‘A catastrophe’: Berkeley campus reacts to suspension of on-site social events

Panhellenic Council and Inter-Fraternity Council have suspended them until further notice

In light of recent sexual assault reports, shootings, and concern about campus safety, the Panhellenic Council and Inter-Fraternity Council have suspended future social events, including on game days.

Presidents and chapter officers of the campus Greek community received an email from PHC president Divya Thomas and IFC president Daniel Saedi, which communicated their decision to suspend on-site social activities until the councils could plan long term solutions at the Joint Social and Risk Management Roundtable on Saturday.

Many are glad that at least some action is being taken to keep students safe; in the past six months alone, there have been 61 reported sexual assaults in Berkeley, including around campus. Others, however, remain doubtful that the ban will have any real effect on the number of sexual assaults- college students will always find a way to party.

Anisha, 2nd year Cognitive Science major

“I’m really glad they did it. To be honest, I think it’s about time someone did something about all the violence. I don’t think it’s going to fix all the problems, but it’s definitely a good place to start.

“I want to be able to go out without worry about being drugged or hurt or assaulted.”

Samir, 3rd year Public Health major

“This is worse than when GBC stopped selling chicken strips. Just a catastrophe.”

Talia, 2nd year English major

“I didn’t know they could cancel game day, what am I supposed to do on my birthday now? I appreciate that they’re taking safety seriously, not sure how we’re gonna fix this though.”

Naomi Baru, 2nd year EECS major

“I think it was good and well timed. Given that it was a Friday game day, it’s not like as many people would have gone anyway so it wasn’t too disruptive to the social aspect of game day (which might have pissed off some frat boys) but it still showed that the PHC/IFC was doing something about it.

“If nothing else, it brings attention to the student body mostly because they can’t party anywhere for the weekend. I don’t think they intended it to be a publicity thing but I saw a lot of outlets writing how “Berkeley Greek community takes stand against sexual assault” which is good and all and we got publicity for it, now we just have to follow through on whatever reformations were decided on Saturday”.

Hannah, 2nd year English major

“I think it’s similar to how a parent might discipline their child for doing something totally inappropriate and in misconduct; if students at UC Berkeley are going to do things they shouldn’t be doing, they’re going to lose their privileges. It’s a due consequence, though not sufficient enough for a campus that still struggles with how to handle sexual assault.

“Taking away fun events will draw attention and perhaps anger other students, but it fails to properly address the real problem in the same way that a parent taking away their child’s toys as a behavioral management tactic fails to show the child why what they did was wrong.”

Midori Chen, 3rd year Gender and Women’s studies major

“That’s really fucking awesome. I remember in GWS 14 when we were talking about sexual assaults on campuses and someone made a broad sweeping generalization talking about how much Greek life sucks, and then this row of sorority girls in the back just raised their hands and started talking about all of the efforts they’ve put in to change Greek Life here, and they were very frank about acknowledging sexual assaults and problematic sociality, but it really struck me that these are people who are trying to change the system, and not just ‘Greek life sucks,’ and that was great to see”.

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