Non-Greek with Greek Screen Name
 

Earlier today I received an IM on AOL from a gentleman whose SN has the name of a fraternity. On his profile it states where he goes to school (which is in the same city where I go to school), so I figured he was a member of this certain fraternity at the school listed on his profile. I mentioned to him that his fraternity had invited my sorority to a party this past spring and he mentioned to me that he WAS NOT a member of this fraternity and was going to "pledge" in the fall.

I would not want someone who is not in my sorority affiliating themselves with my sorority like this guy has done. He may be a great guy, but everything this guy says to someone via IM, or even e-mail, affiliates him with this fraternity, which he is not a member of. It's a little deceiving. His response when I asked why he had the name of the fraternity in his SN if he is not a member: "i was thinkin of joinin." That's great! But what if for some reason he does not go through recruitment, or what if he does but he does not join this fraternity? I asked if he was a legacy, which might explain why, but he said no.

Something about this just does not sound right. Why would someone put a certain fraternity or sorority in their SN if they are not a member, to make others think that they are? This just rubs me the wrong way.

Seems like that could kill your chances of pledging. Remember that girl last year who was going through rush and used ChiO in her screenname? Someone politely pointed out that doing that could be seen as presumptuous. (GC never heard from her again.)

I think that's kinda rude to use a GLO's name in your screen name and not being a member of it... Most of my friends that are greek went and changed their screen name to one with their org's name in it the day they accepted their bid. I think that's a really cool idea, because then they were able to announce to the world their affiliation... with a screen name that said it, too! :D

I kinda equate the screen name thing with the woman that lives across the street from me that wore her cousin's ZTA letter shirt all the time... She was never a ZTA, but she TOLD people she didn't know (like Wal-Mart and stuff) that she was! :eek: She ALWAYS wore it, and then about a week ago I asked her if I could buy it from her for $5, and she accepted it! I'm gonna give it to one of the ZTA's I know at school, cause I can't stand to see her wearing them when she was never even a member...

This is only kind of related to your comments about user names, but in the last few years I have met three different guys whose first names were 'Deke' but they were not DKEs. One was an SAE, one was an ADG, and one was a non-Greek. When I first met them I asked what chapter they hailed from and was told that no, that was their real first name, not their fraternity. They were not legacies and had no apparent connection. It was just what they had been given as first names. My Dad told me that Deke or Deak was a fairly popular boy's name in the deep south when he was growing up. I suppose it still is. Must have been funny for a guy named Deke to pledge SAE or ADG!

haha i've actually had a confrontation regarding misrepresentation of an org before... not a pretty thing.. something i feel so strongly about. DO NOT PRETEND TO BE A MEMBER OF A GLO IF YOU ARE NOT!!!! even if you are going to rush!!

Kappa Tarzan
 

Or if they have to say anything, maybe "wannabee XYZ"
but yeah, don't claim letters that aren't yours.

Why do people want to be posers?
Kappa Delta has an extensive online community, strongly through our Yahoo group.
There was a girl named Fallon who jonied the list, said she had been a KD and had transferred to another school. She basically tried to affiliate with that chapter, and they found out there's never been anyone named Fallon that was a KD! Ever!
She joined in our messages frequently, and we actually busted her during our weekly chat. Basically we had all put two and two together, someone did the research on her through our Headquarters, and we confronted her. She made up all these stories about the stress she was under, yada yada yada and evaded the question we asked: what's your pin number? why are you lieing?
She blocked each and every one of us from her IM list and was never heard from again.
We were really upset because she seemed like a great girl, but deceived us like that! Someone in the group had even sent her a small present and a card, and we were just deceived.
Why would people want to pose as a member of a group that they certainly are not? Especially when it's not that hard to find out the truth.

There's an old saying "Imitation is the highest form of flattery!"

I actually saw a poser in action awhile back. She was visiting friends at Mississippi State and told everyone all weekend about her GLO at the U of Arkansas. She was wearing paraphernalia too! The girls in that group at State had a funny feeling about her after a couple of days and asked me to call a friend who was president of that chapter at Arkansas. No such person had ever been in that chapter!

In the meantime, the girls in the State group were doing hilarious stuff to her like asking her if her chapter pretended to row a boat in the chapter room as a part of the initiation ceremony like theirs did (they made that up) and she said yes! They strung her along all weekend before they busted her!

Fraternities are different sometimes...
 

With Summer rush many times these guys are everything BUT new members of these fraternities. Our house tries to line up our Candidate class before rush actually starts if at all possible. If this was the case I can see this happening.

Re: Fraternities are different sometimes...
 

LOL, I thought that was a rules infraction? Certainly a violation of the spirirt anyway.

I wouldn't get too excited about someone with letters in their IM name though.

