Rituals
 

Have any of you ever found out, accidentially or otherwise, a part of another GLO's ritual? How did it make you feel?

I'm wondering because at my school, guys were always asking girls to tell them parts of their ritual and vice versa.

**Note** Please don't say what you found out if you did!

I haven't ever come across any valid information of secret rituals. I try to avoid the likes of the fraternity secrets web site. I don't recall anyone ever asking about other GLOs rituals or anything else secret while I was in school, although I imagine it happened occassionally.

Even when I've looked @ public rituals I feel kinda funny because I'm not a member of said GLO.

NONE OF THEIR DAMN BUSINESS!

I will never tell anything about my Ritual! I hope You do not!

People that want to find out have to much time and of small minds!:(

I'm sorry but asking about someone else's ritual is totally and completely rude. It should not even be done jokingly!

Most of us hold our ritual to be the embodiment of the ideals that we strive for as members of our respective organizations. Being privlidged to be granted the secrets told to initiates in an organization is a great honor!

To try to dig and find out these secrets is literally spitting in the face of everyone that has worked hard to become a brother/sister.

I have been told ritual by people who had just been initiated and didn't know any better. The actives from their chapter stopped them when they heard what they were saying. However, it's not like I now have this divine knowledge since I know something outside of my own ritual. I don't plan to share their ritual, because if someone were to tell a non-DZ some of our stuff, I would hope they would have the decency not to pass it on...especially since you never REALLY know if what you have been told is true or a fabrication.

I honestly accidentally came across someone elses ritual. I was cleaning up the study room at our house to prepare for a meeting and a woman from another GLO had been there studying with one of my sisters earlier. For what ever reason she left behind a bunch of papers including some ritual papers for her GLO. When I realized what it was I felt so bad and I got them back to her, asap! I still don't understand why she was so careless with them. But I didn't think about it after that night nor did I tell anyone what I saw. I can't even remember what I saw on the papers anymore.
As far as people wanting to find out another's ritual, I don't understand why they care? My sorority ritual is sacred to me because I am a part of it, I took those oaths, and it means something to me.
Personally I think it would be boring to know another's ritual because it means nothing to me. So what if you know XYZ's secret handshake - what do you do with that info now??? It's pointless and those that plaster supposed secrets all over the web are only showing how cowardly, immature, unintelligent, and classless they are.

I have no interest in knowing other rituals.

As for ours, I could send you a Delt Ritual book tomorrow and you might not be able to figure out which GLO it belongs to because certain key words (like the letters) and other phrases are left out.

In truth, our Ritual is beautifully written and a memorable ceremony, and as such, would be a wonderful thing to share beacause of its meaning and guidance offered.

But I won't share it for the same reasons you shouldn't.

Agreed!
 

I could care less. If it's not Alpha Phi Omega, or Masonic Rituals, I have no use for 'em.

There was once a study done by a respected scholar on fraternity rituals. I can't remember who did it, but a quick search on google will bring it up. About 20 GLOs voluntarily gave him the ritual handbooks and what not, wiht out revealling any secret meanings or grips, just the handbooks. No one particular fraternity was named, the guy just talked about certain similarities and historicle parts. He devided them up by certain periods. It was quite an interesting study though.

before i attended school in San Diego, and was in a fraternity, one of my friends from high school joined a sorority. one night i saw something written on a scrap book in her room, so i asked what it was. she told me it was from her sorority and that she couldn't tell me. not being Greek i didn't really understand that it was part of her ritual, or what a ritual even was. anyway, i asked why not, and she ended up telling me what it meant. when she told me i was like whatever...it didn't have any meaning to me so i could care less.
now that I'm in a fraternity i see the importance of ritual. if i had known i would have never asked...anyway, i never told anyone because i didn't think it was a big deal. now i know that there are girls who hold its meaning dear to their hearts, so i shall never repeat it.
i have a friend at my school who is in a chapter of the same sorority, and we were talking about little things that you can do, say, or write that only people in your organization would know. she showed me (without telling me what it meant) what i had seen on my friends scrap book, and told me that she would never tell anyone what it means because it, and her sisterhood, means so much to her. I didn't tell her that I knew what it meant, and never will.
anyway, that's my story...if you are in a GLO, you don't want to know anyone else's ritual, you understand its importance to initiated members. If you're not in a GLO then its a different story because you cannot understand the importance of ritual.

I was told when I really didn't want to. I was telling a girl who deactivated from a certain sorority that I was thinking of rushing there. The girl then said, "Oh, don't go there. You know what they do for initation? *Insert ritual here*" :eek: I can't believe she just came out and told me like that, even though she was deactivated and all. I don't really care to know the rituals of any orgs I don't belong to. It wasn't even anything considered hazing or anything... I thought it was quite nice, but I just found it so not cool for her to say that.

