Category: Opinion

By Spenser Hickey
Assistant Copy Editor

As the new film “42” – a biopic about the life of Jackie Robinson and his role in the integration of professional baseball – is released this weekend, the OWU community has been invited to take part in a celebration of the role played by Robinson and Branch Rickey, the Brooklyn Dodgers manager and member of the OWU class of 1904.

There will be a discussion from 4 to 5:30 p.m. featuring Rickey’s grandson, Branch B. Rickey, and Cleveland Indians Vice-President for Public Affairs Bob DiBiasio, and OWU alum. The Cleveland Indians were the second team to field a black man in modern baseball, shortly after the Dodgers.

There will be four baseball games played against Denison – two doubleheaders at noon Saturday and Sunday. Also on Sunday, the Strand will show “42” at 2 p.m.; there will also be an art exhibit at the City Art Center.

Yet as we honor these brave men and the role OWU played in influencing Rickey’s decision to break the baseball color barrier, there is another color barrier that deserves remembering – and OWU’s collective role in it is one we are far less likely to be fond of.

The page “The History of Ohio Wesleyan Athletics” on the university website says Rickey was inspired to hire Robinson in 1903 after seeing the OWU team’s catcher – a black man named Charles Thomas – be denied lodging at a South Bend hotel, and insisted that Thomas stay in his room.

An April 15, 2012, article in “The New York Times” backs up this claim, although the article acknowledges Rickey may have embellished the tale for dramatic effect.

What our website does not mention is that when Thomas returned to Ohio Wesleyan, he would be denied equal lodging there as well.

It was not until 1949 that Betty-Lou Dotson ‘50 took part in integrating the dorms at Ohio Wesleyan, becoming the first black woman to live in them.

Before that, black students, including the first black graduate, Olive Day ‘03, had to live in off-campus boarding houses or in Selby Stadium.

I imagine most students here are far less aware of this racial barrier and its connection to OWU – it’s certainly not one we would want to publicize, especially since it continued after Rickey, on the virtue of his time at Ohio Wesleyan, integrated baseball.

It is also of note that it was not until 1968 – perhaps the most turbulent year in the history of American race relations – that a student group was formed to represent the interests of the black community at OWU.

In 1968 there were only 40 black students at OWU; Pete Smith, class of ’71, one of the founders of the Student Union on Black Awareness (SUBA), said half of the black students left OWU his freshman year, leaving the others to decide whether to follow them or stay and commit to making positive changes.
The newly formed SUBA had to struggle for recognition and their own private meeting space, the Willa B. Player Center in Stuyvesant Hall.

Now, though, members of SUBA and its umbrella organizations question whether the Center receives the respect it deserves and can still be considered a safe space for their community.

I do not write this in an attempt to dissuade you from attending the celebratory events or viewing “42.” I imagine I’d be one of the last people on campus to discourage increasing awareness of racism and its effects.

But at the same time, remember that our collective past is not as noble as we would like it to be.

Yes, Rickey’s role in breaking down the MLB’s color barrier is something to be honored and remembered, but the existence of a color barrier in Ohio Wesleyan housing should also be remembered and acknowledged.
As you observe the events, keep in the back of your mind the knowledge that racism and discrimination, as well as sexism and homophobia, are still strongly persistent in our community.

We cannot properly honor the heroes of our shared legacy without also admitting our own failings, past and present – or resolving to correct them in the future.

By Taylor Smith
Copy Editor

I can truthfully say, I am not the only lifeguard upset with the recent changes that have occurred at the pool, and we’re not the only ones on campus have been affected.

On Friday, March 29, work-study students for the Edwards Weight and Conditioning room, the Meek Aquatic Center and Edwards Gym received an email regarding the issue of their work hours being cut and/or eliminated.

The desk attendant positions for the Meek and Edwards’ lobby were fully eliminated or “let go” effective April 1 and the hours for lifeguards and weight room staff had their hours cut back, as the hours of those facilities were also cut.

