To the Editor:
I was deeply disturbed to learn that the Coed Fraternity Sorority system received a grant from the Bildner Endowment to do diversity programing. Fraternities and sororities discriminate on the basis of sex -- therefore they should not be eligible to receive grant money from an endowment designed to fund projects aimed at ending bigotry and discrimination. No amount of programing will eliminate the bigotry inherent in organizations that base their very existence on sex discrimination.
In 1989, the College's Committee on Diversity found that, "The CFS system tends to encourage excessive drinking, anti-intellectualism, sexism, racism and homophobia -- precisely those types of behavior which the College is actively trying to correct."
Four years later, the Committee on Diversity and Community at Dartmouth felt compelled to quote from the 1989 report, presenting its conclusion as their conclusion, noting that "the CFS system has not changed materially since the report was issued four years ago." Despite the fact that the CFSC and SAGE have sponsored numerous discussions, speaker panels, and presentations about the CFS system's problems, nothing has changed since 1993. There is no reason to believe that more diversity programing will make a difference now. Education can change individual attitudes, but it can't change institutional structures -- and the problems of fraternities and sororities are rooted in their very structures.
Dartmouth became coed in 1972 -- single sex houses have had over twenty years to learn to function responsibly in a coed environment, and they have failed miserably. The College does not allow student organizations to discriminate on the basis of race, ethnicity, or sexual orientation -- it shouldn't allow student organizations to discriminate on the basis of sex either. It's time for Dartmouth to stop coddling the fraternities and sororities and finally put an end to sex discrimination on campus.
