate $50 to finance posters and fliers talking about pornography and Playboy. Volunteers would post the information around campus.
Johnston is leading an effort to coordinate an "oppositional response" to Playboy's visit by holding an informational campaign. When it comes to Dartmouth, Playboy will interview women who want to pose for the magazine's "Women of the Ivy League" pictorial in the October 1995 back-to-school issue.
Usually, an Assembly committee approves a bill and sends it the general Assembly for a vote. This gives everyone at least 24 hours to prepare to discuss the bill, Kartalopoulos said.
The Assembly's Executive Committee planned to discuss the resolution this weekend but its Sunday meeting lacked a quorum because many members attended the Ivy Council meeting at Princeton, N.J., Assembly President Rukmini Sichitiu '95 said.
Because the executive committee did not approve the resolution, procedure required a two-thirds vote of the general Assembly to consider discussing the motion.
Ten people voted for discussing the resolution, seven members voted against and one abstained.
Johnston said she found the decision "disturbing" and said the Assembly failed to represent a large number of concerned students on campus. After the meeting, Sichitiu told Kartalopoulos and Johnston she was "sorry" about the outcome.
Kartalopoulos said he and Johnston pushed to have the resolution discussed now rather than wait a week because Playboy is visiting so soon.
The Assembly last night also discussed its upcoming retreat, this weekend's Ivy Council meeting and the upcoming Symposium on Women and Poverty.
The Assembly plans to hold a retreat at Pierce's Inn in Etna on May 7 from 5:00 p.m. to 8:30 or 9:00. Both this year's and next year's Assemblies will attend the retreat in order to smooth the transition, Sichitiu said.
"The purpose of the retreat is not only as an agent to enable this Assembly to focus on our goals for the remainder of the term, but also to help make the transition to the new Assembly in the new year," Sichitiu said.
Assembly Vice President John Honovich '97 said Dartmouth dominated the Ivy Council meeting, held over the weekend.
The Council is made up of representatives from the student governments from the eight Ivy League schools.
"We were the best student assembly there," Honovich said. "We were clearly the most informed representatives about financial aid."
The Symposium on Women and Poverty will discuss welfare and how poverty affects women, and is part of the Women Leadership in Activism series, Sichitiu said.
She said she plans to include six poor, single mothers as speakers and possibly local officials like Vermont Governor Howard Dean.
