This article has been modified from its original version. Correction appended. During the fall of my freshman year, I found
By Maureen D. Connolly
Nov 9, 2005
This article has been modified from its original version. Correction appended.
During the fall of my freshman year, I found a message scrawled across
the stall at the Science Center bathroom: "I was raped at the Spee,
Spring 2002." While it made me vaguely uncomfortable, the anonymous
note didn’t stop me from continuing my weekend routine. Every Friday
and Saturday night, I would slap on some eyeliner, shove my feet into
stilettos, find my tightest jeans, and head out to Mt. Auburn Street.
My freshman clique and I would shiver on the steps while a club member
looked us up and down to see if we were hot enough to get in. Inside
we’d be handed alcohol by someone we usually didn’t know, dance or play
beer pong, and end up making out with a cute guy that we’d never
actually see during the daylight hours. Wooooh, college!
Right?
But then one weekend at the Phoenix, my roommate stumbles
upstairs with a guy who’s been handing her beers all night. When I ask
where she went, I am told that the upper level is for members only and
that I should stay downstairs. And during the spring of my first year,
after hooking up with a guy in the back room of the Spee, I find out
that his friend had been hiding and watching the whole time.
I’m sure a lot of guys reading this are thinking, “I would
never do something like that.” And maybe that is true. But when a
social venue is entirely run by men, where men control the space and
the alcohol, even the best intentions can result in some pretty
imbalanced situations.
By participating in this system, everyone in the clubs gives
tacit approval to gender inequity. Just as it would be hard to justify
joining a white-only club or a straight-only club, belonging to a club
that reinforces power imbalances is problematic. “But my friends and I
are nice guys” doesn’t cut it.
In the fall of my sophomore year, as my male friends were
being punched by the clubs, I was still standing on doorsteps, waiting
to be let in. I started to get tired of laughing at jokes that weren’t
that funny and batting my eyelashes at the guy standing at the door. I
would sit next to club members in section during the week and then have
to perpetually be their “guests” at parties on the weekend. I ended my
sophomore year still trying to wrap my mind around what exactly made me
so angry about my experiences as a woman at Harvard (and in the world).
Last year, I came back to school ready to take action. During
a drunken discussion of the lamer points of final clubs, a group of
friends and I decided to start SASSI-WOOF Clubs (Students Against Super
Sexist Institutions-We Oppose Oppressive Final Clubs). Our basic
mission was to create a campus free of final clubs.
After sending out an e-mail for our intro meeting, even we
were surprised by how many people were influenced by the club system.
At one extreme, friends told me I was being called an ugly ho bitch on
clubs lists. At the other extreme, girls were coming forward with
stories about being drugged at parties.
During that fall, SASSI received a lot of support. We held
campus-wide discussions, leafleted outside the clubs, contacted campus
media, did research on the clubs at City Hall, met with club
presidents, and spoke with the Office of Sexual Assault Prevention and
Response. But as we faced the task of trying to deconstruct a system
that has existed for over a century (including a time during which the
clubs received financial support from the University), it became clear
that, since we had no money of our own, the only way we to get rid of
the clubs was to convince guys to stop joining and people to stop
going.
That didn’t seem likely. It is never easy to give up power,
and as the months went by, it became increasingly clear that those who
had it weren’t looking to change. Over and over again, conversations
came to an impasse. Members refused to frame the discussion in terms of
gender inequities, and I refused to view the clubs as just a place to
hang out with buddies.
After a frustrating fall, I grew tired of living so close to a
system that revolved around gender discrimination, and I moved off
campus. I haven’t looked back since.
Now, in my senior year at Harvard, I must say I’ve actually
learned the most from the very clubs I want to deconstruct. Final clubs
have taught me that simply because they are male, my friends and
classmates deserve eight huge mansions in Harvard Square. Final clubs
have taught me that no matter how hard I work, I will never have access
to connections that my male friends do. They’ve taught me that I don’t
deserve a social space of my own in which I can feel truly safe.
They’ve taught me that if I want to get into someone else’s social
space, I better give a good blowjob.
Finally, final clubs have taught me that those who have power get to keep it and that it is time for me to stop complaining.
What worries me most is that, by living in the midst of this
discriminatory system, we’ve all implicitly been taught these lessons
during our time here. In the end, this isn’t just about a place to
party. This is about the fact that, because these clubs still exist,
the leaders of the future are being taught that it is acceptable to
deny women access to resources simply because they are women. And we
all know that that just isn’t okay.
CORRECTION: The print and original
online versions of the Nov. 9, 2005 magazine story "No Longer Knocking"
contained an incorrect reference to the Delphic Club. The club's
bathroom has a lock, and there is no evidence of an assault occurring
there.
The Crimson regrets the error.
