A Word About Racism & the Greek System

I was just reading this article about the SAE incident. For those not familiar with it, someone on the party bus of this chapter at the University of Oklahoma decided to videotape & post a video of this fraternity singing a racist chant. The school reacted by getting rid of the chapter, expelling people & the national office came down on them as well. Big controversy in some corners of the world.

The author actually cited an incident that happened at my school. I remember it well since I was a sophomore at the time, a member of the Greek system (though we may not have even been a chapter by that point & didn't have a house) and found the whole incident appalling. Coming from Winston Salem, NC & a high school class that was 50/50 black to white along with having many good friends who were never "tokens" but simply my black friends who weren't cutting me down behind my back like plenty of white bitches in my class, I didn't get the whole racism of these guys. I've always felt like other minorities can understand each other in a way people who aren't don't get. It might be a different story & different struggles but there's still knowing what it's like to be ostracized, bullied, harassed & having an "otherness" about you that likely explains why I've had lots of friends who wouldn't be candidates for membership into the Aryan Nation or WASP.

For the record, the major offender in that incident was not SAE like this story portrays. Perhaps there were racists there or immature guys simply joining in out of peer pressure or drunken stupidity but the real offenders were this other fraternity that draped themselves in the Confederate flag on a regular basis & called themselves "Southern gentlemen." I also wasn't personally present to see this since I was in my dorm room & then read about it later when the Black Student Association at my school publicized it.

SAE was not a fraternity that my black male co-worker at the campus museum said he wouldn't set foot in for fear of being harmed while the one I mentioned as the major offender (and the reason I had nothing to do with Oglethorpe for many years) was. These were his words, not mine.

Oh, and lest you think it's a Southern Greek system thing or that sororities always side with the frats it's not & we don't. My own sisters were just as appalled by the whole thing, especially the ones from outside of Georgia who were not used to seeing this blatant racism in their faces. We were equal opportunity & started out running the gamut in terms of our membership; I & at least one other founding member would be livid if that weren't true in our chapter today. I've seen that equal opportunity reflected in other chapters and among other alumnae I've met over the years. I don't think a single one, regardless of where her chapter was, would be siding with the behavior of the frats in this story.

There was another incident my senior year involving KA concerning their Greek Week skit & Antisemitic remarks among other offensive things (again, not present for that one; I was working in my telephone interviewing job at the time--I heard about this from my own sisters). Aside from my own sorority sisters (some of whom were Jewish), a number of girls in another sorority (who also had Jewish members) were quite ticked off about that as I recall.

Now I support free speech but I don't support speech without consequences & you bet if you uttered a racial slur around me, you'd get hell for it considering you're trashing dear friends of mine, business associates and some people who were actually there for me in life while your sorry ass probably wasn't. I'm glad to see this university taking action; my school let KA get away with shit for years. They were far too lenient on them, especially considering we were supposed to be a "liberal arts" school.

I never had issues with the other frats. I didn't go to SAE & feel like I wasn't welcome or an outsider. Guys who were members there were nice to me; I remember one of their members once telling me I was welcome there anytime. In fact, I got that kindness at every frat other than the racist one. Our newer members got along with some members there but I remember we older ones didn't feel welcome or like we had a place there. Guess we figured Southern gentlemen exempt loudmouth feminists from their "gentlemanly" behavior. At least, I felt that way.

Oglethorpe was trying to increase their black student enrollment when I was there. With the presence of that frat & a number of well known and well regarded black schools in Atlanta, I didn't blame black kids for not wanting to enroll in the racist pit that I saw Oglethorpe being at the time. I was also pissed since I didn't enroll there to endorse racism or have it shoved in my face; I came there for the academics & the experience of living in a major city.

