From Dec 19th new story:
Dec. 19, 2006, 10:54PM
Charges don't keep frat from partying
Austin group's actions following Houston teen's drinking death surprise officials

By ROBERT CROWE
Copyright 2006 Houston Chronicle

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/front/4411723.html

And those of "us" who have only been around for decades at most face the same problems. New students judge us everyday on the misconceptions created by these older, more "historic," organizations. ONE isolated incident happened with an Asian GLO that shouldn't reflect anything or become a generalization for other organizations around the country.

Isolated incidents... This past year I've heard of everything from a new member falling off his balcony to a pledge being locked in a casket. These did not occur within Asian organizations, but rather those with 100+ years of history. You speak of this "we" and "you" division like my organization would be any different than your's in purpose. I keep wondering what older, more experienced organizations think about newer organizations because these type of divisional comments.

I'm proud to be in my organization (Yes, an Asian one). I without a doubt believe we have more in common than just 10 random guys "calling [ourselves] something using Greek letters." We serve our community, set up Philanthropy events, and furthermore, turn young men into leaders. There's nothing to talk down to about that. If not for this ONE incident, I'm sure all of the current Asian GLOs would have been in a council within the next few years. I'm sure that we'll be on one before our first decade on campus is over. In the meantime, all we've been doing was researching on the different councils to find which one will suit us best. Coming from a much smaller, and newer organization, the idea of being "recognized" is much different compared to that idea for century-old organizations.

(Sidenote: I have friends and acquaintances in all GLOs. The point I was trying to make is that ethnic groups aren't any different in tradition and culture, so much as to say I'm Vietnamese, he's African American, and she's White.)

Jon, I was referring to someone else's comment about an active being stripped of membership for ratting something out.

What does your comment imply?

Sorry, I may have mis-read or mis-understood your comment.

All my posting was about was a new update to others already in thread.

Oh that's cool =)

Jaynu,

There is a BIG difference between kids falling off balconies or dying of overdoses and the forced drinking to death in this case.

The former are unfortunate tragedies that derive from behavior that is common for many college students- Greek and non-Greek.

The incident in this thread was deliberate and incredibly stupid, and it is one of many over the years that has happened with an unregistered GLO at Texas. These problems are not the result of the organizations being of a particular race. They are problems of organizations that exist without proper structure or guidance.

That sure seems evident in their behavior. I can imagine a non-Greek student getting drunk and driving, or falling off a roof while intoxicated. Overdoses happen all the time.

How often does ANYONE force-feed someone booze until they die? It takes the pledge-active relationship of a GLO to make that possible, but it takes a pretty messed up group of people to actually do it. The continued parties after the incident (the article Jon posted which I read in Houston when it came out), certainly do not tell the tale of an organization that recruits men on solid principles.

Guidance and structure can be lacking in any chapter, but by their very nature unregistered GLOs are operating in a far less safe manner than any GLO which is responsible to a strong national office and a university.

I have no problem with new GLOs- why should I? The more of us there are serving an increasingly diverse student population, the better off the Greek community is as a whole.

But when organizations put out a public appearance of being Greek groups for university students (ie they have Greek letter names) but they do not even bother to associate themselves in name and responsibility the same as other GLOs, they are merely trying to rip off our prestige and then damage us all when something goes wrong.

NPHC organizations in many cities exist just fine outside the scope of university representation. They also have their own methods of recruiting and membership that set them apart. They are not trying to have the benefit of being associated with a college and at the same time avoid the responsibility of other student organizations.

And spare me the BS about representation on councils. Texas has a council for Asian-specific GLOs- but only sororities are members of that council.

If, as you imply, the failure of Asian male GLOs to be officially registered with the University or a council is racially motivated, how come the Asian GLO council (which is not specifically stated to be reserved only for sororities) does not have any of the many Asian male GLOs?

For that matter, considering how many different Texas councils there are for registered GLOs of a wide range of racial groups- how is it possible that you are being kept away from doing the same? Is there a conspiracy against Asian fraternity members?

The reason that and so many groups are underground is obvious by their behavior in this case- specifically what they did and then what they did after the fact.

The racial connection is purely coincidental. GLOs in this country have traditionally been home to white students- and with membership on a slight decline overall, there is little need for more predominantly white GLOs.

And so it is natural that growth in the number of GLO organizations will tend to be for groups that are conceived by and largely serve members of minority groups- who are also attending college in greater numbers.

So nice try, but this is not about race. This is about groups that lead a marginal existence, try to appear to be the same as us, and make us all suffer when they do something stupid that gets heavy publicity- which is far more often than it is for us.

Newspaper readers are discerning. Are you going to tell me they don't see the difference between a young man falling and dying while at home versus a pledge being force fed booze until he died?

Incidentally, not all the traditional long-lived GLOs are white. There are some NPHC organizations older than some of the larger traditionally white organizations.

Point being, "We" and "Us" was not the racially discriminatory type comment you would like to associate with my post.

Jaynu, the reasons LPhiE was not recognized at Texas is most likely because of their repeated violations of school policy. I know for a fact of LPhiE not being recognized at at least 15 university across the country, almost 33% of their chapters! That is insane. Moreover, LPhiE is a member of the NIC, and thus should have some sense of the responsibility involved when you are part of a National organization.

