Sorority Formal Shirt with Racist Image
 

http://www.ajc.com/news/news/nationa...t-shirt/nrNMP/

I wish that I could say that I'm shocked. I also wish that we weren't discussing this- again.

The ADPi chapter at Samford University(AL) is under fire for their sorority formal shirts. The shirt has a caricature of a black man eating watermelon.

What is (almost) worse about the situation, is that the university had told the sorority that the shirt would not be allowed when it was submitted. The sorority went ahead and printed it anyways.

There are some things here that don't add up. If the University rejected the shirt, then the Chapter president saying (at http://www.nydailynews.com/news/nati...icle-1.2636727 )

“In selecting the T-shirt, we failed to focus on the specific images in the design,” ADPi Samford chapter president Lauren Hammond said, adding the shirts will be destroyed.

“We are horrified by our oversight. Had we recognized what the design details depicted, we would never have purchased the shirts.”


The primary question to me is "Who designed the image on the shirt, some of the sisters or was it an image gotten from elsewhere"?

Except for the "University rejected it", I *could* see this happening by mistake, if the image for the t-shirt front that the sisters saw when selecting it was half the size or so...

Usually the images on shirts are designed by the company the shirt is purchased from. A lot of clip art/stock imagery is used, and a proof is put together and emailed to the T-shirt chair who sends it to the chapter for the girls to purchase. At least in my experience.

Pretty sure the image is stock...
 

In about 1 minute of looking for alabama map t-shirts on images.google, I found the following
http://www.zazzle.com/alabama_vintag...44407346706706
and
http://www.zazzle.com/alabama_vintag...34547141801545

Which I'm fairly sure is the same "vintage" map, just in monochrome. *But* I certainly would not have been able to tell if I hadn't seen the first image. So as I said, if the school did tell them, then the chapter screwed up *somewhat* significantly, but if not, then I'd let it go.

(somewhat of a lane swerve, I guess the equivalent racism toward asians would involve a rice bowl and chopsticks, no idea what food would be viewed that way for non-hispanic whites)

I was going to say the graphic looked like vintage maps that you would have on place mats at diners when we traveled by car in the 50's and 60's.

One way or another, it was a poor choice, and a bad decision to disregard the university's mandate. May they make much better decisions in the future.

What doesn't even make sense to me is...usually formal shirts go with the theme of the formal (Paris, come sail away, etc). What on earth was the theme of this formal? Our school is in the state of Alabama? Lazy and thoughtless on the part of the t-shirt chair and/or formal chair, without even getting to the racist imagery.

Not all formals are themed. My chapter's never were.

Unrelated to this specific issue- why do chapters order shirts for formal? You are wearing formal wear.... I feel like I am missing a piece of this puzzle

For some campuses the shirt is the souvenir, not something worn to the event. You buy one for you and one for your date. The dates like them as it shows they got an invite. The members like them because it is just another way to proudly wear letters and show how much fun it is to be in that organization.

"A spokesperson for Alpha Delta Pi said the chapter found the shirt design online and did not take part in creating or designing the questionable map of Alabama in any way.

The T-shirt’s design was rejected by the university as part of its approval process, but the shirts were printed anyways.

The shirt vendor acknowledged it failed to notify the sorority that the design had been rejected by the University, so the chapter did not know there was a problem with the design."

http://www.wtvm.com/story/31987289/s...ffensive-image

My kids graduated from Samford and both, plus SIL,said that Kappa chapter were rule followers to a T. They were very surprised that this chapter would risk everything over a T shirt and did not believe that was the case. This makes more sense.

@LaneSig, I'm sure there have been much worse shirts in Greek event history. I'm sure even the Sigma Chis have printed very inappropriate shirts over the years. I'm not saying it was right, the girls were definitely in bad taste, but I see that they were at the point of political correctness that they just said F it, the shirts are done, they are paid for, it is too late. It was offensive. There is no getting around that. I just know that at my chapter, we always had to ask ourselves about our image. Every single day. The ADPis weren't thinking this. If I wore a shirt too tight or a skirt too short, there were girls around me to tell me that it would look bad. We now live in a world where everyone is hyper sensitive and to survive as Greeks, we DO need to be concerned about image.

