Sorority Life: The GC Game
 

Okay, if you watch the train wreck that is MTV's Sorority Life, let's play a little home game...

What is your definition of "un-Sigma-like" behavior?

( funniest answer wins :D :p ;) )

What do we get if we win?? A rhinestone Greek 101 t-shirt?? Oh, I could only hope!!!

i want to play...does the looser get bitch-slapped by her "pledge sisters" and can we all live in a make-believe "pledge house" that was decorated by ikea and has a pool????

alrighty...on being "Un-Sigma like" (oh, this could get really dirty!)

One shalt not wear enough makeup to make a clown jealous, nor shall one be grinded on by men, women, or pledge sister. As well as, one shall disobey all regulations set up by the chapter and not be punished for it, but shall have a "talking to" if this said pledge was talked about behind her back.

Those pledges who do talk behind each other's back shall be praised as tattle-tells by all older sisters. Also, those pledges who slap others in the face, shall be not confronted by other sisters. These incidents merely will be swept under the rug. It is also possible for a pledge to miss out on a mandatory event if they are thirsty and need coffee, no reprocussions shall ensue.

Unsigma like behavior:

Stuff that the actives do but its okay because it isn't shown ;)

The Ten Commandments of Being Un-Sigma-Like (break any of these and you are un-sigma-like)

I am MTV thy god. Thou shalt watch no other networks before me.
Remember to keep holy Greek101.com.
Thou shalt go through a bottle of hairspray every day.
Thou shalt drink only Aquafina water in the house.
Thou shalt not BE CAUGHT drinking alcohol in the house.
Thou shalt not celebrate thy 21st birthday with thy pledge sisters.
Thou shalt not cockblock.
Thou shalt bitch-slap thy sisters if thou so wishes, without fear of repercussion.
Thou shalt not miss mandatory pledge events, unless thou hast a valid excuse, like wanting to go to a bar instead.
If thy name is Dede, thou shalt not appear on camera for more than five seconds at a time.

ROFLMAO!! The person next to me is trying to talk to me, and I'm not even paying attention because I'm laughing so hard at this!! Hahahaha!!! This is the funniest thing I have ever read. :D :D You get my vote for winner.

So when is IKEA delivering my new furniture?? :D

we are still trying to build you your very own pledge house where you won't be able to drink in it....oh, alright, if you really want to drink in it, it's ok. i won't tell.

You forgot one commandment:

Thous Shalt not Run into Glass doors and get them dirty because your drunk ass just fell in the dirt as well!

Although, we all watch it so were hypocrits I guess. Kinda like a car crash... you just can't help but look.

quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Originally posted by aephi alum
The Ten Commandments of Being Un-Sigma-Like (break any of these and you are un-sigma-like)

I am MTV thy god. Thou shalt watch no other networks before me.
Remember to keep holy Greek101.com.
Thou shalt go through a bottle of hairspray every day.
Thou shalt drink only Aquafina water in the house.
Thou shalt not BE CAUGHT drinking alcohol in the house.
Thou shalt not celebrate thy 21st birthday with thy pledge sisters.
Thou shalt not cockblock.
Thou shalt bitch-slap thy sisters if thou so wishes, without fear of repercussion.
Thou shalt not miss mandatory pledge events, unless thou hast a valid excuse, like wanting to go to a bar instead.
If thy name is Dede, thou shalt not appear on camera for more than five seconds at a time.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


Excuse me while I clean the Vanilla Coke off my monitor. ROFMLAO!:D aephialum, you have my vote!! That was too funny!!!

