uuuu VOL. LVIII
ymm ■
By JOE JOHNSON It is September at Longwood near the beginning of fall semester and the weather has a humid stuffy tinge. It is hot in the afternoon and Orlando Turner's legs are aching. He does not know how far he has run. The dull thump of combat boots is two paces slower than his heart and the black sweatshirt sticks to his
IX)NGW0ODCOLLEGE, FARMVILLE, VIRGINIA, TUESDAY, MARCH 1,1983
Inside Black FraternitiesThe Q-Dogs on Campus
his brain were an AM radio mentally and physically past the caught in between the channels. breaking point." Don't think about the voices Orlando Turner gave up 6 1 1 playing basketba11 for PK.^ u„ i°°„ I. " ° •, T Longed them. He straightens and walks during that fall semester. He gtoward the candy colored red and ave it up to go through 8 weeks of yellow house that Dalany Brown pledging, of running and has rented. There is the refuge, screaming, of small chores and there is the home, there are the late night studying and doing everything and more to make himself an Omega man, a brother.... Mike Mcroy and Troy Littles are in a room talking about the basketball game that is playing on the television set. Gary Thornhill is pressing ice to his biceps, sitting in a small flower patterned loveseat near the left hand corner of the room. The ice he hopes will numb his upper arm. Numb it enough so that he won't feel the brand - the red hot Omega brand. It could have been made for a cow puncher - a long metal stem with the Grecian Omega letter twirled tangent on the end, like an inverted horseshoe. The other brothers have told him about the brand, how it hurt for days worse than a tetanus shot - like a bullet wound hot and piercing. The ice is beginning to melt, it trickles, down his arm. He wishes it wouldn't melt so fast. An Omega brother sees that Gary is ready. He picks up the brand and carries it into the room where The Omega Psi Phi fraternity: (top row, from left to right) Gary is sitting. Gary holds up his Orlando Turner, Dalany Brown, Gary Thornhill; (bottom row) James sleeve with his left hand. Richardson, Mitchell Walker, Troy Littles. Not pictured is Reginald Close your eyes...its going to hurt. He keeps them open. He Glasby. thinks the brand looks cool, like a brothers. neon sign, a little red glow. It water sheened body like new "Not everybody can do it, you comes closer. He can feel the paint to primer. have to want it; want it bad. It The other runner, Mitch, is made me learn the rewards of heat of the iron now. Just do it man - a low sizzling sound. The behind him somewhere, he can discipline, now I feel like there's T"" ".'"". hear hear the dull thud as black boots Sng I'can't do - because I've ^TaSTS he Z n" slap asphalt and his thoughts pushed myself to the limit, past flinch, he doesn't scream. coalesce into a raging rhymatic the limit." "That was about a year and 6 chant "0 -M-E - G-A-P - S-I-PIt is cooler now, late February months ago" says Gary "It didnt H-I" louder Orlando. "O-M-E - and the green army fatigues and hurt half as bad as the brothers G-A-P - S-I-P-H-I louder combat boots Orlando wore that said it would. They were just Orlando LOUDER! afternoon in September are bullshitting, to get me scared." "Omega Psi Phi - OMEGA PSI replaced with a comfortable In Dalany Brown's rented PHI - OMEGA PSI PHI". leather jacket and Nike*. He is a "rt "^"i,; ^Ik* fiooTof He stops -- lungs roaring for sipping a coke and munching on ^ cand ,ored house across air — and bends, wrapping a M n'Ms and is satisfied with life. the street from Frflzer towel around his ears. Frazer He is now a brother, one of the dormit a small ^niih black dormitory looms overhead like few elite that make Omega Psi and ^ ^ fc showing ..^ Gibraltar, white and towering, Phi and he is proud. Warriors". A violent saga of "When I stopped running that gtreet ^ asphalt deaths there are chants and catcalls ^ ^ M arm [& from the window "Go home Q- day in September I wasn t feeling that good because I hew there ,„£„£££ the weited badge Dog"..."Get lost." He doesn't hear the voices, his was something else they d have Q{ couraKe hands are on his knees and in his me do - there's always something "Not every brother has to do it. mind there is a buzzing tone as if else. They keep pushing you If you want to you can, if you
don't want t0, its no
big deal. It's a tradition in black fraternities like the way we pledge - very tough and structured almost like a bo0t camp." Two other Omegas, Troy and Mitch Walker, are sitting on a sofa facing the TV. Dalany is off to the right. His head is tilted upward, poised on the back of his hand. He has the look of a warrior, dignified, majestic, accomplished. His eyes flash across the room and meet Gary's. If there is a leader to be found for these men it is here, in Dalany's razor-slit eyes and terse machine-gun speech. "We take our pledges and we mold them into the type of Omega they're supposed to be," Dalany folds his hands into a cupped U and then compresses them. "If you don't fit the criteria for Omega man..." he pauses letting the words get under the skin. "You won't make it...ya know
No. 18
what I'm saying, you just won't make it." Troy hits his chest and says "Everything we have comes from here man." "I'm going to tell you what a white guy said to me..." Dalany crouches in his chair, his elbows on his knees watching for a reaction. "This dude from Delta Sigma Phi, he comes up to me and says 'Dalany who do you think would win if the Delta's got into a fight with the Omega's" and I'm like thinkin' 'Why would you even ask me a question like that,' you gonna fight us or something, so I said "What difference does it make?" And he said, "Well, we got more brothers than y'all got." I said, "Man, what difference does it make if you got 40 brothers and when it comes time to throw down 30 of them, run that way." He points to the door. Mitch says "That's right" and nods. (Continued on Page 6)
James Richardson shows off hie Omega brand.