Ole Miss is still investigating reports of homophobic and disruptive behavior at a Tuesday night performance of "The Laramie Project," a play about the response to Matthew Shephard's 1998 murder. But late yesterday, Ole Miss announced that it knows enough to require all students who attended that play to attend a mandatory dialogue session.
Because of conflicting reports and the difficulty in finding the person that the cast and crew said used a slur, the entire audience will be required to go through an “educational dialogue session led by university faculty and allies.”
Cast members also are invited to participate.
Twenty-five freshmen football players along with other athletes were among the 100 or so members of the audience. The Ole Miss athletics department is still gathering facts, a spokesman said, and any additional penalties would be based on new information.
“The task of identifying specific individuals who were purported to have disrupted the performance is difficult because of the dark theater, and initial reports vary in regard to the frequency, volume and source of the comments or disruption,” Ole Miss’ statement read. “Although initial reports indicate that student athletes led the action, it is important to note that this has not been verified, and they were not the only students present. Reports indicate that comments were made by student athletes and students, but no report has singled out a specific student or mentioned any names.”
No word as of yet about when this "dialogue" will take place. The way it looks, the only reason the players suspected of being the worst offenders are suiting up tonight against Auburn is that the athletic department's own investigation is still very much underway. However, you can bet your bottom dollar Hugh Freeze's captains are trying to ferret them out as well. Fellow Kossack Otteray Scribe mentioned
in my original post on this affair that his grandson goes to Ole Miss, and told him on the phone, "There will be no circling the wagons on this mess because Hugh Freeze is no Joe Paterno." Which means that the hammer could come down as early as next week, when the Rebels play Texas A&M.