Rumor has it and several Meek and Edwards’ staff members have been told that cuts were being made because the school lacked resources (i.e. money) to continue operating the facilities as they had been.

Basically it cost the school more to pay us than it did to keep the facility open.

I know as a lifeguard we received a Google Doc to sign up for hours on the newly revised schedule and there was a mad rush to get hours. Hours were assigned based on seniority working at the pool, so only a few freshman lifeguards made the cut. There were even a few junior and sophomore lifeguards who just recently started working at the pool this year, so they didn’t make the cut either.

I have been fortunate to have been working as a lifeguard since I stepped foot on campus my freshman year three years ago, so I was not badly affected.

I did have my hours cut down from 12 hours a week to seven hours a week. Some were not as lucky. Some lifeguards went from working 10 or more hours a week to less than five hours a week.

The reason there is a shortage of money is because the new weight room desk attendants are paid out of the same budget the lifeguards and Meek and Edwards’s desk attendants are paid out of.

I am not aware how many total weight room attendants there are, but I have noticed when I go there are two to three attendants at a time. Most would say they don’t do much, and I do not know how much they’re paid per hour.

But I’ll give them the benefit of the doubt, for now, because I know, as a lifeguard, my position has been criticized for being easy, overpaid and not having to do much; then again, I am a trained and certified professional rescuer.

I can’t help it that there are not many people at the pool sometimes and I am being paid to do homework, though there are times where so much is going on we sit in the chair for most of the shift.

I feel as though the school can help how it pays the workers for two facilities. The weight room never had a single staff member on hand, let alone three. When the school renovated the weight room and created new positions—initially great for the students—the administration, Student Employment and the Athletic Department should have determined where they plan on getting money to pay these workers.

If they’re just going to combine budgets, there’s nothing wrong with that, but they should of at least made sure they had the money to pay the students to work the hours they originally signed up for and not force them to change it mid-module.

I know I’m not aware of all the details of this situation, which leaves me a little confused; but aren’t most work-study students paid through the federal government? Most federal work-study grants pay $1,500 to $2,500 a year.

Some feel it’s rare that students reach his or her limit, but some do, which is why there shouldn’t really be much of a budget issue.

If a student doesn’t earn his or her full federal work-study money, that’s the end of it—it cannot be held for the future and the school can’t use it for other reasons.

There are a lot of work-study students who rely on that money to help pay for their tuition, living expenses and other costs that arise (supply fees, parking permits, fraternity or sorority dues, etc.). For some it is spending money, but for many it is need.

The administration and the Athletic Department are—or should be—responsible for determining a budget and system that is reliable throughout the year and does not leave students jobless with a month of school left.

To be honest, when I first found out OWU Confessions existed, I groaned a little bit to myself.

I’ve seen these pages sprout up from other universities, and I’ve found them to be places where vitriol and judgement are condoned and human decency is sometimes abandoned altogether. I don’t want such a place to exist at Ohio Wesleyan because we deserve better—no one on this campus should be subjected to anonymous hatred and rumor.

But so far, the posts have been fairly innocuous. The carbon copy, “OWU Confessions Absolutely Anonymous,” has hosted some submissions leaning further toward obscene, but I haven’t seen anything that’s had the potential to do substantial harm to anyone. In the past couple days, I’m somewhat ashamed to admit, the pages have become guilty pleasures of mine.

Some of them, however, have been hard to read. The potential fallout that could result if the submitter’s identity were known is unsettling to me, so the anonymity is good. But it shocks me what some people have done to and think about others, and that they’re so cavalier about admitting it.

Then again, it’s made me realize the therapeutic power of letting go of something a person has kept secret for a long time. To confess must be inherently cathartic—I can only imagine how much of a weight must have been lifted off the shoulders of those who submitted some of the posts.

