For obvious reasons, sororities try to keep politics (the government kind, not the chapter kind) out of the picture. If you joined in the last eight or so years, you likely learned that you shouldn’t talk about the three Bs – booze, boys, and Barack – during recruitment. While the restrictions on the first two seemingly fade away after initiation, openly talking about politics in a sorority setting is still a no-no. Sure, we all have our side conversations/Facebook posts, but our organizations initially remain as neutral as possible, with good reason: our members are diverse, with a lot of different views, and we don’t want to alienate anyone.
But what happens when politics and sorority intersect in a way that simply can’t be ignored? Well, you do what Sigma Kappa did regarding Niki Mossafer Rahmati, a sister of their chapter at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).
Their statement, along with her photo reads:
Sigma Kappa’s thoughts are with our sister Niki Mossafer Rahmati of the Theta Lambda Chapter at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). Due to the recently-imposed travel ban, Niki was prohibited from boarding a Boston-bound flight over the weekend and is currently back home in her native Iran. Niki is a junior Mechanical Engineering major at MIT, served as the chapter executive vice president last year and holds a multiple entry student visa. Sigma Kappa is proud to represent women of diverse religious and ethnic backgrounds who come together to form a sisterhood whose values are exemplified by our commitment to “Live with Heart.” We sincerely hope the situation is resolved soon so Niki can return to MIT.
Because as one commenter put it, “sometimes things aren’t about politics, they are about people.”.
Nice Move243
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Jenna Crowley
Jenna used to be known as 2NOTBrokeGirls, but then one of the girls actually went broke, so she's struck out on her own. Jenna spends her free time saving the world, one sorority girl at a time (usually while wearing yoga pants), questioning why she decided to get a doctorate, and documenting her love of all things cheese related. You can ask her anything you want about football, using your boobs to get what you want, and pizza at @JennaLCrowley on Twitter or via email at JennaLCrowley@gmail.com.
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