Oh, and another one. There was this guy that lived in my dorm building that was in my German class (who is SO annoying... he stuffed me into a trash can once! :(.) He was part of the re-colonized fraternity on our campus, which my best friend's boyfriend is also a part of it. When my best friend, me, and him went on a fieldtrip to Michigan for a German field trip, he told us that night in the hotel their WHOLE ritual for initation... Not to be nosy or anything, we told some of the other members of that fraternity, and needless to say they have a close eye on this guy.

The reason why I was asking this is because my boyfriend asked me today..."What does AOT mean?" I was kinda shocked because I thought, "As if I would ever tell him! And if I did, why would he care? What would it mean to him?"

It amazes me how some people can be so casual with it all! Members of the XYZ sorority on my campus made COPIES of their ritual book in the LIBRARY....and left them there! A sister of mine found it, read enough to figure out what it was....and sent it through the shredder. (It was just a copy...not the originial :) )


Another instance...some of my sisters went over to a fraternity house and the guys were taking down everything from inititation....and just let my girls in the door.


Crazy.........

I have a lot of friends who are members of the greek community...I can honestly say that I have never had the desire to know their ritual or anything like that. But what I find interesting is that people who arn't in a greek letter organization want to know all the secrets! I can't even begin to name how many times someone has asked me..so what's your password? Ex-boyfriends, friends in general, my aunt...so on and so fourth. Finally, I realized something...I could sit down and tell them all about our intiation but it wouldn't mean a THING to them! The whole reason I value my ritual so much is because I love my sisters as much as I do...I would feel as though I was letting them down. In the meantime, I have all my relatives convinced that our password is Chitty chitty bang bang! :D

Blaire

So proud to be a DELTA ZEE!

No matter the letter, greeks do it better!

If I hadn't taken an oath to keep it a secret, I would be proud to share my sorority's Ritual with other people. It's a beautiful, touching ceremony (and, contrary to what some people may say, has NOTHING to do with Aladdin :D ) and I feel proud having been one of relatively few people who have shared in it. I'm fairly certain, though, that most people feel that way about their Ritual!

I've never accidently found out any information about another GLO's Ritual, and I'm glad I haven't. I feel it would be mortifying for me; sort of like walking in on my dad in the bathroom or something :eek:

Let me tell you what, I don't even want to know about other GLO's rituals. I think it's so disrespectful when you hear members yakking about their rituals to people who aren't members of their group.
One time Mr.ChiOJenn had a box full of Sigma Nu stuff at my house (pictures and whatnot) and I was like, oh can I look at the pictures? He was like-hold on there might be ritual stuff in there. I dropped that photo album so fast you'd have thought it had the plague on it. :D He's never asked about my rituals and I have never asked about his. (Even though Dumbass Ex once started yakking at me about it-I was like-arghhh don't want to hear it).

QUESTION...
 

I just have a question, I actually know quite a few traditions from an organization that is on my campus. Not because I wanted to, but because I was around when I saw their members being hazed. They basically do most of their traditions on campus, and because they have no nationals to worry about (they are the only chapter of their organization.... they're not at any other schools). My questions is what would you do if you knew another organization was deliberately hazing their pledges? Further, they wear shirts and stuff that alude to their "tough" pledgship. It places my org and other orgs in a tough spot cause you want to tell someone, but we dont' want to look like bad guys. I mean we don't want to get nipped in the butt because of this...


It's not a secret that we know what this group does... we just choose to keep our mouths shut... but is that good?

We were having a Scavenger hunt for actives and new members and part of our trip was to get something from the Sig Eps (who live next door to us.) So we went over not knowing that they were having ritual and walked into thier ritual room, good thing they had already been finished but still havent taken down or covered some things up. The next weekend when I went to see my boyfriend (who is a Sig Ep at another campus) I asked him what I saw. His brothers were VERY angry that a chapter would just leave a room unguarded which was housing some VERY secretive things. But I never told anyone what I saw. If someone had run across my ritual I would hope they would have enough respect to keep it to themself.

Me and an exboyfriend of mine (of 5 1/2 years) were initiated into our organizations very close to the same time. After he was initiated he came over to my house proudly displaying his new letters...and he started telling me everything he had done through the entire night. I told him that I didn't want to know because that should be between him and his brothers but he didn't listen. A tried to get him to stop but he kept saying, "oh, you just don't want to listen to my stories." After he was done he proceeded to say, "so what do you guys do?" I was like screw you...this is exactly why I didn't want him to tell me anything about his ritual because I knew he was going to ask about mine. Even though we are no longer together I have never told anyone about anything that he told me although I'd like to tell his brothers that he has a really big mouth!

