OU SAE To Sue The University And Possibly President Boren
After an emergency meeting was reportedly held by OU SAE current members and alumni, the decision was reached to hire power attorney Stephen Jones to represent them in a suit against the University of Oklahoma and possibly President Boren. The basis for this suit is unfair characterization and exploitation of the chapter as a whole.
From KFOR:
The local chapter of Sigma Alpha Epsilon is planning to pursue legal action against the University of Oklahoma, and possibly OU President David Boren.
The group has hired high-profile attorney, Stephen Jones to represent them.
Jones told NewsChannel 4 the group is outraged over President Boren shutting down the fraternity house and branding all SAE members as racists and bigots.
Jones says the two students who were expelled because of the incident have apologized sincerely for their remarks, and now the incident is being exploited.
If you haven’t seen President Boren’s presser, of which much of SAE’s claim is in reference to, watch it below. He’s pretty salty..
[via KFOR]
Image via Google Earth
Bold strategy
11 years ago at 1:06 pmLet’s see if it pays off Cotton
11 years ago at 2:06 pmThere’s already a precedent of a fraternity successfully suing a school for being wrongfully kicked off campus for free speech. While I disagree with the chant, SAE should win this one.
11 years ago at 1:06 pmAmen
11 years ago at 1:09 pmIt would be hard for the university to win this one. Even if they say that SAE is a threat to students it would be hard to prove. Sadly they will win this one.
11 years ago at 1:09 pmYes, it’s extremely sad that a fraternity would win a case to protect its existence on campus and avoid being shut down as a result of an incident that only involved a few of its members. Truly tear-jerking
11 years ago at 1:25 pmIronically, this guy is “for freedom”
11 years ago at 12:08 pmYou do realize racism of any kind is considered a hate crime, and not free speech… i.e. denying entry to this “fraternity” based on racist beliefs is illegal, meaning the university has the right to shut them down if they found evidence of this
11 years ago at 2:06 pmThat is wildly inaccurate. First Amendment Law should be a required class for everyone.
11 years ago at 2:25 pmYou mean like when an all-black fraternity only accepts black people, or a Jewish fraternity only accepts Jewish people? You could argue that those are both hate crimes as well, due to exclusion and discrimination of potential members because they don’t fit into a certain racial group.
11 years ago at 2:33 pmWhat black fraternity are you referring to? There are kinds of folks in a lot of the chapters. And there are tons of white folks in traditionally black universities. I’ve seen them.
11 years ago at 7:13 pmMany schools, my own included, have cultural fraternities governed by a different administrative body than that of your typical fraternities. There are all black fraternities, but no explicitly all white fraternities.
11 years ago at 8:01 pmIt’s not a hate crime because white people are the ones being discriminated against.
11 years ago at 9:38 pmSo racism/discrimination against white people doesn’t matter? I find that to be absurd!
A hate crime is a usually violent, prejudice motivated crime that occurs when a perpetrator targets a victim because of his or her perceived membership in a certain social group. Examples of such groups include but are not limited to: ethnicity, gender identity, language, nationality, physical appearance, religion, sexual orientation.
How do white people not fit in that definition?
11 years ago at 12:03 amhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_African-American_Greek_and_fraternal_organizations
fucking geed
11 years ago at 11:35 pmAgain, what fraternity are you referring to? I attend an HBCU and we’ve had several white students. One of those students are currently a member of my fraternity. We don’t disreminate against white people, the only reason you may not see a white male in most of these historically black fraternities is because they simply aren’t interested in joining or majority are already legacies in another fraternity, while on the other hand, there are plenty of African American males who attend PWIs and are interested in joining one of your fraternities, but are denied (by some) because of their race, and if you honestly think that doesn’t happen anywhere (especially in the south), then you sir, are ignorant.
