Dishonesty or Truth?

Disingenuousness comes in many forms and this is one of them.

Now, if doing the Nazi-style salute is not an issue at all then I dare the Kappa Gamma of today to do another group photo doing the exact same salute as the Kappa Gamma brothers did back in the 1989.  Go ahead and prove me and to the rest of the people out there wrong.

Here's a close up zoom of a Kappa Gamma group doing the Nazi-style salute seen below . Note the deliberate outstretched arm, palm flat facing toward the front that reminiscences Nazi Germany's own Nazi salute ?  They are certainly not waving, Carl.

In Carl's futile effort to rebut my argument on the fraternity Nazi-style salute he had the audacity to use a picture of MLK waving to the crowd (more pictures here) as being the equivalent of a Nazi salute. Completely laughable. Yet note the palm of MLK's right hand is outstretched while his right arm is bent in a relaxed form but not in an attentive form.  Sorry, Carl, it is not the same thing. MLK wouldn't do such a dumb thing as to mimic a Nazi-style salute knowing full well, with him being a highly educated and wise man, knowing the history behind Nazi Germany. The kind of salute that is a reminder of the Holocaust that Nazi Germany atrociously committed during WWII.

Ok. What about the Pope's own salute? A Nazi style salute?

Nope. Not even close. Note the relaxed arm. The spread the of his fingers or outstretched palm. Nothing is indicative of having an attentive form but a person who is obviously waving at people, humbled by their presence.

Ok. What about Obama?

Nope. Again, just like the Pope. He is in a relaxed pose, outstretched arm with outstretched palm where he is obviously waving to his adoring fans before entering on his Air Force 1 jet like he has done many times.

Hmm. What about a cartoon drawing depicting a Nazi-style salute?

Seriously?

Based on a Roman character during Roman times doing their own kind of salute specific to their own time period that *PRE-DATES* Nazi Germany and WWII? Oh, c'mon! Why so desperate, Carl?

This next drawing suggested by Carl seen below certainly cannot be compared to the Kappa Gamma's 20th century Nazi-style salutes because that salute in the picture scene depicts an era that, again, pre-dates Nazi Germany and WWII by a few thousand years.

The point of this has to do with after the fact when it was Germany who made their Nazi salutes recognizable around the world and is correlated strongly with the history of their atrocious mass killings of several million Jewish people in Europe.   Anybody who attempt to use salute examples that predates Nazi Germany in an effort to rebut an argument about KG's own Nazi-style salute as being warranted and justified is simply missing the point in a totally disingenuous and dishonest way.

But, you know what's funny, Carl?  When you produced a picture seen below in the effort to rebut my argument it has backfired on you. Why? Simply because the young man with the tattoos doing the salute was a 20 year old professional soccer player who did the Nazi salute at a soccer game that got him booted for life.

The Hellenic Football Federation met Sunday in response to the incident and decided to ban the player, who has previously captained the national team in youth competitions. “The player’s action to salute to spectators in a Nazi manner is a severe provocation, insults all the victims of Nazi barbarity and injures the deeply pacifist and human character of the game,” the federation said as Greece marked the 70th anniversary of the deportation of thousands of Greek Jews to Nazi death camps.

Katidis, who initially claimed that he was not saluting but pointing at a friend in the stands, said later that he had no idea what the gesture meant. In an apology issued after the ban, he called his salute “totally unacceptable,” adding, “I feel terrible for those I upset with the stupidity of my act.”

Video and photographs of the incident showed that while several members of the club’s support staff celebrated with the player, others looked disturbed by the gesture, and at least one older man tried to pull his arm down.

Bold emphasis is mine.

The big difference with the 20 year old professional soccer player who did the salute is that he profusely apologized to the public for something that he was not aware of that it was in bad form and an insult to do such a salute. He acknowledged the stupidity of doing that salute. Did the Gamma do that? Nah. Never apologized to the public. Not once. In fact, we got people like Carl to help sweep it under the rug, because, you know, doing Nazi-style salute isn't hurting anyone. Right?

