Fraternity Guy Sterotype...
 

Have you ever been in a situation where a non-greek person pulls out the "fraternity guys are all..." comments?

I just left a discussion/debate with a good, non-greek, friend of mine. She was trying to make a point about how not all college guys often date-rape girls, but the guys she decided to use as her example of guys who are most likely to do this was the fraternity guy. I don't know if it was a slip of the tongue, or if she had some alternative motive, but it was not a smart comment. It helped having my friend from TKE sitting there too because we both know it happens, but we also know its a small, small, small percentage of the population-no more that what is expected from the entire male population.

Anyway, I just thought I would share....Anyone else have this happen with non-greek friends?

It just happened to me the other day.

My campus has a WEAK Greek system. The strongest fraternity on campus happens to be a local one that pretty much fulfills every known fraternity guy stereotype.

So my non-Greek friend and I were having lunch the other day and we got into a discussion about hazing and alcohol and how it affects the Greek system's reputation.

[I apologize now for my slight use of profanity, but I'm just being real...]

Friend: Frat guys are nothing but drunk, horny bastards.

Me: I know there are guys out there who are like that, but you really shouldn't generalize them like that. I know a lot of them that joined their organizations for other things..and not partying and drinking.

Friend: Oh whatever. That's bullshit. How would you know guys like that? The [insert UH fraternity name here] are always getting in trouble for parties at their house.

Me: Because, dumbass...I've been to the mainland and met some of these guys. They seem like perfect gentlemen to me.

[5 minutes pass and I'm still trying to convince her...]

Then...

Enter [insert UH fraternty name here] peeons through the Campus Center. They're carrying 3 empty kegs tied to long sticks. Their peeons are all wearing togas while their "lead peeon" is banging a gong. What are they doing? They're passing out flyers for their "TRIPLE CHUG PARTY". I'm intentionally leaving out some parts because what they did afterwards is not appropriate to post on GC. :eek:

My friend looks at them and then looks at me... all I could do was roll my eyes. Their president, after seeing me in my letters, approaches me with a bunch of flyers to pass out to the sisters. I waited till he was gone before I went and dumped em in the trash. Sorry, but that act was just disgusting.

I know it's difficult to make people not believe stereotypes, but I can at least try... it's really disheartening to see Greeks living up to these stereotypes. It's because of their actions that give what little Greek life we have here at UH a bad name...and that really pisses me off.

The two of you have just, pehaps unintentionally, defined a large part of the problem.

We work long and hard to try to overcome the stereotype and then a few dorks set us back to the stone age.

Be sure you're not being one of the dorks.

Amen! I was thinking the same thing!

OTW, I am glad U held in your researve to keep from RIPPIN his face OFF! Moronic Butt Heads!

Well NOW, I have 2 Hulla AGD Ladys to talk To!:) :cool:

I just read my post above and realized that it could be assumed that I was talking to Josh or Teeny.

No so.

I was talking to everyone else -- including myself.

Remember that stereotypes generally don't just happen. There's usually some basis in fact.

2 Issues I see with that:

(1) Fraternities cannot sell brotherhood, they have to sell fun and a good time. For those guys, sadly, their fun exists in the realm of alcohol overload. Eventually that guy will outgrow it but by then the new batch of bros will pick up where he left off.

(2) No one is holding them accountable for their actions. What is the chapter president doing to uphold the fraternity mission? Are they holding enough other events to establish a balance?

---

Fraternities have all kinds of images, not just ones I would refer to that incident as "Meat Heads." It's kind of natural for a fraternity to accumulate brothers of a like mindset. Take this into consideration, we have the dork fraternities, the high class fraternities, a plethora of honors fraternities, oh and don't for the jock fraternities.

Furthermore, who cares what your other friends will say. I remember before I became a brother how all my friends were attacking me for rushing. However, I still make time to hang out with them and we're just as close as before. It's just a weird movement in our society to go against the established organizations.

Fraternities might need to work on building a grass-roots kind of image if they want to win back the favor of the entire country.

That's my 3 cents.


