University of Virginia Library

Where All Is Bright & Straight

The Board of Visitors' refusal to uphold
the Student Activities Committee's allocation
of $45 to the Gay Student Union bothers us
because 1) it is inconsistent, 2) vague, and 3)
sets an undesirable precedent.

First of all, it is inconsistent in that many
of the activities presently funded by the
Student Activities Fund are, as we have
previously asserted, no more related to the
educational purposes of the University than is
the Gay Student Union. To specify the GSU,
as unpalatable as its activities may be to the
Board members or anyone else, as the only
organization on the Grounds whose activities
are "unrelated to the educational purposes of
the University" is simply unfair.

Secondly, despite the legalistic structure of
the document, the reasons enumerated by the
Board are not specific enough to include only
the GSU. The statement contends that
"heterosexuals have no de facto access to the
GSU and its social events." Do whites have de
facto access to Black Student Alliance events?
Do civilians have de facto access to the Field
Artillery and Saluting Battalion, etc.? In
addition, the GSU is purported to "advocate a
style of sexual life." This is countered with
the contention that private and personal
matters do not have a reasonable relationship
to the educational purposes of the University.
We would be inclined to agree, except that we
are curious as to where the Board draws the
line which separates private and personal
activities which do have such a relationship
and those which do not.

Thirdly, the action sets a precedent for
appeal to the Board of Visitors by any group
which opposes any allocation by the SAC
thus showing no confidence in the
decision-making ability of the SAC which was
established by the Board in order to
adjudicate such disputes. On what grounds
disgruntled students will appeal allocations to
the Board henceforth is anyone's guess.

The upshot of all this brouhaha over the
meager sum of $45 is that the Student
Activities Fund is in trouble as it has never
been before. There are strong arguments to be
made for dissolving the entire fund, thus
allowing students to keep their money and
spend it as they choose. We were not
enamored with the idea of contributing to the
Gay Student Union, but we recognize that
as long as the fund exists, it must be
distributed fairly.

If the reasons given by the Board and
President Shannon are supposed to hold
water, we are afraid that they are going to
have to be applied more indiscriminately in
the future. We are dismayed at the Board and
President Shannon for choosing to exercise
such arbitrary judgments in a matter which
should have been handled with fairness and
consistency as the foremost considerations.