Delta Zeta At DePauw University Eliminates Women Who Are Overweight, Studious

Delta Zeta should be kicked off the campus. Period. They've just damaged the self-esteem of these young women.

Sorority Evictions Raise Issue of Looks and Bias

By SAM DILLON
Published: February 25, 2007

Andrew Hancock for The New York Times

GREENCASTLE, Ind. — When a psychology professor at DePauw University here surveyed students, they described one sorority as a group of “daddy’s little princesses” and another as “offbeat hippies.” The sisters of Delta Zeta were seen as “socially awkward.”

Women at DePauw University in Indiana who were either asked to leave the Delta Zeta house or resigned in protest hold a sorority photo.

Andrew Hancock for The New York Times

Elizabeth Haneline, who was among those evicted, said, “The Greek system hasn’t changed at all, but instead of racism, it’s image now.”

Worried that a negative stereotype of the sorority was contributing to a decline in membership that had left its Greek-columned house here half empty, Delta Zeta’s national officers interviewed 35 DePauw members in November, quizzing them about their dedication to recruitment. They judged 23 of the women insufficiently committed and later told them to vacate the sorority house.

The 23 members included every woman who was overweight. They also included the only Korean and Vietnamese members. The dozen students allowed to stay were slender and popular with fraternity men — conventionally pretty women the sorority hoped could attract new recruits. Six of the 12 were so infuriated they quit.

“Virtually everyone who didn’t fit a certain sorority member archetype was told to leave,” said Kate Holloway, a senior who withdrew from the chapter during its reorganization.

“I sensed the disrespect with which this was to be carried out and got fed up,” Ms. Holloway added. “I didn’t have room in my life for these women to come in and tell my sisters of three years that they weren’t needed.”

Ms. Holloway is not the only angry one. The reorganization has left a messy aftermath of recrimination and tears on this rural campus of 2,400 students, 50 miles southwest of Indianapolis.

The mass eviction battered the self-esteem of many of the former sorority members, and some withdrew from classes in depression. There have been student protests, outraged letters from alumni and parents, and a faculty petition calling the sorority’s action unethical.

DePauw’s president, Robert G. Bottoms, issued a two-page letter of reprimand to the sorority. In an interview in his office, Dr. Bottoms said he had been stunned by the sorority’s insensitivity.

“I had no hint they were going to disrupt the chapter with a membership reduction of this proportion in the middle of the year,” he said. “It’s been very upsetting.”

The president of Delta Zeta, which has its headquarters in Oxford, Ohio, and its other national officers declined to be interviewed. Responding by e-mail to questions, Cynthia Winslow Menges, the executive director, said the sorority had not evicted the 23 women, even though the national officers sent those women form letters that said: “The membership review team has recommended you for alumna status. Chapter members receiving alumnae status should plan to relocate from the chapter house no later than Jan. 29, 2007.”

Ms. Menges asserted that the women themselves had, in effect, made their own decisions to leave by demonstrating a lack of commitment to meet recruitment goals. The sorority paid each woman who left $300 to cover the difference between sorority and campus housing.

The sorority “is saddened that the isolated incident at DePauw has been mischaracterized,” Ms. Menges wrote. Asked for clarification, the sorority’s public relations representative e-mailed a statement saying its actions were aimed at the “enrichment of student life at DePauw.”

This is not the first time that the DePauw chapter of Delta Zeta has stirred controversy. In 1982, it attracted national attention when a black student was not allowed to join, provoking accusations of racial discrimination.

Earlier this month, an Alabama lawyer and several other DePauw alumni who graduated in 1970 described in a letter to The DePauw, the student newspaper, how Delta Zeta’s national leadership had tried unsuccessfully to block a young woman with a black father and a white mother from joining its DePauw chapter in 1967.

Despite those incidents, the chapter appears to have been home to a diverse community over the years, partly because it has attracted brainy women, including many science and math majors, as well as talented disabled women, without focusing as exclusively as some sororities on potential recruits’ sex appeal, former sorority members said.

Sorority Evictions Raise Issue of Looks and Bias
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Published: February 25, 2007
Correction Appended

(Page 2 of 2)

“I had a sister I could go to a bar with if I had boy problems,” said Erin Swisshelm, a junior biochemistry major who withdrew from the sorority in October. “I had a sister I could talk about religion with. I had a sister I could be nerdy about science with. That’s why I liked Delta Zeta, because I had all these amazing women around me.”

Enlarge This Image

Andrew Hancock for The New York Times
Rachel Pappas, former chapter secretary, discussing the events in class. At a rally, she said national leaders had misrepresented the truth.
But over the years DePauw students had attached a negative stereotype to the chapter, as evidenced by the survey that Pam Propsom, a psychology professor, conducts each year in her class. That image had hurt recruitment, and the national officers had repeatedly warned the chapter that unless its membership increased, the chapter could close.