Oh now come on...when Jordan ran into that glass door, I nearly peed my pants laughing!! THAT was funny, and incidents like that happen all the time at my school :)

As for un-sigmalike behavior:

- Removing your Greek101 shirt for laundering
- Not sitting in the bar staring at your new members having a better time than you ever will
- Having an active sister besides the NME and Asst. NME at any new member activity
- Not saying cockblock 37 times in one evening
- Not slapping your pledge sister across the face when she wants to get her groove on with some crackhead
- Not being as loud as humanly possible when you're wrecked

When MTV and Greek101.com send you all your promotional logo clothing! Oh yeah, you got my vote too because the only un-Sigma-like behavior I could think of is:

http://www.plauder-smilies.de/happy/invasion.gif

I have this vision of a bunch of happy Sigmas, having fun together doing something. Anything. Dancing, partying, having an in-house retreat, planning their future, whatever. But the one behavior that we, as viewers, just haven't seen much of are happy, smiling Sigma faces. And that makes me really sad, because I have to believe that as a sisterhood they have a great time together most of the time. Unfortunately, the production and editing of the tv show leads me to think that they have a less than pleasant experience and I know that *can't* be true.

Christin

Sorry, no IKEA. :( But if you're lucky, maybe I can find you a "Do You Yahoo?" sticker for your laptop! hehe ;)

Wow those were all incredible!!!! They made me laugh tremendously!

I just find it really really sad that the same people on here that were worried about the poor-sister stereotypes being portrayed on TV are the same ones that are displaying the behavior that they condemn.

This is really sad. Christin hit it on the head when she suggested that we really are a happy fun bunch. MTV doesnt want to show that

That is something that should have been taken into consideration WELL before the dealings with MTV began.

Zuma, I think we all expected that MTV wasn't going into this show planning to show happy sorority sisters doing positive things together. I know it's been my frustration in watching the show, seeing all the drama, and wondering how much has been completely manipulated. I think this thread is the result of many of our frustrations in not seeing that, either. The show makes this big deal about sisters discussing un-Sigma-like behavior, but we have nothing to compare it to other than more un-Sigma-like behavior. Am I making sense?

This may be hard for me to reply to and harder for you and any other Sigma lurking out here to read, especially if you went through the quarter of taping and general MTV upheaval with the show. Unfortunately, all we see is what gets aired on the show. Therefore, that's all we can comment about. If the show producers and editors and such decide to make it the Jordan and Candace show, or last week's Jessica and Sylvia show then that's our perceptions of Sigma and the New Member class. Remember, from the viewers end this week for example, most of us were completely clueless about who Sylvia was and why she'd be with Jessica anyhow until the full ep aired!

It's hard for me to watch the show without shaking my head in shock and/or disappointment. I'm from a different era and back in my collegiate days the campus and fraternity houses were the party social centers and there wasn't a lot of going out to bars to drink and dance. That's just me. The show just isn't showing a lot of sisterhood or honesty, not much Sigma-like behavior. How would we know what Sigma-like behavior is supposed to be if we don't see it? We're all sorority women and fraternity men, we KNOW how we each are expected to conduct ourselves and we expect that other organizations have the same expectations. MTV hasn't been kind enough to show us the real Sigma, so all we have to go on is what we see. It may not be true, for your sorority's sake I hope it isn't true.

Christin

Zuma, I'm sorry that you and your sisters are ridiculed and have become the punchline of many jokes, but you have put yourselves in that position by choosing to do the MTV show.

This thread was an attempt to take our frustrations about the show and laugh them off.

I'm sure everyone on this board realizes that, but the way MTV edits their shows makes the real people in it almost fictional. I know that when Someone is staring blankly at someone, and there is no one talking, that's just an MTV edit of someone listening to a conversation, not just staring blankly at them.

I'm sure MTV could make any sorority look bad... It's not that difficult to do with film editing!

Film editing is only one factor. The behavior of these pledges gives MTV the drama that they are looking for. Seriously, slapping a fellow pledge sister is so far out of line. That's not good for any sisterhood.

LOL@aephi alum & shadokat - great lists!

