LETTERS TO THE EDITOR: DOUBLE STANDARDS HELPED ALLOW TRAGEDY TO HAPPEN

To the Editor:

I am writing to express my outrage at the fraternity hazing-induced death of the Southeast University student. As a chapter advisor for a fraternity at Southeast, it is my contention that this tragedy could and should have been avoided.

Over the past several years, national fraternal organizations and university administrations have taken steps and enacted policies to eliminate fraternity hazing. By and large, these actions have been successful. Southeast's campus is no exception. Physical hazing is truly a thing of the past among the predominantly white fraternities at Southeast. Emotional hazing has been virtually eliminated as well.

This is not true among the black fraternities at Southeast, however. As in so many other areas of university administration, a double standard has been employed when dealing with black students. For the past several years, offenses for which white fraternity members were aggressively and severely disciplined, went unpunished, unnoticed even, when committed by black fraternity men. Further, when acts committed by two or three men of the same white fraternity were deemed unacceptable, the entire chapter was held accountable by the university. The same cannot be said for black fraternities, however.

Indeed, white fraternities have been held to a much higher standard of conduct over the years. Unfortunately, this has been to the detriment of the black fraternities. As a result, more often than not white fraternities graduate men at a higher rate and with higher grade point averages than the all-mens' average at Southeast. Black fraternities, however, have been allowed to consistently earn chapter grade point averages that were not only far below the mens' average, but were often below a 2.. This is inexcusable.

I have long maintained that racial double standards severely harm the very people they are intended to help. This tragedy is sobering evidence of that belief. In this instance, the application of a racial double standard has resulted in the death of one whom this double standard was purportedly supposed to help.

Had black fraternities been held to the same standards as white fraternities over the years, and been disciplined with the same zeal with which administrators have disciplined white fraternities, Michael Davis would still be alive today.

It is my belief that a large portion of the blame for this tragic death can be laid squarely at the feet of university administrators who were either too liberal or too cowardly to hold black fraternities to the same standards of behavior to which they've held white fraternities. And a promising young university student is dead as a result.

It is my sincere hope that in the wake of this tragedy, the university will take steps to eliminate hazing within the black Greek System, just as it has already done within the predominantly white Greek System. Because if steps are not taken, and this double standard is allowed to continue, more tragedies like this one will surely be the result.

BRIAN SHELTON

Cape Girardeau