Here's another incident of two girls from a girls basketball team doing the Nazi salute that got them in hot water this year.

Remember, what we have is a *GROUP* photo of KG brothers doing exactly the same Nazi-style salute that took place in 1989, well before the era of the internet. It was a salute that looks exactly like this:

But knowing the history behind the people who did the saluting were the ones who supported and obeyed Hitler and his regime would understand that a Nazi style salute reminds people of this:

And, Carl, since you emigrated from Netherlands to the United States as a little boy and your continued refusal to acknowledge the seriousness of Kappa Gamma's own Nazi-style salute disrespects and insults the memories of those who died at those Holocaust camps, the Netherland Jews who suffered at the hands of German Nazis.

After the German invasion of the Netherlands in May 1940, a civil administration was installed under SS auspices. Arthur Seyss-Inquart was appointed Reich Commissar. He presided over a German administration that included many Austrian-born Nazis. They in turn supervised the Dutch civil service. This arrangement was to prove fateful for the Jews of the Netherlands.

During 1940, the German occupation authorities banned Jews from the civil service and required Jews to register the assets of their business enterprises. In January 1941, the German authorities required all Jews to register themselves as Jews. A total of 159,806 persons registered, including 19,561 persons born of mixed marriages. The total included some 25,000 Jewish refugees from the German Reich. A Jewish council was established in February 1941.

The arrests of several hundred young Jews (sent to the Buchenwald and Mauthausen concentration camps) led to a general strike by Dutch workers on February 25, 1941, and a hardening of Nazi policy. The German authorities and their Dutch collaborators segregated Jews from the general Dutch population, and incarcerated 15,000 Jews in German-administered forced-labor camps. The Germans then ordered the concentration of Jews in Amsterdam and sent foreign and stateless Jews to the Westerbork transit camp in the northeast part of the country. Some of the remaining provincial Jews were sent to the Vught camp. As of April 29, 1942, Jews were required to wear a yellow Star of David on their clothing.

Deportations of Jews from the Netherlands began in the summer of 1942. The last train left Westerbork for Auschwitz on September 3, 1944. During these two years, the Germans and their Dutch collaborators deported 107,000 Jews, mostly to Auschwitz and Sobibor, where they were murdered. Only 5,200 survived. In addition, 25,000-30,000 Jews went into hiding, assisted by the Dutch underground. Two-thirds of Dutch Jews in hiding managed to survive.

The geography of the Netherlands made escape difficult. The ruthless efficiency of the German administration and the willing cooperation of Dutch administrators and policemen doomed the Jews of the Netherlands. Less than 25 percent of Dutch Jewry survived the Holocaust.

Carl, by sweeping under the rug what your own Kappa Gamma brothers did you manage to disrespect the memory of your own motherland by making light of it. Out of the 107,000 Netherland Jews that were sent to concentration camps, only 5,200 survived. But you insist the KG's salute was nothing.

Carl, you managed to defile the memory of your motherland and your Netherland ancestors in one full sweep by essentially laughing about the KG's Nazi-style salute.

Here are some pictures to make you laugh! We the Kappa Gamma Brothers do have our own salution–a gesture of our own that is as ancient as it is modern! It is an incognito salution–I shall never tell you our secret!

A load of bull, Carl. Completely dishonest and disingenuous regarding this salutation. Just like that young soccer pro at age 20 who did the Nazi salute in full public view, he didn't understand the gravity of doing that.  Others around him were visibly disturbed by his saluting out on the soccer field. He continued to do that even while an older and wise man tried to pull his arm down to get him to stop doing the stupid Nazi-style salute. The young soccer pro was completely clueless and didn't understand the seriousness of doing that Nazi salute. Neither did the group of 35 young, Kappa Gamma men in their early 20s, who didn't understand the folly and seriousness of doing a Nazi-style salute in a group photo, too. Otherwise, if that salute is not a big deal, then I challenge you and all the KG brothers to do another group photo doing the exact same salute that was done in 1989.

