I miss the pre-social media Greek Chat
 

Before social media took over, Greek Chat would come alive in late summer and into the fall. There were so many recruitment story threads you could barely keep up. Now it's completely different.

I miss those days. It was fun hearing what was happening with different people on different campi.

+1

We could still do it!

I agree. I miss the stories.

I miss the train wreck NPC recruitment threads. The ones where the girl would post that it is Top Tier chapter at her campus or nothing. Then she gets dropped on Day 2 from all chapters. Then she comes back to tell us she's going to start her own sorority.

And then, she comes back a few weeks later to ask GC either: 1) how to start her own sorority (see PreciousJeni's thread "Before you start your own sorority"), or 2) how to colonize a dormant NPC chapter at her campus.

I also miss the crazy parents.

I do NOT miss the crazy parents!

The crazy parents were good for a laugh, though!

Last year's crazy Texas mom was good for a laugh. :D

There still seem to be a fair number of parents...probably more parents than PNMs.

For those who feel there is a shortage of parents, you'll probably get your fix in January when Indiana has recruitment. However, even that was better this year.

Ouch, but probably true! :D

I think the PNMs are relying on that OTHER site for information and it's not always a good thing. Tiers and tops and innuendo up the hits/views for sure but it doesn't make for an educated PNM.

I miss the traffic for sure. I enjoyed there always being several new posts each time I signed in.

The mean girls ran off a lot of people.

They did indeed.

Well, it's up to us! We could start some more social threads s well as recruitment-themed ones but everyone needs to put in their 2 cents!

Glad to hear someone say this! This site can be a dangerous place for an uninformed PNM or PNM-momma.

It may also be that girls are actually learning a little and reading without blabbing too much. And dare I say it, maybe the mothers too?

Have you searched on YouTube for "how to rush" videos?
THAT's where the girls are getting their info. Remember, this is not a reading generation.
There are some very good videos out there, though. Production quality might not be the best, but the info is solid.

Even the various blogs seem to be languishing now, but there seem to be more videos than ever.

Ditto on that.

Yeeeup. Seeing GC in general change over the years post social media has been interesting.

I just told my god-daughter about the recruitment videos on youtube. She goes thru in 4 weeks. Time to study!

I mentioned in a previous thread that I was planning to share my daughter's story when recruitment was complete. However, another poster requested that my daughter write her own story...she's a busy freshman...we may be waiting for awhile.

We would love to read her story. Please post.

I miss this site, too. But truly, the mean girls ran people off. I felt
terrible when the poor dad from Ole Miss got jumped on so badly earlier this season.

Yes me too!! I felt great empathy for him!! For me I have and will continue to post very little because I just never know what I can say and what I shouldn't. I am so very happy and thrilled for all the young ladies who have gone thru recruitment so far- 2 of which are personal friends of mine now at FSU and Oklahoma State- one is a new theta and the other a gamma phi beta!! I mean the whole point of this is to provide help and support to our loved ones going thru the process, which can be so brutal. I just want to say this site has both helped me and hurt me. That being said, I still love to read the posts. I will be more of a reader than a poster in the future but I guess that's ok too.

The thing is, if you have something to say you also have to be able to accept correction or STFU when it's apparent you don't know what you're talking about. When people double down on rumors they ARE going to get a smack down. People get into trouble when they won't accept that they don't actually understand how RFM works. And I get it, but the internet is forever. Allowing misinformation to stand means someone is going to read that in 5 or 50 or 200 years and get it wrong.

I didn't. He came in with an arrogant attitude and wasn't willing to be corrected. I wasn't one of the ones who sparred with him, but I understand why they did.

This isn't GC specific and has far less to do with "mean" posters than people would like to think. The other MB I was a regular contributor to and that was just as if not more active than GC is completely gone. Another that I just spottily contributed to is gone too. All anyone wants to do these days is post pictures. Conversation is dying online as fast as it's dying in real life.

IIRC the "poor dad from Ole Miss" got called out on his misinformation by me and a few other posters. And that thread went South (pun intended) when another GC poster went off the deep end. There was no meanness in that particular thread until she entered the scene.

I won't start a fight, but I won't back down from one; and I will never let misinformation go uncorrected. Like my Panhellenic sisters who've posted above in this thread (and +1 to your comments/observations), I am not blowing sunshine and rainbows; and trust me, you haven't seen me be mean. Blunt, yes. Mean? Hardly. You don't want to see me be mean. Take my word for it. I'm not putting on kid gloves for anyone when it comes to misinformation; most especially when it comes from non-NPC posters. But don't call it "mean" when one of us says something that you don't like. And, if you have a problem with me or anyone else, take it to the source directly. That's what adults do.

Too blunt for you? Probably. Mean? Hardly.

Mean girls =/= correcting misinformation. The mean girls I am referring to several years ago when a group of GC'ers would jump on any newbie that made a misstep or came here for advice when their daughters did not receive bids.

Ole Miss Dad needed to be corrected with his " not enough spots for all " misinformation. He was politely corrected, took exception to it, and lashed out. Completely different scenario, as AZTheta pointed out.

