bs-n-giggles

Melon Drama

2011-06-03T02:33:00.000-07:00

By Giggles Anderson

How does anyone expect
a woman to hide her
melon-sized breasts?

Imagine throwing a cloth
over two cantaloupes
as they sit on a table.

Whether she wears large clothes,
body conscious frocks,
or formal business attire,
melon lovers will see her,
as an object of affection
or affliction.

Some are attracted
or distracted
by a woman
dressed like a man,
a nun, a librarian,
a nurse, or a hobo.

Those who are attracted
to a woman, or distracted by her,
simply because she is alive and
drawing breath.

There is no solution.

Black book

2011-06-03T02:18:00.000-07:00

By Giggles Anderson

Public institutions
and pathogens can create
public safety nightmares.

Clusters turning into plagues.

Like angry bugs lining up,
at the base of a tree.

A simple case of head lice,
the complex journey that is HIV.
With staph and TB stuck
somewhere in between.

Pathogens are making appointments
with the kids at school,
lawyers at the Courthouse,
and anyone with an opening in their schedule.

Touch Football

2011-06-03T02:08:00.000-07:00

By Giggles Anderson

Did you meet The Mumps
on your way home?

What about the stranger at the park
that you let hold the baby
for a few minutes?

The old friend who volunteers
at the local shelter?

The friendly cashier
at the grocery store?

The nice old lady from church
who gave you a ten-minute ride home,
with the a/c blasting
instead of letting fresh air
circulate from the windows?

Maybe you got lucky
and someone intercepted the pass.

Know the signals.

Premedicated

2011-06-03T01:57:00.000-07:00

By Giggles Anderson

America wants microwave results.

She wants to immediately correct
maladaptive behaviors
that took months to cultivate
and years to perfect.

A different approach?

Will before pill.
Still before ill.

Meditate.
Mediate.

Live within the pauses
of the breath.

Thick and Thin

2011-06-03T01:53:00.000-07:00

By Giggles Anderson

In the end,
our Society is bent
on fixing problems
in an instant.

The human body
does not work
that way.

Losing weight is about
changing ones mind and
one's lifestyle
to include
healthier responses
to whatever ails
the spirit.

Extreme fitness
will work for some,
but not for others.

Fat Fetish

2011-06-03T01:48:00.000-07:00

By Giggles Anderson

The outcome depends
on where a woman
carries her extra weight
and the fetishes of
the hiring officials.

Open Door Policy

2011-06-03T01:45:00.000-07:00

By Giggles Anderson

Is there a reason
that your Boss would
or should be touching
your feet?

The art of seduction
and the grooming process
for sexual misconduct
are sweater twins
with many similarities.

The working world must strive
to separate itself
from the social
and the private.

Customer Complaint

2011-06-03T01:07:00.000-07:00

By Giggles Anderson

A man called the telly station
to report his explosive frustration
with Charlie and his shenanigans.

The station called the lawyers,
the police, and the insurance company,
but not necessarily in that order.

Order was restored.
An arrest was made.

All threats are taken seriously.

Cross Bones

2011-06-03T00:47:00.000-07:00

Bikers and pedestrians
do not have the benefit
of the Volvo steel cage.

Impatient drivers
demand the right of way
and distracted drivers
demand the yield.

It is safer for
pedestrians and bikers to
jaywalk than to cross
the intersection of
Mangled Person
and Heavy Steel.

Better to let the car have the light
than to have your life.

Hacking Stack

2011-06-03T00:36:00.000-07:00

By Giggles Anderson

Hackers lurk
for months
even years
before making
themselves
known.

Creating mirrors.
Running parallel.

Collecting crumbs
of information
like ants
at a picnic.

Corporations
will never
be prepared.

There is
a BIG
disconnect
between
the Board
and
the Staff
regarding the
seriousness of
computing security.

Dead Weight

2011-06-02T21:46:00.000-07:00

By Giggles Anderson

There was a time
where the weight
of having killed
your passengers was
punishment enough.

