Georgetown University’s Newspaper of Record since 1920

The Hoya

Georgetown University’s Newspaper of Record since 1920

The Hoya

Georgetown University’s Newspaper of Record since 1920

The Hoya

A Year of Pain and Progress for LGBTQ Georgetown

From hate crime to “Hate Free,” it was a rollercoaster year for Georgetown’s LGBTQ community. After the events of fall 2009 caused some to doubt whether the university had progressed as far as had been thought, a group of passionate students fought to redefine life on the Hilltop for those who felt unsafe and unseen.

Flashback

Everything changed for Georgetown’s gay community in the fall of 2007 – or so it seemed.

That semester, two students were targeted in anti-gay incidents: one was reportedly assaulted near campus by men shouting slurs, while another was shoved in a similar incident a month later.

These reports prompted an intense push for recognition by LGBTQ students. In Red Square and the office of the university president, participants in the Out For Change campaign petitioned the administration for attention and action.

They were successful. University President John J. DeGioia committed to ensuring that campus was informed more quickly of possible hate crimes, dedicated administrators to meet the needs of gay students and agreed to open a resource center for LGBTQ students. The students behind Out For Change achieved their foremost goal on Aug. 26, 2008, when the center opened.

“This is just a huge victory for us,” GU Pride Co-President Scott Chessare (SFS ’10) said after DeGioia acquiesced to student demands in October 2007. “I don’t think we could be any more happy or thrilled than we are right now.”

It looked like Georgetown’s often tense relationship with its LGBTQ community had turned a corner. “It seemed that things had gotten better,” Lauren Cucarola (COL ’10) said. “It seemed like things were working.”

Déjà Vu

But this past fall, the safety of LGBTQ students at Georgetown returned to the forefront of campus discussion. Over the course of two weeks, a rash of anti-gay incidents seized the Hilltop’s attention.

On Oct. 27, two men allegedly assaulted a female student wearing a pro-gay rights shirt on Canal Road; the men made comments about her perceived sexual orientation before striking her. On Nov. 1, a student was reportedly physically assaulted near the intersection of 36th and N Streets by an assailant who used anti-gay language.

On Nov. 2, LGBTQ Resource Center Director Sivagami Subbaraman found a note containing a slur (which, she said, was directed at her) fixed to the door of the center’s office. On Nov. 11, graffiti containing anti-gay language was discovered in Copley Hall.

The string of “bias-related incidents,” as DPS referred to them, provoked surprise and outrage on campus. “Everyone’s response was, `I thought this was over,'” Cucarola said.

Chessare said he saw parallels to the events of 2007. “What we saw in 2007 is happening again,” he said in November. “Clearly, after two years and the creation of the LGBTQ Resource Center, we haven’t solved the problem.”

“The creation of the resource center wasn’t the end of the issue,” Carter Lavin (SFS ’10) said. “It was the end of the university’s negligence.”

A Community Mobilizes

As in 2007, members and supporters of the LGBTQ community responded quickly and publicly.

On Oct. 30, about 50 students gathered in Red Square for a rally; two days later, after news of the second assault broke, Lavin organized a “flash rally” that took place in Red Square.

“Hate crimes are ridiculous / my Georgetown is better than this,” students chanted as they formed a circle at dusk. The rally ended with a brief march and was followed by a GU Pride meeting at which students discussed steps to ensure the safety of gay students on and near campus.

On Nov. 2, over 150 students, faculty and administrators descended on Red Square for an evening vigil, which featured a visit by a representative of Gay Men and Lesbians Opposing Violence, a D.C. support organization, as well as Jewish and Catholic prayers.

Following the events of late October and November, students formed what Cucarola called an “unofficial working group” to recommend ways for the university to make students safer. Lavin, who was part of this group, stressed that safety – for gay and straight students alike – was the key issue.

“The university needs to take student security a lot more seriously. . There are infrastructural changes that the university could make,” he said. According to Lavin, wage increases for DPS officers (which came to pass in February), heightened neighborhood patrols and greater student awareness were priorities of students in the working group.

Lavin said he has seen improvement. “I’ve seen evidence that the general security problem is becoming more obvious to the student population,” he said.

Come Together

Perhaps the most visible response to the events of the fall came in March, when an unofficial group, Hate Free Georgetown, spearheaded a week of activities to promote unity and respect on campus. If you visited campus this spring, chances are you caught sight of the group’s logo – the Georgetown “G” circumscribing a peace sign – at some point.

Organized by Nomadic Theatre members Joshua Goode (COL ’10), Cucarola and a handful of others, Hate Free Georgetown Week included the distribution of flyers and a petition, an interfaith discussion, a lecture by Fr. Rick Curry, S.J., and a Georgetown University Grilling Society barbecue.

The week sought to promote understanding on campus among different groups, according to Cucarola. “We wanted to do something that could change the culture,” she said.

“[The week] was a response to the attacks in the fall, but it wasn’t just for LGBTQ protection. . It was for respect from every member of this campus to everyone on this campus,” Goode said.

Goode emphasized Hate Free Georgetown’s efforts to engage the entire community by enlisting a number of campus institutions for support. The Corp, the Georgetown University Student Association, Nomadic Theatre, GU Pride and the Diversity Action Council contributed funding.

This support from the broader community suggests Hate Free Georgetown may be a sustainable enterprise, according to Goode and Cucarola.

“We’d definitely like to see it continue,” Cucarola said. “Now we know it can be done.”

“I don’t think we do enough to dispel the misconceptions we have about campus,” Goode said.

Still, Lavin said, Georgetown has more to learn in the wake of the fall’s incidents. “Yes, you can still be Catholic and yes, you can still care about your LGBTQ students,” he said.

Only with a strong commitment on campus can students – of all backgrounds – feel safe, Lavin said.

Only with the sorts of efforts that followed those difficult weeks in October and November can Georgetown ensure that history does not repeat itself again.

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