When The DM published my article expressing my unapologetically hateful view of Total Frat Move last semester, the Twitter response from some members of Interfraternity Council organizations was (hilariously) misconstrued.
“Stop making it a race thing!” was tweeted in response to my article. Strong claims that I didn’t know what I was talking about appeared when my piece was reposted on Facebook. My fragile heart broke — just shattered, all over my MacBook’s keyboard — at the thought of these young men defending a site that perpetuates all of the worst stereotypes in the world about their Greek organizations.
How could you stand up for this idea that claims (and makes tons of money) off the notion that you, by virtue of being a member of the IFC, tolerate racism? Why is it okay for a website to joke about you being bigoted jerks if you really “aren’t like that”?
Then, just last Sunday, a “race thing” happened — and to be honest, you’re not really doing a great job of making it appear as if things aren’t “like that.”
This ubiquitous phrase has permeated each and every last discussion of the statue’s lynching in which I’ve been involved. Usually, a white male student in an IFC fraternity, discomfort seeping from his pores, will feebly claim that very few — “a small minority” of — students on campus are racist, or will tolerate casual racism.
Let me be the first to tell you that this is totally a lie; maybe very few students are foolish and violent enough to be moved to risk expulsion and the wrath of the federal government by committing a hate crime, thus making campus feel like an even more unsafe environment for black students than it did before. Still, tacit acceptance of hateful language and behavior — from all students, not just men in fraternities — largely influences the thought processes of people who think racist behavior is acceptable, or even praised.
Whether or not you choose to acknowledge it, this campus is strung with racial tension, and has been since James Meredith dared enroll more than 50 years ago. A memorial romanticizing the antebellum South stands within walking distance of a monument to him that’s supposed to represent a landmark achievement in the civil rights movement. This is physical evidence that this fabled “progress” that Ole Miss has made is laughably stunted; no university that truly values its black students, or black people in general, would memorialize a period of history that enslaved them.
Ole Miss’ failures aside, despite what anyone says about IFC fraternities and exclusivity, they do have the right to be exclusive. After all, Greek organizations are private organizations and more than that, brotherhoods and sisterhoods. Not everyone can (and should) be part of our organizations, and though undoubtedly in some cases racially discriminatory practices exist, predominately white organizations do have minority students who are content with their membership in the IFC or Panhellenic Council. **
Regardless, I was not impressed with the letter from the IFC that claimed that its organizations would not tolerate racism, should the perpetrators of the crime be found to be members of their organizations. Adults do not get a pat on the back for not being racist. Acting like a decent human being should not exceed the public’s expectations of your organization, and I think you can and should do better than this.
All of that having been said, however, it is dangerous to assume that the burden of changing the racial environment of campus falls on the shoulders of the IFC alone; non-Greek students are racist, too, and make up more of the population of the university than Greek students do. Being Greek is not the problem; being racist and accepting racism is.
Still, despite what’s fair and unfair, when such an egregious, ugly, hateful crime happens, inevitably the language to describe the guilty becomes more specific, and in this case, the guilty are described by their past Greek affiliation. If it’s really “not like that,” as you say on Twitter and murmur frustratedly in casual conversation in the Union, then passivity of response when racist things happen does not help affirm your words or your cause.
Because of the tacit acceptance of the racial environment cultivated here on campus, and the praise of ridiculous things like Total Frat Move that try to present you as bigoted clowns, IFC organizations alone are deemed implicit in hateful behavior. If you don’t think it’s right, if it’s really “not like that,” then work to save the culture of your organization from hate and racial exclusiveness and the type of people who think that racism is acceptable. Reject the systems that make it easy for you be insensitive to minority students, especially the ones within your organizations. Be sensitive to minority workers here on campus, from people who work in the Union to the professors in your classrooms.
Silence doesn’t fix anything, and continued silence will only result in the recurrence of racial incidents like this — and they will only get worse. White students must be a part of the conversation. Speak up and stay woke.
Sierra Mannie is a junior classics major from Ridgeland.
