Editorial: Biden appearance the wrong place for pep

Pep rallies are a lot more fun when you aren’t discussing sexual assault.

Hundreds of people trudged up the hill Tuesday to the Petersen Events Center for Vice President Joe Biden’s speech about the It’s On Us awareness campaign. But what could have been a moment for a united campus to advance a somber subject was instead one tainted with disorganization, symbols of rape culture and misguided messaging.

Leading up to a group of speakers, including “Orange is the New Black” star Matt McGorry and Gov. Tom Wolf, Roc the Panther skipped through the cheerleaders, throwing T-shirts. Meanwhile, pop songs, such as Calvin Harris’ “Blame” and the Black Eyed Peas’ “I Gotta Feeling,” blasted through the building’s speakers.

Organizers somehow found it appropriate for a sexual assault awareness event to feature songs with the lyrics “Blame it on the night, don’t blame it on me” and “Fill up my cup, mazel tov/Look at her dancing, just take it off” while our school mascot blew kisses.

In doing so, the organizers utterly missed the point of Biden’s visit. And with hundreds of students turned away before any of them even knew about the pre-talk festivities, it’s safe to say students didn’t a need a pep band and a free shirt to pump them up for a conversation about sexual assault.

The speakers, including Biden, discussed violent assaults and continually hammered in the idea that protecting one another is a moral imperative. This was not the proper environment for festivities — it was a space to come together and discuss how we can better accomplish that task. It’s confusing, then, why it seemed like Pitt was celebrating instead of teaching.

The inappropriate environment didn’t create a space for personal connections to survivor experiences. Instead of fostering empathy, it promoted enthusiasm. A lack of personal perspective widened the gap between audience members and the survivors whom speakers broadly discussed.

It was good to see students represented by leaders from student minority and activist groups on stage with the vice president. But it would have been more useful to hear from survivors of sexual assault or activists who were willing to speak from that vantage point.

Adding to a lack of useful conversation, poor planning meant that more than 800 other students — some of whom had tickets — didn’t even make it through the door to hear anything because the event happened in the lobby of the Pete instead of the actual arena.

While this was the White House’s decision, according to Pitt Student Affairs spokesperson Shawn Ahearn, Pitt should have made it clear from the beginning just how many students would be able to enter the Pete, and offered a separate live streaming somewhere on campus to ensure anyone who wanted to could hear Biden’s message.

Instead, the University continued ticket sales for an additional day and noted that the tickets did not guarantee entrance.

Life doesn’t have to be wrought with doom and gloom, but there are some moments that warrant a serious tone. Biden’s It’s on Us speech was one of them.