But you and your KG brothers will never, ever do that in a million years because you and they KNOW it is not right. You know it is not right to do that in public or in private within the confines of the KG's fraternity walls. Your recent comment is a startling revelation because you appear or seem to imply that this type of Nazi-style salute is done all the time within the confines of the KG's private areas? And that KG brothers are required to do that kind of salute to each other? Just like Hitler's troops and officers who were required to do that back during pre-WWII and during WWII?  Are you saying that KG is still secretly doing that type of Nazi-style salute today??

Utterly unreal, Carl.

Keep digging. Keep going to bat for them, Carl.  I'd would rather see a much better and improved Kappa Gamma fraternity for them to own up to their own history and move forward and finally deserve the respect and recognizance. You're not helping, Carl.

Paddling is hazing no matter how you try and minimize it

In the Greek fraternity business, the use of a paddle represents hazing. It represents the degradation of your fellow human beings. It represents power and abuse over those who are powerless and seeking acceptance in a group that wielded power on the campus of Gallaudet University.

And yet paddles are still proudly displayed on the fraternity walls like past trophies on the unknown number buttocks they have paddled and caused pain, injury, and suffering.

Carl Schroeder is a Kappa Gamma brother of the 79th Congregation. In his recent blog last month he attempted to minimize Kappa Gamma's use of their paddles on pledges as inconsequential and harmless and by his own admission revealed that paddling was a common practice in Kappa Gamma during his time.

The odd thing about this fraternity pledgehood was its initiation which was, to me, “the battle of wills and wits–alienation and accommodation, as well as affirmation.” I went through a battery of social tests, mental challenges, and physical tolerances. They were well-planned, well-programmed, and well-delivered, and my ego was never in bruise. Yes, I got tired and angry, and, yes, I was made to laugh at times throughout my Fraternity probation–the trial of my character. You can check with my beloved Brother Gary Malkowski of Toronto, Canada, because, as the pledges, we laughed together in public.

Now here are a few words about paddling. The Fraternity paddles were properly introduced to us the pledges. We were asked to accept them as very much a big part of the Kappa Gamma Fraternity. There was one member in our Congregation who did not so he left, for which I am always saddened by his own decision. Paddling itself was never crazy, absurd, or senseless; it was always foretold, explained, and interpreted. We were never subject to humiliation or abusive tricks, and we were never harassed with disagreeable tasks.

Meaning and understanding of the Kappa Gamma Fraternity are socially determined that casts light on the examination of the experience to elucidate these concepts, generating many different things. If one is not a full-fledged Kappa Gamma Brother, he cannot have a multiple concept of this prestigious fraternity, period! For me, as the Kappa Gamma Fraternity Merit Key holder, I am proud to be “the Fraternity man,” especially from Gallaudet University.

My baby brother Gerhard (Olgar) and our father George were also initiated as Kappa Gamma Brothers. It was very cultural for us. I first learned about this precious Fraternity when I was young in the middle school at the Maryland School for the Deaf. After I became initiated into the Blue Brotherhood, I confess to have since been “true to Gallaudet.”

Carl is proud to be a Kappa Gamma brother? He's proud of the fact that his Greek fraternity organization at Gallaudet University was caught hazing and suspended numerous times? Even racism was a factor for one of that fraternity suspension? Proud of the fact that Kappa Gamma brothers did a Nazi-like salute in a group photo, by which he continues to remain silent about?  Proud of the fact of how Kevin Clark (a former Kappa Gamma pledge who took Gallaudet University and Kappa Gamma to court for hazing) was dumped at a children's hospital in D.C. after sustaining injuries that night of hazing from paddling causing bruising and bleeding to his buttock? Proud of the fact that Kappa Gamma never publicly apologized for their past hazing practices to all the past pledges (those who made it or opted out)?  Proud of the fact that Kappa Gamma never publicly apologized for the Nazi-like salute group photo to the public and to president Hurwitz who is Jewish?  That sure is a long list of stuff to be proud of, Carl. Yet you opted to sidestep the issue or keep quiet about it. Quite curious how you avoided the KG Nazi-like group photo in your blogs but didn't mind discussing the paddling aspect of it one month after I did a few KG blog pieces on paddling and hazing, and the KG group photo.

