Dean of Students Mark Bandas told the Hustler in an e-mail Monday that his office cannot act upon the allegations made in a Hustler article in which two former members of the Christian fraternity Beta Upsilon Chi alleged they were targets of discrimination because of their sexual orientation.
"We expect all student organizations to abide by our non-discrimination policies," Bandas said. " At this point in time, we have not received a formal complaint. The information provided in Friday's Hustler story does not constitute a formal complaint. In this story, a number of unsubstantiated allegations are made by anonymous sources. We cannot act upon the information that has been provided by Hustler. Whenever we receive formal complaints about actions violating our non-discrimination policies, we conduct thorough and careful investigations."
The article, published on Nov. 5th, has been picked up by other media outlets including: Huffington Post, Advocate.com and Out and About Newspaper.
In a letter to the editor published Monday, Nov. 8th, senior Trevor Williams came to the fraternity's defense, writing, "As an admitted discriminator who knows all about it, I believe I can say with authority that the principles that the BYX fraternity stands for are the exact opposite of discrimination."
Williams is secretary of Youth for Western Civilization, a non-profit organization with a mission to organize, educate and train activists dedicated to the revival of Western Civilization. Williams posted his letter to the organization's website on Monday, writing, "At Vanderbilt University, the left has started a campaign to have the Christian fraternity Beta Upsilon Chi lose their recognition from the school for enforcing a common moral standard. Two gay students who had broken the rules of the fraternity were removed from it."
Beta Upsilon Chi is a registered religious/spiritual student organization and a Christian fraternity on Vanderbilt’s campus. The original charter was established in 2003.
The Code of Conduct states its beliefs regarding sexuality in the second clause of the document: “We believe that sex is a gift of God to be enjoyed only inside the covenant of marriage between a man and a woman. Therefore, we will not condone such activity as homosexuality, fornication, or adultery. (I Corinthians 6:15-20; Hebrew 13:4).”
Vanderbilt requires, as stated on the student organization website, student organizations to abide by its anti-discriminatory policy, which states that all student organizations must “refrain from discriminating in membership selection, officer or adviser appointments, or practices of organizational activities on the basis of race, sex, religion, color, national or ethnic origin, age, disability, military service, or sexual orientation, in compliance with Federal law, including the provisions of Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972, Sections 503 and 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, and the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990.”
