Yale Daily News

Whats good for the goose is good for the gander. The deans seem to have a hard enough time trying to match early risers and soft music listeners with others based on freshmen housing forms. Why not just make it easier for the deans and allow them to mix the sexes for flexibility. Anyone too antiquated in their sexual mores is not welcome at Yale. If we truly live in a gender neutral society Yale should take the lead and prove it. Forget about genetics, forget about social constructs, forget about privacy, forget about modesty.

This is a duplicate post from the news article today. This editorial may draw more opinions, so here's mine:

I'm not quite sure what the big deal is. After freshman year, don't people pick their roommates and participate in room draws for the available suites in each college? All it would take would simply to announce that the administration would not bar people from picking different sex suitemates. Any students who don't join groups would simply check one of three boxes as gender preference for suite/roommates: male/female/don't care. Most incoming freshmen would most likely prefer same sex roommates, but even then preferences could be indicated on the housing apps. The default for frosh could still be same sex without causing much uproar.

For my senior year, four of us conspired to create a coed suite. None of us were romantically linked, we were just good friends. The woman put in for a single, the man who wanted a single joined the other two of us for a nice triple, and they just switched when it came time to move in. We split the large living room in half and built a loft so each of us could have a bedroom. No big deal and nobody gave a rat's ass and that was 35 years ago.

"Anyone too antiquated in their sexual mores is not welcome at Yale."

This sentiment speaks volumes.

DOWN with those whacky Christian fundamentalists! Down with those Hassids! Where all the SAME! No fundamental difference WHATSOEVER!

It would be funny if it weren't so sad...

(I state again: I am not against mixed-sex dorms; I am against the dogmatic screeds of PC brownshirts; first GESO, now THIS!)

Well...some things are true. Christian fundamentalists are wacky. So are Hassidic Jews; I mean, have you seen the outfits?

Of course, we shouldn't invalidate their opinions because they make us chuckle. We should invalidate them because their opinions are usually of the restrictive, freedom-reducing "you can't do it if it doesn't say it's ok in our book of fairy tales" kind.

Sometimes the "PC brownshirts" (whom I abhor as much as the next guy) get it right. This is one of those instances.

I just don't get why this is an LGBT issue or why it's a sexual preference issue at all. It should be a freedom of association issue. My female suitemate was decidedly hetero and I didn't mind her boyfriend staying over from time to time. He was a good guy and didn't contribute mess he wasn't willing to clean up.

Here's why it's an LGBT issue: Yale assumes, with the current housing system, that roommates will not be attracted to each other. Girls live with girls and boys live with boys so that there are no complicated sexual issues between roommates. This assumes that every student is attracted to the opposite sex. It's a matter of validating the existence of gay students and recognizing that it may be more comfortable for a gay man to live with a woman than with another man. I'm a lesbian, and I never had any problem living with female roommates, nor was I overwhelmed with attraction to them (sorry, roomies, no offense), so this wasn't an issue for me. But it's validating to LGBT students if the housing rules at least recognize that same-sex attraction could exist between roommates - and gives them the option to choose something different.

hey '05 Alum,

I don't want to recognize same-sex attraction.

Deal with it.

Dear #7 (08 student),

No one is forcing you to recognize your same-sex attractions. You can remain closeted your whole life and nobody will care.

-Jason

'08 Student, no one is asking YOU to recognize the existence of gay people (though it is 2008 and we are hard to ignore). It doesn't matter whether you are homophobic, but Yale is a major institution of learning, and the Corporation needs to get with the times - as 6 of the other 8 Ivy League schools have already done.

as long as the residential college system stays in place, students will never be able to room with whoever they want to unless they move off-campus.

'05, thanks for the explanation. I'm sure you are correct and it does have a logic. Now I can respond to that LGBT concern on the issue.

What a load of crap. So LGBT's want validation from Mother Yale? Pres. Levin can devote two days to a reception line for all who need it to get a pat on the head and be told, "You ARE somebody. You are loved." Then everybody can go about their business and not waste more time giving "validation".

The LG&B's should be happy with the same sex assumption since it enables them to room with their lovers if they want to. The T's, at least before their chosen surgical remedies are completed, will always have to be treated as special cases. But as I said before, freedom of choice should be allowed for the upper three classes. And if done for administrative convenience instead of as a result of political pressure, it's more likely to be achieved.

Keep housing the way it is.

1- Even if many students are cool with official co-ed roomming assignments, perhaps their parents (who typically pay the bills) might not be so comfortable. An issue like this is not really a good reason to lose potentially great Yalies. Observant/orthodox Jews, Christians and Muslims are not exactly small or fringe groups.

2- As several have already stated, most upperclassmen live on floors with several suites, whose occupants may or may not be of the same gender, so just clip with your friends and leave the doors open in between. There are even Old Campus opportunities to do this (LW common rooms in the B3 and C1 stacks, for example, connect through easily deactivated fire doors)

3- It is not like there is a bed check. sleep wherever you damn well please.

I agree with SY99.

Personally, I don't think Yale allowing this co-ed option should upset anyone. It simply allows the CHOICE to live in a co-ed suite, it doesn't mean you have to.

If orthodox jews, Christians and Muslims don't want to live in a co-ed suite, they don't have to. Furthermore, if parents don't want their children to do so, they can enforce that upon THEIR children. Who cares if someone two floors down is having sex with their roomate? How exactly does that affect the person who chose not to live in a co-ed suite for moral reasons?

Thank you ADC! I was nervous no one with sense was posting.

Really SYNN? You'd let anyone from another suite randomly crash @ your place because they can "sleep wherever they damn well please"?

I'd like to see it.

"Thank you ADC! I was nervous no one with sense was posting."

Oh Rachel, you hurt my feelings. ;) I was arguing for free choice at #2 and again at #11: "But as I said before, freedom of choice should be allowed for the upper three classes."

Yes, yes. The right way to deal with one who is anti-gay is to call him gay as if it is an insult.

You are an idiot.

What happens when some dude gets drunk and sexually assaults his new co-ed suite-mate? A law suit against Yale is what. You kids... so innocent, so naive.

Take off the blinders. Human nature still exists! You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make it drink. You can say sex does not exist, but it still make people think.