Lambda Chi Alpha
Phi-Delta Zeta (UMBC)
Baltimore, MD

It's true, there are all these fraternity stereotypes, and the worst thing is, people viewed exceptions as proving the rule. Like on my campus, the Phi Delts were the football players, the Fijis were partiers, and the Theta Chis were the computer nerds. Now people used the first two chapters (both composed of nice guys by the way!) to "prove" that all frat boys, so to speak, were drunken jocks. And the Theta Chis, you know, they're just not a "real" fraternity. Or you'd get (from girls you wanted to rush), "Sure, I like all of you, but I don't like what sororities are REALLY like, so I don't want to join."

It was like every bad thing (or thing that was stereotypical even if not bad) was "proof" that Greeks were bad/snobby/drunk, and anything to the contrary was an "exception." It didn't matter how many exceptions piled up, it was always that, well, chapter X is different, person Y is different, or our campus is different - but that all the rest of the Greeks out there must conform to my preset ideas!

I make it a point not to befriend people who make stupid, discriminatory comments. If they slip, I point out the error of their ways...if they persist, I don't need them in my life. Period.

Anyone who can't see past media stereotypes or one bad experience, and conducts their life that way, is one sorry ass loser. They'll cheat themselves out of a lot of experiences.

Well what can I say...There will always be people like that :rolleyes:, that judge all greeks for the actions of some. It will be very hard to change that but we can certainly try!;)

GO GREEK!!!:)


Ronnie:D

[QUOTE]Originally posted by mdshoreboy
[B]2 Issues I see with that:

(1) Fraternities cannot sell brotherhood, they have to sell fun and a good time. For those guys, sadly, their fun exists in the realm of alcohol overload. Eventually that guy will outgrow it but by then the new batch of bros will pick up where he left off.

(2) No one is holding them accountable for their actions. What is the chapter president doing to uphold the fraternity mission? Are they holding enough other events to establish a balance?

---

I have to disagree with this point. Brotherhood is one of the things that IS sold on my campus. We have 5 fraternities and 2 Sororities. (at one time, we had 7-5, and are starting to build back up. we've gone from 20% male greek, to 52, though the female average is still steady at a small 17%, low because of a lack of options(said a number of non-greek women)) Out of the 7 houses, only the fraternities have houses they can live in(something the sororities are trying to remedy, with full support from most of the houses), and out of those, 1 is always dry(phi delta theta), one is conditionaly dry until the end of this year(Sigma Nu), and the other three are not dry. Or at least, not in practice. Each house on campus has their reputation, and the reality. Unfortunatly, there is a student anti-greek sentiment from a small group of students, supported by a small group of faculty, but the administration has turned pro-greek in recent times(as many of them are not only greek, but greek alums from this campus). The anti-greek sentiments are founded in steriotypes, that are strengthened by the occasional mistake.

One of the things I learned at College of Chapters this past summer(Sigma Nu's training program for delegates from all our chapters) is how to push things in rush that aren't "c+p" Or chicks and parties. Our rush this year was completely non-chicks and parties. It was founded in brotherhood and our ideals. through these things, we managed to gain the second biggest candidate class out of the 5 fraternities, some of which pushed chicks and parties, and some of which didn't. A couple fraternities on our campus, through athletics, and other "training" camps that start before the rest of the school year, gather pledge classes, in an informal manner of having people say "yes, I'll rush you" basicaly before the offical school year starts. Be that based in friendship, or the possibly parties that those two houses throw, I'd say its more the former than the latter, since no parties are thrown at that time. They are called pre-(xxxx) (house nickname) during fall term here, as it is known who they are going to rush. Though a couple fraternities use chicks, parties, and drinks to bring in pledges, we don't, and in the last 4 years, have had some of the biggest classes out of all the houses on campus. A successful campaign needs no bribes.

M.
Sigma Nu,
Knox College

Great Job
 

Delta Theta
What a well written post and I am so glad that you do use the postive rushing techniques.. good job guys,

Same here - kudo's Delta Theta....

Any fraternity can rush on the parties and girls aspect - that is (sometimes unfortunately) the only known outside perception of fraternity membership.

Where the payoff in QUALITY comes from is being smart, and advertising the additional benefits of membership beyond what prospective members already think they "know" about us. I'm sure this is an effective technique in weeding out those that are there just to drink and get L**d....and retaining those that are looking for something "more" to being a member of something...