Third Eye

2011-06-02T21:38:00.000-07:00

By Giggles Anderson

Disappear
in the walk-in
freezers,
coolers,
closets,
and any of
those zones that are free
from the camera.

Dance.
Duck.

Dilly and Dally
For tomorrow,
the new monitoring
system will be installed.

No places left to hide.

From Pillow to Port

2011-06-02T21:21:00.000-07:00

By Giggles Anderson

The trucking industry forgives
that drunken brawl
the vandalism of the bridge
and all that smack
shot into a favored vein.

The truck learns to love
the parent's nightmare
on a big bike.

The highways bend to respect
that young tyke who ran the town
as the Sheriff slept.

America thanks the drivers
who haul Our goods from
state to state.

Port to port.

There is life after
a series of bad choices.

The lucky ones find
themselves behind
the eighteen wheels
of a truck.

Prey

2011-06-02T21:08:00.001-07:00

By Giggles Anderson

Predators
will wreak havoc
on Our society
if we let them.

Couch Potato

2011-05-15T10:51:00.000-07:00

Soon
States will be in charge
of health care and
insurance companies
are all looking to cut costs
while encouraging customers
to take better care of themselves.

An natural outgrowth
Encouraging pain management
with yoga, meditation,
rest and exercises

As opposed to medicines.

Once people realize
their own ability
to control their pain
without the side effects,
long and short,
of medications
we will see a transformation

There are too many people
filling prescriptions
with no clue
as to daily damage
being exacted
on their renal system,
brains, etc.

Soon, the State
will start pouring
more monies into
psychotherapy, and
alternative medicines
as preventative care.

Soon, we will all be spending
more time on the couch!

Raising Cain

2011-05-15T10:36:00.000-07:00

Each state ought to mandate
parenting classes
for each parent.

Every parent should have
at least one course.

We all take a driving course.
Few cars last a lifetime.

Parenting is not a easy as one might think.

Six year old children are driving to the grocery store.
Teachers are taping children to chairs.
Children are finding themselves on trial for murder.

A set of instructions can not solve every problem,
but they would certainly help.

Currently, we are raising a generation
who feel entitled to a smorgasbord of things.

What about the hard work and discipline?

Helton Shelton

2011-05-15T10:06:00.000-07:00

A student used the facade of the building
to invite a fellow student to prom

After hours.
Without permission.
The girl accepted the invitation.

The school masters rejected
the manner of the invite.

Vandalism?
Romantic Gesture?

Liability.

Was this the type of behavior
that school officials were targeting
when they decided to ban certain rule breakers from the Prom?

Clearly, this kid is the trouble making sort
that kind that the school struggles
to discipline and control.

Or maybe not.

The Prom is a once in a lifetime event--
a true milestone,
which makes this punishment
inappropriate.

The Prom the last vestige
of a formal tradition of dating
in the US
where the parties buy clothing,
tickets, flowers, dinner,
take pictures,
meet parents
and get both
the curfew and the clothing approved.

Sadly, some of the kids
who become teen parents
have never endured
the formality of
"asking for a date"
as required for Prom.

An alternative punishment?
He could pick up litter around the school.
He could clean tables in the cafeteria.
He could sweep the halls.

He should be assigned an annoying activity
because his act subjected the school to liability.

What if he had fallen as he posted the message?
What if he got hurt while on campus without permission.
The world is not yet his oyster,
but his high school campus is like his second home.

Banning him from The Prom
keeps him from attending a public event
where he gets to behave as the Gentleman
raised by that community.

Traffic Ticket

2011-05-11T14:19:00.000-07:00

No ticket?
No laundry.

Someone is late for dinner.
Someone didn't come home last night.
Spouses and significant others think
they have done something wrong.

Love does not live in the house.
It is camped out
in the backseat
of the family car.

Bent over the passenger seat.

There is no love here.

Money moves from palm to palm.

Convenience and availability both have a price.
Find something to pawn.