Several of them are genuine and positive, too, honest admissions of struggle or stories of hope. The fact that OWU Confessions has produced a raw human bulletin board as well as an internet cesspool is remarkable.

What aren’t genuine, though, are the comments. The hard thing about an online forum for things as intimate as these confessions is that everything is submitted for the judgment of the internet’s harshest critics. People are quick to judge each other’s secrets, and ridiculing them is a sure way to kick a confessor while they’re down.

Like the posts, though, not all comments have been this way. Some are supportive, giving the submitter solidarity or sympathy. Some even invite non-anonymous conversation with them if they need someone to talk to.

Even more often, I see commenters calling out problematic confessions—like those of people who chronically cheat on their significant other, or think the “friend zone” exists.

As University Chaplain Jon Powers pointed out to me, there’s a difference between criticism and criticism with substance. The latter is the only kind of criticism that should ever show up on OWU Confessions. Someone’s honest admission of human struggle should not be laughed at; but if you’ve got the bravado to publicly (albeit anonymously) issue your opinion as objective fact or dig up an embarrassing moment from someone’s past, I don’t feel it’s unfair to receive a little criticism.

Ultimately, it comes down to two entities—the moderators of the Confessions pages and their readers.
The former have a responsibility to ensure the submissions they choose to post won’t do anyone any harm. While some of them are entertaining, no confession should involve any other person by name. Neither the submitter, nor the moderator, nor anyone else can possibly know how someone will react to having something intimate about themselves published online by someone else. The anonymous compliments are surely rather innocuous (at least as far as I’ve known), but the harm outweighs the good for anything otherwise.

The latter—us—have a responsibility, too. We need to uphold the power of OWU Confessions as a cathartic forum rather than support the its potential danger. This means being supportive of people who submit secrets that might have been difficult to admit, and substantially criticizing those who attack or demean others. Our campus should be a safe space, not a harmful one. This extends to Facebook, too.

OWU Confessions can be a good thing for a lot of people, but we shouldn’t allow it to turn into a bad thing for anyone.

Noah Manskar
Editor-in-Chief

By Tom Wolber
Associate Professor of MFL

Ohio Wesleyan students love fantasy novels. Many spend every free minute reading them. More than once I had to remind students at the beginning of the class that it was now time to put their books down. I can certainly relate to their passion.

When I was a teenager, I had a similar addiction to the adventure and fantasy novels by German author Karl May (1842-1912) to the extent that it worried my parents. Did they have a reason to be concerned? Yes and no, as I will explain.

Let’s explore the world of fantasy novels a bit. Obviously, this is a huge, albeit understudied, topic, and so I am focusing on but one popular author – Christopher Paolini and his now complete “Inheritance” series, consisting of the four novels “Eragon,” “Eldest,” “Brisingr” and “Inheritance.” In these books, the human spirit soars to the highest heights and the “divinity in man” (Thoreau) reveals itself in fullness. It would not be wrong, in my opinion, to call Eragon an avatar of Nietzsche’s “oversoul.”

Young Eragon (he is fifteen when we meet him) has grown up motherless and fatherless. He is poor and ignorant. He cannot read or write, although he has sharp eyes and is a good hunter.

And yet, at the end of the fourth book he has slain the evil king Galbatorix and risen to be the wisest and most powerful man in the empire, able to make peace and reconcile the warring races of humans, elves, dwarves, urgals and dragons. Once Galbatorix is dead, Eragon then lays the foundation to a new and better future in which the various races live in peace, harmony, mutual respect and admiration.

Catapulted into the chaos that rules the empire, the young protagonist has no choice but to learn quickly how to survive. Under the tutelage of experienced teachers and mentors, he studies swordfighting, the use of magic and several foreign languages.

A teacher myself, I love the books’ consistent emphasis on and appreciation of knowledge and wisdom. In fact, I am inclined to call the entire series an epistemological novel because the subject of knowledge acquisition is so prevalent. At one point, it is even stated that knowledge is sacred and must therefore be protected and preserved. Obviously, Paolini is a firm believer in the Enlightenment, its optimism, its humanistic values and its didactic methods. Eragon learns and learns and learns – everything from history and geography to mythology and philosophy.