I’m not going to sit here and be a bigot and say “All white fraternities are full racists douchebags, and cry to mommy and daddy when they get exposed for showing their true colors.” That would be wrong of me to generalize a group of people based off of the action of a few, and I was raised way better than to have that type of mind set. Just like everyone else who saw the video I was in outrage, and my heart ached, because I have several friends (Caucasian) from My childhood who went off to become leaders in their prestigious Fraternites and at their University. Then I began to ask myself, all those times we went on vacation together, and the times my family have invited theirs over to dinner and sporting events, and vice versa; is this what they really think about me when they’re away at school and around their fraternity brothers? (Unfortunately, I will never know the answer) However, I remembered my values and how I was raised. It would be wrong of me to assume they’re racist off of a 9 second video, from a totally different fraternity, at a totally different school, in a totally different state.
However, I say all of that to say this. I agree, SAE should sue the school, not because of the words that were said by a few members, but to have the boys that weren’t involved put back on campus, and hopefully bring back a pledging process. I agree that it is morally wrong to punish an entire group for the actions of a few dumbasses, and if you look closely at the second video (the one with the guy clearly facing the camera with the microphone) you can see a brother behind him trying to grab the mic from him, so he can (what I assume) prevent his fellow brother from making an ass out of himself, franternity and his family. The two that were outed got what they deserved, and I’m sure there are a few more who should be delt with, and I do not pity them, but to punish the entire fraternity, it’s kinda messed up.
11 years ago at 12:49 amif this was shorter i might read it
11 years ago at 11:27 pmway tldr
11 years ago at 6:33 pmThen why are people, like Cornel West, and others who are on campus, and the internet not arrested or kicked off campus for their racist language and supposed crimes? We’ve got people out there who say “Kill whitey” or “Kill the cracker” or “Let’s kill the Jews”. Just recently at UCLA a girl was questioned if she could be “unbiased” on a panel because she is Jewish, yet the students on that panel are not expelled.
http://campusreform.org/?ID=6324
How would you react if this chant was from KAPsi, a black fraternity and they sang “There will never be a cracker KAPsi”? There’s a good chance that wouldn’t even be a blip on the radar for most people.
Jesse Jackson Sr. referred to Jews as “Hymies” and called NYC “Hymietown”. Why was he not arrested?
Want to know what’s also pretty sad? The murders of Channon Christian and Christopher Newsom (both white) were brutally raped and murdered, yet the crime was under-reported AND it’s not labeled as a hate crime. And every single one of the five people involved in the crime was black.
And here’s the real point: Hate speech is protected unless it brings imminent violence. Yes, the OU SAEs sang about lynching, but there was no clear threat, like them saying “We’re gonna go hang the next black guy we find.”
11 years ago at 3:23 pmWhat about all the people on OU campus hating on greek life. Vandalizing and acts of violence don’t constitute expulsion… But a privileged white kid drunkenly singing a song he probably doesn’t even soberly agree with constitutes him getting expelled and his chapter loosing its charter. Double fucking standards.
11 years ago at 9:41 pmMight shoulda taken 10 seconds to Google that one, hot shot. First result is the FBI’s hate crime page. It’ll fill you in on how unbelievably fucking retarded you are.
11 years ago at 4:53 pmYou do realize you have no idea what you’re talking about?
11 years ago at 9:06 amWhy did you put fraternity in quotes?
11 years ago at 6:56 pmThe original cease and desist order was issued by SAE, not by the university.
11 years ago at 7:38 amConsidering that their claim is based on “unfair characterization” and “exploitation” and not the First Amendment or Due Process clause, I’m not sure how they’ll win this. They’re basically suing for defamation, which requires that a lie be told about them. And I don’t think OU profited from the incident so both claims seem pretty weak in all honesty.
11 years ago at 9:34 amThis is a TbluffM by the SAE chapter. They are hoping that OU’s insurance company steps in and settles without a trial. An actual trial would be devastating for SAE. It would involve depositions from everyone in the chapter, which would result in written descriptions of rituals, the pledging process, underage drinking, adults providing alcohol to minors, the teaching of racist chants, and a host of other activities that no one wants publicized. If it went to trial, these depositions would become part of the public record, to be salivated over by every liberal media outlet in the country. No one really wants that.
