GLBTQ students struggle to find voice, identity

This article is the first in a series in which The Collegian will explore issues facing the queer community at the University of Richmond.

At a recent meeting of students from the sexual minority community at the University of Richmond, senior John Frank sat center of a large conference table, eyeing the faces of the six other students in attendance -- men and women, freshmen and seniors, Greek-affiliated and independent.

All were invited by word-of-mouth. The group had no name and no status as a university-sanctioned club. On a few torn-out sheets of notebook paper, Frank had scrawled a brief introduction that articulated a handful of goals.

"The purpose of this meeting is not to talk about what's wrong with campus," read Frank, who is openly gay. "We need to build a queer community, raise awareness of the queer communities among queers themselves."

Frank acknowledged he was frustrated with the lack of a visible sexual minority community on campus, a sentiment that more than a dozen students, faculty, staff and administrators have echoed during interviews.

"The culture is dominated by fraternities, which is OK and not problematic, but some frats promote homophobia," Frank said. "All of these things go unchallenged. There are those who speak up against it, but the voices aren't heard."

For these students, conquering what they view as widespread assumptions that everyone on campus is heterosexual is merely one task in a long list of goals.

"Most people assume you're straight until you say otherwise," Frank said.

But the GLTBQ community is one that often lives cloaked in shadows -- invisible, silent, fearful of ridicule and largely fractured and divided, students said. The number of students reluctant to come out as a sexual minority is of deep concern for some members who are GLBTQ -- Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender and Queer/Questioning.

"Sexual minorities experience, what I call 'minor indignities' almost every day," said Glyn Hughes, director of Common Ground. "I put 'minor' in quotes because I don't think they are minor at all. Whether it's a T-shirt on the row or just walking by a room and hearing somebody say 'faggot,' it creates an environment that is not welcoming."

Several at the student meeting said they had invited closeted friends who ultimately refused to come, fearing that their sexual identity would emerge through association with the group.

"I think that there is silence on campus," said one upperclassman in a sorority, and a member of the queer community, who identified as a lesbian, but questioning.

"I think it's gotten worse since my freshman year. And when you come out, there's a very thick fear that you'll be clumped with other gay people. You fear losing your identity -- that it would overshadow everything else."

Ideological disagreements and a lack of united student leadership have left the sexual minority community a shell of what it was four years ago, several others acknowledged.

"First-year students don't have a visible outlet from the students, and there's little from the administration," said junior Emily Miller, another member of the queer community. "Everyone knows everyone's business, so a small campus makes it difficult [to come out]."

Discomfort about disclosing sexual identity is not limited to students. GLBTQ faculty, staff and administrators said they were reluctant to reveal their sexual identity because they were unsure of how people would react.

"I'm noticing that I'm interacting with students more than in my previous jobs," one staff member said at a Monday meeting of the Common Ground GLBT Community Board which is made up of GLBTQ and heterosexual people. "But I am 'covering' a lot more than I used to, and I don't know why. For whatever reason, the vibe I'm getting is that I can't present myself in front of students."

People from many departments on campus were represented during the Monday GLBT board meeting, which drew about 30 people. Representatives from the police department, recreation and wellness, Residence Life and Common Ground gathered on the third floor of the Tyler Haynes Commons, as they do each month, to talk about GLBTQ issues related to campus.

Tracy Cassalia, a health educator for the Weinstein Center for Recreation and Wellness who says she tries to incorporate issues of sexuality into wellness courses, said the Richmond community had a reluctance to discuss these issues openly.

"They think: '[Sexual minorities] are not going to raise a conflict, and if we ignore it long enough, they'll shut up and go away.'"

Although many sexual minorities said they felt discriminated against, others said they had never been targeted or felt different from heterosexual students. But incidents of bias have occurred each semester during recent years, leaving many in the GLBTQ community wondering what their place is on campus.

Several weeks ago, a fraternity pledge was made to wear a T-shirt displaying a derogatory statement directed at gay men while he served drinks during an on-campus lodge party.

"The thing that frustrates me most is the utter silence on campus," said one attendee who was a member of a GLBTQ activist group. "We chalk on the forum and nobody says anything. We write editorials in the paper and nobody comments on them. But if you take away their trays at D-Hall on Fridays, you never hear the end of it."

Some in the group agreed that the silence that surrounds GLBTQ issues at Richmond was frustrating. Others said they had noticed that their actions had spurred conversations among small groups of people, indicating progress.

"I came here and thought I was going to come out to everybody," Frank said. "You go to college thinking it's going to be more liberal. I can't speak for other schools, but the pressure is still here to not talk about it. The most difficult thing is ... a reluctance to be yourself all the time."

New Directions, formerly the most visible student-led group for sexual minorities, renamed itself to Student Alliance for Sexual Diversity (SASD), but has yet to meet.

A separate group of seven students from the Allies Institute, a diversity program on campus, is organizing efforts for a National Day of Silence in April to raise awareness for those in the closet. Now defunct are two other groups -- Icebreakers and Safe Zone -- the latter of which formed in late 1996 to provide a safe outlet for GLBTQ students.

For all of the challenges facing the sexual minority community, there appears to be gathering momentum to address the group's concerns.

"I'm not really gay in a sorority, I'm just in a sorority," the upperclassman said. "I fit in other sections of the Richmond mold. You don't have to fear losing everything by coming out."

Collegian staff writers have interviewed more than a dozen students, administrators and alumni, some of whom were granted anonymity because they had not disclosed their sexual identity to others.

Contact staff writers Dan Petty at dan.petty@richmond.edu and David Larter at david.larter@richmond.edu