At the start of the fall term the national office was especially determined to raise recruitment because 2009 is the 100th anniversary of the DePauw chapter’s founding. In September, Ms. Menges and Kathi Heatherly, a national vice president of the sorority, visited the chapter to announce a reorganization plan they said would include an interview with each woman about her commitment. The women were urged to look their best for the interviews.

The tone left four women so unsettled that they withdrew from the chapter almost immediately.

Robin Lamkin, a junior who is an editor at The DePauw and was one of the 23 women evicted, said many of her sisters bought new outfits and modeled them for each other before the interviews. Many women declared their willingness to recruit diligently, Ms. Lamkin said.

A few days after the interviews, national representatives took over the house to hold a recruiting event. They asked most members to stay upstairs in their rooms. To welcome freshmen downstairs, they assembled a team that included several of the women eventually asked to stay in the sorority, along with some slender women invited from the sorority’s chapter at Indiana University, Ms. Holloway said.

“They had these unassuming freshman girls downstairs with these plastic women from Indiana University, and 25 of my sisters hiding upstairs,” she said. “It was so fake, so completely dehumanized. I said, ‘This calls for a little joke.’ ”

Ms. Holloway put on a wig and some John Lennon rose-colored glasses, burst through the front door and skipped around singing, “Ooooh! Delta Zeta!” and other chants.

The face of one of the national representatives, she recalled, “was like I’d run over her puppy with my car.”

The national representatives announced their decisions in the form letters, delivered on Dec. 2, which said that Delta Zeta intended to increase membership to 95 by the 2009 anniversary, and that it would recruit using a “core group of women.”

Elizabeth Haneline, a senior computer science major who was among those evicted, returned to the house that afternoon and found some women in tears. Even the chapter’s president had been kicked out, Ms. Haneline said, while “other women who had done almost nothing for the chapter were asked to stay.”

Six of the 12 women who were asked to stay left the sorority, including Joanna Kieschnick, a sophomore majoring in English literature. “They said, ‘You’re not good enough’ to so many people who have put their heart and soul into this chapter that I can’t stay,” she said.

In the months since, Cynthia Babington, DePauw’s dean of students, has fielded angry calls from parents, she said. Robert Hershberger, chairman of the modern languages department, circulated the faculty petition; 55 professors signed it.

“We were especially troubled that the women they expelled were less about image and more about academic achievement and social service,” Dr. Hershberger said.

During rush activities this month, 11 first-year students accepted invitations to join Delta Zeta, but only three have sought membership.

On Feb. 2, Rachel Pappas, a junior who is the chapter’s former secretary, printed 200 posters calling on students to gather that afternoon at the student union. About 50 students showed up and heard Ms. Pappas say the sorority’s national leaders had misrepresented the truth when they asserted they had evicted women for lack of commitment.

“The injustice of the lies,” she said, “is contemptible.”

Ellen DeGeneres Gives Martin Scorsese A Script At The Academy Awards

This is absolutely funny. I don't know if it was staged or spontaineous, but it made me laugh out loud.

Kennedy Insider Arthur Schlesinger Dies at 89 - AP

John Kenneth Galbraith, Arthur Schlesinger, representatives of a grand era when Government worked.

Kennedy Insider Arthur Schlesinger Dies at 89
HILLEL ITALIE | AP | March 1, 2007 10:31 AM EST

Schlesinger was dining with family members in Manhattan on Wednesday when he suffered a heart attack, his son Stephen said. He died at New York Downtown Hospital.

Schlesinger was among the most prominent historians of his time, widely respected as learned and readable, with a panoramic vision of American culture and politics. He received a National Book Award for "Robert Kennedy and His Times" and a National Book Award and a Pulitzer for "A Thousand Days," his memoir/chronicle of President Kennedy's administration. He also won a Pulitzer, in 1946, for "The Age of Jackson," his landmark chronicle of Andrew Jackson's administration.

"(He had) enormous stamina and a kind of energy and drive which most people don't have, and it kept him going, all the way through his final hours," Stephen Schlesinger said early Thursday. "He never stopped writing, he never stopped participating in public affairs, he never stopped having his views about politics and his love of this nation."

With his bow ties and horn-rimmed glasses, Schlesinger seemed the very image of a reserved, tweedy scholar. But he was an assured member of the so-called Eastern elite, friendly with everyone from Mary McCarthy to Katharine Graham and enough of a sport to swim fully clothed in the pool of then-Attorney General Robert Kennedy.