Oh boohoo, I don't think you'll find much sympathy here. Months ago when you got warnings from everyone on this board, all you could say was, how NOBLE you were being, how your org was going to singlehandedly CHANGE the perceptions of greeklife, and how thorough and WELL-INFORMED the decision was to invite MTV into your house as it lurked outside like the hovering vampire it is. And NOW, it's "oh no, what's happened,somehow MTV tricked us, how could this be, we never saw it coming." I and everyone else warned you gals, like it or not, you are now 2 dimensional character products of the media, congratulations, you went ahead and made your decision, you were just too smart to listen to warnings, so now you gotta live with it and it sucks, but that's the way it is. Look, you can't decide to step in sh** and then be surprised/angry/upset that it's dirty and it stinks! The only comfort I can give you is that your fame...well, actually more like mild infamy, will inevitaby fizzle out after a few years, so make the most out of it and learn from it----and use your experience to educate others.

Hmm, i don't know about "un-sigma-like behavior", but if i hear their pledge trainer give them the 'concerns' talk again-

"Uh...we have some girls that have expressed 'concerns' ....."

-i think i'm gonna retch. I mean, for the love of all that's holy, bring em up on honor court or something already.


Kitso

Zuma, my post wasn't intended to make light of Sigma AEPi as it is, but rather, as it is portrayed by MTV. What I know of your sorority is limited to your website and what I've seen on MTV. That is true of most of the people out there - including, I'm sure, many incoming Davis freshmen.

Did you honestly believe that MTV would show a "happy fun bunch" of women doing community service, studying together, and just hanging out, when they could show drinking, provocative dancing, pledges hooking up, etc.?

The few examples of sisterly behavior that I've seen on the show have been coupled with drama - e.g. Jessica's cockblock, intended to keep Sylvia safe, resulted in Sylvia's slapping her, and Candace signed up to be sober sister, but later decided to shirk her duties and get drunk. I'm sure you could show us many other examples of sisterly behavior among the sisters and pledges, that don't have associated drama, but they're probably on the cutting room floor.

And admit it... y'all did wear a LOT of Greek101 merchandise... :)

And editing only goes so far, the stuff that happens.....happened.

oh Zuma....what can i say? We all said that this was a bad idea from the start. Yet, ya'll didn't listen.

However, don't condemn us for your sister;s behavior; we are only commenting on what we see...and what we see is what your organization allowed to happen on national tv.

and just think, greek chat is only a miniscule part of the national/international greek population. Can you imagine what those people would say too???

like i have said before: don't do the crime if you can't do the time.

and here's a little funny tid bit of info: i was talking to a woman yesterday in the chemistry department from davis who was placing an ad with our company. i asked her about the show. she said that the entire administration is up in arms about this show. According to Sigma, they had the blessing of the school. According to this woman in the chem dept. the admin is all pissed off about it. so whatever.

Here's my beef:
It is one thing to criticize. Those I can take seeing. Its another thing to ridicule. And thats what the intention of this thread was.

I understand that people dont respect the decision made by sigma. And the warnings only came after the show was in the can since we didnt even know about this site. We've talked in circles about this.

I found this thread to be mean-spirited, and I dont believe that I have to sit silently through this crap. I did avoid it for awhile, but how would you all feel if I singled out a sorority -lets say AGD since someone did mention the Cosmo article- and made up a list of reasons why you couldnt get in? It would be poor greek relations.

Like I said, I find it sad that the people that were so worried about what stereotypes we were going to put out there are the ones that are actually acting that way.

This thread is un-sigmalike behavior, ok?

I agree with you Christin! I was excited when I heard about Sorority Life, because I expected to see women who were having a great experience like me!

Call me naive, but I thought there would be more emphasis on the sorority. What we are really seeing on the show though is just a bunch of girls that just so happen to be in a sorority together. It is rare on the show that we actually SEE anything that separates this group from anything other than a bunch of college girls picked out of a crowd with the exception of the weekly blurb from the pledge meeting and perhaps a bonding experience (of course MTV chooses to show when Jessica's trust fall goes arwy or the pledges ranting about moving rocks). Nothing that I feel is important about a sorority is even mentioned half the time and the women (with the exception of the president Leah - I think she's lovely ) seem like they're not even having a good time.

