Racist party at Johns Hopkins University

[bluestateguy]

http://www.jhu.edu/news_info/news/home06/oct06/frat.html

On Saturday evening, Oct. 28, at an off-campus house, members of the Sigma Chi fraternity sponsored a party that was advertised as a "Halloween in the 'Hood" party. The invitation invoked offensive racial stereotyping. The coordinator of Greek life last week had told the chapter president that he found the advertisement racist and offensive and directed the fraternity to withdraw the advertising immediately. The advertising later reappeared, without the coordinator's knowledge, in altered but still offensive form.

A decoration outside the party site was a plastic skeleton dressed in pirate garb hanging from a rope noose.

The university's community liaison officer was asked early Sunday to respond to the scene of the party. After she did so, a decision was made to close the event down.

The university is now conducting a full investigation into this matter. Based on the information received thus far, the university has suspended all activities of the Sigma Chi fraternity, pending the results of the investigation. The university has also alerted the fraternity's national headquarters about this action. The national fraternity has imposed a 45-day suspension of the chapter's activities and will conduct its own investigation.

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[proud2BlibKansan]

1. George Allen had a party at Johns Hopkins?

[LostinVA]

2. This happens every few years

A UVA frat had a "blackface" party a few years ago -- heads rolled, as they should have. But, nothing stops the privileged, racist yobs.

[SheilaT]

3. I wouldn't be quite so fast

to label these kids. They're 19, 20 years old, probably worked real hard throughout high school just to get into a selective school, and are still pretty much nose-to-the-grindstone at Johns Hopkins. What' you're really seeing is youth, inexperience, and ignorance more than real racism. Not that they shouldn't be slapped down, shouldn't be told some of the facts of life. I good punishment would probably be some kind of community service in the inner city.

Kids this age, especially the ones in college, more especially the ones in a pricey, academically rigorous one, just have no idea what the outside world is really like. But then, even those most of us who didn't go to college have learned a lot over the years. Most of us (but certainly not all) have an understanding of things we didn't have in our youth.

[LostinVA]

4. No, I have seen it up close -- it's racism

I don't know all the facts about the JH party, but I do about the UVA party, and it was racist, and these weren't scholarship kids, trust me.

I think you're giving them too much credit here. I suspect they knew exactly what they were doing.

[bluestateguy]

5. Ole Miss and Auburn had similar parties a few years back

Also, at the University of Alabama, a black girl who rushed the white sororities three years ago was not given any bids. She did so again the following year and again, was denied across the board.