11 years ago at 4:31 amI know a thing or two about winning court cases…SAE’s got this one
11 years ago at 1:07 pmFun tidbit: Stephen Jones ran against Boren for a senate seat, can’t wait to see the bad blood in this one
11 years ago at 1:08 pmFun tidbit #2: Jones was also the defense lawyer for Timothy McVeigh
11 years ago at 1:41 pmI don’t think that’s as fun.
11 years ago at 2:22 pmAnyone else think it seems like bad publicity to get involved with McVeigh’s lawyer? Especially in Oklahoma…
11 years ago at 4:50 pmThat’s all I was sayin’
11 years ago at 9:31 pmMcVeigh was nothing but a sheep dipped patsy convicted by the MSM in the court of public opinion long before his trial. If the MSM will use propaganda to smear the greek community like this ‘story’ then isn’t it possible that they haven’t been honest with us about other big “stories”. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qD2cK2tKN20
11 years ago at 9:06 pmIn other news, jet fuel can’t melt steel beams. ….ya fuckin weirdo
11 years ago at 9:37 pmYou should really go to work for MSNBC Dorno
11 years ago at 1:08 pmI mean, we can’t say we didn’t see this coming.
11 years ago at 1:09 pmAs much as id love to get behind this one, something that was drilled in my head during pledging was that as a brother, i represented something bigger than my individual self. Those 2 men’s names are meaningless. They are SAEs, and their actions put the organization which they belong to as a whole into a negative light. Wether its fair or not, its the reality of the situation. They really fucked up here.
11 years ago at 1:09 pmI can tell you from experience that if something like this happened to your house and you had nothing to do with it, you would be pissed that the media was unfairly labeling you and your entire house as something that you’re not. The guys who weren’t on the bus during that video are getting fucked more than anyone.
11 years ago at 1:39 pmBut here’s the thing: that chant was not spoken for the first time on that bus. Every brother in that chapter was aware of it, and they can’t deny it. At some point, a brother has to stand up and say that it’s not ok. No one did, successfully, at least, and this is what happened. They(SAE’s not on video) deserve to be students at OU, but this is exactly why I you lose your charter. They failed to fix something wrong in their house and now they suffer the consequences.
11 years ago at 1:54 pmChris Harrison. Are you making statements here based on facts? Like you know for a fact that EVERY brother was aware of this?
Goin against the status quo, and in this case, going against common sense, huh.
11 years ago at 6:38 amI don’t think those guys realize the magnitude of their fuck up, though. Greeks in different fraternities and sororities getting their houses/cars vandalized, athletes withdrawing their commitments to the university, lawsuits, etc. I can fully understand those two getting expelled as they should, but the fraternity as a whole deserves a chance to be heard.
11 years ago at 1:57 pmThe whole fucking point of joining a fraternity is that your brothers are your family. You choose what family to join, and you choose who to let into your family. If they didn’t want these guys representing them, they shouldn’t have given them bids. There’s a culture in that fraternity that made these guys think it was okay to start that chant. I’d bet my left nut this wasn’t an isolated incident, and if you thing otherwise you’re childishly naive.
11 years ago at 2:05 pmSAE will win this case without a doubt. Whoever’s making comments about how a fraternity should pick better brothers is an idiot. Rushing is comparable to speed-dating, no homo. If you’re rushing, you check out every house and if you’re an active member, tons of guys come to your house. You have a short time to decide which of the 50 or so guys out of the hundreds are gonna get bids Based on common sense, i don’t think there’s a single fraternity chapter in this country that specifically looks for white guys who favor “white supremacy” and who are racist. Typically you look for guys who you think would be a great fit for your house. Guys who can pull girls, guys who are balanced, guys who like the same things that your house likes, maybe jocks, maybe funny guys, maybe smart guys, maybe guys with a great personality, maybe guys who are great at networking, etc. It all depends on the particular house and chapter.
