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Beta crossed the line with poster

It takes a lot to offend me.

When Beta Sigma Delta distributed the poster of a woman lying in a fetal position on a bed with "She might hate herself in the morning, but you won't," even someone as thick-skinned as me took offense. I'm a pessimist by nature, but I never thought that someone could write something like this and distribute it throughout a university as an enticement to join a fraternity. I just didn't think it would ever happen.

I wish I had never been proven wrong.

All week I wondered what sort of people could spread such a horrible flyer. At the same time, I hoped whoever had distributed the flyer was very sorry for what they had done and saw it as a very serious violation not just of university policy, but as a violation of humanity as well.

Sadly, again I was proven wrong. As the rest of campus was wondering what I was wondering, the brothers of Beta were busy laughing it up, wondering what the big deal was. An anonymous Beta brother said the flyer was taken out of context and was supposed to be a joke. This flyer, so he said, was actually making fun of the brothers themselves.

Well, guys, the joke's on you. This flyer was immediately brought to the attention of the Interfraternity Council (IFC) and was dealt with swiftly and somewhat adequately. The decision of the IFC was to require Beta to write a letter of apology to the student body and to take out an ad in The Voice to publish their apology. The entire fraternity also has to attend a seminar that will focus on the posters, according to Gretchen Osterman, Greek Affairs coordinator. These are the only two things that were done correctly in this entire ordeal.

The issue at hand is a complete lack of tact and professionalism from Beta. I hope that Beta realized that this is wrong. But if they didn't, it's not as if they had a good example of professionalism and tact to follow on the university level. When a reporter approached Osterman about this story, Osterman said that she had a "feeling that you [the reporter] would screw it up" and that the reporter was "not competent enough" to write the story as a non-Greek.

If you ask me, Osterman is just trying to hide her lack of competence as a Greek Affairs coordinator. She has had numerous problems with The Voice in the past and will most likely continue to in the future. She doesn't understand what it takes to represent the Greeks from a university level and has absolutely no concept of what it takes to talk to the press about any situation in the Greek community.

In the university community, you must lead by example. Osterman has failed miserably. She needed to show the Greek community what a professional should be, and instead she drew a line in the sand between Greeks and non-Greeks. In her words, a non-Greek cannot understand and report on the situation as well as someone in the Greek community. Instead of bringing the university together, Osterman sees it fit to keep both sides divided and continues to keep Greeks and non-Greeks in their respective stereotypes.

Regardless of the lack of Greek Affairs leadership, Beta will still have to face the repercussions for their actions. They will have to comply with any sanctions imposed by the Office of Student Standards, Osterman told The Voice. Until they comply with these sanctions, Beta will be forbidden from participating in any Greek activities, including homecoming.

While we're looking at sanctions, I've got an idea. Bloomsburg University should no longer recognize Beta Sigma Delta as a fraternity on this campus. All of the privileges given to them as a fraternity should be stripped and the fraternity should be made an example for all to come as a warning of what you should never do. I think it's just too easy to let Beta get away with an apology in The Voice. I think it's too easy to just suspend activities until the fraternity complies with the sanctions. We should get rid of the organization all together. I don't see any other reasonable alternatives.

As a university, I see this as their only option. If the university wants to set an example to the rest of campus, the town, alumni and prospective students, it must demonstrate that this type of inhumane message should never be tolerated. The university needs to let everyone know that Bloomsburg University is not a university that supports what this flyer is implying. The university needs to react and do it swiftly and harshly. There is just no other choice in the matter.

This flyer, in just 10 simple words and a picture, takes women back to where they were not too many years ago, subservient to men. Women were seen as objects, as playthings for men. Beta brought women right back to this inferior stage. To me, the woman on the flyer is not content. She is curled up in a fetal position in pain. She is wounded. She has been violated.

While this may have been a joke to Beta, I certainly didn't take it that way and I don't think the rest of the university sees it this way, either. This flyer, to me, says that date rape is not only tolerated, it's encouraged. When I read this flyer, it said to me that if I wanted to participate in date rape, Beta Sigma Delta is the place to go. This flyer says to me that date rape is not only practiced in the fraternity, but that it's criteria for admission.

While I know that this flyer doesn't prove that date rape is a reality at Beta, it certainly doesn't disprove it. What worries me is, that if Beta has enough stupidity to write such a thing on a flyer, how many other people are thinking this same thing? How many men, fraternity members or not, see this flyer as a perfectly acceptable advertisement for a fraternity? I hope not any, but I'm not that naïve.

If it happens once, this is a sign to me that it could be the part of a larger problem. That's why I think all fraternities and sororities on campus should be required to attend a meeting on the acceptable ways to attract new members as well as some sort of sensitivity training. The "it's only Beta that's to blame" doesn't hold up in my book. While they are on the hot seat for this poster, this problem is seen by the public as a Greek problem and should not and cannot be handled lightly. If funding is an issue, I'd highly recommend Beta paying for all expenses out of their own pockets. They at least owe us that much. This problem transcends the barrier between Greek and non-Greek. It affects the entire university. For anything positive to come of this, swift action must be taken. Because if I'm this offended by this incident, imagine how everyone else must feel.