As to what Thielgirle said, most fraternity chapters that I am aware of do not allow pledges to wear letters at all. Chapters that is, National rules are often different. Obviously sororities are different, but most fraternity chapters do not consider pledges to be members yet.

All rhetoric about changing the name from pledges to new members to the contrary.

I wouldn't worry about it too much... after all, this is the internet! There are men out there with female screen names, women with male names, adults pretending to be teenagers, twelve year olds claiming to be twenty, etc. One thing about the internet is that you can't always judge a person by his or her screen name! I mean, I wouldn't like it if someone were presenting herself (or himself for that matter) as a Gamma Phi without actually being one. But there are worse things. :)

We had a girl at our school my freshman year who bought different letter shirts (fraternity and sororitity) and wore them all over campus...

Yep, she turned out and came to a bid party, she was kinda psycho.

being "Fallon-ized"
 

That was the BEST chatnight we ever had - but BOY, were we ever deceived!

I can't believe she went to such great lengths to "prove" she was a KD. And I can't believe so many of us fell for it.

yes, this IS the internet - you can be whoever you wanna be. But Fallon knew some of our ritual - no doubt, be conned someone into "refreshing her memory".

Let this be a warning to everyone - make sure your membership knows (collegiate, alumnae and esp ONLINE) never to IM or email any part of ritual to ANYONE!!

OMG!!! :eek: That takes BALLS to do that in Clarion...where everyone knows everyone....so who ended up kicking her butt?

Re: poser
 

LOL, they call that vandalism and theft.

***

Hi All! AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!! I was just reading this thread and something occured to me that hadn't before.... I am using a user name with a greek letter-MU, and some might percieve it as offensive and disrespectful. Honestly I didn't even think about it! My initials are AJK and the University that I attend for my masters is Marywood University...I wonder if there is any way that I could change it! I am a PNAM looking into doing AI with an org. Does anyone know if I can change? I don't want anyone to be offended!

Hi! If you're being serious, settle down. :) No need to change your screen name. If your screen name was AJKPhiMu or something, then you'd have issues. But "mu" isn't the name of any group.... or even a nickname that i can think of.

it's all good

WHEW! Alright, thank you very much for your reply, I just wasn't sure. Because honestly , I do think that its very deceptive and disrespectful using a screen name to make everyone think that you are a member when you're not.... I guess some just want to be accepted and go to great lengths to do that....

I guess that girl didn't get a bid to join any sorority on your campus. I kinda understand she would buy the sorority shirts (I don't condone that behavior though) but fraternity http://smilies.jeeptalk.org/contrib/dday/shocked.gif(!!!) shirts!! That girl is beyond kinda psycho, she is uber psycho!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I still have alot of my ZTA stuff, but I dont wear it. Ive sold some of it on Ebay and given some of it away. I know that I used to be a pledge or whatever but theres no point in wearing something of a GLO's that youre no longer affiliated with.


Nichole

I don't know if anyone reads rush threads but ADPi went through just this similiar situation in September. A girl claimed to go through rush, did a long rush thread, claimed to recieve a bid from ADPi. We welcomed her immediately into the sisterhood and into our forum and then come to find out that she 'refused' to name the school she went too. That situation really caused me to lose some faith in people and their honesty.

Brianna

Why do folks keep resurecting these old threads?

I don't know if it's such a huge problem on here. Typically, it's unintentional. Sometimes, it's intentional deception. GC while being a great place where we can learn a lot is still an internet community.

You know, the internet, where many 13 year old girls are really 40 year old men.

Yeah, it sucks to be deceived but it's going to happen.

Having said that, if there's anyone posing as a Sigma Nu on this board, consider yourself threatened with bodily harm:D

you tell um ktsnake.

I have to say that that warning should go straight out to every fraternity and sorority. Just don't pose as someone you aren't

Brianna

my opinion
 

i think that as long as they are being tactful they are all right. as long as they plan on joining the GLO, if they are just pretending that isnt cool, but if they are just excited that is awsome. i would love to have pledges that are that excited it would make rush really easy.

Re: my opinion
 

I disagree.

Keeping what I said before in mind...

On here, as in all other places, your letters represent your own organizations (this has been a matter debated up as high as the HQ level with some organizations). It is not fair to full members of an organization to have individuals with no affiliation whatsoever posting in such a way as to lead others to believe that they are also representatives of that organization.

I see potential for trouble.

It seems like people here are all preaching to a choir. As members of GLOs we understand that our letters mean something signifigant and special. However, think about how clueless you might have been when you were 17. A lot of this, aside form people actually pretending to be initiated and stuff, is probably a lack of understanding about what Greek life really is from the inside. I never realized how much my letters would mean to me until after I was initiated. Now I feel differently from when I was a pledge. I'm not saying that ignorance justifies using our letters, but nevertheless, maybe a polite request would suffice.