To the Editor:
Thursday morning (May 7) a BlitzMail message was sent out by Giavanna Munafo, head of the Women's Resource Center, stating that, contrary to what had been printed in The Dartmouth, the Dorothy Allison/Dolores Prida reception planned for Friday afternoon was not the first event of the Women Writers Conference (which was open to the public). Rather, the reception was "meant primarily for ... the gay, lesbian and bisexual communities." In other words, straight people are not invited and should please come only to the reading in the evening.
The blitz began to bother me. Instead of saying that the discussion would focus on queer issues and that all supportive students are welcome, the organizers took a stance to make sure random straight people did not attend. Implicit in this stance is that either the inclusion of straight students would have made queer students uncomfortable or that the inclusion of straight students would have overpopulated the reception.
If the blitz was sent to ensure the comfort of queer students, the organizers might have realized that their logic was in fact very consistent with the logic of those who perpetuate the oppression of lesbians, bisexuals and gay men. This very same logic fires or refuses to hire gay/lesbian/bisexual teachers because parents may not be comfortable sending their children to such a school; this logic discharges queer members of the armed forces because others may not be comfortable sleeping and showering in the same facilities as them. Reasoning that discrimination is justifiable to ensure the comfort of certain community members is particularly offensive because DAGLO, whose members know what harm comes of such faulty logic, cosponsored the reception.
If organizers of the event were concerned that the reception would be over-attended if they were to open it to all students, they might have made it an invite-only reception. It would have been reasonable for organizers of the reception to make sure that a small, limited-attendance reception includes those whose time and energy helped to bring the authors to Dartmouth and to publicize their readings here.
However, the handling of this reception made it clear that sexual orientation was the deciding factor as to whether students were welcome to attend the reception. I don't believe in discrimination based on one's sexual orientation has a place at Dartmouth. I find it hard to believe that DAGLO or Munafo believes in it either.