Courtney

One need not be hypersensitive to find that image in extremely poor taste.

And of course, Samford is a private institution, so under their rules, there may very well be hell to pay for going forward with an unapproved tshirt.

And no national organization is going to jeopardize their brand by allowing something like this to take place. There are plenty of reminders of our past when mostly white males curated pop culture insofar as what would be deemed appropriate and this sort of imagery--not just in the South--was not uncommon in the United States even when I was a child.

Tshirts can be funny things though. Often, as part of the shirt design process, you pretty much hire out all of the graphic design work, approve it, send the money and you receive a box of shirts. I could see how if that was the process here, one could easily miss this image being on the shirt. It sounds like there was a lot more to this though including a rejection from whatever university administrators is in charge of offensive shirts (this is why tuition is so high folks). It's worth noting we are almost always dealing with young folks who are prone to exercising bad judgment. I hope no one goes overboard in determining consequences.

Ahh, that makes much more sense! Thank you!

The chapter president's phrase "Horrified by our oversight" hopefully will go a long way toward helping with this.

Also, having Samford 's University President Andrew Westmoreland's letter on the issue. In order of "blame", he puts the T-shirt issuing company first, only *slightly* behind them the University itself, and then down the list, the women of the Alpha Delta Pi chapter. The advisors and ADPi National were involved pretty early as well.

http://www.wtvm.com/story/31988158/s...fensive-images

Given this, I expect the chapter will have no official punishment from *either* Alpha Delta Pi HQ nor Samford University. I could see the chapter working with the local NPHC for a history discussion or something similar, but nothing that would (for example) lead to them losing their House or penalties to Quota.

I understand that different campuses have different processes, but at the campus where I advise t-shirt design approval is between the chapters and the Greek Life office.

Is it common to have the vendor contacting the Greek Life (of Student Activities) office for approval and leaving the chapters out of it?

For the record, I make my guys send me the t-shirt design first for approval before they send it to Greek Life. I have told them that they'd rather have me catch something inappropriate first before the University catches it. It's worked well so far.

I can't imagine that NO ONE at the chapter saw the shirt design before ordering it. Someone had to decide who to order from and give them money. They really didn't check the design before paying for the shirts?

And it's more typical for at least the council and an advisor and maybe the Greek Life office to see the design before it goes out.

Their excuse is awfully implausible.

According to the article, one of the ways where the Samford President says that the University fell down is that they basically just sent a note rejecting the shirt to the Printing company and *didn't* contact the chapter to explain why it was bad. (And ADPi's licensing company approved the shirt!)

The Greek Life office *did* see the shirt, *rejected* the shirt, told the printing company it was rejected and the printing company mis-entered the shirt into its database as approved. The Greek Life office *didn't* contact the chapter to tell them there was a problem.

Whether or not it is an excuse, the *University* President considers the chapter to be the least at fault out of the University Greek Life Office, the Printer and the ADPi chapter.

Thank you for clarifying that!

At the same time, how did anyone at the chapter think that shirt was okay? I know part of our mission is to educate our members, but good grief... how naïve are these people?

Judging from the links naraht posted earlier in the thread, it is likely that the part of the image in question was just not noticed when viewed on a t-shirt. A regrettable oversight, as the chapter stated, not an endorsement of racially sensitive images as "okay."

I agree!

A statement from Samford University President Andrew Westmoreland, shared on the Alpha Delta Pi website.

Warning: it's several pages long. I have many thoughts about the content. Reader's Digest version: majority of blame is placed on vendor employee error in changing University's disapproval to approval status for t-shirt.

There's more to be said but you can form your own conclusions after reading it (if you choose to do so).

There is no dispute that the image was racially insensitive, and clearly a string of oversights occurred that must be corrected. It is good that the trail of oversights was investigated and formal apologies issued.