Excellent job - I hope more chapters start to pick up on this marketing idea!

Had this pulled on me last night while hanging out with my bros, a couple new pledges and a couple girls.

Started talking to this girl that I'd never seen before and is a roommate of one of my pretty good friends for the summer (they're staying at the AGS house). We start talking about majors and I tell her that I'm a sociology/pre-med with a bio minor. She goes "are you kidding?"

Now this didn't necessarily bother me b/c it's unusual to find a pre-med sociology major, so I usually have to explain that. So I start explaining, and mid way through she goes "oh you really are a pre-med, doesn't that mean you have to be smart." At this point I'm kinda confused, a little due to the alcohol, a lot due to what this chick is saying. I'm like, "yeah, I guess" and she says, "aren't you supposed to be like a finance or business major then?" at this point, I'm really unsure of what she's getting at...

then she says it. "I thought all fraternity guys were business students b/c that's the easiest coursework, and leaves the most time for having parties." Now I'm no business major, but I know that there are some difficult courses in every major...it wouldn't be college if there weren't. Further, I have some extremely intelligent friends who are in the College of Business Admin. and I didn't appreciate her calling them stupid or saying that the only reason they were there was so they drink more often. Finally, I didn't appreciate the whole generalization that a) we're stupid (my house GPA was a 3.516 afterall) or b) that all we care about is drinking.

I just ended the conversation by walking away, but it really bothered me.

BTW this girl was a GDI

If one of your strong points is brothehood, sell it. Think about it, do you really want a brother who is only there to party? Live your values and sell your values. If you live your values, people will see that and you won't have to seel anyone, they'll come to you b/c they want to be a part of it.

If no one is holding them accountable, you do it. If you change your chapter and follow your values the chapters not keeping up and living their values will die off or have their charters revoked. Thus the stereotype is slowly killed off. We hold the key to killing these stereotypes in our actions. Live your values get others to live them and you'll make your greek COMMUNITY better.

By the way, business can be a challenging major.

Yeah it is, I'm in aerospace engineering and I wouldn't survive in business. Economics, marketing, etc. doesn't come easily to me and it puts me to sleep.

My boyfriend's an aviation management major and his classes would kill me. Law, ugh.

Something I would like to point out -

Thread after thread makes statements like this. First of all, I hate the term GDI. I am independent, (for the moment) but I hate having the GD attached. To me, that is just as bad as if I called fraternity men "frat boys".

Second of all, not only independents have this stereotypical mindset about men in fraternities. When I went to the sorority info meeting last year, they were doing a question and answer session, and one of the "sample questions" was, "If I join a sorority do I have to date fraternity boys?" The rho sigma answered. "Most of us wouldn't date them. Our standards are a little higher."

My best friend is in a fraternity, and I know that intelligence and politeness are more common among his brothers than not. You'd be surprised how many "GDIs" share this opinion.

GDIs
 

Crystal, I know there have been posts on the topic before, but this is my take on the GDI thing.

You are not a GDI. Ariesrising (not Greek and not planning on it, to the best of my knowledge) is not a GDI. My non-Greek parents who support me being Greek are not GDIs. Who is a GDI?

• The girls on my dorm floor who asked me how many fraternity boys I had to sleep with to join, and asked if I liked buying my friends, but were at the ABQ house partying it up every weekend.
• The people I worked with on campus who said "I have to work with a sorority girl?"
• The boy in the library who calls me a sororistute because I was wearing lettered flip-flops

GDI could also stand for GD Ignorants. I don't know any Greek who uses GDI to refer to every single Independent...we usually reserve it for the dumb ones, just like most Independents reserve "fratty" or "frat boy" for our dumb ones.

Ahhh ok. Thanks for the clarification - I am now blushing and hanging my head in embarrassment. :)

Some of the major's within the College of Business are easy. I have had broad experience within the College and I know this for a fact. But... go tell an accounting, economics, or finance major that they have an easy major. Good luck.

Don't be - you didn't do anything wrong!

Business majors depend a lot on your university - at my last one, it was a play major. At my current one, it's pretty prestigous.

HAHAHA... I'm sorry, but that's funny.

