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Students from Swarthmore College sing at a sit-in at the Phi Psi fraternity home on Monday in Swarthmore, Pennsylvania. (AP)
For two years, Maya Henry regularly spent time in the two houses of Swarthmore College fraternity. Every week, the modest stone structures turned into drunken lairs, while party-goers piled into sweat-soaked rooms with cheap alcohol and danced all night on a soundtrack of the latest hit. of the Top 40.
Henry, however, has never attended these holidays by choice. She had a job to do.
"Most of the time, my job was to prevent sexual violence and to make sure no one was hurt," said Henry, now a junior, at the Washington Post. Aged 20, he is a member of Swarthmore's SwatTeam, a student-run organization that works to ensure the safety of events on public campuses where alcohol is served.
"I would run down the stairs that led to the bedroom we call the" attic of rapes "because I knew that there was only one woman there and one group brothers of fraternity, "said Henry.
The alleged reference to "attic for rape" is just one of the troubling details recently revealed about the culture within Pennsylvania Select College fraternities, which has been made public in internal documents disclosed in two campus publications. . The redacted versions of the documents, released earlier this month by Phoenix and Voices have since sparked strong protests among students, including a sit-in that began Saturday on campus west of Philadelphia.
Over the weekend, the growing outcry has pushed the directors to suspend any fraternity activity while waiting for the results of an investigation.
The 116 pages of documents would come from the "historical archives" of Swarthmore's chapter of Phi Kappa Psi, which is not affiliated nationally, and which contains the minutes of the meetings and details of the tasks related to the pledges. The documents contain graphic descriptions of members' sexual relations, including a reference to a "rape tunnel". They also describe their conversations about women, minority groups and sexual assault, which often included offensive language, such as homophobic and racial language. The documents chronicle activities between 2010 and 2016, the Phoenix reported.
"I absolutely condemn the language and actions described in the documents," Swarthmore President Valerie Smith said Monday in a statement. "The content of these pages is vulgar and deeply offensive to all of us. The racism, misogyny and homophobia described in these texts go against the values of the College and violate the student code of conduct and basic decency. "
But for many students, the content of the documents was not surprising.
"It confirms people's experiences," said Henry. "It confirms the stories."
Henry said the documents were difficult to read because of their "disturbance".
"It just reminded me of the increased anxiety I felt while working here, trying to protect my classmates and trying to protect myself," she said.
A number of these experiments, involving Phi Kappa Psi and the other college fraternity, Delta Upsilon, were published in a Tumblr blog that began in early April and titled "Why Should Swarthmore Fraternities Disappear?" 100 submissions from individuals whose identity has been kept anonymous. In first-hand and second-hand accounts, writers have described how they would have been assaulted at fraternity events or between members of members between 2015 and 2019. Other articles have described cases where members were homophobic, racist and sexist. (The names of fraternities and members were not included in the messages).
It was not long after the blog was published that the documents were leaked, said Morgin Goldberg, an elder, to The Post.
"We realized that together, it was an overwhelming account of fraternal violence and its wrongs," said 22-year-old Goldberg, one of the students who created the blog and participated in the organization. sit-in.
In a statement communicated to Facebook on April 17, current members of the Phi Kappa Psi chapter said that they "strongly condemn the language in the 2013 and 2014 notes, as they are not representative of who we are aujourd & # 39; hui ".
"All of our current brothers were in high school and college at the time of these unofficial reports, and none of us would have joined the organization if that had been the norm when we arrived at Swarthmore, "the statement said.
However, when Goldberg reviewed the leaked files and compared them to blog posts mentioning more recent events, she said that themes were starting to appear. Although jokes about a room in the fraternity house, known as "attic for rape," date back to 2013, people still write about the alleged "being assaulted in the bedroom or seeing their friends being assaulted." in the room, "she said.
The fraternity did not respond directly to the allegations of the blog. A statement from the national headquarters of Phi Kappa Psi said that although he has no affiliation with the group, "we were nevertheless shocked by their actions".
"From the first day of their membership, members learned to treat all people with dignity and respect," the statement said. Delta Upsilon did not respond to a request for comment late Monday.
Strong testimonials and documents, Goldberg said that she and other students had taken action earlier in April, asking the college to terminate its housing leases with fraternities. Demonstrations took place and meetings between administrators were disrupted. Meanwhile, former members of both fraternities drafted editorials in Phoenix calling on the college to remove chapters from the campus. The college also has a sorority.
Similar demands have been made against fraternities in the past, but "never showed up to actually get rid of those brothers," Goldberg said. Last year, a committee charged with evaluating campus culture recommended that a moratorium be imposed on homes, which Smith decided not to impose.
When it became clear to Goldberg and other student activists that their efforts this time were not yielding the desired results, she said that they had decided to make more efforts. .
On Saturday, a group of about 50 students "rushed" into Phi Kappa's Psi home, and the group quickly grew to more than 100 people, Goldberg said. The students took over inside and occupied the lawn outside the house, hanging banners manufactured so that it was written: "CLOSE THE & # 39; RAPE ATTIC. TIME 'S UP' and 'END THE FRATS'. protesters hung placards on the outside. A bed sheet painted with a spray of paint indicated "STILL A REMINDER OF HAVRE".
"The sit-in really took place after many different direct actions that seemed to not work, even if we put everything we had on the table," Goldberg said. "The sit-in was our way of saying," In fact, this space is ours. "
Students from Swarthmore College gather in front of the home of the Phi Kappa Psi fraternity during a sit-in Monday in Swarthmore, Pennsylvania (AP).
Hours after the start of the sit-in, Smith announced the suspension of the activities of the fraternity. She wrote that the directors received unredacted copies of the files and coordinated with an external investigator.
Henry said the documents were needed to get people such as administrators, teachers and friends of fraternity friends to be "moved to do something".
"We had irrefutable evidence that someone would take seriously," she said.
Despite the "victory", Goldberg said that the students intended to stay in place until the college met all their requirements. In addition to the termination of the lease, it had to dissolve the two fraternities and reassign the houses to groups historically marginalized by the institutions.
The goal, Henry said, is to see the houses "transform completely and radically." She added that it had already been suggested that buildings be turned into spaces for first-generation students or women belonging to a minority. and non-binary students. .
By the end of Monday, about 30 students were still inside the house and many were planning to stay overnight, told The Post Amal Haddad, a freshman involved in the protest. The 18-year-old said the sit-in had attracted support from the entire campus, with the exception of the fraternity members.
"It was really a community environment," she said. "It's really nice to see this space as what could be in the future."
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