I know some handshakes, but I think they're just rumors. I think whoever showed/told me them was screwing around. It might be true though. I hope not.

A friend of mine transferred from another school where she was a Kappa Kappa Psi. Since it is a music fraternity and so is mine we were talking about them(not the ritual parts though). Then all of a sudden she said, "for our initiation, we had to [insert ritual here]" What does SAI do?" :eek: Of course I didn't tell her! Not only are we not allowed to tell non-members our ritual, but we are under NO circumstances allowed to photocopy, type up, or write down ANY PART of our ritual. So I couldn't believe she had so little respect for her fraternity that she would tell me their ritual!

You wanna know the REALLY funny part? She asked me when SAI had rush because she wanted to become a member. :rolleyes: As if we would give a bid to someone who can't keep her mouth shut!

Ritual is private! But not all questions about it might be bad-intentioned. For example, some GLOs have letters that do not have a secret meaning. So if someone is in one of those groups and asks you what your letters mean, they may not realize they are asking to know a secret.

I dont mean to sound rude, but I could give two shits about someone else's ritual. I'm sure everyone has heard the saying that in the greek alphabet only three( or two) letters matter, well that is how I feel. People have asked me what phi phi kappa alpha means all the time. Do you know what I tell them? To you it means nothing at all, to me it means the world.

well said, Pika2001.

some people are so retarded :mad: ..seriously... i have a few sisters have have been told about rituals from other GLO's... all but one of them have the decency to not breathe a word of it... but one of them gets off on telling people, i swear. its like she thinks its funny that she can tell other peoples secrets but not her own.. i dont know if she still does that, i havent talked to her much since i got initiated...:(

Does anyone have a punishment for revealing the ritual? We're a local, so our rules are usually different, but we have a set rule that revealing any significant part of the ritual is grounds for immediate expulsion. We don't write it down, which means it's always someone's job to memorize the entire thing, word for word. Even mentioning it around outsiders is taboo. It's ours.

As for knowing other people's rituals.....I know some careless Sigma Pi's and SAE's who've let things slip, but I've really no interest in their rituals. It's indecent to be interested.

OnePlus: Rock on!!! Anyone who can memorize ritual is awesome! :)

To address an earlier question of "what would someone do if they saw another group hazing?" Hmm....I would have told the Greek Life Coordinator. That way, he can ask the group about it. If it turns out to be a misunderstanding, no harm done.

My boyfriend said, "I'd call their Nationals." I don't know if I could go that far because I tend to misinterpret things a lot.

Usually the punishment for revealing ritual is a good ass kicking.

other GLO rituals
 

Lots of unhappy (former) members, jilted ex-boy/girlfriends, and initiates who don't care anymore are the reasons why GLO rituals are revealed to non-members.

Any well-rounded greek would realize that all GLO's have the same basic purposes for existing - it's just the way we all state them which makes us different.

You'll realize this when you meet other greeks throughout life.

And, by the way, I have found copies of ritual information of many GLOs on the internet (including my own). Sure, it's interesting reading, and you can see how similar our groups all really are. But my conscience told me that reading others' ritual was not right.

I feel sorry that initiates were careless enough to reveal ritual. It's disappointing to see any of it on the internet.

But really, once you know, what's the big deal? You certainly won't make friends with members of that GLO if you go around saying what you know. And when you're 30something like me, no one really cares that you know [insert GLO here]'s handshake. So what!?

BTW, I have mentioned my findings to other sisters (in our Yahoogroup, alumnae association meetings and at our National Convention), but I have never revealed what I have found out, nor have I told anyone where to find it.

It's just not right.

I would hope that other greeks who find out my ritual would extend the same courtesy.

Actually, it was Bobby McGinn's doctoral dissertation in 1979. He asked 67 fraternities to allow him to study their rituals, with the promise that his dissertation would keep all rituals confidential and would be worded in such a way as to avoid identification of any particular ritual with any specific fraternity. 22 fraternities honored his request. Somewhere on the web (I can't remember where) there is a place where doctoral dissertations can be ordered, if anyone is interested.

There is information that can be found by clicking on this link to Duncan's Greek Pages that, as I recall, is culled from McGinn's dissertation.

I will add that I have, from time to time, run across ritual information from other fraternities. I will also admit that I have found that information interesting for two reasons: I like studying the form of secret rituals -- I guess as a social science study -- and I am particularly interested in the use of symbols and symbolism. For this second reason, I find it interesting how GLO's (and other groups with secret rituals) use their secret symbols on public items: badges, coats-of-arms, seals, etc.