This business model involves
exploitation and violence.

Pain for sale.
Age is inconsequential.
What is the profit margin?

There is plenty of violence
in the modern normalized workplace.

Retirement accounts are under assault
with no insurance for the battered and bruised.
Therapy is not covered under The Plan.

Wall Street is as dangerous as Main Street.

Souls are bankrupt and broken.
Disturbed and displaced.

Homeless.
Jobless.
Friendless.

Worried that the Worker
on the next block
is trying to take your spot.

No one is safe.

Human trafficking has littered
our shores and streets
with bodies for years.

The office is no different.

Caught in the Well

2011-05-11T14:03:00.000-07:00

We teach our kids
that only bad people
go to jail.

We forget sometimes
to mention that
well-educated,
well-dressed,
well-spoken
citizens are sent to jail
for a variety of reasons.

Making an inordinate amount of money
in a way that appears to subvert State regulations
can result in a prison stint.

Stuck in the Well
without a rope
or a bucket.

Wool Wearing Wolf

2011-05-11T13:53:00.000-07:00

Air and water
enable predators
who often look
like normal,
law abiding citizens.

Predators, whether human,
animal, insect, or plant are born
with the cunning ability
to camouflage themselves.

Predators are often high.
Functioning members of our society.

Children can not protect themselves
unless we stop pretending that
predators look like scary monsters.

Party Planning 101

2011-05-11T13:17:00.000-07:00

No one else
has thought
this far out
in advance.

It is much easier to plan
for the biggest party
for your Party
when one does not have
to be concerned
with pesky construction issues.

Run Tell That

2011-05-11T12:18:00.000-07:00

If you can't report
on the supply chain,
then report on the supply.

We are running out of components
We are running out of parts.

Our products will soon be bodies
waiting in line for hearts.

Totem Pole

2011-05-11T12:10:00.000-07:00

The export opinion:

Consolidating certain business units
means the Chief realizes
the import of having
complete control
over the tribe's
supply chain.

How?
Bow.
When?
Now.
Then?
Sell
more
cow!

Open Auditions

2011-05-11T11:26:00.000-07:00

New actors like
foreclosure
case managers
and paralawyers,
will be necessary
to address this crisis.

Bases Covered

2011-05-11T11:22:00.000-07:00

States extend grant monies
to State you
in exchange for reliable
data and statistics.

Conclusions
on which
to base
policy.

Day Train

2011-05-11T11:19:00.000-07:00

And this would be where
the federal government
invests in each state
in an attempt
to gather data
to be used
for its policy making.

To train students
who will become partners
in the supply chain,
we all have to develop
the curriculum
and training programs.

Like Air

2011-05-11T11:09:00.000-07:00

Because the old guard
still run the firms

They try and try
to bend the internet
to its will.

The networks make it clear.
content is off limits
viewers don't decide
when to watch what.

the backlash will be swift.

the consistent
and continuous
creation of content
has begun.

vehicles traveling outside
mainstream control.

like air,
this pipeline has
no gatekeeper

catch it if you can.

Old McDonald

2011-05-11T11:05:00.000-07:00

Pharma bought a
an acre or few
for a gazillion or two.

I was perplexed.

There was a business deal
a few months back
that gave me pause.

Turns out R&D is expensive.

The Dying Beedies

2011-05-11T11:03:00.000-07:00

Because I wondered
about the funding for this
when I saw it on 07/10.

Because strokes can be
a residual effect
of diabetes, which is
a common long term
side effect of
antipsychotic,
pain, and
heart medications.

Because the state
will be taking on
the burden of health care.

Because if you know
what the side effects
of long term use is,
then you can create
devices and solutions
including teaching
patients to cope
with the pain
called life.

Yes. 32 Unmarked Graves on the Campus.

2009-03-08T09:04:00.000-07:00

TALLAHASSEE
Black victim tells of beatings at Florida Panhandle school
Another former student of the Dozier School for Boys in Marianna comes forward to tell tales of abuse at the Panhandle institution.