My attitudes on race are more nuanced since I know racism isn't just a white thing. It's an everybody thing. I also lived a lot of things in my youth & had parents who taught me better than some of these people's parents must have. No one was a "token" with my parents & if they called you a friend of theirs, you were lucky especially with my mother since she's semi-reclusive. I still wish we were in touch with my father's truck driver friend (who was half black, half Native American) since I wanted him to know about my father's passing & be able to pay his respects. They were really good friends & we actually went to his house, a rarity with my parents' friends. He wasn't one of my father's drinking buddies & my mom actually liked him and his wife.

I'm skeptical of the whole "educating" people idea unless maybe it involves having to deal with direct confrontation or just dealing with people in day to day life & seeing they're really not so different from you. Kind of like that episode of The Boondocks where Uncle Ruckus meets that country music singer who's a total racist & they get along so well in their racism of black people, they do a duet. Granted, Ruckus claims to have the reverse skin condition of Michael Jackson & that's he's really a white guy but it's an example of why The Boondocks is pure genius in its social commentary. See the first three seasons for yourself; I didn't see much of the fourth so I can't speak on that one. Overall, I feel like when people are adults, they are set on certain things & sometimes so much so even death, poverty or divorce won't change them. Death didn't change my ex though it did change me. Losing stability also changed me in some ways though perhaps it also amplified what I already had. You can carve out exceptions for people you befriend or meet but it's very hard to change things like racism or homophobia & you can't do it in a commanding fashion or by forcing change. You have to do it in more subtle ways.

You have to show examples of people who aren't living up to the negative stereotypes. I also think a huge key is showing how we're the same. There are universals to human experience in my view. Death, kids, animals, weather (good or bad), parents, authority figures, the incompetence of our "elected" officials, that kind of thing.

Wow, Seems OU is Finally Doing Some Things Right

Oglethorpe University: it's the school I got my college degree from. You can probably tell I have a mixed relationship there. My history was not so great in some major aspects. As I mentioned in that last post, I went to an alumni event I was invited to on Monday.

My expectations weren't very high & I wasn't sure I'd have a good time. I was concerned, for one thing, about having to deal with the bitchy attorney who pretty much told me I had no chance in Hell of ever getting to live out my dream of being in New York City (at the time, I didn't know there was such a thing as being an entertainment lawyer).

I was also concerned it was going to be a big "give me money" fest. That was a huge thing when I was in undergrad; every time you turned around, you were being begged at for money. Even in my senior year, I remember being accosted to contribute to the Senior Gift (which I did not contribute to due to the total lack of support I got in terms of financial matters & feeling like the institution was sabotaging me). I remember them asking me to give money mere months after I graduated.

You know, maybe we should institute some rule that says schools you graduate from can't ask for money until you've been out for at least 5 years. For law schools & professional programs, let's make it 10 years.

Turned out it was a good thing I went because of a great many things:

1. People were nice to me. In fact, one girl I knew recognized me instantly & gave me a hug. She told me I looked great. So did she. She was a member of Chi Omega, which had a HUGE chapter at my school; in fact, their chapter was the oldest one there. I told her about being mistaken for a member of Chi Omega (this was when I was a freshman & we were doing Greek Week) & she said "That's because you're cute." I had to tell her what Psycho Boy told me about how I was the prettiest of our founding members, though it was not my intention to diss them in that story. I was simply sharing an anecdote. The first thing she does is tell her husband about how I founded a sorority chapter. Chi Omega was definitely known for having hot girls; I had kind of hoped Psycho Boy would just meet one of them & not bother me anymore when he was getting too carried away w/me but sadly, that didn't work even though he'd not been a fan of redheads before me.

That made me feel really good considering it felt like us against the world when I was there. It also gave further validation of my no longer being an ugly girl.

I also no longer get to diss Chi Omega though believe me, there was dissing going on & probably among all 3 sororities. I don't think I really have a personal beef with them; maybe it was more akin to sorority rivalries.

