The national focus on Duke’s racist anti-Asian frat party may have subsided with Kappa Sigma’s suspension of the Duke fraternity pending an investigation.
But the situation is far from over.
Last week, the Asian Students Association and Asian-American Alliance filed a formal complaint with the university. They will meet this week, but the initial public response from the university was, to say the least, disappointing.
On NBCs TODAY, Larry Moneta, the vice president for student affairs, gave a particularly meek response to the situation, saying, “Acting boorish and foolish is not in and of itself a violation.”
Violation of what? Does Moneta need to cite chapter and verse here of some campus code? Couldn’t he just blast the racist activity as having no place in Duke’s campus life?
Instead, he gives a Caspar Milque-toasty meditation on boorishness.
The word “boorish” may cover racism, but not all boorishness is racist. (For example, vomiting on a party guest, a frat party tradition, is boorish but maybe not racist, unless one vomits on just particular guests.) But how can Duke get away with passing off the self-proclaimed “#racistrager” as mere boorishness?
