What do a fraternity and the Hood Museum have in common? First of all, art, if you're willing to consider the pong table a canvas. Secondly, and maybe less contentiously, hosting parties. Last Friday, the Hood threw a student party with free wine, soda, snacks and door prizes. It was a classy affair without contrivance. Unlike Programming Board's "A Taste of Class," hosted in Sarner Underground last Saturday night, it didn't need a chocolate fountain. The space was beautiful and tasteful enough. And when else, unless I become very rich, well-connected or painfully hip, will I ever find myself drinking wine in a gallery or exploring a museum after hours again? I'm not trying to hate on Programming Board, but chocolate fountains give me flashbacks to the veritable social traumas that were my high school formals.
One of the nicest things about the Hood party was that the behavior of the student attendees fit the space. Unlike a party on Webster Avenue or Wheelock Street, no one was particularly drunk or pretending to be. No one threw used cups on the ground, or chugged. Or flipped the hors d'oeuvres tables.
Obviously, unlike the fraternities that host popular parties, the Hood is a gender-neutral space where all students are equally accountable for their actions. I know that the male ownership of the dominant social spaces on campus and the easy access to alcohol within them create some of largest social problems at Dartmouth. After the Hood party, I began to more deeply consider the role of the physical space itself as a factor in these behavioral changes.
Consider the saying, "Nobody smokes in church," or, as I've now adapted it, "Nobody boots in the Hood Museum." These spaces are sacred and beautiful, and people know inherently not to defile them or the experience. Think about the broken windows theory: if a city or neighborhood repairs its broken windows and removes its graffiti, it helps prevent vandalism or more serious crime. If we're gathering in a space where spilled beer festers on the floor, where men turn around to urinate on the wall, where cups and cans are strewn on the ground and the music is too loud to talk, how does this impact the way we treat each other? If we don't respect the spaces where many of us spend our weekend nights, can we realistically hope to respect each other?
I understand that it's impossible to keep your basement "nice" when hundreds of students are coming in and out for a party, but maybe the students would treat the space a little better if the baseline standard of physical space were different. As I've gotten older and had the chance to socialize on weekend nights in nicer spaces through events like senior tails and the Hood party, I've thought a lot about how norms and behaviors change in different environments, even when the activities, such as standing around and drinking free alcohol, are largely similar.
When you catch that distinct whiff of a frat basement, know that you're also inhaling the scent of decay in standards of acceptable behavior. Often, it seems to me that we're only as good to each other as we are to the physical spaces we occupy.