I think that is what worries me the most about Sorority Life. Not that it shows drinking, or bumping-and-grinding, or backstabing - because if you want to admit it or not, every sorority, fraternity or group has people that do those things. It's college, for goodness sake! What worries me more is that none of the girls seem happy with the experience. Why would a PNM want to join a sorority if she thought it would just be a big, disappointing hassle? I certainly wouldn't. But that's just my opinion.

As for Zuma and the other members (or "insiders") of Sigma, I think they have had more than their share of bashing from people at GreekChat already. Nobody's asking them to post here, and personally, I like their "insider" point of view. Let's play nice so they'll stick around.

Jennifer

delta gamma
"I didn't come to college to find a husband, I came to college to find bridesmaids."

Oh man I can not believe we actually have someone here who is from that sorority. I have been dying for one of them to get on GC. Anyway, I am totally for the other greeks! We all did warn them that they should not do this. I am sure most of them saw Real World and Road Rules before. They have to have known that MTV was only going to show drama. Talk to any of the real worlders and they will tell you MTV edits like crazy and that sometimes they are totally misrepresented. Its not even MTV's fault. They are a tv network. They don't know anything about sisterhood, they are producing what sells so you can't blame them. I do partly blame the girls because knowing that your being filmed you shouldn't have been breaking rules, getting drunk and grinding at some bar or slapping a fellow new member ( I simply refuse to haze like these girls did and call them pledges or "pledge master"). Come on you guys knew what you were getting into. MTV I doubt tricked you in anyway. And now you realize that the beautiful pledge house with the new ikea furniture and retarted yahoo as well as all the rhineston greek101 gear (can u please tell that girl with the red and grey one to buy another one because damn she wears that same one all the time!) really were not free. It all comes with a price and your price was a heavy one. As for the rest of UC Davis, I am not at all surprised that the administration is upset. Their college was totally misrepresented! As for UC students and other Greeks on campus, I heard most of them are not allowed to be anywhere near where MTV shot and most of them out of choice do not even associate witht the girls becuase of the bad representation they have given greeks everywhere. Seriously, almost every greek I know hates this show or at least what it has done to the Greek community. I do feel sorry for the sisters who were already active at the time of the taping because I guess none of them knew how bad the the house new members were going to be. Hopefully some of them didn't make it into the sisterhood!

Hey-and this is my crabby/PMS side coming out-but so what if you think this thread is mean-spirited. You guys made the choice to put yourselves on NATIONAL TV-you opened yourself up to any and all kinds of feedback-whether it's positive or negative-and now you have to deal with it. If you didn't want to possibly hear unkind things said about you-you should have turned MTV down the second they came a knockin. As far as I'm concerned, you don't get to whine-you gave that right up when the cameras walked in the door.

I totally agree with you chiojenn78---(but i am pms'ing too!).

this thread maybe somewhat mean spirited...but you've allowed your sisters to act like this on national tv. you've chosen THESE girls as your sisters and as a representation of you, and the sorority as a whole. So deal with their actions. Don't blame us bc they look like fools, we are just pointing out the obvious.

and Zuma, please define "un-sigma-like" behavior! And please explain to us the whole slapping incident....i think we are all just a little angry that either you all did not/ or it was not shown in dealing with sylvia's abuse of jessica.

Hey, I guess I am "un-sigma like" because I think this thread is funny.

Actually... Zuma trying to take up for sigma only makes it that much more hilarious. Hey Zuma, nice time to be sigma like. You should have thought about that before you signed on the dotted line.

Amen!

AGD as well as other national and most local groups don't go out looking for trouble by letting themselves be filmed by MTV. Again, you made your decision, now you have to deal with the backlash. We are discussing MTV's "Sorority Life" as if it were any other reality TV show. Many people from RW and RR are Greek and GCers have talked about them too...that doesn't make it poor Greek relations.

Oh calling out on AGD was a cheap shot Zuma. Look, when you go out on national tv guess what? people will watch and talk, both bad and good about you. I am sure you and your sisters have sat and made fun of celebrities. JLo gets talked about her butt all the time Britney Spears gets made fun of for being a pop princess. Yet, they deal with it because they know its the price of being famous. The media and the American public are harsh and if you guys didn't know this would happen then your really naive. If you don't like it, shouldn't have let MTV come in with their cameras. And then insulting all of us saying we are mean spirited and calling out on AGD was wrong. I think that was UN-SIGMA LIKE BEHAVIOR!

