Watch and Decide: Was A Yale Frat’s Initiation Stunt A ‘Call For Sexual Violence?’

  • Share
  • Read Later
REUTERS/Shannon Stapleton

Students walk on the campus of Yale

Fraternities have been behind a lot of ridiculous stunts in the past, but this is a whole new low. 

As part of an initiation practice, the Yale Daily News reports, the school’s chapter of Delta Kappa Epsilon had their pledges march through the university’s Old Campus last Wednesday, blindfolded and chanting “No means yes, yes means anal” and “I’m a necrophiliac, I f— dead women.” As offensive as this is on its own, it was seen by some at the school as particularly aggressive because the chanting took place directly outside many freshman female dorms. And because this is 2010, there of course is a YouTube video of the chant.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CLh0RMpit1k]

Yale’s Women’s Center understandably took offense to the chant, writing to the Yale DailyNews that the incident was “hate speech” and “an active call for sexual violence.”

The fraternity’s president, Jordan Forney has since apologized for the chants, calling it a “serious lapse in judgement. According to DKE’s official website all pledging activities have been suspended for the chapter and the executive director of the fraternity will be visiting Yale this weekend to “review this incident and set forth a plan of action for the chapter.”

Members of the Women’s Center and DKE assembled last week to hold a forum on the chant and a letter from Yale College Dean Mary Miller stated that “Any and all disciplinary processes are confidential at Yale, from their inception through their conclusion as required under federal law and University policy.”

So while the matter seems to be just about wrapped up on Yale’s end (as far as what the public will hear about anyway), it seems like it’s just starting to blow up on the Internet. Bloggers and commenters are having a field day with the story–some are defending the pledges (the whole “boys will be boys” argument) while others are calling for the Yale chapter of DKE to be shut down.

And as we’ve seen from the recent Duke student’s Sex Thesis, college controversies can go viral in an instant and take on a life of their own–so this could just be the beginning.