'White girls only': Yale fraternity accused of enforcing colour bar at party

A member of a Yale University fraternity turned dark-skinned students away from a party this weekend, telling them: "No, we're only looking for white girls."

That's according to a student who said she was standing next to him on the stairs when he held his hand out to block a group from entering the Sigma Alpha Epsilon party.

Those girls looked startled and walked away, said Sofia Petros-Gouin, a freshman at Columbia who was visiting friends at Yale and described a stairway crowded with people trying to get into the Halloween party, and the fraternity member, who was white, repeatedly saying, "White girls only," and letting blonde women go in.

"I was shocked," she said. "I was disgusted."

The allegation, which was echoed on social media in several complaints about similar incidents at Yale SAE, was especially charged because Sigma Alpha Epsilon has been repeatedly accused of having racist traditions as part of the fraternity culture. The national chapter announced initiatives in the spring designed to ensure that racist behaviour is not tolerated in its chapters.

It opened up a heated conversation at Yale, with some students saying it shows blatant racism on campus, and others questioning whether it could have really happened.