From the Elves, he even learns about living sustainably and in harmony with nature. In the good old tradition of the German “Bildungsroman,” Eragon goes through the phases of apprentice and journeyman until he becomes a master himself. On his side is Saphira, his dragon, who similarly grows and matures into a wise and majestic being.

At no point are Eragon and Saphira seduced by the temptation and trappings of wealth or power. To be sure, there are numerous trials and tribulations for both of them, and there are discussions about the best tactics and strategy, but there is never any question about what is the right and the wrong path.

He and his dragon have no interest in self-promotion and self-aggrandizement. They only want to serve to the point of self-sacrifice, and in the end they retreat from political and military life altogether to teach the next generation of dragons and their riders.

I am not saying that Christopher Paolini is a great, original writer. But he is a memorable author with a strong message. Karl May, Tolkien, Rowling and Paolini are not merely entertainers; they explore and instill eternal values like human rights and social justice.

I am convinced that books of this nature can teach young, impressionable minds much about the difference between good and evil and the responsibilities of an individual to society, and humanity as a whole, whenever and wherever evil lurks.

Unfortunately, the world is full of Voldemorts and Galbatorixes and their political equivalents (Hitler and Stalin) who must be fought.

The struggle between good and evil, light and darkness, is one that never ends. This is, perhaps, the core value that Karl May instilled in me as a teenager.

His fantasy books provided a moral compass to me and millions of other readers that still guides me today, decades later. I would therefore disagree with Plato, who thought art, music and literature were nothing but big lies and useless dreams and that the state should therefore ban them. On the contrary, I would argue with German philosopher Ernst Bloch that fictional literature contains the seed for a more humane social order and can have a liberating, emancipating effect.

However, fantasy novels can, on occasion, also be a way to escape from the real world. They can become a form of “opium” (Marx). It is possible for readers to be so obsessed with literary characters that they begin to neglect their job or friends. If you are a fan of fantasy, do not allow that to happen. Do not ever skip class or work because you are unable to put your book down. You must be able to resist your craving, intoxication and dependency.

Consider self-imposing a daily limit to the time spent with your favorite novel. This way you will be able to extend the pleasure of keeping company with your imaginary friends even longer.

Not long ago, I had a student who knew and loved Christopher Paolini, but was unable to operate in the classroom and in the real world. Withdrawn into a dream world, he was essentially dysfunctional.

I tried to help him find or rebuild a meaningful connection between fact and fiction, the real world and his alternate world, but he had fallen into such a deep hole that I was unable to pull him back out.

A one-dimensional world uninformed by music, art and literature would be flawed and incomplete, but a mind without roots in reality would be equally lost and adrift.
The reciprocal relationship between the two must be maintained. As so often in life, there has to be a balance between the two.

That is what Paolini teaches us in his inspiring “Inheritance” series, among many other things. His books are a call for commitment and action, not for escapism and inaction.

You should read them some day, if you aren’t familiar with them already.

By Anonymous
Transcript Contributor

I knew I was going to go to Take Back the Night. I knew I was going to speak there.
I dreaded it all the same.

I’m not a survivor of sexual assault. But what I’ve known – and tried to forget – for years is that my mother is a survivor. I guess you could say it’s becoming something like an addiction for me, and that makes this editorial one of my own personal 12 steps.

When I left the stage at the end of Take Back the Night last week, I was in the same place I was last year when I shared my mother’s story for the first time.

At last year’s event, I told the audience what I knew had happened to my mother and then I buried that pain so deep I forgot it still boiled, acid in my heart.

That worked – for a while at least. But then The Vagina Monologues reminded me. A Memory, a Monologue, a Rant and a Prayer reminded me. Deep down I knew the pain was still there, though I didn’t feel it. That’s why I went there – I knew it would force me to let the pain out, to admit the truth – not to the audience, but to myself.