Paddling is paddling and that is part of hazing no matter how much you try and minimize that, Carl. Every time someone sees a paddle hanging proudly on a fraternity wall means that fraternity has not learned anything about paddling and hazing.  Why are you still covering them, and making excuses for them?

From the wise words of a Kappa Sigma brother seen in the 1990 Tower Clock Gallaudet University Yearbook, page 324:

The benefits they had to offer, frankly, were unequaled by any other organization I knew of and the concept of a warm, strong brotherhood that these men had shared caught my fancy.  another valuable plus about them: they don't haze.   Their stand against hazing and the belief that pledging should be any enrichness and education of character rather than abuse and strict "training and re-education" of minds and bodies only served to further reinforce my initial hunch that this fraternity was the one for me.

Carl, you do not need paddling or hazing in order to have a strong brotherhood. A paddle need not be a big part of a fraternity. That kind of mindset is absolutely warped and sickening. Take the example of Kappa Sigma, a Greek fraternity that does not haze. Paddling has never been a part of their tradition. Compare that to Kappa Gamma when their tradition was obviously steeped with paddling. One thing though, do they still hang their KG paddles on their fraternity walls? If paddles still on their walls mean they still secretly embraced their past tradition of hazing.

Carl, the only way to ease your burdensome thought and embarrassment about Kappa Gamma is to be fully honest about the whole thing.  Reach out to those who have been wronged in the past. Minimizing the whole paddling and hazing history and practices is an attempt to hide the real truth of what really went on. The only way to right a wronged history is to be forthcoming about it honestly and truthfully. Only then will Kappa Gamma come out better and brighter in the future.

Video: Deaf Athletes doing the Nazi Salute at Summer Deaf Olympic Games

Here's a shocking video with picture stills (see below) of deaf athletes parading around on the White City Olympic stadia oval track doing the Nazi salute at the Summer Deaf Olympic Games or known as the International Games for the Deaf  at White City, London in 1935. Twelve countries and 221 deaf athletes participated in that event. One picture still from the video you can clearly see a deaf team from Great Britain doing the Nazi salute. Of course, the deaf German team was expected to do the Nazi salute while flying their Nazi Germany's Swastika flag. It's a grim look into the past seeing deaf non-German athletes "forced" to do the Nazi salute not knowing in a few years many of their deaf brethens in other countries and deaf Jews would be persecuted and/or exterminated during the horrors of WWII Holocaust by Nazi Germany.

Click here for video

How ironic on finding this video while the Deaflympic Games is taking place presently in Sofia, Bulgaria, too.

Click here for video

 

 

It's no fun seeing deaf people running around mimicking the Nazi-like salute whether intentional or not just like what the 35 brothers of Kappa Gamma of Gallaudet University did in a 1989 group photo shot.

It's quite shocking that in 1989 Kappa Gamma brothers did not have enough intelligence to not incorporate their Nazi-like salute into their fraternity claiming it to be a type of a "secret handshake." This is a salute which can only be construed, as anybody would, as nothing but a Nazi-salute. There is no excuse for what Kappa Gamma brothers did when you factor in the horror and history of the Holocaust in WWII. And by saying that let's take a closer look at the history of 1935 Deaf Olympics and what the Holocaust did on deaf Jews in Germany.

We need research taking a look at what was going on with the so-called Deaf Olympics. There were international games for the deaf in Stockholm throughout the 1920s but in particular in 1935, and then in 1939 after there was almost a boycott of the regular Olympics in 1936, yet deaf people throughout the world participated in the Olympics in Stockholm. And of course, the Germans sent a team. There were no Jews, there were no Jews on the team but there was a team that went to the games in Stockholm, and of course, as you can imagine, the Germans won the most medals.  

I apologize to the interpreters, that was a long aside.  