Crystal, there is nothing to be embarassed about. I understand how sometimes the term GDI is taken and that's why I only use it to apply to people who are big jerks about the Greek system, just like GeekyPenguin pointed out. And I greatly admire the fact that you were able to stand up on a board of Greeks and challenge something that you felt was wrong.

Before I start, I want everyone to be very open-minded to my thoughts. I am NOT anti-fraternity in ANY WAY; I am Greek afterall(a music Greek, but still a very proud Greek!). I have close friends in many Greek organizations on my campus. However, I've made some observations and such.

As far as the stereotypes go...unfortunately, some groups (well, I should say certain individuals in the groups, not the group as a whole) DO live up to the stereotypes. I will not name any groups in this post, but here's some things I've noticed.

Stereotype #1: "fraternity guys are all jerks/stuck up". Well TOTALLY depends on both the group and the individuals. There are a few groups here that are totally cool, open-minded and friendly. However...the other groups, you can go to their parties, but they don't talk to you or even notice you're there, unless you're one of the girls in the sorority they associate with. This has also happened to me in classes I've had with some of the more stuck-up guys. Please, GreekChatters, I'm NOT trying to stereotype them; but this has been my personal experience. I've gone to parties at every house on campus many times and this has happened to me at a few houses.

Stereotype #2: "fraternity guys drink 24/7." Depends on the guy...and besides, I know plenty of non-Greek people that drink 24/7, so that's just stupid.

Stereotype #3: "fraternity guys do drugs all the time." Well...one of the fraternities here do.....the others...not that I know of.

Stereotype #4: "fraternities are date rapists." This is NOT always just a rumor or a stereotype. A close friend of mine who is in one of the top fraternities on campus has an older sister who was date raped by a particular fraternity on campus. My brother's best female friend was ALSO date raped by a member of this group. And a friend of mine went to one of their parties and drank something that one of them had put a date rape drug in. A mutual friend of ours realized she had been drugged and got her out of there.

Now, this may only be one guy there doing that. But this has happened, by members of this fraternity, NUMEROUS times here. How can this be allowed to go on?

Another fraternity on my campus has their house directly across the street from my dorm, and my hall faced their house directly. These guys would be drunk EVERY SINGLE NIGHT, and be yelling and screaming so loud that they woke up EVERYONE in my hall. We would yell out the window for them to shut up, and they'd get louder. We'd call the police on them, and they'd shut up for maybe 5 minutes, and get louder again. One occassion, I drove past their house and about 5 of them threw beer cans at my car. And these same guys wonder why a lot of people don't respect them. :rolleyes:

I don't want any of you to think I am anti-fraternity; I'm not. I think GLOs are wonderful, and raise lots of money for philanthropies as well as doing service projects for the community, etc. However, many fraternities get upset when they get stereotyped when they very clearly live up to that particular stereotype. I mean, if you want people on campus to respect you, you have to be respectable.

THoughts? Similar experiences?

sairose, I completely understand your frustration with the groups on your campus that live up to a negative stereotype. One person in a group can destroy years of positive PR, and one group run by morons can destroy an entire Greek community.

I'm fully of the opinion that these people who act like morons and neanderthals would be exactly like this if they weren't in a fraternity/sorority, and acted like this before they even got to college. Why do entire groups act this way then? Well, everyone likes to hang out with people like them. So all the idiots turn on their idiot magnets and before you know it, all the idiots have congregated into a single group and proceed to make all groups look bad with their moronic antics.

I'm not saying the Greek system produces clones or that everyone in an org. is exactly the same. But doesn't everyone in your org have at least something in common, or a common mission? Yes, there's one or two people that aren't on the same wavelength, and sometimes they're the best members, and sometimes they're the worst members.

I probably didn't get anywhere with this post, but I just wanted to throw some ideas out there and acknowledge the fact that we know there are idiots out there.

I'm curious. Are any fraternities actively fighting to destroy this image on a Inter/National level? For example, does any fraternity have an education program that focuses on preventing violence towards women? This would be a very important thing, IMO, and a great place to start. I know that I've personally never heard of this and if I saw a fraternity on campus sponsor a program on this to make all men aware of this epidemic, I would feel better about fraternities actively working to improve their reputation and eradicate the stereotype altogether...