Why co-ed fraternities?

Open letter to President Bennet and the Wesleyan Community:

I am writing to protest Wesleyan University’s policies as they relate to Fraternities, particularly Psi-Upsilon, especially regarding your insistence that Psi-Upsilon co-educate.

By insisting that Psi-Upsilon co-educate you are enforcing the kind of cultural imperialism I am very familiar with from my meeting with representatives of the Administration of the United States President, George W. Bush. I am saddened that in what is advertised as a bastion of liberalism you are in fact employing similar justifications for your stance as the British did when trying to ‘civilize’ Middle East populations in the 1920s.

It is ironic in the extreme that the statement “In a plural age, liberal education can no longer imply a single canon, nor should an educational institution prescribe values” (source: “Wesleyan Education for the Twenty-First Century”) is so prominent in the administrations mission. Yet, you are trying to prescribe a set of values that are by no means universal, in fact, they are not even shared by a majority of the entire Wesleyan community.

I ask you, what right do you have to impose a set of values and morals upon people that have freely decided to join an organization with over a century and a half of history and service to others behind it? Would you encourage Wesleyan students to take your behavior as an example and attempt to impose an ultimately narrow ‘American-liberal’ world-view on all of Africa? If not, then why are you doing so at Wesleyan?

Sincerely,
Charly Salonius-Pasternak