The Chronicle

Issue date: 4/18/07 Section: Columns
Last update: 4/18/07 at 9:51 AM EST

Things change, people graduate, but the morning Chronicle, tinged with a cup of Alpine coffee, is forever. It's under these auspices that I say goodbye… to both The Chronicle and to Duke.

My column, since its meager (and controversial) beginnings freshman year, has attempted to understand a college culture that values sex on social terms, and my investment in the Duke lacrosse case reflects this. As a graduating senior, "Duke University, Inc." is my last hoorah on The Chronicle's editorial pages. (Feel free to beam with relief.)

It has become entirely clear to me in the past week that Duke's primary concern is not the success or well-being of its students, but rather the success and well-being of its business and good fortune.

Duke University, Inc: May it live long and prosper… despite its many ethical wrongs.

In their victorious (read: voracious) spotlight last Wednesday-and against the backdrop of their Sheraton Raleigh Hotel conference room-former lacrosse players David Evans, Collin Finnerty and Reade Seligmann thanked a horde of supporters, including KC Johnson, the players' teammates, friends and adoring family.

Board of Trustees Chair Robert Steel wrote in an e-mail to students Wednesday that Evans, Finnerty and Seligmann are "honorable" men and that they have undergone tremendous "agony" in the past year. His e-mail followed in the volley of male camaraderie that trails Duke's lacrosse men and reads like a lovesick tribute to the now-exonerated players.

It also read like a propaganda piece, perhaps in an attempt to convince, even Duke students, that these men were innocent all along.

But it was never about Evans, Finnerty or Seligmann.

What has been at stake for our campus, since the beginning, is not whether or not the lacrosse team raped, kidnapped and/or assaulted a Durham stripper, but rather that a racially motivated gang bang is entirely possible on Duke's campus, and that it can be perpetrated by Duke men. This has been the argument heralded by both student activists and concerned faculty.

For the students-activists and passersby alike-the following is also at stake: Duke University doesn't seem to care.

The fact that so many of us reacted furiously in the initial days after March 13, 2006 indicates the following: We believe that Duke students are capable of racism, misogyny and violence.

The administration's flimsy Campus Culture Initiative Report, which dedicated a meager 1.5 pages to race and another single page to gender and sexuality, did not do the issues justice. Instead of living up to the ethical dilemmas of the lacrosse case, Duke decided to brush the issues under the table, showing itself, for perhaps the first time, as what it really is: a business and an institution that doesn't want to change.

It makes me wonder: If media attention, pots and pans, concerned faculty and student fear don't prompt the administration to reconsider its race and gender relations, what will?

Indeed, Steel's e-mail, however flawed, should have come from President Richard Brodhead or Vice President of Student Affairs Larry Moneta, and it should have come with the recognition that racism, misogyny and violence still exist on this campus.

The fact that the message (loud, clear and deficient as it was) came from a financial figurehead-rather than an academic one-is entirely suggestive.

On its own website, the University reports: "Duke University received $341,894,326 in charitable gifts during the 2005-06 fiscal year, making it the strongest fund-raising year in Duke history."

Also according to the University's website, Duke acquires 30 percent of its revenues from foundations-families, communities and otherwise-and another 13 percent from corporations. The University even houses an office of "Corporate & Foundation Relations."

What the Duke website doesn't make clear, however, is what foundations and corporations, specifically, donate to the University, and with what agendas.

Indeed, the lacrosse case has been hijacked by a number of non-affiliated parties, all of whom seem to think they know what really happened: A black stripper lied about rape in an attempt to up her finances, and the University's administration abandoned the wrongly accused men in their moment of need. In truth, even though the case has now been dropped, the events (and potential culprit) are still unclear.

But under the business model, these foundations and corporations (and their agendas) become Duke's clients-or costumers-and in the words of the popular consumer slogan, the costumer is always right.

In the past months, corporations and foundations that support Duke lacrosse have become a priority for the University, and e-mails to students, like the one distributed by Steel, reflect an attempt to appease Duke's financial contributors amid unwavering controversy.

Indeed, Duke has shown grave (sometimes superfluous) support to these groups at the expense of its students.

What the University forgets, however, is that we, the students of Duke, are also its costumers, and our hefty tuition fee comes with the expectation that the University prioritizes our well-being.

I understand that Duke, like any school, has financial obligations. But if it continues to market itself as a safe haven for students-a place to grow and learn-then it must choose us before the big bucks.

Shadee Malaklou is a Trinity senior. Her column runs every other Wednesday. This is her final column.