To the Editor:
We are writing to expose an atrocity which has continued unabated for the last three years. The Student Domestic Partnership Policy was passed in 1992 to give Queer students the right to live with their partners in an off-campus setting in much the same way that married straight people had been allowed to do for many years. Queer students fought long and hard for this, and Residential Life finally decided to implement it on the honor system, trusting that students would not abuse it. The only requirement was that two people sign an affidavit stating that they are in a committed relationship, and that if the law permitted, they would get married.
This policy was instituted in an attempt to give Queer students a more equal standing with that of their straight peers. It seems, however, that many Oberlin students are unable to respect this. This year, 44 student couples have DP status. How many of these are actually legitimate? Considering that the number of married couples on campus is three, and that the number of straight people greatly outnumbers the number of Queer people, it's safe to say that, at the very least, there are 78 - 80 people currently abusing this policy.
This may not seem like a very big deal, especially to those of you who are more concerned with getting off campus and off board than dealing with the rights of those annoying faggots and dykes. You may also be pleased to know that the total cost of this abuse exceeded $310,000 for this year alone, and that Res. Life was recently asked to cut $600,000 from their budget in order to stave off the structural deficit. They accomplished this both by cutting a number of student services and by firing some of their employees. The money wasted by the abuse of the DP policy surely could have helped retain some of the people who had to lose their jobs. But who cares? At least you don't have to eat in Dascomb!
Because of this disgrace, Res. Life has been forced to call the entire DP policy into question. And Queer people are now going to have to spend a great deal of time coming up with a viable solution so that certain self-centered students won't be able to flounce up to Sandy Hougland's office and sign a little form in complete disregard of the myriad issues involved.
Perhaps the greatest misfortune is the effect it is having on the entire Oberlin community. Not only is it putting Queer people very much on the defensive and causing Res. Life to treat the student body with skepticism and mistrust where they didn't before, but it has indirectly caused a number of people to lose their jobs. What sort of remark does this make on Oberlin? Some of our peers are obviously so wrapped up in the pursuit of their selfish desires that they are completely unaware of the extent to which they are hurting others in their community. With this in mind, we urge anyone who knows of a "couple" with an illegitimate Domestic Partnership to turn them in, either by bringing them up on judicial charges yourself, or by turning them in anonymously to any of us.
In the meantime, we will be attending meetings with Res. Life trying to deal with a problem we didn't create. We also urge any interested Queer people to contact us for information on how you can involve yourselves in the process of modifying the current policy.
Copyright © 1996, The Oberlin Review.
Volume 124, Number 24; May 10, 1996
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