Thursday night's reactions to Alpha Chi Alpha fraternity's and Delta Delta Delta sorority's plans for a "luau" party were entirely inappropriate.
Whether or not the luau theme was actually offensive, the angry BlitzMail message sent to students and administrators accusing the Greek houses of being racist was unfair, considering that the houses had no conscious intention of being disrespectful and did not know their theme would offend anybody.
Events such as the "ghetto" party last fall helped the College community take a positive step toward becoming more open to discussing sensitive issues. However, a more open environment toward recognizing offense does not mean that people should attack and threaten others when they feel offended. In fact, such responses shut down any constructive conversation that might otherwise take place.
In order to move toward an environment in which students can truly learn about other's backgrounds and sensitivities, members of the College community must work together to listen to each other's views, rather than having one group threatening, the other quickly apologizing, and both moving on.
Not only does such a manner of addressing sensitivities cut off constructive communication, but it has the potential to place those who have possibly offended others on the defensive and make them unreceptive to truly understanding what has occurred. This does not leave much room for preventing such acts from taking place again in the future.
The rash reaction to the planned "luau" party demeans the serious and thoughtful response to last fall's "ghetto" party or even the longstanding debate over the Dartmouth Indian mascot. If every minor incident is treated in this manner, the community will become desensitized to acts which are more clearly the result of insensitivity.