This time, I had resolved, I’m not going to bury it again and try to forget. If I do that, I’ll be in the same place a year from now as I was a year ago. And while that place is a lot more comfortable, it’s not the right place for me to be. Last Thursday I spoke out about my pain, now, this Thursday, I want to speak out about my recovery.

Those who were at Take Back the Night can probably tell who I am based off what I’ve written, but I’d appreciate it if you extend the confidentiality shared at the event to this piece.

The first step that pushed me forward wasn’t mine. It was those around me – friends, people I knew of but hadn’t met, people I still can’t name – who supported me afterwards; several were survivors themselves. To all of you, thank you so much – without you pushing me to stay strong that night, I’d have fallen into the same place I was last year.

Sorry if I’ve been distant since then – it’s hard to share something like that and then act like it didn’t happen; even harder to act like it did.

It hasn’t been an easy week.

Friday morning was tough. I didn’t sleep much that night; for a while I just let the tears go as I remembered the night before. I grieved for my mother’s story, and for all the other stories I’d heard.

There was so much pain poured out in that room last Thursday night, but there was so much healing shared afterward, both just from being able to tell your story – or, in my case, my mother’s story – and from all the embraces of the many survivors present.

But throughout that weekend, as I tried to focus on something that night that wasn’t about my story, I remembered those embraces, and I felt guilty for getting them. At the speak-out, after I sat down and regained my composure, I’d begun to question whether I should’ve spoken out in the first place.

This is an event for survivors, I told myself. I’m not one of them.

It wasn’t until another student came up and shared a story similar to mine, saying I’d inspired him to speak, that I realized the event was meant for secondhand stories like mine, too.

But when survivors came to thank me for speaking and hugged me in support, inwardly I struggled again. Why was I the one being supported? I wondered. They’re the survivors, not me.

It felt wrong, like the roles were mixed up; they were the ones who suffered, not me; they were the ones helping me through it.

At the time, all the support made me feel guilty for getting it, for being treated (as I saw it then) like I was some kind of hero for telling a story that wasn’t mine, or like I was a survivor myself.

Eventually, even as this was all still spinning around my head, I went to HamWill and walked into the Counseling Services office to make an appointment.

I’m now on a waitlist, and should meet with one of the counselors within two weeks. They told me not to focus on this too much, but I feared that not thinking about it at all would lead me back to forgetting.

So I talked to my father, and realized that it wasn’t the first time I’d done so; I had a hazy memory of considering how I’d like to discuss it with him but I never actually did it, or so I thought.

What actually happened, several years ago, was that I did talk to him, and then after he’d confirmed that my mother had survived a sexual assault I wiped that memory from my mind, so I could still cling to the miniscule false hope that I was wrong, that it had not happened.

But it did.

Reflecting on my experience that night now, I’ve realized some things about myself and why I felt so guilty afterward from all the support. I told myself that my experience and pain sharing my mother’s story was nothing compared to the others, the stories of real survivors, because I wanted to believe that, to avoid accepting the last bit of truth there was.

The story I shared, of learning that my mother was sexually assaulted, is not just her story.

It is my story too.

It was a lie I told myself: that I was not a survivor; that the story belonged to my mother, not to me as well.

Even though I was not alive when it happened, I am surviving it now, and the pain I feel is similar to that to that I’d feel if I had been the one assaulted. It’s not equal, but it is comparable, and I didn’t want to acknowledge that.

It makes me want to sob, to scream, to find a brick wall and punch it to pieces with my fists, to tear the pieces to bits with my fingernails until there’s nothing left, until the pain’s gone – not that it ever will be, not completely.

It makes me want to stand atop the wall of patriarchy and shout for any man who’s ever thought of raping to listen to my story, to think of what it means to know that the woman who brought you into this world, who you love, to have survived such an assault.

