To the Editor:
The Nov. 10 Herald article confirming that a Brown student was given a “date-rape” drug at a fraternity party and the subsequent Janus Forum debate and Professor Lindsay Orchowski presentation on rape culture research create an unprecedented opportunity for the University to act decisively and intelligently to reduce sexual assault.
The University’s initial response to suspend the fraternity should be applauded. But it is an interim action. The University should suspend from campus the fraternity at which the date-rape drug-spiked alcohol was allegedly consumed until each of its current members has graduated — that is, for four years. Only when each member of a community is held responsible for the actions of the whole is there any hope that we will see the change we need on campus.
The University is struggling to implement criminal or quasi-criminal punishments against those students who engage in sexual assaults. But it would be simple for it to implement ethical standards of conduct that enhance the safety of its students. At a faculty and staff meeting with the Task Force on Sexual Assault, we were told that the University holds itself to a “higher standard” than the (mere) criminal law. In that spirit, a fraternity should not be permitted to look the other way when anyone allegedly takes advantage of one of its parties to disable a woman to engage in non-consensual sex. To end such conduct, we should hold each member of this group responsible.
Multi-year suspension of a fraternity is a serious penalty. But rape is serious and endemic on this and other campuses. Until we implement the simple principle of holding everyone to be his brother’s keeper, we cannot expect change. Fraternities know or should know what is happening at their sponsored events. Fraternities and the University should monitor conduct to ensure that minors are not drinking or serving alcohol and that no one is coming to prey on young women with date-rape drugs or alcohol.
Women are told that they should walk in pairs, go together to parties to look after each other. It’s time to impose the same principle on men. When an alleged assault grows out of apparent misconduct at a fraternity party, that fraternity should not remain a specially privileged member of the community. A multi-year suspension is a reasonable first step in ending the assaults on women on our campus.
Pamela Foa
Senior Fellow, Pembroke Center for Teaching and Research on Women
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