BY MARY ELLEN KLAS
Herald/Times Tallahassee Bureau

TALLAHASSEE -- Charles Rambo saw news reports of beatings and abuse at the Dozier School for Boys in Marianna 50 years ago and knew exactly what they were talking about.

''I was there. I had personal experience,'' said Rambo, 67, a minister at the Christ the Lord Church in Atlanta.

He is now one of dozens of former students of the school who have come forward to tell state investigators their stories.

The state is trying to determine whether crimes were committed during the 1940s, '50s and '60s, when the school engaged in corporal punishment, and if so, what to do about it today. A class action suit in Pinellas County by 150 former students has been filed, and the lead lawyer said, ``It's growing every day.''

Rambo was 12 when he was arrested for jumping the fence of a Tallahassee swimming pool. He was sent to the Dozier School for 11 months in 1955. He said the brutal beatings he experienced there, used as routine discipline, still haunt him.

''I was 25 before I could sleep in the dark,'' Rambo said.

At a news conference on Friday, he recalled how ''six days a week,'' school officials would drive to the side of the school where black boys were segregated and -- at noon and at 4:30 p.m. -- collect those who were to be punished.

They were driven to the White House, the concrete block building on the white side of the school campus where punishment would be meted out.

Rambo said he was beaten once, for lying about using a curse word. He was forced to grasp the sides of a cot, then was beaten with a weighted leather razor strap -- two feet long, six inches wide and an inch thick -- for as many as 100 licks.

''You hold the bed while the punishment is being administered to you,'' he recalled.

Any instinctive attempt to protect yourself was punished, too.

''If you turn the bed and grab yourself, they start it all back over again,'' he said. They called it ``turning the bed loose.''

The memory is vivid, and haunting. ''And the scar tissue on the back of your behind and legs can take two to three weeks to calm down,'' he said.

Rambo came forward this week to tell his story to investigators at the Florida Department of Law Enforcement because, while many other plaintiffs have come forward, few have been black.

In October, the Florida Department of Juvenile Justice admitted that the abuses took place and apologized to a group of former students. In December, Gov. Charlie Crist ordered an investigation into the beatings and of the 32 unmarked graves on the black side of the school campus. And in January, 87 former students filed a lawsuit in Pinellas County Circuit Court.

Among the claims the plaintiffs -- now numbering 150 -- have made: Some boys were sodomized with a ''probing rod.'' Another died after being shoved into an industrial clothes dryer. A boy's arms and legs were tied to two trees while he was repeatedly kicked in the groin, and school employees placed bets on which of them could draw first blood during the beatings.

''If someone came into my office and told me this story, I wouldn't believe them, but it's the same story with some variation, no matter who you talk to, and it has to be true,'' said Thomas Masterson, the Pinellas County lawyer who filed the suit.

He said Rambo's story rings true as well. ''Most of the white people say they could see what was happening on the black side, and most of the white kids said the black kids got it much worse,'' he said.

The lawsuit names former Marianna reform school employees Troy Tidwell and Robert Curry as defendants, as well as four state departments, including the Department of Juvenile Justice.

Rambo has not joined the lawsuit, but he has hired an attorney, Fred Flowers of Tallahassee. He said he will await the FDLE investigation but wants ''a full accounting and disclosure of what happened'' and is also pursuing a claims bill to allow victims of the school and their heirs to be compensated.

Flowers said precedent was established when the governor and Legislature passed a claims bill to compensate victims of the massacre at Rosewood, the black town in Levy County that was destroyed by whites in a 1920s race riot.

''We want to see what the governor is finally going to do to try to make right a wrong,'' Flowers said.

Mary Ellen Klas can be reached at meklas@MiamiHerald.com.