If it’s difficult to determine precise figures for the number of deaf people the Nazis sterilized, as Dr. Heberer indicated, it is impossible to know exactly how many deaf people were murdered in the T-4 program. As she mentioned some of the records of this operation were destroyed, but even if there were complete documentation, gleaning the number of deaf victims from the files would be a delicate operation. Deaf people were never officially designated as subjects in the Euthanasia Pro... project, yet we know from Friedlander and Biesold that deaf infants, children, and adults were murdered in the asylums. Some were surely misdiagnosed as schizophrenic, cognitively disabled, sometimes as a result of staff failure to properly communicate with deaf people in sign language or in appropriate written German, and sometimes as the tragic result of societal prejudice about the intelligence of anyone who is deaf. When we recall that a patient’s dossier from an asylum often received only a cursory glance from the doctor, who could sign a death warrant, it’s clear that the diagnoses were often meaningless. Perhaps only a painstaking examination of extant hospital and asylum files, records from schools for the deaf, and the state-run killing centers will elucidate the treatment of deaf people in the T-4 program. The fate of deaf Jews in Germany, in Nazi-occupied Europe, is a story of tragic discrimination and heroic survival. There were very few deaf Jewish survivors from Germany.

Regardless, the Holocaust is a known history that took place during WWII where 5 to 6 million people were murdered in extermination Nazi camps. What might be surprising with the group photo circulating the internet is that the current president of Gallaudet University is a deaf Jewish person with a strong Jewish heritage. In fact, president Hurwitz became the first deaf Jewish person to become president of Gallaudet University in its 145 year history. Also, in 1983 he was awarded as an honorary Kappa Gamma brother by Kappa Gamma. How will president Hurwitz and Kappa Gamma's own history of hazing where the Greek fraternity was suspended three times in 1980s and 1990s be able to rectify the Nazi salute photo to the American public? Can president Hurwitz explain away with a straight face to deaf Jewish people everywhere that the Kappa Gamma salute in the group photo is not a Nazi-style salute? But merely a type of a "secret handshake?" Will president Hurwitz continue to align himself with the Kappa Gamma fraternity as an honorary Kappa Gamma brother knowing their hazing past and their Nazi-like salute taken 1989 while continuing to attend Kappa Gamma's annual Grand March seen in this video here? 

How will Kappa Gamma and president Hurwitz of Gallaudet University rectify these problems that have come to light recently? Why would anyone want to join a fraternity who have refused to publicly apologize for their past behaviors and hazing practices on former pledges and who may still be suffering mentally and emotionally? Who will take the lead to rectify these past mistakes? President Hurwitz? The leaders of Kappa Gamma, current and past?

Keeping quiet is not the answer.

Who will have the balls and leadership to step forward and do the right thing?  Why continue to ignore the whole Nazi salute snafu as if nothing happened, president Hurwitz? I'm sure the Jewish Deaf community and the deaf community as a whole would like know. Why continue to ignore the past persecution and murder against deaf people by Nazi Germany? Why continue the association with Kappa Gamma if they are unwilling to publicly apologize for their past hazing transgressions against deaf pledges and their careless indifference about the Holocaust history by doing the Nazi salute while their official Kappa Gamma robes are the blue hooded garments with human skulls on them?

Simon J. Carmel’s lecture, “Silent No More: Testimonies of Deaf Holocaust Survivors” related the unheard stories of the persecuted deaf Jewish during World War II.

What would deaf Holocaust survivors say to you, president Hurwitz? Kappa Gamma? Will you honor the memories of deaf Holocaust survivors and those who never made it out alive in WWII?

President Hurwitz, it's time to be "silent no more" and help preserve the institution's integrity, the Deaf Jewish community relationship and make a stronger and more respectful fraternity organization. It's time to be on the victim's side of history and do the ultimate mea culpa in public.

They are waiting.

