Earlier accounts told the truth
Hillary Castrop
senior
I heartily agree that accusations of racial discrimination are not to be taken lightly, and considering the consequences of such accusations, are not to be falsely charged. However, I did not want to be a bystander at the events that took place on Jan. 30 at Heartland. I did not want to see one of my very best friends humiliated and ridiculed in front of a crowded line of club goers. I did not want to see the look of shock, hurt, sadness and disappointment on my friend's face when the bouncer's comment was more than just a frustrating dismissal of her ID.
I too wanted to have an enjoyable night at Heartland with my friends. Yet this was not the way things went down at all. The truth is that Kristine Rosario was the brunt of a discriminatory comment from a bouncer that night. Many people were witness to it, and no surveillance camera can show us who was in earshot of the comment.
Jessica Donnelly's Feb. 12 Viewpoint letter did nothing more than condemn Ms. Rosario's accusation, when her own knowledge of that situation was based on hearsay. She can claim that the whole complaint is false, but considering she was not standing in line that night and did not hear the conversation or subsequent phone call, why should anyone believe her story?
Rosario has nothing to gain by "making up" this incident. Maybe Donnelly could explain why Rosario would fabricate such an accusation when she has been going to Heartland for over a year now, has obviously enjoyed going there enough to want to return and has never had any problems with employees in the past. Perhaps she could also defend her employer by explaining why he or she has not returned numerous phone calls or responded to letters from concerned students wanting to make the management aware of the incident and ask for an apology.
The owner would have saved himself a lot of trouble by simply acknowledging the fact that his employees are fallible and may have said something derogatory. He could have agreed to discuss the matter with the bouncer and apologized for possibly offending some of his club's patrons. It is not difficult to believe that the bouncer who stated these derogatory comments would lie to his fellow employees and management in order to avoid termination. Yet the owner's blatant disregard of our concerns leads me to believe that he has no problem allowing racial discrimination to occur under his supervision.
Let the Notre Dame and Saint Mary's communities believe what they want to believe. Unless they were standing there that night, they can never really know what happened. But Ms. Donnelly, you were not standing there either, and as someone who was, I refuse to support an establishment that not only permits discrimination but does not take accusations or racial discrimination seriously.
Hillary Castrop
senior
off-campus
Feb. 12
All Viewpoint Stories for Thursday, February 13, 2003