Gender and Conformity in 2009

2009-02-22T11:33:00.000-08:00

Menace to Sorority
Posted by Amanda Hess
Feb. 18, 2009, at 10:00 am
Washington City Paper

From the time that Devin Alston-Smith became involved in George Washington University’s Zeta Phi Beta sorority, he made it clear that he was not your typical sorority sister. In spring 2008, Alston-Smith began what Zetas refer to as the “intake process.” He knew his sisters would have a lot to take in: He asked them to call him Devin instead of his legal name, Chanise. He told them he preferred male pronouns—”he” and “his” instead of “she” and “her.” At sorority events, he wore a button-down shirt and tie and a fedora over his long dreadlocked hair.

The sorority’s sisters were initially welcoming, friendly, and confused. At the initiation ceremony, all sisters were required to dress in head-to-toe white. Alston-Smith had white pants, shirt, and tie, but he didn’t have any white shoes, so one Zeta offered to buy him a pair. He told her he wore men’s shoes, size 6½. She returned with white women’s flats. “I tried to get a low heel,” the Zeta explained.

“That’s when I sort of knew that they didn’t really get it,” says Alston-Smith. He wore the women’s shoes anyway, the flats uncomfortable on his feet. “I felt degraded, like I was dressing in drag or something,” he says. “I know that all my signifiers, except for my clothes, indicate that I’m female. So I try to be really understanding.”

Alston-Smith had never intended to become anybody’s sister. “I was anti-sorority for a long time,” says Alston-Smith. “Then I joined Zeta.” During his sophomore year, Alston-Smith kept running into one senior Zeta around campus. She told him, “I’m a Zeta. You should come to our events and check us out,” he says. He did, and the historically black sorority’s commitment to “Service, Scholarship, Sisterhood, and Finer Womanhood” surprised Alston-Smith—he actually liked it. He had trouble getting his sisters to refer to him consistently with male pronouns, or truly understand what it meant to be transgender, but he knew they were making an effort. Only one Zeta, junior Vanessa White, appeared visibly uncomfortable with Alston-Smith’s presence. “A lot of the members were really nice and open individuals,” he says. “I felt like they were the most open sorority on campus.”

That spring, Zeta Phi Beta extended Alston-Smith an offer of membership into the sorority. At his campus debut as a Zeta, which the sorority calls a “coming out show,” Smith and his fellow inductee, or “line sister,” Shauna Butler, performed a step routine the two had choreographed for the audience. This time, the wardrobe was Alston-Smith’s choosing, down to the blue-and-white Converse shoes. The routine ended with Alston-Smith’s official “unveiling” in front of his fellow sisters, the sorority’s graduate chapter, his friends, and his mom. At the big reveal, the sorority president pulled the tape off of Alston-Smith’s backward hat, exposing the nickname his sisters had chosen for him: “The Liberator.”

Zeta Phi Beta, for all its inclusiveness, maintains a small presence at GW. The seniors who had welcomed Alston-Smith into Zeta’s fold graduated and moved on in May of 2008, leaving only four members: Alston-Smith, White, Butler, and Akilah Bledsoe. White had been elected chapter president. Alston-Smith hadn’t voted for her.

Over the summer, the sisters hung out regularly as friends, eating lunch together or planning step routines for the fall semester. During one choreography session for a sorority “Step and Stroll,” Alston-Smith saw how his new sorority sisters’ discomfort with his gender identity would be enforced. “We were learning new steps from an older [sister], and I was doing the moves differently,” says Alston-Smith. “One of the routines was to a Beyoncé song, ["Get Me Bodied"] and it involved a lot of feminine gestures. I was just tweaking them so I didn’t have to bend over really sexy, stuff like that,” he says. “They told me I had to do it—that we were going to look stupid if I didn’t.” Alston-Smith stopped dancing. “I’m not going to pop it like a girl,” he told them. According to Alston-Smith, they shot back: “You are a girl. You have to stop acting like a boy.”