UPDATE: What I have should have done was put into a pre-Nazi historical context with the salute. Prior to 1942 the Nazi-like salute was actually done in the United States as part of the Pledge of Allegiance to the flag. This was called the Bellamy Salute, something that I discussed in an earlier blog in reference to the 1989 group photo.  "It was actually the official American salute (in the Pledge of Allegiance) and then it became the official Olympic salute before it became the gesture of German socialism (see the new book "Pledge of Allegiance + Swastika Secrets" by Ian Tinny explaining the work of the historian Dr. Rex Curry). The Pledge of Allegiance was the origin of the Nazi salute and Nazi behavior. So, at the old olympic games there were more than just Germans doing the gesture. and the 1989 youngsters might have known more about the gestures roots in the USA and in the Olympics then those around them." Hat tip - Daniel Ruth. 

Yet, it is still a shocking vid seeing them doing a Nazi-like salute even though that salute was invented around 1892 but 7 years later in 1942 Congress out of act of embarrassment and preservation out of the fact that Nazi Germany stole the United States' salute changed their salute to hand over the heart whenever we do the Pledge of Allegiance to the flag. 

"Gallaudet Student Alleges Hitlerite Hazing"

Sticky: For those coming in here from ASL Dragon going by on what Carl commented about PKZ go here because I don't mention PKZ in this blog piece. But continue reading below about how KG did the Nazi salute with a picture as proof.  


The title of my blog comes from an article in Legal Times (June 6, 1994, Vol. XVII, No. 3, page 6) entitled "Gallaudet Student Alleges Hitlerite Hazing" discusses the "Fuhrer Furor" regarding a former student who alleged that Gallaudet University tolerated a supposedly neo-Nazi style fraternity environment promoted by Kappa Gamma. In the article, it has a group photo taken during 1989 the 35 Kappa Gamma brothers doing what it appears to be a Nazi-type salute.

The first impression can be a good or bad one. Doing a salute that looks exactly like a Nazi salute is first and foremost a really bad impression, especially in the age of the internet, for Kappa Gamma and Gallaudet University as a whole.

Say it ain't so with a straight face to the American public.

The current president of Gallaudet University is Dr. T. Alan Hurwitz. He became the tenth president of Gallaudet University on January 1, 2010. He also became the first Jewish person to head the institution in its 145-year history. He is also an honorary Kappa Gamma brother in 1983. And he has a big impact on the Kappa Gamma fraternity in his support of it.

President Hurwitz can be seen attending the 2011 Fall Kappa Gamma march in this video here.

The 1994 Legal Times article is a case dissection of Kevin Clark's lawsuit against Gallaudet University for the 1993 hazing claim against them that has caused him to suffer a "post-traumatic stress syndrome." The article also provided an incredible revelation of a defense response from the university's legal officer about the Kappa Gamma group photo doing what appears to be a Nazi-like salute. Michael Levy who was a partner at D.C.'s Freer and McGarry law firm said he was able to obtain,

a 1989 group photograph of the Kappa Gamma fraternity members engaging in what appears to be a Nazi-style salute. Although the picture is almost 5 years old, Levy says, it shows two of the defendants in the suit apparently saluting. Yet Kelly, the university's legal officer, says that Levy has misinterpreted the photo.  

What the picture shows, Kelly says, is a group of fraternity brothers holding their arms erect in "the equivalent of a secret handshake."  

Besides, Kelly says, several of the fraternity brothers are Jewish, and some are African and Asian-Americans. "It doesn't make sense that these students would be idolizing Adolf Hitler," Kelly says.  

Tessier, the Kappa Gamma member, echoes that sentiment, calling the notion that blacks and Jews would join a neo-Nazi fraternity "ridiculous."

Below is a color group photo but have chosen to cover their faces but not their shirts this time. Their shirts clearly show the Greek letters Kappa Gamma.

The galling claim by Mr. Kelly was that the salute is the equivalent of their "secret handshake" just goes beyond credulity. Why on earth have that kind of salute within a fraternity circle? Something that is instantly recognizable by everybody as nothing more than a Nazi salute using the right arm outstretched, above the shoulder with palm open and flat while facing down just like a Nazi soldier would do using the exact same right arm?