Most of all, it makes me want to forget.

The moment last week that hit me the most wasn’t at Take Back the Night, or during The Vagina Monologues. No, that moment came during the Tuesday performance of A Memory, A Monologue, A Rant and A Prayer, during the reading of Mark Matousek’s piece “Rescue” when I heard the line “I was shocked myself, not because the information was new, but because I’d never said it out loud, which meant it only half-existed.”

It was that line that struck me the most, especially given that it was delivered after the narrator has suddenly come to the realization that his mother and three sisters all survived rapes.

Last week was the second time, not the first, that I’d spoken out what happened to my mother, but I spent most of the year between the two declarations trying to forget that it existed.

I have no sisters, but I have friends here I love and care for who are survivors, too. Like the narrator of “Rescue,” I am a man with a broken heart, and like him I’ve spent much of my life hiding the truth from myself.

I don’t know where I’ll go from here, but I know two things: that the road I’m on will be painful, and that I am not alone on that road.

That’s the most important thing Take Back the Night gave me: the support of so many of my peers on campus.

We have each other’s backs and will support each other on this road to recovery.

We will survive.

By Spenser Hickey
Assistant Copy Editor

This editorial contains references to slurs used against minority communities.

I had my first brush with the issue of on-campus racism last year, writing a story on a rally over the death of Florida teen Trayvon Martin, shot by self-appointed neighborhood watchman George Zimmerman, whose trial has yet to officially begin and has unsurprisingly slipped out of the public eye.

Interviewing members of the Student Union on Black Awareness, I brought up the question of racial profiling in their lives; they mentioned some instances back home and Chaplain Powers mentioned the issue of “shopping while Black” in downtown Delaware. I followed up on this with a story on Anti-Hate Week shortly after, but then summer rolled around, and when I came back I had forgotten that prejudice – either on the basis of race, sex, or sexual orientation – still existed here.

A few weeks ago, I signed up to cover events honoring Dr. Martin Luther King. I’m ashamed to say that I picked the story because I thought it would be a good addition to my writing portfolio when I applied for a job. While I was talking to some audience members from the Delaware community, Chaplain Powers told them I was “a true believer” in the movement for racial equality; I sheepishly said that I was just a reporter.

Looking back, I was unworthy of Chaplain’s praise. Sure, I believed in racial equality – most people do – but what had I done about it? Nothing, and that’s what counts. Maybe now, having focused my reporting on the issue of race and minority issues in general, I’ve earned the term.

Many members of the majority community go through their time here unaware that prejudice continues; I wouldn’t blame them for it that much. But as a journalist, it was my job to know, and to show it to the community through my writing.

As journalists, one of our core responsibilities is to “give (a) voice to the voiceless.” As a BMF member pointed out, the minority communities on our campus, through no fault of their own, lack a voice that can reach the rest of the community; all they can do is vent to each other about shared experiences. As the campus’s reporters, it’s supposed to be our job to record their stories of discrimination and harassment. It’s news of the most real and raw kind, a rarity on a college campus, and we – myself especially – missed it.

I’d like to think that my stories have demonstrated adequately what minority communities experience, but I know this isn’t the case – I’ve only been able to talk to a small fraction of the minority community here, namely members of activist groups such as SUBA, SU, BMF, VIVA, Hillel, Tauheed and PRIDE, and residents of the Women’s House and the House of Black Culture.

To anyone I have not interviewed but who has a story to tell, please contact me: my email is schickey@owu.edu.
Going back to the interviews I did following the Martin Luther King events, when Professor Twesigye described being welcomed to campus with a swastika and Chaplain Powers said the campus woke up to a burned cross in front of University Hall his first year, I was stunned.

As a straight white man, I’ve never known the fury or humiliation that being called a nigger, bitch or faggot provokes. The English language doesn’t even have comparable words to be used against our majority community – and if that doesn’t show privilege, what does? It’s not something I can come close to comprehending, a fact that helped preserve my objectivity but cheapened my ability to provide context to the story.