He was a longtime confidant of the Kennedys, a fellow Harvard man who served in President Kennedy's administration and was often criticized for idealizing the family, especially for not mentioning the president's extramarital affairs.

"At no point in my experience did his preoccupation with women _ apart from Caroline crawling around the Oval Office _ interfere with his conduct of the public business," Schlesinger later wrote.

Liberalism declined in his lifetime to the point where politicians feared using the word, but Schlesinger's opinions remained liberal, and influential, whether old ones on the "imperial presidency," or newer ones on the Iraq war. For both historians and Democratic officials, he was a kind of professor emeritus, valued for his professional knowledge and for his personal past.

"Arthur was a trusted friend and loyal advisor to President Kennedy, and a wonderful friend to me and to all of us in the Kennedy family," Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, D-Mass., said in a statement. "I will miss him terribly, but his contributions to this country will live on."

A native of Columbus, Ohio, and the son of a prominent historian, he was born Arthur Bancroft Schlesinger Jr., but later gave himself his father's middle name, Meier. Family friends included James Thurber, historian Charles A. Beard and future Supreme Court justice Felix Frankfurter.

Schlesinger attended Phillips Exeter Academy and in 1938 graduated summa cum laude from Harvard University. During World War II, Schlesinger drafted some statements for President Roosevelt and served as an intelligence analyst for the Office of Strategic Services, forerunner to the CIA.

Schlesinger emerged as a historian with "The Age of Jackson." Published in 1945, when he was just 27, the book offered a new, class-based interpretation of the Jackson administration, destroying the old myth that the country was once an egalitarian paradise. The book remained influential despite eventual criticism _ even by Schlesinger _ for overlooking Jackson's appeasement of slavery and his harsh treatment of Indians.

Schlesinger was deeply involved with the Democratic Party, and even when writing about the past he minded the present. "The Age of Jackson," for instance, was completed during the presidency of Franklin Roosevelt and its characterization of President Jackson as a great 19th century populist was an acknowledged defense of Roosevelt and the New Deal.

Like many liberals of the 1940s, Schlesinger was also trying to reconcile support of the New Deal to the start of the Cold War. He responded by condemning both the far right and the far left, any system that denied the "perpetual tension" of a dynamic democracy. "World without conflict is the world of fantasy," he wrote in "The Age of Jackson."

In 1946, Schlesinger helped found Americans for Democratic Action, a leading organization of anti-communist liberals. Three years later, he published the influential "The Vital Center," which advocated a liberal domestic policy and anti-communist foreign policy. The book's title became a common political phrase, still in use decades later, and Schlesinger's call for defending American ideals abroad was endlessly revived as Democrats debated U.S. involvement in countries from Bosnia to Iraq.

In the 1950s, Schlesinger became increasingly involved in electoral politics, supporting Adlai Stevenson, the erudite Illinois governor and two-time loser to Dwight Eisenhower for the presidency. In 1960, the historian switched his loyalty to Kennedy, even as he acknowledged that Stevenson was a "much richer, more thoughtful, more creative person."

Liberals were wary of Kennedy, but Schlesinger, tired of Stevenson's dreamy detachment, was drawn to Kennedy's "cool, measured, intelligent concern." Over time, he came to embody Schlesinger's ideal for a head of state: charismatic but not dogmatic; progressive yet practical; a realist, he once observed, brilliantly disguised as a romantic.

Kennedy appointed the Schlesinger a special assistant, an unofficial "court philosopher" of symbolic, if not practical power. The high-minded historian was soon trapped in the tangle of superpower politics: the Bay of Pigs invasion in 1961, the disastrous attempt to overthrow Cuban leader Fidel Castro.

Schlesinger was opposed to the plan, he later wrote, but acknowledged helping the administration suppress a pre-invasion story by The New Republic that correctly reported the U.S. was training Cuban mercenaries. Had the press not cooperated, it might "have spared the country a disaster," a regretful Schlesinger recalled.

His time in government was brief. Kennedy was assassinated in 1963, and the historian soon left the administration of his successor, Lyndon Johnson. ("With Kennedy gone, it was no longer exhilarating," Schlesinger explained). Schlesinger then supported Robert Kennedy's brief, tragic 1968 campaign.

Being a liberal, Schlesinger once observed, means regarding man as "neither brute nor angel." Whether discussing the Kennedys, Vietnam or the power of the presidency, Schlesinger sought moderation, the middle course. He blamed the Vietnam War on the moral extremism of the right and left and worried that the executive branch had become "imperial," calling for a "strong presidency within the Constitution." He saw American history itself as a continuing "cycle" between liberal and conservative power.

In 1998, Schlesinger opposed Republican-led attempts to have President Clinton removed from office, and he later criticized President George W. Bush for his doctrine of "preventive war," saying "I think the whole notion of America as the world's judge, jury and executioner is a tragically mistaken notion."

