TigerXero
09-14-2007, 10:47 PM
I'm a freshman at Vanderbilt University (which is in Nashville, TN), and I just wanted to bring some attention to recent happenings on campus. Last weekend, there was apparently a gay bashing on campus. A graduate student and his boyfriend, who is an alumni of VU, were waiting in line at one of the dining facilities beneath one of the fershman/sophomore student dorms on campus (the Towers to be specific). Two other guys in line started verbally harrasing them, and a bit of a verbal fight broke out. The two guys then left the facility, and the gay couple finished getting their food and eating. Upon leaving the Towers, the gay couple was then assaulted by these two men, who focused on one of the two gay guys (I do not know which one that was). One of the two assailants escaped, but the other one, who is a VU student, was aprehended and jailed. He is being handled by the metro police and being punished by the school as well.
However, here's the thing. There has been no publicity of this event at all. No one knows about it. It has not been talked about in any of the school or local city newspapers. Apparently, the vibe I am getting is that the University does not want people to know about what happened (what would that be like for their reputation if hate crimes were happening on its campus), but we're hoping to help leak the story to someone who will publish it. However, this is not the first time Vanderbilt has apparently been quiet about a hate crime. When I talked about what had happened last weekend in my Women's and Gender Studies class, my professor informed me that last Spring (or the Spring before last) one of her students was attacked for being gay as well (she only found out after she inquired why he had not been coming to class), and he was injured so badly, he couldn't even remember what had happened to him. No one knew about this inicident either, there was no publicity, and the University did not let any outside source (like the metro police) know and handled it themselves. It's a weird similarity between how the situation is being handled now, albeit the fact they are letting the metro police punish one of the attackers.
It is just very concerning for me that awareness is not being raised about this issue, that no one is talking about it. The University talks about other crimes on campus, such as rape, but why not this? The Princeton Review ranks us as one of the bottom twenty gay friendly schools in America. Maybe they have a point.
I'm basically going to rant now about other things that will hopefully be changed on campus in the future, but what I said above was the extent of my posts purpose.
Another issue I've noticed on campus, which the Human Rights Campaign Vanderbilt (HRC) {which just started up this year and is partially led by the Vice Executive of the Vote No on TN #1 campaign} and the Vanderbilt Lambda Association (Lambda) {which has been around since 1988 and is a Gay/Straight Alliance which does a number of different social and educational activites} have pointed out, is that there seems to be no visible LGBT population on campus; I've never seen a same-sex couple holding hands; we need more visibility. Also HRC is interested in pushing for a number of changes. Our 'one room' LGBT resource center is secluded in an obscure area of campus, so we need a much larger facility that is located more centrally on campus. Our campus has a sexual orientation non-discrimination policy, but it does not cover gender identity/expression, and it needs the latter to protect transgender individuals. We don't have a LGBT Alumni Association, and we need one to help raise and sustain funds for our LGBT organizations. HRC wants to make an LGBT studies major/minor and believes that Vanderbilt should have an active interest in recruiting LGBT students to come to their school and have an admissions counselor who will specifically do that; they also believe that there should be the option to mark your sexual orientation on the college admissions application as there is a need for openly LGBT students at Vanderbilt to help bring about change on campus. There also needs to be someone high[er] up in the school's hierarchy to represent us, and as we are looking for a new school Chancellor right now, it is also extremely important that the next Chancellor is progressive and pro-gay and has a record of being so. There are several things that HRC and Lambda want to change concerning the campus atmosphere as well, but it's going to be many, many years before we are able to reach the many goals that these organizations have.
I feel like I've come to Vanderbilt at a very strategic point in time, and I also wanted to rant about the crap going on at our school.
However, here's the thing. There has been no publicity of this event at all. No one knows about it. It has not been talked about in any of the school or local city newspapers. Apparently, the vibe I am getting is that the University does not want people to know about what happened (what would that be like for their reputation if hate crimes were happening on its campus), but we're hoping to help leak the story to someone who will publish it. However, this is not the first time Vanderbilt has apparently been quiet about a hate crime. When I talked about what had happened last weekend in my Women's and Gender Studies class, my professor informed me that last Spring (or the Spring before last) one of her students was attacked for being gay as well (she only found out after she inquired why he had not been coming to class), and he was injured so badly, he couldn't even remember what had happened to him. No one knew about this inicident either, there was no publicity, and the University did not let any outside source (like the metro police) know and handled it themselves. It's a weird similarity between how the situation is being handled now, albeit the fact they are letting the metro police punish one of the attackers.
It is just very concerning for me that awareness is not being raised about this issue, that no one is talking about it. The University talks about other crimes on campus, such as rape, but why not this? The Princeton Review ranks us as one of the bottom twenty gay friendly schools in America. Maybe they have a point.
I'm basically going to rant now about other things that will hopefully be changed on campus in the future, but what I said above was the extent of my posts purpose.
Another issue I've noticed on campus, which the Human Rights Campaign Vanderbilt (HRC) {which just started up this year and is partially led by the Vice Executive of the Vote No on TN #1 campaign} and the Vanderbilt Lambda Association (Lambda) {which has been around since 1988 and is a Gay/Straight Alliance which does a number of different social and educational activites} have pointed out, is that there seems to be no visible LGBT population on campus; I've never seen a same-sex couple holding hands; we need more visibility. Also HRC is interested in pushing for a number of changes. Our 'one room' LGBT resource center is secluded in an obscure area of campus, so we need a much larger facility that is located more centrally on campus. Our campus has a sexual orientation non-discrimination policy, but it does not cover gender identity/expression, and it needs the latter to protect transgender individuals. We don't have a LGBT Alumni Association, and we need one to help raise and sustain funds for our LGBT organizations. HRC wants to make an LGBT studies major/minor and believes that Vanderbilt should have an active interest in recruiting LGBT students to come to their school and have an admissions counselor who will specifically do that; they also believe that there should be the option to mark your sexual orientation on the college admissions application as there is a need for openly LGBT students at Vanderbilt to help bring about change on campus. There also needs to be someone high[er] up in the school's hierarchy to represent us, and as we are looking for a new school Chancellor right now, it is also extremely important that the next Chancellor is progressive and pro-gay and has a record of being so. There are several things that HRC and Lambda want to change concerning the campus atmosphere as well, but it's going to be many, many years before we are able to reach the many goals that these organizations have.
I feel like I've come to Vanderbilt at a very strategic point in time, and I also wanted to rant about the crap going on at our school.