It continued that way throughout the summer—friendly interactions would inevitably devolve into critiques of Alston-Smith’s clothes, his dance moves, “the way he was.” Gender pronouns were a particularly sore spot. “At first, everyone seemed accepting, and it seemed like it was something that they would work on,” says Alston-Smith. By the time the administration change was complete, it became clear that the resistance was more than just confusion. “I tried to compromise, because Vanessa says she doesn’t feel it’s morally right to call me by the male pronoun,” says Alston-Smith. “I said, ‘OK—don’t call me by any pronoun. Just refer to ‘Devin’ whenever you speak about me.’ But she just didn’t want to budge.”

When classes reconvened for the fall, it was time to show off all the summer sorority planning. Zeta’s first event of the fall semester was called “Sweetest Selections,” an evening where community members could learn about famous Zetas and munch on refreshments—”pastries and things like that,” says Alston-Smith. As preparation, Alston-Smith read up on his chosen Zeta: Harlem Renaissance writer Zora Neale Hurston. “She was a Zeta, but she was an outside-the-box Zeta,” says Alston-Smith. “She hung out with a bunch of GLBT people. She was a visionary for her time.”

White did some preparations of her own to make sure Alston-Smith didn’t appear too outside-the-box. Before the event, Alston-Smith says, she called to inform him that his men’s shoes would not be making an appearance. Instead, he was free to borrow another sister’s dress shoes—a “girl’s sort of shoe.” When Alston-Smith declined, he says White raised her voice, telling him that the sisters “have to look a certain way” because “interests,” or potential members, would be in attendance, and he wouldn’t want to “confuse them.” “She was screaming,” says Alston-Smith. “I couldn’t get a word in.” According to Alston-Smith, he broke into tears, and White hung up.

That freed the phone line for another sister, Bledsoe, to call Alston-Smith. “If you wear my shoes, then I’m gonna have to wear some shoes that I don’t like, and they’re gonna hurt my feet,” Alston-Smith recalls Bledsoe saying. “Get in line,” she told him, suggesting he buy his own sorority-appropriate shoes. According to Alston-Smith, Bledsoe then said she’d have to get off the phone before she was forced to say something that would hurt his feelings, and hung up.

Bledsoe’s feet were spared. At that point, Alston-Smith wasn’t too interested in slipping on another pair of women’s shoes, or regaling potential members with tales of great Zetas. Alston-Smith proved a no-show at the event, and the sorority’s graduate chapter placed one more call for good measure. “They told me that no matter what, I should have gone to the event,” says Alston-Smith.

The other sorority sisters spent the next few functions avoiding Alston-Smith completely. At one event, Alston-Smith stood by as White chatted up an “interest,” repeatedly referring to Alston-Smith with female pronouns in the process. “It was smug, the way she did it,” he says. “I gave her this look, like, What are you doing?” he says. After Alston-Smith corrected White in front of the interest, White pulled Alston-Smith aside and berated him for making the sorority look bad, he says. “Again, she said I was confusing them. She said, ‘Don’t do that. They’re going to think that men can join us.’”

Only a month into the new semester, White notified the sorority’s graduate chapter of the Zeta Phi Beta infighting and scheduled a meeting. Alston-Smith was prepared to talk about what he considered the sisters’ ongoing harassment and sent an e-mail to both chapters again explaining his pronoun preference and his choice’s protection under the D.C. Human Rights Act. White was prepared to talk about Alston-Smith’s repeated failure to cooperate. The sisters would be joined by advisers from the graduate chapter, including former graduate chapter president Yvette Jardine, an older professional who had been a Zeta since she was an undergraduate. “I was warned about her before I even met her,” says Alston-Smith. “She has a really firm belief system about what it means to be a Zeta.”

Alston-Smith came prepared for the meeting with pamphlets discussing basic GLBT and transgender issues. “They didn’t touch the handouts,” Alston-Smith says—Jardine wanted to do the talking. “She started saying that what I am didn’t fit into the mold of Zeta,” he says. “She told me that I should have known not to accept the membership. She said, ‘It’s an organization for women,’ and that they have a certain model for ‘woman’ that’s supposed to be a part of the organization.” When Alston-Smith told Jardine that continued harassment from the sisters could force the university to “take Zeta off of campus,” Alston-Smith says that Jardine responded, “Well, maybe we don’t want to be on this campus.” She then asked Alston-Smith repeatedly if he intended to pursue legal action.