While the most overt acts I heard of came from non-students – at least recently – there is still an undercurrent of subtle prejudice and stereotyping that persists among our community, in the past noticed only when it bubbles over into violent or destructive incidents – a bombed house or a burned cross here, a fist fight there, and then ignored once more.

As a campus, we pride ourselves on our diversity, but how much time do we give to the concerns of minority students? Not enough, in my view.

We mention Branch Rickey, class of 1903, as one of our most treasured alums, while neglecting to mention that 1903 was also the first year a Black student graduated from the university.

We claim that his time here, particularly seeing a fellow ballplayer denied housing at the hotel he stayed at, inspired his integrating baseball. We forget that it wasn’t until two years after Jackie Robinson joined the Major Leagues that OWU ended segregated housing and allowed Black students to live in dorms rather than Selby Stadium or off-campus. We may be proud of Branch Rickey now, but I doubt he was very proud of us in 1947.

The recent hate incidents at Oberlin, which were only noticed after a man in Klan robes was spotted outside the Afrikan Heritage House there, showed what racism unacknowledged can boil over into. Before this came a month of racist, homophobic and anti-Semitic graffiti and throughout the year similar messages were posted on an anonymous online forum for Oberlin students.

But as I write this editorial, and review the story it accompanies, I question whether it will achieve any impact on increasing awareness of prejudice and hate on campus and in Delaware.

This semester, after hearing about the past instances of serious racial intimidation on campus, I’ve written nine stories and this editorial – almost 15,000 words of copy – on issues related, either directly or peripherally, to minority communities’ struggling for equal treatment. The response I’ve gotten from minority communities has been overwhelmingly positive.

But the response of the majority community has been disappointingly minimal. Yes, I am aware that The Transcript has a small readership, and that few read past the front page, but that’s where six of my nine stories have been (including a feature photo).

For once, I’ve had the opportunity and the obligation to go beyond reporting on events and tackle an actual social issue, and yet the majority of students seem to remain oblivious to it.

It’s frustrating, and it’s a frustration shared by many of the campus activists I’ve interviewed in my stories. In my meetings with them, they’ve all said similar things.

“Is racism a problem here?” I ask. “Yes,” they all reply, often as a group.

“Are students and staff aware about it?” I ask. “No,” they reply. “We can only vent to each other; every minority group faces the same issues.”

As a reporter, I must remain objective in my reporting – and this editorial, given its subject matter being the same as the article I wrote. Due to this, I am hesitant to take a position, as a journalist, on whether racism, sexism, or homophobia is wrong – although as an individual, I’d be more than happy to give my view.
I can, however, say that racism, sexism, and homophobia is present in Delaware and at OWU, and provide many incidents of these issues having occurred here.

That’s what I’ve done; that’s what I’ll continue to do.

I can also say that, in my experience, both in my life and in the stories I’ve heard from interviews, it is the majority who are involved in continuing issues such as racism, sexism, and homophobia.

We – the majority – are the problem, if you consider these issues problems.

We may not be shouting slurs from cars or, in the recent case of Oberlin, writing hate graffiti or donning Klan robes, but we can still be part of the issue without even realizing it.

Furthering prejudice can be done in subtle ways, ones I’ve seen and heard in the majority communities at OWU; using anti-minority slurs, even in conversations with only those in a majority community, is one such way.

Yes, I realize that both this editorial and the article I’ve written on pages 1 and 2 use such slurs, and that they are not censored, as was done previously in The Transcript this year.

While it was not my decision to run the slurs in full, I’d like to explain my rationale for sending the story in with them as they are.

These slurs are foul words with a foul history I can barely scratch the surface of understanding. They are as unsettling to look at as they are difficult to stomach writing. It would have been easier for me had I sent my stories in with them printed as “n*****.”

