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December 1, 2005
Cartoon
on Bush recalls Yale frat hazing
BY
KIMBERLY CHOWS AND JACK MIRKINSONS
Contributing Reporters
Cartoonist
Garry Trudeau '70 said he thinks a little-known fact about President
George W. Bush '68's past -- that his first mention in The New York
Times occurred in 1967 when, as former president of the Delta Kappa
Epsilon chapter at Yale, Bush defended the fraternity's practice of
branding its pledges with a red-hot coat hanger -- deserves more
national attention.
On Sunday, Trudeau's cartoon "Doonesbury" featured fictional
character Mark Slackmeyer explaining the President's position against
current anti-torture legislation by revisiting a series of 1967 Yale
Daily News articles that exposed DKE's rush activities, which at the
time included brandings and alleged beatings. Soon after these stories
were published, the University's Inter-Fraternity Council fined the
fraternity for performing "physically and mentally degrading
acts," and the Times published an article in which Bush defended
the brandings, comparing them to cigarette burns.
"At the time, it caused quite a stir on campus, even generating
some national attention," Trudeau said.
The News article, published Nov. 3, 1967, featured a photograph of a
half-inch high "D" burned into a pledge's naked backside.
Trudeau drew his first cartoon for the News for the story -- a picture
of smiling pledges, naked and bent over at the waist, with a figure
holding a DKE branding iron standing over them.
In a News story the next day, Bush is quoted calling the branding
"insignificant." He said he did not understand how the News
"can assume Yale has to be so haughty not to allow this type of
pledging to go on."
Trudeau's recent cartoon comes on the heels of the controversy over Sen.
John McCain's Anti-Torture Amendment to the Defense Appropriations Bill.
The amendment, which would outlaw torture and "cruel, inhuman and
degrading treatment of detainees in U.S. custody," passed in the
Senate 90-9 on Oct. 5, but Bush has threatened to use his first-ever
veto on the bill if McCain's provision is included in the final passage.
Trudeau said he drew parallels between Bush's connection to fraternity
hazing and his national policy today because he feels that it reveals a
lot about the President's philosophy.
"While you can't draw a direct line between a 19-year-old's
fraternity activities and national policy … this is part of a larger
picture of this administration's belief that the ends justify the
means," Trudeau said. "I don't think [Bush] gives much thought
to what it means to torture people or how it makes us look in the eyes
of the world."
The 1967 Yale Daily News article provided a look into the covert hazing
practices of fraternities in general, but focused on the DKE branding.
Some pledges at the time told the News their branding was preceded by a
physical beating.
"By that time, my body was so numb [from the beatings] that the
iron felt good, like a match was being held close to my body," an
anonymous DKE pledge told the News in 1967.
While the article provoked outrage in the Greek community, most of those
who complained expressed anger that fraternities' reputations were being
called into question, though few charged that the story was fabricated.
"Once the article came out, nobody denied its truth," Trudeau
said. "It became simply a question of characterization."
But in a 1967 letter to the News, Collister Johnson '68 -- who recently
served as Bush's Ohio campaign manager and national field director
during the 2004 presidential election -- wrote that the article
contained "embellished facts" and "smacks of
sensationalism." Johnson could not be reached for comment yesterday
at his home office in Virginia.
Albert Evans '68, a college acquaintance of Bush's and the president of
the Inter-Fraternity Council in 1967, said the majority of DKE's rush
activities at the time were performed in the spirit of good fun and
camaraderie.
"What DKE was doing was clearly outside the rules, and they were
sanctioned for that," Evans said. "At the same time, it wasn't
of the order that somebody was killed."
Although he was quoted by the News at the time as saying that the
branding was "not as bad as it sounds," Evans said he
disapproved of the practice when it was revealed.
"My personal reaction was, 'I can't believe they'd do that,' but
not, 'Why aren't these people being expelled?'" Evans said.
"We all did something in our four years we're just as glad wasn't
reported in the Yale Daily News."
The White House did not respond to requests for comment before press
time.
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