That said, I will add two other things very quickly: I would never ask anyone to reveal secrets of their GLO -- I would respect their vow to secrecy just as I would hope they would respect mine -- and I would never reveal the few things that I have come across. I would never even admit that I knew any secrets of any GLO, and certainly would not divulge any secret that I know. I consider it my obligation to keep the information that I have come across just as secret as I would if it were information of my own fraternity.

I'd Like to meet this "careless Sigma Pi" .....and after he dislodges my sketchers from his arse...I'd like to talk to him.

Thanks for respecting Sigma Pi's rituals

Revealing the ritual
 

Any initiate of Sigma Nu that reveals ANYTHING about our ritual or secrets would be expelled from Sigma Nu.

You'd know why if you were a Sigma Nu.

Re: Rituals
 

Just a hint if you do a search under Chi Omega or Sigma Chi under this topic in a search engine you are bound to find out something.

A few years back I girl I know was very adament about showing me the Sigma Chi handshake. I remember it very well - she just grabbed my hand, but I yanked it away quickly. I told her I had no interest in seeing this suppossed hand shake. She didn't undestand when I tried to explain to her that it was totally disrespectful to want to find out about orgs rituals, and in my case especially Sigma Chi since because all my good friends, boyfriend and now brother are all Sigs.

Once on a random net surf, I came across a site for a chapter of Theta Chi. There was a link on the main page called "Theta Chi secrets." When you clicked on the link, it took you to a list of obviously bogus secrets like "we only eat on Tuesday" and "when we run into a brother, we start beating the crap out of him. He's supposed to say, 'Ow! Quit it! Ow! Quit it!'" Then you scrolled down to the bottom of the page and it says, "What, you didn't think we'd *really* give away our secrets, did you?" It was pretty funny.

Anyway, that's as close as I've ever gotten to learning somebody's ritual.

Just PM me about LXA Ritual! I will be more than Happy To Tell You to F OFF!

I would not let my Ex Wife look into the trunks that held the Gear for fear of Divorce! Yes I would have!

If you for some stange reason want to give up your Ritual Secrets, that is your choice but your stupidity!

That is the Bonding for your Org and No one else!

While I may Know certain things about someone, that is my business, not anyone elses!

GLO Secrets
 

I would be very offended if another member of a different Greek Organization shared his or her GLO's secrets with me or asked me to share with them my secrets.
However, I find that it is people that are not members of a GLO that are always asking questions. When I told my non-greek friends that I had finally inititated they asked me, "What did you have to do, did you have to eat fish, blah, blah, blah, etc, etc. etc. And I was like I can't tell you about my initiation." And they didn't seem to understand why it was such a big secret. I found it very difficult to explain to them why it was so important that it was kept between my sisters and I. Another non-greek friend, asked me what my letters meant and I said Pi Beta Phi, and she was like but what does that mean. And jokingly I said I could tell you, but then I'd have to kill you. She laughed and then asked again it was difficult for her to understand why I couldn't tell her. When people ask me what I had to do when I initiated all I say to them, is there was no hazing, but I can't tell you anymore than that. If you really want to know our secrets then why don't you rush, maybe you'll initiate and become part of the special bond we share.

Pi Phi Love aand Mine,

Emily

P.S if you find that there are people who really need to see a ritual then tell them to go and see the Delta Upsilons. They're a non secret fraternity

Re: GLO Secrets
 

I know what you mean! Only one of my friends from high school and my mom have ever questioned me about an inscription and they didn't get it when I couldn't tell them, because of fraternal secrecy. My friend said, "Why does it matter? I'm not going to care about what it means, and none of your sisters are around." I told her, "That's exactly why I can't tell you...it doesn't mean anything to you and my sisters trust me to not share anything."

My mom was like, "But I'm your mother!" and I shook my head sympathetically and said, "I'm sorry mom, but you're not a Pi Phi." :D

I've always wondered whether or not initiations for the same sorority vary across campuses? I'm not asking for anyone to reveal anything, but do chapters personalize their initiations over time?

I know we were told during Initation that the first two days of ceremonies were Indiana Gamma specific ceremonies. Also that during the second day from a certain point onward it was the nationals initiation ceremony.

I thought this was pretty neat that our chapter had come up with it's own specific ritual. :)

Jess

I can't remember a single time my GDI (sorry if you hate the term)
roommates asked anything about AXO. Yet, there were girlfriends of the Sigma Chis who were hell bent on finding things out usually right after initiaton. It has a lot to do with maturity in my opinion. It's like "I've got a secret" in grade school.
Those who seek out the information must feel left out or empty somehow.

The important thing for everyone to remember is- The way you live your live is the only way the TRUE meaning of the ritual comes alive. It's "secrets" are revealed over and over to YOU and those who share in the meaning.

You may know the notes, but that doesn't mean you can sing.