Photo accompanying Gawker article

Well, what the Gawker publishes is not always exactly politically correct…  But this has a certain ring of truth to it…

Adam Weinstein’s U. of Alabama Greeks Win Fight For Their Right To Be Racist Dicks gives this account of the University Student Government Association’s recent lack of action:

Last summer, the University of Alabama campus was rocked by allegations that the fabled Greek scene was racist. Well, not allegations: The school’s all-white sororities rejected two women because they weren’t white. The school’s student Senate had a chance to fix things. But last week, they said “fuck it.”

A modest proposal encouraging Bama’s fraternities and sororities not to discriminate or segregate on the basis of race died in the student Senate last week—after it was sunk by senators with Greek sympathies, according to several of the bill’s sponsors.

The proposed resolution was tame as hell; after decrying the school’s longtime “stigma… regarding its legacy of segregation,” it stated that “the Senate supports the complete integration of all Greek letter fraternities and sororities at the University of Alabama, with respect to social diversity among its membership.”

In fairness to the University of Alabama’s racially fraught Greek organizations, they also seem to like beating and humiliating white students.

And plenty of other campuses house fraternities that were begun by unrepentant Southern whites during reconstruction, or who share their beginnings with a secret society that formed the basis for the Ku Klux Klan. As I write this, one frat on the local campus in Tallahassee is preparing for its annual “Old South” ball by remaking its house into a fort, complete with cannonades:

Old traditions die slowly in The Heart Of Dixie…

Jezebel covered the story too. In her story Bill Supporting Greek Integration Doesn’t Make It Through “Bama Kate Dries wrote:

The news that this resolution didn’t make it through the SGA is wholly unsurprising, given that UofA’s student government is known to be controlled by The Machine, a “secret” Greek organization. The Machine is made up of representatives from numerous fraternities and sororities. These individuals help decide what candidates for SGA should be endorsed and funded, thus ensuring that the Greek agenda has consistently strong majority representation on campus. As The Crimson White reported, 27 members of SGA “voted yes to keep the bill from being voted on, 5 no, and 2 voted present.” A few weeks ago, Alabama SGA’s Twitter account was hacked and tweets were sent out alleging that candidates were pay $5,000 to run.

If the bill is to move forward, it will have to be rewritten and reintroduced to the SGA next term. Multiple sponsors of the bill allege that it was not voted on because members of SGA felt it displayed a bias against Greek life; Speaker of the Senate Cole Adams told AL.com that there were issues with its “verbiage and intent” and that his fellow senators had “technical questions” about the resolution. Lead sponsor and writer of the resolution Katie Smith said the bill was laughed at when it was introduced, adding that she wrote it in the fall but did not introduce it then because the SGA said they “did not want to take a stand” on the issue of racial integration.

Considering how much drama the resolution has prompted, the content of it is incredibly uncontroversial. It does not attempt to force integration of any kind and only acknowledges that though Greek organizations “benefit the campus and community … there is a distinct and also unique portrayal of a number of Greek organizations at the University of Alabama as having membership defined on the basis of one’s race” which has “attracted unfavorable national attention” in a number of important national media outlets.