With anti-discriminatory chants thundering off the polished white walls of the student center outside of the Golden Key room, members of Georgia State University’s Pi Kappa Alpha, or Pike, fraternity answered charges that their fraternity engaged in discriminatory behavior.
The hearing comes nearly three months after two members of the fraternity dressed in black face paint during a hip-hop theme party.
Since then, the fraternity has been charged with violating the university’s alcohol and discrimination policies.
Committee members began the hearing to a packed house early Tuesday morning. The hearings, which have historically been closed due to an interpretation of federal educational privacy laws, were opened to the public due to the extensive interest generated by the event.
After a brief opening statement by Assistant Dean and Director of Student Life and Leadership Pam Anthony, who represented Georgia State in the hearing, the university called three witnesses who attended the party and said that they had felt “threatened” by the fraternity members in blackface.
In her line of questioning, Anthony also focused on the fraternity’s alleged supply of alcohol at the party and whether partygoers were asked for identification before being allowed into the party.
After a short recess, Pike President Dan Forrester, who served as the fraternity’s representative at the hearing, offered the committee a motion to dismiss the hearings on the grounds of due process and constitutional violations.
Forrester, who told the committee in his opening statement that the “other policies” section of the university’s Student Conduct Code was too broad for accurate interpretation, conceded that the fraternity had violated a technical portion of the alcohol policy by not telling Pike advisor Joe Trolan about the party.
However, he added that Pi Kappa Alpha followed the rest of the statute to the letter and did just as Mr. Trolan would have done had he known.
Forrester pleaded with committee members, saying that while the blackface incident might have been offensive, the committee should be mindful of the current situation on campus regarding race relations.
“Racism is here, on this campus,” Forrester said. “A group who wasn’t involved with the party at all has taken the university hostage through the printing of malicious flyers. Hip-hop is in our culture today. I’m not saying that we weren’t offensive, but we had no intent to hurt anyone. What happened [at the party] was an ill-advised move.”
Forrester went on to describe a flyer that was published by the Black Student Alliance after the party that had photos of fraternity members at Auburn University dressed in blackface, KKK attire and ropes around their necks.
“We are being made up to look like Klansmen, lynchers and deer hunters, and we are not!” Forrester said.
After the Pikes called their witnesses, all of whom testified that there was no keg at the party and that they really didn’t have any real knowledge of the history of blackface, the committee took recess, wading through a mob of BSA members and other students holding signs and chanting “Punt the Pikes.”
In her closing statement, Anthony referenced the historical racism that the Pike organization has perpetuated on the Georgia State campus.
After showing the committee a photo from a 1968 yearbook, which shows a Pike member dressed in blackface and telling the committee about another 1992 incident in which the Pikes were implicated in a discrimination incident, Anthony drilled home the university’s position.
“I think it’s important to note that the student code of conduct is not law, but it’s the university’s responsibility to set certain standards of behavior,” Anthony said.
“It’s important to send a message about what is acceptable behavior.”
The committee is currently deliberating and will make its recommendation to Associate Vice President and Dean of Students Rebecca Stout sometime this week.
The Pikes will then have an opportunity to appeal any decision made by the dean.
The Signal has learned that the committee has expelled the two students who actually donned the blackface paint from campus for a year.
1 comments