If it's like a "secret handshake" and it's not really an issue then I suppose the Kappa Gamma fraternity as a whole, the 1989 fraternity brothers in the photo, Gallaudet University and president Hurwitz wouldn't be embarrassed about it and would without a second thought allow the photo to be publicly displayed in full? Can president Hurwitz accept Mr. Kelly's claim with a straight face while trying to explain to the American public that it's not a Nazi-style salute but the equivalency of some "super-secret handshake" type of thing? Can you even buy that without shaking your head? Would the American public ever buy that? It's not about the fact that Kappa Gamma doesn't idolize Hitler or that it's not a neo-Nazi type fraternity, that makes sense.  The fraternity is clearly not like that. The problem is how the public sees the photo. Would they see the 35 salutes with arms outstretched and not the fraternity brothers' skin color or their last names based on their Jewish, European, African, or Asian-American descent? Would that salute instantly remind people of the horrors of the Holocaust created by the Nazi and Stalinist parties (which one was worst?)? A time during WWII where millions of innocent people from babies, young children, teens, adults, the elderly, and those with various disabilities, even deaf people, were brutally killed in the planned machinery of mass genocide aimed at Jewish and Polish people, and many others. It was all about race supremacy and maintaining the nth generation bloodline of the "purest of the pure."

Perception and having the first impression is everything.

Another revelation in the Legal Times article was the allegation that,

former student alleges he was blindfolded and forced to endure three hours of  taunts, nazi sloganeering, and wild spatial disorientation in a "confined and overheated" portion of a basement in a university building.   Because he is deaf, Clark says in the complaint, being blindfolded meant being deprived of his crucial remaining sensory ability.  That deprivation, he says, combined with the excruciatingly loud screaming from the fraternity members, contributed to his trauma. Levy says that while his client could not actually hear the loud screams, the noises created vibrations distressing to him.

Nazi sloganeering? Exactly what went on in the Kappa Gamma's? Did they force pledges to do the Nazi-like salute to their brother superiors whenever they were around? Did they say "Heil XXXXX" to one of their higher-ranked brothers while saluting him? Was it a requirement to salute to each other or to higher ranking brothers? What did or did not happen in the stuffy Kappa Gamma basement of hell back in those days? Did the Kappa Gamma brothers continue to experience hazing (probably on a much lower scale and intensity) soon after becoming a brother, too? What's more important is whether that sort of nonsense is occurring today despite Kappa Gamma's strong anti-hazing support.

As for blood-curdling screams they were supposedly heard by a hearing student staying in Krug Hall while attending Gallaudet University to major in Sign Language Interpreting. A claim that lends credence to the allegation of "excruciatingly loud screaming" that went on in the basement of the Kappa Gamma fraternity organization. 

In the face of these new revelations of old, how will president Hurwitz, who is of a strong Jewish heritage, and Kappa Gamma's own history of hazing be able to rectify the group picture Nazi-like salute to the American public? Can president Hurwitz explain that with a straight face to the Jewish people everywhere that the salute in the picture is not a Nazi-style salute? Just a type of a "secret handshake." No harm. No foul. Right? Will president Hurwitz continue to align himself with the Kappa Gamma fraternity as an honorary brother knowing their past?  How will Kappa Gamma rectify their past hazing practices on former pledges and those who didn't make it may still be suffering deserve an apology from them? Who will take the lead? President Hurwitz? The leaders of Kappa Gamma, current and past? Who will have the balls and leadership quality to step forward and do the right thing?

Hazing supposedly ended in 1993 the year when Gallaudet University suspended Kappa Gamma for four years for violating the university's strict anti-hazing policy which began in 1909. Although they were suspended in 1990 for hazing violations and again in 1992 due to accusation by a black pledge of racism, supposedly so if that was really indeed the case. Would performing racist acts to a black pledge be considered a form of hazing?  By pre-emptively suspending the fraternity in 1993 Gallaudet University essentially admitted that hazing did in fact take place in 1993, again, before the lawsuit was ever to begin in court.

