Clothes and the Modern Man

One of the blog postings that I needed to complete.

I am wading into tricky waters here, but I feel compelled to speak up in defense of Morehouse College, the target of an article recently published in Vibe magazine, "The Mean Girls of Morehouse".  When I first read the title, my eyes rolled in trepidation...there have been several articles written lately that have attacked HBCUs in general or specific institutions, and unfortunately, here was the recently resurrected Vibe magazine joining the fray.

To offer some background, a decade ago when my brother was a student at Morehouse, he complained that the campus culture had become too permissive of overt homosexuality.  We debated the issue, with me often taking the position that he was unnecessarily sensitive, and even if what he alleged was true, it was a sign of the times.  Furthermore, as the only private, all-male HBCU, Morehouse College had to embrace the spectrum of black manhood that accommodated both Malcolm X and James Baldwin.  An institution that prides itself on nurturing great black leaders has the same urgent charge to nurture great gay black leaders to stand against the injustices and inherent danger of unchecked homophobia.  Not surprisingly, I did not win those arguments; my brother demanded to move off campus and my parents (father) acquiesced. 

When a Morehouse student nearly beat another student to death with a baseball bat, the school was forced to finally confront the culture of homophobia that pervaded the campus.  Since then, Morehouse has come to terms with its allure as a magnet for the best and brightest young black men--straight and gay.  However, tolerance does not mean that anything goes, and a dress code was enacted a couple of year ago.  At most institutions, such a move would be deemed unnecessary, but I doubt most other institutions have a campus cross-dressing problem... 

Yes, a problem.  Would cross-dressing be considered a problem across town at Georgia Tech or Emory?  Probably not (but then again this is the south...)  Nevertheless because Morehouse is the only private, all-male HBCU, it seeks to promote a standard of conduct in its students that runs counter to certain forms of behavior and expression that might be acceptable on other campuses.  Therefore, a dress code that bans doo-rags, sagging jeans and women's attire such as dresses, skirts, high heels, and purses is consistent with the Morehouse "brand" of producing respectable black men.  To outsiders who believe the College is being reactionary or discriminatory, this current controversy centers on whether the attire policy infringes on the students' freedom of expression.  To others, the policy asserts the right of a private institution to determine the limits of that free expression. 

The Vibe article, under the guise of questioning the legitimacy of the dress code, calls into question whether Morehouse is merely acting to protect its brand or whether it is singling out a few campus eccentrics.  Conveniently for a publication that is struggling to remain relevant, this story breaks in the wake of several highly publicized incidents involving bullying of and suicides by gay teenagers.  Inconveniently for Morehouse, this is yet another attempt to diminish its reputation (and again, it is a sucker punch to the jaw of one of the more prominent HBCUs).

Morehouse has made tremendous progress in navigating the rapidly changing societal attitudes towards homosexuality.  A generation ago when I was a Spelman student, traditional ideas about masculinity kept many young men in the closet; a decade later when my brother was in college, the atmosphere had changed, but not without a lot of discomfort (to put it mildly).  It is not surprising that an institution founded as a training ground for black preachers would have struggled to make this uneasy, yet inevitable transition towards tolerance.

And this is where the Eddie Long/Catholic priest/Ted Haggard scandals become instructive--a LOT of people have been taught to regard homosexuality as an issue of conduct and not an issue of identity, which is usually grounded in one's reading of the Bible.  This article conflates identity with conduct and casts Morehouse as both a haven for bigots (another common refrain against black folks lately) and as a microcosm of how nearly every community outside of Atlanta, New York, DC, San Francisco, etc. is evolving towards varying degrees of tolerance.

The most cynical aspects of this article are the profiles of the students who felt victimized by the policy.  Sadly, their naivete about the world they expected to encounter at Morehouse explains a bit why they allowed themselves to be caricatured by Vibe, which made it clear from the tongue-in-cheek title of the article that the "mean girls" of Morehouse are actually the main attractions at a freakshow. 

My opinion?  Biased, as expected, in favor of the dress code.  It is also biased in favor of private institutions to set policy that will govern its charges.  Do the students in this piece earn my sympathy?  Yes, both for the humiliation they suffered and for the confusion they endure as young people seeking to define themselves.  And, that is all.