On the other hand, the president of Samford also seemed bent on creating unnecessary drama – this is hardly a campus “crisis” that should ruin the experience of all AA students at Samford. If I even wondered about the president’s interest in milking the PR angle, I didn’t when I read this in his letter:

"A couple of weeks ago, an African-American male, a retired executive, sat in my office and cried as he recounted the reception at which he was honored as he received the highest promotion of his career. The reception featured watermelon. None of the white executives noticed, but the moment deprived this black executive, attaining the pinnacle of a lifetime, of the joy of his accomplishments. Years later, the hurt was still deep enough that he could not conceal his emotions."

I have to wonder if Samford will eliminate watermelon from campus, now that it has been identified as a racially insensitive food by the president.

OMG I used a watermelon stamp on a letter today.

I'm sending my daughter with watermelon slices to a school picnic on Monday. O.o

I know Dr Westmoreland personally and he is a good man. Because I know him, I believe that he is sincere in what he wrote. It doesn't make sense that he would seek publicity in such a debacle-this is a lose/lose scenario all the way around. There is no advantage to having Samford's name associated with this. He did not write the letter to the NY Times or the Birmingham News. He wrote a letter to those affiliated with Samford. Samford is affiliated with the Baptist Church, hence the tone of the letter.

Know your American History
 

For those who may not fully understand why this t-shirt is a racial issue, here is an article that explains why the image on the ADPi t-shirt is seen as offensive.

http://www.theatlantic.com/national/...-trope/383529/


(DrPhil was so much better at explaining issues like this.)

I should not have assigned a motive to his letter or questioned his sincerity – I apologize as I do not know him.

I appreciate his transparency and explanation of the events, and I don’t think his dramatic letter was intended to fan any flames beneath the Greek community. I see that his very accomplished daughter was in a sorority at Samford. ;)

Though I still regard his letter as unnecessarily dramatic – even approaching silly at points (thinking of his descriptions focused on his feelings in the midst of this “crisis”). The incident was a regrettable, though unintentional, offense -- not a hate crime of campus “crisis” proportion. Those involved have been very apologetic, so hopefully those offended will be forgiving.

The watermelon anecdote was just over the dramatic top IMO. I agree that the t-shirt image was offensive, but following his comments about the larger problem being our overlooking symbols of racism -- should serving watermelon at a reception be so racially offensive and emotionally traumatizing?

Perhaps some of us should be more sensitive and aware of recognizing these symbols, while others of us should be less sensitive and slower to take offense.

Otherwise, I wonder what’s next. Wearing cotton? Seems ridiculous, but wearing cotton could be considered the symbolic equivalent of serving watermelon at a reception.

1) It's a great article.
2) It's not really your job to educate white people, so thank you for your efforts.

Lol, especially when this shows up under the thread where everyone is crying "discrimination" because Harvard isn't letting Greeks captain teams.

No, it's not my job to educate white people. Sadly though, these incidents of racial insensitivity by white people keep happening. That is why I title my thread 'Know your American History'.

As long as some of the participants in this thread were being glib about the issue you, DBB, had no comment. Once you and anyone who reads through this thread were given a perspective on the topic that differed from the glib attitude,now you want to act offended. :rolleyes:

In my opinion, the vast majority of "GC White folks" understand that the image is totally inappropriate.

QFT.

Sorry, I didn't mean to say that you SHOULDN'T educate people if you wish to.

I was responding to the parenthetical where you noted that you are doing a worse job than Dr. Phil and pointing out that anything you are doing is above and beyond what is reasonable when it comes to educating people who obviously have an internet connection. You provided a great read on the topic.

I haven't seen one person defend this image as potentially appropriate including the sorority whose shirt it was on. Some just want to go out of their way to be toxic whenever racial issues are brought up.

Neither have I. To be clear, when I first read KSUViolet's comment I thought she was making a broad sweeping generalization about the issue and about the opinions held

After reading it again, I'm thinking that she might have been referring to the comments by some posters making (in my opinion) snide comments about watermelon. If that is so, I am in agreement with her. However, with great respect to KSUViolet and her years on this board, I would never assume to speak for her- so I may be wrong about the whole thing.

I don't think anyone here would think that image was cool, but the thread veered toward watermelon and cotton being inherently racist.