Oh calling out on AGD was a cheap shot Zuma. Look, when you go out on national tv guess what? people will watch and talk, both bad and good about you. I am sure you and your sisters have sat and made fun of celebrities. JLo gets talked about her butt all the time Britney Spears gets made fun of for being a pop princess. Yet, they deal with it because they know its the price of being famous. The media and the American public are harsh and if you guys didn't know this would happen then your really naive. If you don't like it, shouldn't have let MTV come in with their cameras. And then insulting all of us saying we are mean spirited and calling out on AGD was wrong. I think that was UN-SIGMA LIKE BEHAVIOR!

What is happening to the Greek community?
 

I've been reading all these posts for a long while now and have kept my mouth shut. But I cannot be silent anymore. I'm a greek at UC Davis (not a Sigma). I know some of these girls pretty well and respect and admire them as people and a s greeks. I may not fully agree with the decision they made, though i do think they did it with good intentions and were assured of things and made promsies that were broken. However, i think all of you are blowing this WAY out of proportion and being unfairly cruel. Let me just suggest something, have any of you thought that maybe the Sigmas are seeing some of this behavior for the 1st time on TV? As we all know things go on among pledges that sisters dont see all the time, I know they did in my pledge class. The sisters didn't do anything about Sylvia slapping Jessica or Candace breaking Sober Sis because they didn't know it happened! Just cause the cameras saw doesn't mean the sisters did.
But my main point is this: Reading some of these posts has made me be embarassed to call myself Greek. We talk all the time about fostering a sense of sisterhood and brotherhood between chapters, we make a point of trying to create a supportive, positive greek community, yet we treat these girls like crap! Maybe they are a local, but they are still panhellenic members (be it associate members) and are still deserving of our support or at very least they deserve to be treated with respect. To constructivly criticise is one thing but to shamlessly, meanly ridicule is quite another. If we as a Greek Community want to continue to claim to foster unity and create an atomosphere of respect then we must practice what we preach. We may not agree with what the sigmas did but they are part of our community and deserve respect and consideration for their feelings. By reading this web site I cannot help to feel that some of you (not all) are doing exactly what you are shunning the Sigmas for doing, you are perpetuating the negative stereotypes about sorority girls, in your case by being catty, mean spirited and condasending.

Someone please explain to me how we are promoting greek-stereotypes if we are talking about people wearing the same greek101 t-shirt over and over again, and laughing at someone walked into a glass door....How is that being a "stereo-typical greek"? You don't think other people who are non-greek wouldn't talk about that too???it's not like we are making fun of their ritual or symbols! We are making fun of the ikea mtv pledge house and yahoo screen savers.....lighten up!

I stand by initial comment that this thread is hypocritical. I keep hearing that you guys opened yourselves up to this, blah blah blah, which is fine. But I have yet to hear how its not hypocritical...

Go ahead and make criticisms, thats fine. I realize that goes with the territory. But I think it is completely hypocritical that the people who were so worried about negative sister stereotypes being perpetuated are the same ones exhibiting that behavior right now. You were afraid of sisters looking catty? Then what is this?

I wasnt there this year. No body asked me if I wanted to participate in this. But here I am standing as a sister the same, and when you do something that bugs me I'm not going to stand silently.

I didnt call out on AGD. I dont know AGD, I've never even heard of them until I came on here. I only mentioned them as an example because of another thread on here. Do I believe they discriminate, no. But it proved a ripe example because of that thread. And as a national sorority of prominance, it doesnt matter whether you went to the news or MTV or Cosmo, you are subject to those kinda things. I get that. And in naming AGD, I was asserting that it would be completely inappropriate to start a thread with the topic I stated. And by the reactions of some, I see you agree with that assumption. I dont think its any more appropriate to do it to us.

