So we try to convince our students that the university is “the real world” but then we also acknowledge that “things are different here?” What a lame contradiction.

I want my students to behave like adults, and to learn to behave like civil humans. That means they don’t intentionally offend others, neither by drawing masturbating women nor by chalking “shut the f___ up” next to that drawing. This is nothing to be proud of.

Both sides should be harshly condemned. Warn the five groups participating in Coming Out Week that they need to either tone down the sexually explicit messages or else they’ll have to have them approved by the administration in the future. Warn counter-chalkers that they can be criminally prosecuted for hate speech. I’d hate to see daily sidewalk washing be the only solution.

If we want our students to be adults, we need to treat them like adults. Yes, allow them to have dialog, allow them to chalk the sidewalks with clever, thought-provoking messages ("When did you come out straight” is perfect), but there’s no place for anyone to think that behavior that’s criminal outside the university should be acceptable inside.

Jeff, The Real World, at 8:50 am EST on November 14, 2006

Feudi, I think it is dangerous to state that homophobia will only stop when homosexuals stop defining their existence by their sexuality. Will racism end then if African Americans stop defining themselves as black?

This issue seems to be about some students using National Coming Out Day as an excuse to cover their campus with shock messages that they claim are used to elevate the dialogue on a very important issue. I find it difficult to see how a picture depicting a graphic sex act and stating that “Anal Sex is for Everyone,” or a response stating “Why Don’t You Shut the F___ Up Already,” elevates anything or promotes a constructive conversation on campus.

Some of the students, and consequently some of the messages, believe in having that conversation, but it appears that others are using this as an excuse to offend others. I hope that it does not overshadow the intent of those who wish to have an open and respectful dialogue.

Geoff, at 9:45 am EST on November 14, 2006

Kids

I can see two sides of the argument on the ‘offensive images’ topic.

When did sexual images (gay or not) become so offensive as opposed to blood and death on the news every day. To me that’s very sad.

Also, any time I hear someone complain about what a child saw on campus I have to question if the parent bringing the child there ever went to a campus...ever. I’d say there’s a certain amount of risk of exposure to adult themes, topics, situations, etc.. any time you are on a college campus. Honestly, for the sake of young people going to school there, I hope it stays that way.

Anyone that’s offended needs to get laid. Anyone that brings their child to a college campus, needs to wake up to reality of what young people do and discuss on campus.

No adult rules or discussions will ever change this.

Jesse, at 11:45 am EST on November 14, 2006

Response

RC,

If you look at identity development theory you will see that there is a stark delineation between the self perception of personal identities of the majority and minority. The reason that sexuality is the loudest message that is expressed is because that is what they are most identified as by others. How can those in the majority possibly understand what it is like to be marginalized from others by the very traits that place them in that majority?

White people do proclaim their racial identity every time they take advantage of unintended yet constantly present institutional racism. They proclaim their racial identity every time they use the “N” word. Straight people proclaim their sexual identity every time they call someone faggot. These are the very reasons that people say “I’M BLACK!” or “I’M GAY! DEAL WITH IT!” Many in the majority cannot deal with it.

These points are not intended to argue that the vulgar drawings at Swarthmore are any more appropriate, because many of the drawings described were just that: vulgar. Rather, I would like to state the absurdity of asking someone who is gay to not their sexuality as a major part of their identity. Would you ever ask someone to not use gender, race, religion, or nationality as a defining piece of their identity? What makes sexuality different?

Geoff, at 3:40 pm EST on November 15, 2006

I agree that racism and homophobia are two completely different issues, with many different challenges involved. Ron was right to point out that being gay is a largely invisible identity. That is, if you’re able to “cover.”

However, saying that being openly gay justifies someone calling you a “faggot” is a position I find dangerous and hurtful.

Ron, I’m sure there are some parts of you that may frighten or offend others, even if you are an upper-class straight white male. For example, I find your belief that I should stay in the closet about my sexual orientation frightening. Obviously, you have not felt the need to “cover” this opinion for fear of offending me.

I realize this is not a perfect example, as identity is much different from people’s opinions, and I do not believe that my feeling threatened by Ron’s admonition that I stay in the closet, coming as it does from a place of sexual privilege, constitutes oppression.

However, I suggest you re-read your comment in the context of what Geoff just said about straight people declaring their heterosexuality by oppressing other groups.

On another topic, I’m a chalker from Swarthmore College. I’m glad to say that Swarthmore IS a different environment from the “real world” I come from in Raleigh, North Carolina, where NC State University recently had a heated debate over whether LGBT students should be allowed to have a single room as a resource center. Returning from my October break during which I had to “cover” for my sister and my girlfriend’s parents, and from the summer during which I had to “cover” for my employers and co-workers, I was glad to be able to express myself duriing the Coming Out Week chalkings, which are a yearly tradition, and have often included sexually explicit statements and drawings. There is no way I could have anticipated the type of backlash that occurred this year, since nothing like it has happened since 2001.

Rather than deliberately trying to offend people, I was merely trying to express myself in a forum sanctioned by the administration for my use (they gave us the chalk with no instructions). Obviously, however, there are still people at Swarthmore, who, like Ron, believe I should make their majority opinions my prime concern, that I should “cover” so they won’t feel “offended.”

Diana, I’m a chalker, at 5:10 pm EST on November 19, 2006

I can understand that people within a minority group would most closely identify themselves with the attribute of themselves which makes them a minority. Any group which is repressed by society will react in this way, stressing whatever part of themselves which is repressed. Every group in society that tries to better themselves and rise out of the oppression they are stuck in has done it. However, I would still argue that for the discrimination to end, everyone must stop defining themselves in these ways.

For instance, when whites, blacks, asians, indians, hispanics, and every other ethnic group or nationality stop dividing themselves along these lines, racism will end. Racism is when you see in someone the difference and react to that, rather than seeing in them the whole of their being and reacting to that. It is not that we cannot see and appreciate the differences of others and within ourselves... but to get beyond those things that divide us, why do we focus on them?

I would rather my peers see me for my talents, my failings, my aspirations, my quirks, and my passions than for my race, nationality, gender, sexual orientation, and my religion. Each of these traits about me, while they define who I am in part, cannot alone describe who I am.

And while, as a woman, when I encounter discrimination based on my gender my immediate response is to declare that I am a strong woman and will not be placed arbitrarily behind men, on the whole I do not define myself as a woman but as a *person.*

And I will not for an instant believe that friends and family of mine whom I love dearly that are a different race, religion, or have a different sexual orientation, could ever appear to me as black or white or gay or straight or whatever. They will always be my friends, my cousins, and the people I love more than anything.

And I definately think that anyone belonging to a group oppressed by society will at once argue for equal rights and, at the same time, to be seen as a person rather than as whatever single trait, among a multitude of traits, that society has singled out for them.

Descrimination of all kinds will never be fully erased until people of every kind see one another as people, who happen to have such and such traits, rather than as a single trait which just happens to be a person as well.

Nicole, at 1:50 pm EST on February 8, 2007