His works included "The Age of Roosevelt," an acclaimed series about FDR that he abandoned after joining the Kennedy administration but attempted to revive late in life; and "The Disuniting of America," a controversial text which warned a "cult of ethnicity" could reduce the country to isolated factions. To the amusement of President Kennedy, Schlesinger also wrote film criticism for Vogue and other publications.

Schlesinger had six children _ four from his first marriage, to the author Marian Cannon, and two from his second, to Alexandra Emmet.

Video - San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom's Speech At February 8th 2007 Fox Sports Luncheon

Just after a bad PR period where San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom admitted that he slept with the wife of a friend and co-worker and then claimed he had a drinking problem, the Mayor gave a great speech before the Fox Sports Bay Area Baseball Season Kickoff Luncheon on Treasure Island February 8th.

I'm a regular attendee at this function, which this year featured an appearance by MLB Commissioner Bud Selig. But this year, I decided to set up a camcorder and tripod and just let it run while I ate my lunch.

The Mayor gave a general talk, but couldn't resist taking a swipe at the San Francisco 49ers when he said that he'd give Niners tickets in place of MLB All Star Game tickets because he only had one All Star Game ticket for 300 requests.

You can't blame Gavin for the joke considering how Niners owner John York had been treating him.

Here's the video:



Also see the video of MLB Commissioner Bud Selig's speech with a click here.

On Radio Show, Norm Chow Criticized Lane Kiffin's Play Calling At USC - Orange County Register

This article has not been widely reported, but is worth reading in light of the Raiders hiring of Kiffin as head coach. Note that Chow says that DeWayne Walker, a black coach and the UCLA Defensive Coordinator, dismantled the USC offense. Makes you wonder why the Raiders didn't talk to him rather than select the underqualified Kiffin..

Chow praises UCLA's Walker, criticizes USC's play-calling
USC football notes: Norm Chow takes a small shot at USC's offensive coaches.

By MARK SAXON
The Orange County Register

LOS ANGELES – Former USC offensive coordinator Norm Chow took a shot at the current play-calling tandem of Lane Kiffin and Steve Sarkisian in an appearance on a Southern California radio show Tuesday.
"I know DeWayne Walker may be better than both of those guys," Chow said on KLAC/570. "DeWayne Walker is a heck of a football coach, which is why I wasn't too surprised he did what he did at UCLA."
Chow worked with both Kiffin and Walker at USC in 2001. Walker's UCLA defense largely dismantled the USC offense in a 13-9 Trojans loss early this month.
Kiffin said Chow's words didn't bother him much.
"Obviously, I worked with the guy for four years and DeWayne for a year, but what someone says about you really has nothing to do with how you go about your work every day," Kiffin said.
USC's play-calling was criticized at times this year, never more than after the UCLA loss. Kiffin points out that the Trojans averaged 30.3 points per game after losing Heisman Trophy winners Reggie Bush and Matt Leinart, plus LenDale White, an NFL tight end and three starting offensive linemen.
USC was third in the conference in scoring behind Cal and Oregon. The Trojans had the same number of turnovers as in 2005 and two fewer sacks.
"I feel very proud of these players," Kiffin said.
GRIFFEN COMMITS
USC's biggest recruiting commitment so far this year might have come Wednesday, when Avondale, Ariz., defensive end Everson Griffen announced he would attend USC instead of Michigan or Notre Dame. Both Kiffin and Coach Pete Carroll had visited Griffen, and the coaches made the 6-foot-4, 265-pound athlete their top priority.
Some USC coaches think Griffen is the best player they have yet recruited. The Trojans are working on four consecutive highly ranked classes. Griffen ran the 40 in 4.55 seconds.
USC also has a commitment from Tucson, Ariz., offensive lineman Kristofer O'Dowd, meaning it snatched two top recruits from the back yards of conference rivals Arizona and Arizona State.
NOTES
Freshman safety Antwine Perez has filed paperwork to transfer and has left the team, Carroll said. Perez is back home in New Jersey, and there are reports he is trying to transfer to Minnesota.
Freshman Taylor Mays was picked to start ahead of Perez, who also was blocked by sophomores Kevin Ellison and Mozique McCurtis.
Carroll spoke with both Perez and members of his family.
"He's looking for a better opportunity to play," Carroll said. ...
Mays was wearing a cast on a swollen hand Wednesday and was scheduled to have precautionary X-rays. Carroll said he should be OK. ...
Junior defensive end Lawrence Jackson said his decision to return for his senior year might have been different if he hadn't gone the first eight games of this season without a sack.
"It could have been different, but it didn't happen," Jackson said.