Somethings I can answer: From what I've heard, Sylvia was talked to. Some of the sisters on the show left messages on the MTV site about the incident which go beyond anything I can tell you about it. I simply dont know. Nothing like that has ever happened before in the sorority that we know of, so there isnt any precedence for it. Also, no one has ever been kicked out or asked to leave; we've never had the need to. There are different philosiphies on how to deal with situations such as physical violence. I personally dont believe in a zero-tolerence policy. Others are going to disagree. But thats just my personal opinion.

You wanna know about unsigma-like behavior, go to the MTV board and read what the members have to say about it, because I dont have an answer. Its never been a problem before. We are a pretty normal bunch, not with high standards at all, and I can only guess that they were worried about people drinking in excess on a regular basis. But its only a guess since I wasnt there and thats what I've heard. And theres other stuff Ive heard like motivation.

On a side note, I dont criticise celebs. Partially because I live in LA and who knows who will pop around the corner (and yes I've been in that situation) and partially because I dont feel the need. I dont know them, so who am I to criticise.

You got questions about what happened, I can try and answer them, ok?

Sorry, but I still don't feel any remorse. The point is, that for at least the time being, the Sigma girls cannot expect to be treated as individuals. They CHOSE to do this knowing full well that they were throwing themselves on the mercy of the public through a shady arse TV show. I mean, they themselves kept telling us how extensive and thorough the decision making process was, now all of a sudden they try to reverse that? Well, I'm sorry that you got shafted but...such is life. If it makes you feel any better, it doesn't reflect on you as individuals, but rather the characters from MTV. We aren't bashing Leslie the real student at UCD, rather Leslie, the MTV sorority life Vice President who somehow appears in scenes she was never present for through the magic of TV. And might I add, anyone who actually becomes obsessed with the show and believes it to be real is an idiot, plain and simple. But joking, gossiping, and casually debating it openly is just a normal reaction. I agree with phisigsigchic, no one gets upset when Brittney, JLo, Tom Cruise, Martha Stewart, or anyone else in the public eye is discussed, least of all the targets themselves, because they realize that this is just what it is, and they have accepted that give and take. You guys need to become strong and laugh at it too, getting angry only eggs people on.

Re: What is happening to the Greek community?
 

Get ready for more PMS:
I believe you when you say that alot of the sisters are seeing this for the first time-and what a shock it must be. I would die if it were me, and I was finding all this stuff out for the first time.

Secondly-I don't think we're blowing this out of proportion. We have a right to be angry, since we'll all have to deal with the backlash during rush-I know we're all eagerly awaiting the "When do I get to live in the IKEA pledge house??" question. You may be right-the Sigma's may have had the best inetentions when agreeing to do this-but have they ever seen a "reality" show? Temptation Island? Real World?? Any of this ring a bell?? But of course, MTV would never edit for drama...:rolleyes: And how does the saying go...oh yes-the road to hell is paved with good intentions.

Finally-you and Zima are telling us that we're being catty, mean-spirited..but what just happened on the last episode of SL?? Oh yea, a pnm slapped another pnm. And what about the episode before that?? Oh, right...the pnm's got drunk, one ran into a glass door, and no one can understand the concept that they represent Sigma/ Greeks in general/ UCD. And the episode before that one?? Gosh that's right....the girls were talking about Jessica behind her back, and excluding her from their activities.....:rolleyes: Do I really need to go on about who's promoting "sorority girl" stereotypes??

ROLLING!!!
 

OMG - this is TOO much for my 9month pregnant body -- I am laughing through my contractions!!

As for the Sigma crowd....I offer my favorite 4 words...

"I TOLD YOU SO!!!" -- and so did most of the other GC'ers. Then y'all start whining "give us a chance, oh please let's just wait till it airs" -- hmmm....methinks its time to revive my soap operas of old!

Whine whine whine - but its not fair - whine whine whine....

You made that bed so go roll ALL over it! OH - wait - don't misinterpret that for anything that you may want to portray on camera!!! We wouldn't want MTV to "edit" that into something sexual or anything!

MEOW!!