As a freshmen trying to get into the best fraternity, it wouldn’t make sense to talk about your bad qualities or disapproval of minorities. Rushing is like a job interview. You show up and you put your best self out there to get a bid to the house of your choice. I’m an SAE at SDSU and we have plenty of black guys in our house. San Diego has a fair amount of white people. SDSU is like 40% white. There’s a small percentage of black guys and guess what, the guys we liked got bids to join our house. They also got bids over white guys that we liked (we can only give out so many bids). I’ve been involved in the recruitment process for several years and I’ve never heard anyone talk about racism when attempting to befriend someone during rush week. If anything, if we’re talking about what white guys say about black guys, most of the white guys at our school MIGHT say a thing or two about how black guys are good at basketball or something, since our team is doing a lot better these days and guys like to talk about our basketball team, who has a lot of African American stars on the team. If anyone came to our house during rush week and said hey what’s up i’m a born fratstar, I pull chicks, I’m an All-CIF first-team division one football star, I have a 4.0, I own my own business, and oh yea, i’m not a big fan of the African American population, like they just bug me and I’m down to chant racist chants about them all day and all night long….we wouldn’t give that guy a bid because he’s an idiot.
All that being said, I doubt the OU SAE house knew those two guys, or group of guys, would decide to chant a racist chant drunkenly on a bus, when they decided to give them bids after getting to know them for a week or so during Recruitment. It’s hilarious to think that anybody would even try to begin to make the argument that the ENTIRE house could possibly be blamed to any degree or that they should have known better when they decided to give those guys bids.
11 years ago at 6:38 amwell, you just lost your left nut.
11 years ago at 6:42 amI can tell you for sure they had that chant drilled into their heads during pledgeship too. Regardless, let’s watch them win. They deserve to.
11 years ago at 1:55 pmAll of that is true, however, the reason for this is other people’s perceptions of Greek life as a whole. When a University athlete does something wrong or illegal you don’t see the whole team suffer, it is the one person who gets the punishment (minus anything against NCAA rules specifically, but even then the whole team isn’t branded as such). In a fraternity or sorority, that is flipped, and everyone gets in trouble for the deeds of one. I personally had to remove one of my pledge brothers when I was Vice President to avoid a similar situation, which would have been much more severe. We still had to dodge the local news vans, there were literally high speed chases to get away from these vans. Also, we couldn’t wear letters on campus for an entire semester. There are times when you have to separate yourself from a brother to protect the rest. That is the hardest decision a leader has to make. When they win and are allowed back on campus, the other two may even have a case with precedence on the ruling, and they may be able to return. Even if I would advise them to transfer. It’s about time a case that we all know should be in Greeks favor goes to court, we need a national win.
11 years ago at 2:04 pmIf they win the case it sets a precedent going into the future, I hope they destroy OU because it will set a long reaching standard for other chapters.
11 years ago at 4:38 pmThink about this for a second. There is probably 75-80 brothers in SAE OU chapter. Probably only 50 on the charter bus. I’ve listened to the video and I can guarantee not all 50 were singing. So let’s do half which would be 25. If 25. So 1/3 of your chapter doing something stupid drunk? That’s a typical Thursday night in my chapter.
11 years ago at 9:45 pmI think that members on the bus should be punished accordingly but not suspended; what they did was disgusting. As for the the fraternity members not involved, they are being unfairly targeted and should have the right to remain in the fraternity, so kudos to them for standing up for themselves.
11 years ago at 1:10 pmThis is exactly what I have been waiting to hear about. Thank you.
11 years ago at 1:10 pmGood for them, the University prematurely whipped its dick out and smacked SAE across the head without due process. This will be an easy victory.
11 years ago at 1:11 pmYeah, but in Boren’s defense if he didn’t do anything then he would be the one branded a racist as well. Hes just covering his own backside
11 years ago at 1:15 pm“Covering your own ass” is a poor excuse for doing something unconstitutional. Free speech is protected by the US Constitution, no matter how racist it is.
11 years ago at 1:52 pmAlso the amount of collateral damage he cause by eliminating the entire fraternity far outweighs the justice it served. The individuals deserve a punishment, not the organization.
11 years ago at 2:16 pmCovering your own ass, TFM.
11 years ago at 2:35 pmI’m not agreeing with it either. Im just calling it like I see it
11 years ago at 6:32 pm