Clubs stand up to LGBT discrimination

A group of LGBT peer educators met recently with the 10 eating club presidents to discuss issues related to discrimination against LGBT students. Though many presidents said the main purpose of the meeting was to establish a dialogue between the clubs and the LGBT community, the discussion also produced some tangible results.

Together, the 10 presidents decided to publish a signed letter to the editor in The Daily Princetonian, running today, reaffirming to the student body that the Street is tolerant and accepting of all students and that none of the clubs discriminate on the basis of race, gender or sexual orientation. Though no specific concerns were cited as a reason for publishing the letter clarifying the clubs’ stance, many club presidents said it was important to make sure the student body knows that LGBT members should not feel uncomfortable socializing on the Street.

Cap & Gown president Derek Grego ’12 explained in an email that the club takes discrimination “very seriously,” both as members of Cap and as members of the University community.

“This goes for any student, guest, or groups that may encounter any form of hateful or prejudice behavior while on our watch,” Grego said. “The accepting and open community in the Cap membership is one of our finest assets.”

“It was just a forum for discussion,” Tower Club president Joey Barnett ’12 said. “We didn’t bring up any hard-pressing issues. The LGBT representatives were just curious as to what our perceptions were. It’s all in the perception of individual students, but I don’t ever feel that LGBT students should have any reason to be afraid to walk into any of the 10 clubs on the Street.”

In addition to signing the letter to the ‘Prince,’ Barnett said, he is compiling a list of LGBT and Sexual Harassment/Assault Advising, Resources, and Education advisers for club members to help establish direct lines of communication.

Barnett is also an associate editor for opinion for the ‘Prince.’

The discussion was less about combating discrimination itself — neither the club presidents nor the LGBT peer educators believed harassment to be a particularly pervasive problem — and more about combating the sense that discrimination against LGBT students is present in some clubs, presidents said.

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“We were trying to eradicate stereotypes associated with each club and the kind of treatment LGBT people receive within each club,” Colonial president Susan Zhang ’12 said. Zhang said that she had not heard of any instances of discrimination based on sexual orientation in Colonial, but she nonetheless sent an email to the club’s membership reminding them that any form of harassment is not tolerated.

Similarly, Tiger Inn president Jeff Cole ’12 said in an email to the ‘Prince’ that “TI has a strict anti-discrimination clause and our goal is to allow all of our members and guests to have a great time at our club without feeling discriminated against.”

In order to dispel these perceptions, Sandra Mukasa ’12, a Butler College peer educator who developed the initiative to meet with the eating club presidents, said the clubs should strive to be openly accepting rather than passively tolerant.

“We discussed ways in which club presidents might want to outwardly show that they were open and accepting to LGBTQ individuals,” Mukasa said in an email. “I believe one of the greatest outcomes of the meeting was the pledge statement in the ‘Prince.’ It was an idea that originated from the club presidents, who wanted to combat negative reputations and stereotypes and show their solidarity and support of the LGBTQ community.”

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Many of the presidents said that establishing a direct line of communication between the clubs and the LGBT community was also a welcome advancement.

“It was just an open dialogue of what LGBT issues were on the Street and how we could maintain being welcoming to LGBT groups,” Terrace Club president Ricardo Lopez ’12 said. “It was an open dialogue more than anything else. It was just a discussion.”

Lopez also said that Terrace “strives to be the most LGBT-friendly club on the Street” through events like the annual Drag Ball, which the club organizes with Princeton Queer Radicals.

The question of increasing LGBT awareness at the eating clubs came up last April during Pride Week, when all the clubs except Charter Club, Cottage Club, Ivy Club and TI displayed rainbow flags on their clubs’ exteriors to symbolize tolerance.

Charter president Daniel Fletcher ’12 said he found the meeting with the peer educators helpful.

“We’re always discussing how to make things better, and they brought up some interesting points that I hadn’t heard before,” Fletcher said. “We’re definitely taking what they said into consideration.”

The four presidents interviewed for this article all confirmed that their clubs’ members’ contracts contain a nondiscrimination clause that prohibits members from harassing people based on sexual orientation.

Though the discussion was mostly about perceptions, Mukasa said she believes acts of harassment do indeed occur on the Street.

“There is still the occasional name-calling and harassment that is directed towards same-sex couples,” Mukasa said. “These negative experiences can course through the community and create feelings of anxiety. Individuals don’t want to have to worry about whether they will be harassed for dancing or holding hands with someone of the same gender.”

Zhang described some of the unconfirmed incidents that the peer educators brought up at the meeting.

“They mentioned instances where they said people had beer thrown on them because they were a same-sex couple walking in,” Zhang said. “There was jeering when two girls were walking around the Street; they got catcalled and whatnot. It’s only hearsay, and it hasn’t been verified, but it’s what they’ve heard.”

Grego also noted, “There are no particular events I can think of off the top of my head in which someone felt uncomfortable or discriminated against at Cap.”

Rory Wilsey ’12 of Cottage and Caroline Shifke ’12 of Ivy could not be reached for comment. Cloister Inn and ICC president Jake Sally ’12 referred the ‘Prince’ to the letter the 10 presidents submitted.