When the sisters disbanded for a break, Alston-Smith and Jardine walked silently to the restrooms. Jardine entered the women’s bathroom; Alston-Smith used the men’s. When the sisters reconvened, Alston-Smith says, Jardine outed his bathroom habits. “Look, she went to the men’s bathroom,” Jardine said. The meeting was over.

Jardine says she can’t recall the specifics of the meeting, but says she would never wish the sorority off campus.

A week later, Alston-Smith received a letter stating that his Zeta Phi Beta membership had been deemed “inactive.” Alston-Smith was disqualified on less controversial sorority business: He had failed to turn in a transcript on time.

Alston-Smith’s place in Zeta Phi Beta is protected by a peculiar nexus of federal, District, and GW code. Federal law and GW’s Statement of Student Rights and Responsibilities allow social fraternal organizations to discriminate on the basis of sex. The D.C. Human Rights Act, however, prohibits discrimination on the basis of gender identity. So while a female-born trans student, like Alston-Smith, could conceivably be legally barred from participating in an all-male fraternity, the law protects him against discrimination from a female sorority—even though his gender identity is incongruous with the traditional definition of “sisterhood.”

Despite the legal back-up, when Alston-Smith brought his grievances to university police and administrators, he found he was navigating uncharted terrain. While GW’s rights and responsibilities statement promises that the university does not permit discrimination based on “sexual orientation or identity,” the Code of Student Conduct—a document that actually disciplines students for breaking that promise—includes no such language protecting transgender students.

University spokesperson Tracy Schario says the policy still covers trans students, as the university incorporates the D.C. Human Rights Act’s gender identity protection into its own. But the absence of the phrase “gender identity” can complicate the procedure of filing a discrimination claim with the university. As Alston-Smith’s grievance claim ascended the administrative ranks, he says he was told that a similar claim had never been presented to the university, that there wasn’t a clear category for that form of harassment, and that the university protected sorority sex discrimination. (Alston-Smith’s grievance claim is still being processed by the university).

GW’s Zeta Phi Beta undergraduate sorority members did not return requests for comment. In an interview with GW Hatchet Staff Writers Alli Hoff and Emily Cahn, White denied the harassment—while employing the female pronoun. “[Alston-Smith] chose not to participate by not turning in that transcript.…She made it clear she wanted nothing to do with us.” In an e-mail, Jardine seconded the denial. “The undergraduate chapter members knew that Devin/Chanise identified as a lesbian prior to joining,” Jardine wrote. “Devin/Chanise is not the first lesbian member of the organization. Zeta does not discriminate.” Even when sorority members continue to refer to Devin with female pronouns, Jardine says, it’s not harassment. “You try to remember, but sometimes you slip up. This is new territory for our sorority.”

When Alston-Smith stopped attending sorority events, he withdrew from other parts of his life as well. He began to skip classes. Instead, he would hole up, crying, in his dorm room. As the fall semester neared its end, he decided he couldn’t come back—he would take a leave of absence and spend the spring semester at home, in Connecticut. Before Alston-Smith left, he gathered all his Zeta paraphernalia and destroyed it. He ripped apart his letter jacket and scratched out the Zeta Phi Beta emblem on the sorority plaque. He smashed his paddle and tore up the keepsake boxes gifted to him by former sisters. He gathered the blue-and-white mess and placed it in a trash bag. On top, he wrote a note: “You took the liberty of ruining things for me. Now I am returning them to you. All my best, Devin.” He left the bag on White’s doorstep.

Jardine called the gesture a “vicious act of violence.” Zeta Phi Beta has filed a complaint against Alston-Smith with the university.

“It wasn’t a violent or a vicious act. It was a final cry of submission,” says Alston-Smith. “At that point, I had given up.”

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