Hello,
My name is Taylor Turkeltaub, and I am not (or at least I would not consider myself to be) a racist, a misogynist, a misandrist, a pervert, an anti-semite, a homophobe, a classist, an ethnocentrist, or a supremacist (did I miss anything?) beyond the nominal bit that exists, unavoidably, in us all (sorry to all of you who thought you were perfect, ego-less beings but this is true.)
ALSO, I go to Duke. (Gasp.) Yes, these two characteristics are not mutually exclusive in an individual. Though the media may portray the students of Duke otherwise, our school is actually filled with plenty of decent and even good people. Yes, there are plenty of people who fit one or some of the above rude descriptions. But the only reason why people who don’t go to Duke end up hearing about those unsavory people here on the national news is because so many good people go here as well.
What?
Yup. That may seem contrary, but it’s not. If there were no good people at this school, there would be no one to call out the bad people, or the good people misled into doing bad things. There would be no flyers plastered around campus with #racistrager slapped across the fronts, or with email clips inviting slutty nurses to Halloween parties, or with quotes from victims of campus rape who could not seek justice due to a reduced statue of limitations.
Duke is the university people love to hate because it is always in the news for very unflattering reasons. But it is far from the only college with these issues, or even close to the worst. I am originally from a town 15 minutes away from Arizona State University, the largest university in the country that is constantly ranked by Playboy as having the “hottest girls” and by various publications as being the top party school. Growing up I’d hear stories about all the grossly misogynistic activities that always happened on campus, but never about any sort of activism to counter them.
Not too long ago, my friend from Arizona was (very matter-of-factly) telling me about a campus party in which two guys “Eiffel Tower-ed” (Urban Dictionary this if you must) a grossly drunk girl in the middle of a frat kitchen packed with other partygoers, guys and girls, all taking videos on their cell phones. In contrast to my friend’s desensitized feelings toward the matter, I was aghast. It wasn’t that big of a deal by her, but I know here at Duke, people would be in an uproar and the incident would undoubtedly make national news, the responsible frat would be suspended, and the frat boys involved subject to sexual assault charges.
Which is as it absolutely should be. There is a correlation between the number of inappropriate activities you hear of occurring on college campuses, and the number that actually occur, but there is certainly no causation between the two. You hear about Duke scandals more than other school’s on the news, but I feel confident stating that we have a relatively lower incidence of inappropriate activities than many, many other colleges who rarely, if ever, make the news. Of course Duke does not get a free pass for inappropriate behavior just because we aren’t the worst college out there. Bad behavior, manifested through one incident or one thousand, needs to be addressed and dealt with.
I love my university and many of my fellow students, despite Duke’s many flaws and many of my less savory fellow students. I’m sick of this beautiful place and its beautiful people forced into being party to a bad reputation just because we have people on this campus who DO stick up for what it’s right, who will NOT sit back and watch injustice, and who will not then recount anecdotally to a friend over coffee an inappropriate incident they saw, yet chose not to do something about. I just hope that fear of more injury to Duke’s reputation won’t discourage these great leaders on campus to continue to do what it is they do best.