The University of Richmond Collegian 02/16/95

Staff Editorial

by Jeffrey Carl, Opinion Editor

What We Think

an Opinion from the Collegian Staff

“Escort Services”

In the University of Richmond’s card-access world, the women hold all the cards, so to speak. Men not only do not have a card-access system of their own, but they are unable to access the women’s dormitories. This would seem to set a rather horrific double standard, as it were, somehow implying that not only are men rough-and-tumble enough to defend themselves from burglars, looters, pillagers, Communist invasions, etc. that they don’t need a card-access system, but also that they are so rough-and-tumble that if they ever got into a women’s dormitory unescorted that they would burgle, loot, pillage and establish Leon Trotsky as WCArea Coordinator if they got the chance.

We here at The Collegian think this is ... well, stupid.

Ergo, we would like to lend our support to a movement currently underway, supported by numerous campus leaders (see letter to the editor, page 7) to allow men to have card access to the women’s dormitories at certain times. It’s an idea long overdue ... and one that was actually mentioned here in ages past by J. T. Price and other columnists. And whenever somebody takes an idea in the paper seriously (besides burning down the Law School)seriously, we’re all for it.

The card access and escort policy guidelines as they exist now are not only unfair, sexist and antiquated, but also nobody pays any attention to them. What was the last time that you avoided fear of staying in a member of the opposite sex’s room past midnight for fear that the Escort Gestapo would drag you away? And we have bad news for the administration about the part of the policy disallowing overnight stays, too: We’ve heard that it has actually happened once or twice.

Whom are the women’s dormitories being protected from by the card access policy? If it is the male students, then why not just put us in straitjackets during daylight hours so we don’t attack anybody on the way to class? Truth be told, it is a rather humiliating process to stand in a dormitory’s lobby while your escort arrives to shepherd you through the halls, carefully seeing that you don’t break anything, which is apparently what men do if they’re ever left unsupervised. What ever happened to saying hello without asking for permission first?

The idea here is relative equality. We don’t see a whole lot of clamor on the Richmond College side for card access. Who would want to break into Marsh and steal dirty socks and pizza crusts, anyway? To avoid the double standard implicit in the current policy, we must allow men at least limited access to the women’s dorms.

We wish the best of luck to those fighting for reform of the policy. We hope that equal access is in the cards for us soon.