Here's the original thread. See reply #1.

http://www.greekchat.com/gcforums/sh...highlight=miss

Maybe it's the topics. I'm reading (and occasionally posting to) wedding planning message boards, and the exact same stuff that transpired on GC in the pre-social media era is rampant. Catfishing, cliques, and flounces. I think there are even real-life meetups.

What's your point? Too blunt for you? FYI, I reviewed the entire thread before I commented here. And, you may wish to review the other replies in this thread to your comment about the "poor dad". You don't get to cherry-pick.

ETA: if this is how you take it to the source directly, and how you adult, I suggest you put me on ignore.

When he held to his uninformed position when it was clearly explained that he was in error, any sympathy I had for him went out the window. AZTheta is right on.

From healthy discourse (which can only happen through disagreement) better understanding can result. I don't like the whole "thing" that recs have become. But I have read reasons that I can appreciate. I learned. And mostly I learned that if other sororities want to do it different from mine Let Em. But I like a little back and forth. Feels like being a grown up.

I agree. Girls have channels/videos and attract 10s (even 100s) of thousands of views for everything from their dorm room haul to makeup to rush outfits. And this can be lucrative – companies contact girls who have a following to represent or review products and/or make appearances (happened to a local girl).

And hey, the commenters can ask questions without being QFP’d and subsequently picked to death. The girls posting these vids aren’t mean to their visitors -- they want to develop and maintain a following.

I think you are doing more to demonstrate Pass the Pinot's point than to refute it.

Not that I want to see you mean -- since you warned about that earlier in the thread and it sounded really bad*ss and all -- but I don't think visitors will go to any trouble to ignore you.

They will just ignore this forum and find information elsewhere.

I joined Greekchat after those 'golden years' but I lurked for a while before I ever felt like I had the authority to dispense advice or add anything meaningful to conversations in threads. In the years since graduation I have found the need for engagement with this site quite diminished. The content that used to really interest me isn't the same anymore.

I particularly enjoyed reading about the different experiences and cultures at different campuses. Especially, the super large Southern recruitments, as well as historical descriptions of 'vintage' rush.

With zero interest in recruitment at USC, there has not been the need to offer my 2 cents. And any general recruitment advice has been rightly given by those more knowledgeable than I.

Maybe all the advice that needs to be said, and this site provides brilliant advice with regard to NPC recruitment, has already been given. And perhaps, PNMs are turning to other sources. Hopefully they have learned to ask their campus' greek life offices for help.

And definitely THIS:

Well, I came here a few years ago for some advice and education on sec recruitment. I wasn't greek, didn't live in the south and didn't have hundreds of hours to pour over every single thread. I haven't been here now in a super long time, I was just curious about Ole Miss and came to peek.

I quickly saw a few reactions....omg...did you just ask a question that was on the sticky list?! And plenty of attacking and seeming sabotage when mostly mom's came here to figure stuff out. IF people would ratchet down the rhetoric and seeming so hard core about sororities as adult women, perhaps you'd seem a bit friendlier and get more newbies coming to share and chit chat.

Instead it seemed like newcomers were welcome - but to be the newest fresh meat to attack. You either want to be a friendly place to help out people, or you want to hold staunchly onto rhetoric and make sure your exact rules are spit back at you and every marches in lock step. It just isn't friendly here, but heaven knows, you are precise with the rules and regulations.

I remember when I first found GreekChat - I was the Queen of the Lurkers. During the Recruitment Season, people would have HUGE signatures, such as


It was very colorful, and somewhat intimidating, even for alumnae who had been to the rodeo!

Not necessarily an active poster but long time lurker, well before my join date.

It's a combination of things.

1. Forums are dying left and right, almost every one I was involved with has slowed to a creep. Reddit has taken over most of the forums, largely I think because the more anonymous nature of the lack of avatars, post counts, etc makes it much easier for new posters to jump on and less of a clique based mentality. You used to join a forum, get involved, and then talk about off topic conversations on that same forum. Now, on Reddit you use one Reddit for Greek life, one for music, one for news, etc.

2. YouTube is the first point of entry for teens and twenty somethings looking to learn about something new.

3. Frankly a lot of people here were relentlessly rude to new posters and as those older posters disappear, there was no new group to replace them because many were ran off. Not something people want to hear, probably, but for every rude new member, there were nine that were chased off simply because they didn't know the right terminology or process and were seeking info. Hardly unique to GreekChat, this is a forum problem in general and one that Reddit dismantled.

4. The advice here tends to come from a national-istic/utopian ideals standpoint. A lot on grades and recs (which don't get me wrong, those are essential on many campuses) but very little on looks, extroversion/social skills, and social media, which seems to be how most chapters are picking their members, if we're being honest.

5. Well meaning warnings about waiting to post recruitment stories until after the process is over. This is probably fair advice but there's nothing like the excitement of the moment to encourage these threads rather than after, where you're either disappointed/embarrassed or more excited about your new chapter to do a play by play for strangers.

I always wonder which schools that GCers who staunchly commit to the 'Its all about grades, recs and presenting yourself well'-attitude come from; versus the GCers who admit that 'yeah, what you look like/where you come from/who you are, does affect which chapters invite you back'