At this time, I learned about a website called "Chi Omega Secrets" where this former member who'd had a very bad experience in her chapter decided to create a website revealing all of Chi Omega's secrets. To my knowledge, that site's long gone but if you saw it, you would believe that Chi Omega is akin to the Wall Street bankers or the Freemasons in their evil doings & that all the members have hearts as black as Satan himself. Heck, you'd probably hate all sororities if you'd seen that one. The book Pledged probably also killed us though none of that happened in my sorority experience. Don't know if that's because of the circumstances in which I came into my sorority or not but it is the truth.

After all, could you imagine someone like me putting up with hazing? You can't haze people who hold lifelong grudges. They'd eventually kill you or not save you if you were in trouble.

I just felt sorry for the members having to live up to this lofty standard to belong & likely not getting to just relax and be themselves. Many of the founders in my own chapter were not friendly with folks in Chi Omega & preferred the girls in the other sorority on my campus (at that time, Sigma Sigma Sigma).

Oh, and if you question people remembering me I had someone who graduated the year I came in who knew who I was. I didn't recall him & he wasn't a friend of mine or anything but he'd worked at the Admissions Office and said he remembered my coming in. If that guy could remember who I was after not seeing me in a good 10 years, that tells you something & gives me credibility to get pissed if you forget who I am.

2. The President of the university came up & spoke to me directly. I didn't know who he was when he approached me since I'd be talking to someone else before that & he just came up. We started talking and then I was like "I don't believe I caught your name," then learned who he was. He said to me "I think I got there after you left." I said "Yeah" and mentioned I'd been there when Larry Large was President (if you think that sounds like a porn actor's name, you're not the only one since my classmates certainly joked about it on a regular basis including some of my sorority sisters; I wonder if there are any real porn actors named Larry Large).

He then went to speak at our event & basically, I got a very good impression of the guy. He struck me as being the opposite of Larry Large since he mentioned the school making in roads in the community and asking for money from people who could well afford to give it & were their "best friends." He also told me about how they did allow productions to film there (since I think I told him about having my entertainment company) & I mentioned how when I was there, I always heard about the school rejecting those offers.

Plus, having met & spoken to Larry Large as an undergrad I don't recall him being the sort of guy who'd just come up and talk to you at random like that. He also gave me more of a pretentious & unfriendly vibe.

From what I heard, it was like "I wish that had happened when I was there." For instance, now they've got a scholarship for kids who are the first in their families to go to college (totally would have helped me if it had been an option). There's no more racist frat. I hope the business community had some sway in that one since I know that as a business owner, I would be wary of helping a college that had the incidents this school did; I know my company would have said "no way" to helping the OU I graduated from in 2003 & I think many wouldn't want their name associated with such things, even in the South. You are talking about Atlanta, after all & that's a major city.

3. Other people felt the same way I did about the presence of that racist frat & other crap I saw. I told some folks about it since they were close in time to my graduation year & I did mention that I'd not been to any alumni events or given a dime to the school b/c I couldn't in good conscience. After all, I explained, my company was at one time minority owned & is woman owned (majority ownerships, you understand).

It seems a lot of other people hadn't been to alumni events either so glad it wasn't just me who'd been a long ago graduate who'd not bothered. A girl who'd graduated a few years after me told me it got worse & apparently one frat whose house my chapter got was also involved in some racially discriminatory stuff (though they'd not done that when I was at Oglethorpe & had always been nice to us; at that time, they were more known for their legendary parties).

4. It was kind of weird going to this one after having gone to so many lawyer & creative industry networking events. This one was definitely better than most lawyer networking events I've gone to. Now we'll just see if anyone writes back or reaches out to me. I gave out business cards (since they're the lawyer's MasterCard; you never leave home without them) & just had to put more in my bag for the start of NY Comic Con tomorrow.

So, even though I got into the LinkedIn alumni group of another school entirely at random (you could say they "adopted" me I guess though no one ever contacted me or asked me things from there) I feel I can claim Oglethorpe again. I still don't know exactly when the racist frat left but I do know it was probably after 2009 if Wikipedia can be trusted.

All in all, it was a pleasant surprise & we'll see how this whole thing plays out.