Perhaps the best chance for a plaintiff, Fioravanti says, is to prove that the university assumed a duty toward its students by attempting to regulate hazing and then did so negligently. In Clark's case, he alleges that the university knew of the fraternity's hazing and had previously barred the group from campus.

The suit was settled out of court before it ever began which scuttled the chance to explain the pledge's horrors he had to endure. Otherwise had the lawsuit gone through the court process more revelations may have been revealed as part of the whole discovery process legally required of Kappa Gamma and the university to divulge for the plaintiff to have. Suspending Kappa Gamma for hazing before the court proceeding had even started was an interesting way of admitting or acknowledging on what took place. It was better for them to settle out of court than not, and maintain the secrecy in an institution run by many Kappa Gamma brothers in high ranking administrative and staff positions. Kevin Clark did the right thing by taking Kappa Gamma to court. He was a courageous man for doing so and helped open the eyes of the public and gave an extra voice to all of the pledges in all fraternities who were afraid to stand up for themselves.

It's time to clean the gutters of the past and make a better and more respectful Kappa Gamma fraternity and Gallaudet University. Sweeping it under the rug will not help. Do something that will inspire and encourage the public and the deaf community.

UPDATE: Video of deaf athletes doing the "Nazi salute".

Greek Fraternity Doing the Nazi Salute

Here's a group photo of 35 Greek fraternity brothers doing the Nazi salute. Other people have tried to explain away their salute as doing the "Bellamy salute" which was a popular Pledge of Allegiance salute to the U.S.flag  prior to WWII.  It was Hitler, hence the German National Socialists Party, who made the salute popular and recognized around the world. This forced the United States in 1942 to change their embarrassing salute with a hand over the heart instead for their Pledge of Allegiance to the flag.  It was over 40 years since WWII when that group photo was taken with the 35 fraternity brothers doing the Nazi salute at a fraternity retreat. It'd be disingenuous to say that they were doing the Bellamy salute when that salute has ceased since 1942 for obvious reasons.

This photo of the 35 fraternity brothers belonging to a recognized university doing the obvious Nazi salute is so serious and egregious, not to mention totally stupid and embarrassing, I made the decision to cover up their faces and shirts with their Greek letters....for now.

But why did they do the Nazi salute in the first place? Was it peer pressure done as a lark? Was it a secret salute much akin to a secret handshake used to greet each other while safely in the confines of their fraternity building and elsewhere away from prying or curious eyes? Did fraternity brothers ever forced pledges to do the Nazi salute during Rush Week as part of the whole hazing routine? Why even bother taking a group picture doing the Nazi salute when a picture like that would become the most incriminating kind once it got out to the public? Why even bother doing a group photo with that Nazi pose in the first place?

That's the most mind-boggling and most stupid thing of them all.

When a fraternity does the Nazi salute

What would you think or for that matter what would other people think hearing upon about a fraternity who got together with their 35 fraternity brothers at an outdoor retreat to pose in front of a camera and does the unthinkable that no fraternity organization anywhere in the United States would in their right mind do that? What would people say upon seeing a group picture of 35 fraternity brothers wearing their Greek shirts doing the Nazi salute? An insult to the memory of the millions of Holocaust victims who were brutally tortured and murdered in World War II? 

What would you do or say then? Speak up or stay quiet if it was your college's fraternity?

Now, would you even dare imagine a deaf fraternity group doing the Nazi salute for a group picture? What would you think? Before you blurt out, realize that we all make mistakes while young and did stupid things.  That's forgivable. Something that happened years ago while in college. People do change for the better as we grow older and wiser. But what's not forgivable to is try and continue to shove hazing victims under the rug thinking their hazing story will never see the light of day.  Pictures of fraternity brothers doing the Nazi salute along and bloody bottoms of pledges who have undergone intense paddling during Rush week are one thing. But to have pledge hazing victims are another thing whose emotional and psychological scars can last a lifetime just so that the few immature fraternity brothers would feel important.