But these slurs were, for the most part, said to me in full, by members of the communities they target, as they were shouted out by those who used them.

Censoring them takes away their foulness, but also allows one to skip over the words without considering the subjugation and history attached.

For those still reading this, I encourage you to continue educating yourself on this ongoing though hidden issue.
Go to a meeting of BMF or SU, come to Take Back the Night this evening, or drop by a PRIDE meeting – I’ve been to all of these and can attest that they welcome everyone, especially members of the majority.

Or, failing that, just go to an event they hold, or research the issues online.

But do something.

My Facebook news feed was a sea of red on Tuesday.

As the Supreme Court commenced oral arguments in Hollingsworth v. Perry, the landmark case on marriage equality challenging the blatantly heterosexist Proposition 8 from California and the federal Defense of Marriage Act, many of my friends changed their profile pictures to a red equal sign, a special version of the Human Rights Campaign logo.

I don’t think I’ve ever seen such a basic display of allyship spread so quickly. All it took was a few clicks to say, “I favor universal civil rights regardless of sexuality.”

Some people call this “slacktivism” – uploading a picture or sharing a link as a substitute for substantive action against injustice. While there is much more that can and should be done, I can’t agree that these easy actions are akin to doing nothing. Showing even tacit support is better than remaining silent – which, as Andrew Wilson pointed out in the story on page one, is most often counterproductive.

Complacency, however, is different. It’s disgusting to make a red equal sign your profile picture and then act as if you’re the (straight) hero of the queer movement and everything will be wonderful for queer people as long as your virtual friends see you as that little logo.

Straight allyship goes beyond being a decent person and favoring equal rights for our fellow human beings. It doesn’t mean beginning a statement of alliance with “I’m straight, but…” It means listening to the voices of queer people and joining them in active work against the heterosexist power structures under which we live. It means embracing sexuality as something fluid, spiritual and beautiful, not as binary and dictated by stereotypes or mainstream narratives.

Being a straight ally means more than arguing heterosexists are just religious fanatics or that we don’t follow any of the other laws laid out in Leviticus. While those are often true statements (the latter is always true), the stance of straight allies should not be concessional – we should not simply ask people to put their heterosexism aside only on the marriage issue, but rather demand it be rejected in all social, legal and political arenas.
On top of all this, being a straight ally requires an allyship “beyond marriage,” to borrow a phrase from queer activist Nancy Polikoff. Marriage is only one civil right queer people have had to fight for over several decades. But straight people still enjoy an incredible amount of privilege under the heterosexist systems constructed by American law and law in general. Sexual orientation is not covered under equal opportunity legislation, so it’s still legal for a federal contractor to fire someone because they’re queer. Private housing and real estate firms discriminate against queer couples regularly for incredibly arbitrary reasons. Being queer often means automatic disqualification from most federal or local elections. Queer people are victims of numerous hate crimes across the country.

To create true justice out of a heterosexist culture as straight allies, we must change the heterosexist systems that comprise it from the inside out, with marriage equality as a starting point. As Polikoff proclaims, we have to take the rights out of the institution of marriage and put them into a legal system that values all family units, regardless of whether they’re composed of parents and children, siblings, extended relatives or friends. Any people who care enough about each other to live together and provide for each other in some respect should be able to file a joint tax return, visit each other in the hospital and have access to the 1,100-some other rights that come with marriage in our current law.

Additionally, we must simultaneously raise our voices for justice as privileged people and promote the voices of the queer activists who have been doing it much longer than us and have to live in a society that marginalizes them. Our place as straight people is as advocates and allies, not leaders. And qualifying our allyship by beginning, “I’m straight, but…” only perpetuates the problem, as my friend Matthew Jamison noted.
So go ahead – make that red equal sign your profile picture. Watch the Supreme Court for a decision on Hollingsworth v. Perry in June. But remember to engage in activism and allyship offline, too.

Noah Manskar
Editor-in-Chief