One consequence of a more diverse student body at the College has been an increase in episodes of friction between the different racial, ethnic and religious groups that comprise the Dartmouth Community. Asian-Americans on campus have not enjoyed immunity from the intolerance experienced by their peers of other minority backgrounds.
Controversy comparable only to that incited by recent revelations of Zeta Psi "sex papers" simultaneously struck two Greek houses in late 1995 and early 1996, and once again the issues at stake were race and tolerance at Dartmouth.
An allegedly racist and misogynist poem read at a Summer meeting of Beta Theta Pi fraternity and an Alpha Chi Alpha pledge skit featuring a "post-mastectomy Korean whore combined to bring campus indignation with Dartmouth Greeks to a pitch.
Several student groups asked Beta, which had been previously derecognized in 1991 and 1994, and Alpha Chi to release the sensitive documents, which the latter, but not the former, eventually agreed to do. In the interim, however, a group of students placed piles of manure, along with signs reading "Hey, Alpha Chi boys, deal with your shit. Release the script," and "Hey, Beta boys, deal with your shit. Release the poem," on the front lawns of both houses "in an effort to provoke campus reaction," according to a press release to The Dartmouth written by one of the colorful protesters.
Alpha Chi decided to release the script in February, and held a public apology and discussion in Brace Commons attended by 250 students, faculty, and administrators. Dean of the College Lee Pelton, who has since left Dartmouth for the Presidency of Willamette College in Oregon, decided not to take action against Beta for its vulgar poem, but, the College derecognized the rowdy house a third time in November 1996 after it violated social restrictions stemming from an altercation outside The Tabard fraternity during the previous summer.
As if a November 1997 Jack-O-Lantern article featuring "Eskimo Pickup Lines" and "The Dartmouth Review Dictionary" definitions of "faggot" and "spic" had not warned of the fine line between misunderstood satirical intent and plain old poor taste, just two months later The Dartmouth ran a series of "Bear Bones" comic strips which drew fire from Asian American students and faculty.
On January 13, Frank Aum '97 sent a letter to the editor objecting to "the blatant, negative stereotypes that David Berenson uses in his daily cartoon strip, 'Bear Bones.'"
"In the January 10, 1997 issue of The Dartmouth, the comic strip portrayed an androgynous, Asian character with glasses as a nerdy, asexual student who is only concerned about his/her GPA," Aum wrote.
A week later, Berenson met with 75 angry members of the Korean American Students Association and the Dartmouth Asian Organization in Rockefeller Center to field questions about the controversial cartoon. Berenson apologized for offending members of the Dartmouth community and defended his cartoon's intent. The cartoon's "message was not clear," he said. "My intent was not to belittle Asians, and if I did, I'm sorry."
In January 1996 Jeffrey Link '98 confessed to having written "chink" and "bastard" on the Little Hall door of Asian American students Michael Yoo '98 and Jon Jun '98.
Jun said that he and his roommate received a formal letter of apology from Link that "basically said, 'I beg of you not to go to the papers about me'" and 'he was drunk" at the time.' When Link first confessed, Dean of the College Lee Pelton would not comment on whether he would face discipline from the College, and said that free speech is always protected.
"Even speech which is reprehensible and harmful and hurtful is not subject to disciplinary action," he said.
Link was eventually fined $300 after pleading guilty to a charge of disorderly conduct at the Hanover District Court in March of that year. The College fined him $50 and placed him on probation.
