On March 27, both Kappa Sigma and Alpha Phi were suspended by the Office of Student  Conduct for an incident in BD where members threw eggs at the building and were “yelling, spitting, and jumping on top of tables.” A dining worker described hearing a racial slur, although they were unsure who said it and to whom it was directed. A few days later, WashU’s Association of Black Students (ABS) posted a statement to Instagram referring to the event as a “hate crime” and calling for the termination of both chapters from the University’s campus.

After the incident, rather than engaging in respectful dialogue on how to come together and support our dining workers, responses to the incident have spiraled into discourse that invalidates the historical significance and impact of ABS, spreads misinformation about the events, and uses hateful rhetoric to target students as well as dining workers.

One of the platforms that has become the primary medium for which students express themselves is Sidechat, an anonymous app marketed specifically toward college students. The anonymity it grants its users allows for an unlimited range of speech — including hate — protecting its users from any ensuing accountability.

Platforms like Sidechat are not the cause of hate, but rather a medium for individuals to amplify already existing hate from the comfort of an unknown account. Sidechat exists for a reason, one that is apolitical in nature. It is a platform for posting memes, complaining about exams, and according to the front page of their website “find[ing] your community.” Ironically, it is now being used to isolate students from one another as individuals post dangerous and threatening messages to both members of ABS and Greek Life.

Instead of taking what happened in BD and the campus response as a way to further divide ourselves, we should take it to consider where we get our information, how we want our campus spaces treated, and how we engage with all members of this community in the future.

Much of our college experience includes the people whom society wrongly pushes to the margins of this campus: the landscapers, janitors, and service workers. Dining workers are essential workers; without them, no one would eat. Events and responses like this only further serve to isolate them from our campus community and create a greater divide between students and staff.

Moving forward, reach out to dining workers when you see them; learn their names; ask them how they are doing; and build a connection with them. They are essential to this campus and our community, as employees and human beings.

Also, think about where you are getting your information and how you are reacting to it. There is no context in which threatening and defaming members of the campus community is acceptable. And Sidechat, which doesn’t regulate hate or misinformation and allows anonymity, is not a place for productive discourse about serious issues.

Editor’s Note: This article was updated on April 3rd, 2024 to fix a grammatical error.

Staff editorials reflect the opinion of the majority of our editorial board members. The editorial board operates independently of our newsroom and includes members of the senior staff.

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