The bottom line is LPhiE Zeta Chapter dropped the ball big time. They continue to party after they KILLED someone. How is that responsible? Moreover, why isn't the National Office (or the front they say is their National Office) officially derecognizing them and declaring them no longer brothers?

LPhiE is a mess right now. 4 Deaths in 3 years is not good, especially when you only have 46-47 chapters.

Moreover, to back up EE-Bo, universities have created Multicultural Greek Councils and the like because they don't know what to do with Latino and Asian Greeks. To think that LPhiE was blacklisted when the TAPC was only made up of sororities is absurd.

Bottom line: LPhiE needs to get its act together quick. It faces ENORMOUS dues now do the the lawsuits and their attempt to try and get National Insurance (which last time I heard they don't have). Moreover, Greek Advisors are NOT stupid. They communicate between schools. I garauntee you every school with LPhiE is keeping a VERY careful eye on them.

EE-Bo, I'm not defending Lambda Phi Epsilon's act in anyway. What I am trying to say is that you're lumping in a wide range of organizations that are mostly (even YOUNGER than LPHIE), if not all, less than a decade old.

Incidents have happened with recognized organizations. If you're from the UT Austin, I'm sure you know of the guy buried alive in a casket (no need to list names).

Anyhow, it's a bit easy for you to attack the smaller organizations because we aren't recognized or 'organized with guidance.' I can assure you my organization is getting there as well as the other AGLOs on campus. The Texas Asian Pan-Hellenic Council was always designed for women as far as I understood, and close contacts with them tells me they'll be opening to Asian fraternities so I am doing my homework. My main point is incidents don't make you look bad only or the organizations that stand 100+ years strong; they affect other AGLOs also, ones that do plan to join councils in their near future.

How about the other councils? Believe me! We've looked into that also, but such councils do not serve a purpose to help us. For example, several councils would not allow its members to flyer in Jester and West Mall, one of the main ways we recruit our members. This policy would do a lot more well with established organizations that are already known through a much longer period of time. So yes, we have been looking... just for the right one that suits who we are as a newer organization. We've also looked into making our own council and have the other respectable AGLOs join (not racially bound, just because most likely, they're not in one yet either). We also participate with GLE on campus to learn about all of the issues such as hazing and risk-mgmt. so it's not like we're just random guys who wear Greek letters to bring the system's image down. Just want to make that clear.

As L.O.C.K. has stated, this chapter is STILL active with the national organization. I checked the website myself and there is no word of any action having been taken.

What I did not know, and thank you L.O.C.K. for providing this information, is that a third of LPE chapters are not recognized by their respective colleges and that there have been 3 deaths in two years- none of them appearing to be accidents from the news reports I read.

You are right that established GLOs do stupid things too, and get themselves in the paper and make us all look bad. I never denied that.

What I am saying is that it is my personal observation that underground GLOs tend to have a disproportionate number of very serious incidents for a variety of reasons. And I was upset that behavior of these underground groups brings disrepute on us all.

There are plenty of new GLOs out there which are a viable part of an ever-diversifying Greek Community that will strengthen our presence on campuses and ensure our survival.

But from the evidence shown here, LPE is not such an organization- and not just at Texas but on a national level as well.

To be fair, it appears the national leadership bears a lot of the blame. I am not prepared to condemn every chapter and undergraduate member over incidents at a few chapters- so please don't think I am disparaging the whole operation.

A national leadership that does not take action against chapters where hazing deaths occur and, if what L.O.C.K. suggested might be true is in fact the case, if national leadership has not been able to secure basic insurance- then all undergraduate chapters have the potential to get out of control, as Texas did, and then have individual members and their parents face huge financial responsibilities whenever anything goes wrong.

It is important to note that much of the continued news coverage of this story centers around the fact the chapter has continued to operate the same as before with no adult intervention. That is what makes this particular story all the more damaging when it comes to the image of the Greek community and our ability to recruit new members.

I do not think that there or were that many disparaging remarks against smaller GLOs.

The fact is some of the truely old line GLOs of the NIC have small chapter numbers. That then would be no point of discussion.

While I cannot say that all GLOs have had some form of R M problems, very many have in one form or another. What has also been stated by many, when a group using greek letters, anything that happens reflects on all greek orgaizations no matter what.

When one thinks about it, people only see greek letters when they see or read something in the news media.

I do remember the media backlash created when Jack's death occurred. As a member of UT's brother fraternity to LphiE, I can tell you that those guys are real brothers in and out of thier fraternity. We will continue to support LFE, because they always have our back. We do understand that LFE is in a lot of mess not with just the accident last year but some events that occurred earlier in the fall semester. Im sure LFE will pull through and learn from thier mistakes.

So...the article states that LFE is not recognized by UT, but it's suspended until 2011. However according to this thread the chapter is still active. I'm confused...who's doing the suspension, or what the hell is going on?

Interesting question isn't it?:confused:

I agree with his "divisional comments" and wish to add that "the new member" who you refer to was in my fraternity (SAE) at Texas and had nothing to do with any kind of RM issue. He fell off of his balcony at the Towers. He wasn't forced to drink a gallon of liquor.

well from what I understand, the chapter is obviously suspended by UT till 2011...meaning they cant rush on campus, use the facilities...under the name LFE...but they are still a fraternity that has an active house...as far as nationals and everything goes, i have no clue