Lawsuit, Dead Ahead
Burlington Free Press Editorial
February 13, 1998

With its punishment of a fraternity last week, the University of Vermont has done half the job of resolving a racial incident.

Acacia deserved a harsh rebuke, and the two-year suspension is fitting. The remaining job is to turn youthful folly into a learning experience. On that task, UVM president Judith Ramaley has fallen far short.

In November, several pledges to Acacia asked a minority student to pose for a photograph they needed in a hazing scavenger hunt. He agreed.

The pose was demeaning, however, and his sole qualification for the photo was his skin color. It was therefore appropriate for UVM to treat the incident seriously, so that all parties would learn greater sensitivity to race issues.

That is not what happened. Instead the photo was misrepresented, the truth was suppressed, the students´ apology was rejected, and an absurd judicial process took place.

As the prime mover in these events, the fraternity deserved a sanction-if only to remind the rest of the Greek system about what is unacceptable.

But the story does not end there. Ramaley has declared the penalty "the result of a fair and thorough internal judicial process. ... I have full confidence in this process and I am satisfied with the outcome."

Her confidence and satisfaction are sorely misplaced. Consider:

The Office of Multicultural Affairs and Dean Batt embellished the incident, publicly distorting and inflaming the charges. Such as: No one was threatened with a golf club, at any time. Such as: It was not an act of bigotry, but of ignorance. All of the students involved-fraternity members and the minority student-were good friends. They attended the same Vermont high school, they had lunch together two days before the incident.
Batt addressed a rally outside the fraternity 48 hours later, treating the students as guilty and tainting the judicial process. He deserves Ramaley´s censure, at the least, for his poor example and lack of restraint.
The judicial hearing was so distorted, three of the adult witnesses have written to Ramaley to express their disgust. One-a career teacher at the students´ high school-declared he will never again counsel a student to attend UVM.

Last week Ramaley called this incident a learning experience. She is correct. Students at UVM have been fully schooled in the following: Apologies are worthless, political correctness matters more than fairness; reality-that is, telling the public what really happened-is immaterial.

UVM is now wide open to a defamation suit by the fraternity students, who have been labelled racists for the rest of their college years. They can hardly be blamed for seeking the justice UVM has denied them.

Perhaps Ramaley reforms the judicial process, and takes seriously the concerns of those witnesses, the axe might not fall. If the status quo continues, UVM will face the court battle it deserves.

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