To the Editor:
Well, after four and a half years here at Dartmouth, I'm pissed off enough to say something.
Frankly, I'm sick and tired of the endless amounts of rhetoric being spewed by both sides of the latest debates on apathy and the Greek system. I'm sick of people talking about an organization to which I belong as though they really know a thing about it. Most of all I am sick of the disgusting double standard that exists here at Dartmouth.
I find it almost hilarious the way so many hypocrites stereotype "frat boys" in the same breath as decrying them for their intolerance. I find it amazing that the powers that be deplore the Greek-dominated social system and yet still have not, in all their infinite wisdom, come up with anything close to an alternative that interests the same number of people. I find it depressing that so many students have no problem with relying on a small group of people to allow them into the place where they live, pay for a band and their beer and clean up after them, and yet still those students put this small group under scrutiny that they themselves never have to face. I can honestly say that I am 10 times more aware of the things I say and of my actions when I am in my fraternity. Do any of you who live in dorms or off-campus houses have to pass a resolution in your house not to use certain words? Maybe you censor yourself well enough not to need one, but I doubt many people in our community endeavor to have that kind of forethought about their actions in the place where they brush their teeth or watch TV. I don't want some sort of commendation for trying not to say things that hurt other people. I just want people to know that the so-called evil luxuries of being in a fraternity--namely having a location and institution that allows any and all sorts of behavior--are a myth, from my experience.
I haven't spent my Dartmouth career in a basement. I've been Vice-President of my class, an editor of the Stonefence Review, and I am now a Senior Fellow. If I tell this to people, or if I tell them that there was a Senior Fellow in my house last year, too, or that one of the other brothers is writing a play, or another working at a supportive housing organization in New York, the inevitable response is "sure, there are always going to be individuals in every frat that stand apart from the norm." Yet, when individuals in a fraternity stand out by yelling something idiotic from their porch, suddenly their behavior is not only representative of that organization, but of the entire Greek system. Thus, to its detractors the Greek system is either a collection of individuals or an entity that promotes certain behaviors. It just depends on which description is convenient at the time.
I don't have all the data on the recent incident involving Zeta Psi. Therefore, I'm not going to sit here and make demands about what should happen to them. While on the one hand I reacted to my initial reading of the "Zetemouth" with revulsion, I also later heard that the so-called "date-rapist" was actually someone who generally had trouble getting dates at all, and thus the misnomer was an attempt at humor. Bad humor, to say the least, but probably not an offense worthy of incarceration, as some have implied.
It's very easy to blame the Greek system for things here at Dartmouth, because in terms of political correctness, it is completely out of fashion. The funny thing is, those people that are "in fashion," can be just as much to blame. A close friend of mine was working at a public computer in Baker recently when a group of students arrived at a nearby computer to compose the blitz that called people to the recently-held rally. My friend said she felt marginalized and even a little intimidated by these people who seemed so fervently opposed to certain things she takes part in. The truth of the matter is that there is an exclusive class of people here at Dartmouth that is just as sinister as the organizations they are attempting to destroy. The difference is that instead of hiding behind porch railings (as they might put it), they hide behind words like objectification, misogyny, entitlement and gendered spaces. Instead of having a male-dominated system to defend them, they have political correctness and book-learning. These people are the compassionate, caring, equality-seeking folks they claim to be--until your opinion differs from theirs.
We commend people such as Anonymous and formerly Anonymous for their bravery. Yet what they did wasn't brave. Saying something when offended is normal behavior for most people. Truth be told, they said it in a manner that ensured they were completely safe. They hid behind the administration and popular opinion in such a way that anyone who disagreed with their handling of the situation was lumped in with the "aggressors" that had perpetrated the wrong against them. My question to the Dartmouth community is this--why can't we simply approach our interactions with other people as just that: people? Why do we have to come into every situation with so much gendered, racial, etc., baggage that every time we are offended it must be symptomatic of a larger cancer that plagues our community? As Dean Redman said, "We don't have a hate speech clause. We don't have a being stupid clause... we don't have something that legislates against stupid behavior -- we do have principles and peer pressure." If this is true, why was Psi Upsilon adjudicated as they were? Why couldn't we have simply relied on our principles? Why couldn't anonymous have pitied those members of Psi Upsilon for their ignorance, chosen not to be friends with them, and, if she truly was brave, expressed her discontent on the spot? If you want to talk about bravery, talk about the brother in my house who, after I had used the word "gay" on the porch to describe a missed pong save, said that he felt strongly enough about me not saying it to punch me. He made his point. I made a mistake that was detrimental to our community, and I learned to correct it...on the porch of a fraternity.
In case most people don't realize it, once you graduate there is no more principle of community, no more administration to punish somebody when you are offended, no more Greek system to blame. There are merely people interacting with other people and if you can't survive in that sort of "environment" or "system" then you are going to have a pretty miserable life.
It is time we stopped making victims of ourselves and started talking to someone who offends us rather than barking at them through a megaphone. I refuse to be anonymous in this opinion, and I encourage people who disagree to get in touch with me. But don't write another diatribe for The Dartmouth, or send out another blitz to a bunch of people who already agree with you. Start being a person in a community of other people. I look forward to hearing from you.
