Debunking the "Brothel Law" Myth
 

Claim: _ Sororities are outlawed on certain campuses because local "brothel laws" prohibit more than a specified number of females from living together.

Status: _ False.

Examples:

[Collected on the Internet, 2001]
Sorority houses are illegal in PA. Due to a 19th century law banning more the 5 unrelated women from living in the same house. This law supposedly was meant to prevent prostitution houses.
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[Collected on the Internet, 1998]
Well, my alma mater is Denison University. Dogs were part of the landscape when there were fraternities on campus. There are no fraternities there anymore. I was in a sorority, but we weren't allowed to live in the sorority houses (old town law about more than 8 women in a house constituting a brothel).
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[Collected on the Internet, 1997]
I have a friend who goes to Loyola New Orleans. They cannot have sorority houses because more than five girls in one house is a brothel.
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[Collected on the Internet, 1995]
I have heard from the ol' rumor mill that the reason that sororities don't have houses at the University of Chicago is that there's some sort of local/state law which defines four or more unmarried women living together as a brothel.

Variations:

* The number of sorority sisters that would supposedly trigger the "brothel" designation varies from telling to telling, with six being one of the more common figures kited.


* This legend is told as true on any number of U.S. campuses, always by way of explanation for each school's lack of sorority houses.

Origins: _ This mistaken belief has been recorded since the 1960s and is probably a great deal older than that. Its possible origin might lie in a mental confluence of half-remembered tidbits about old time "blue laws" mixed with a healthy dollop of badly-parsed newer input about zoning laws adopted by various communities in more contemporary times. Short and sweet, if any so-called "brothel laws" anywhere tie a building's classification as a bordello to the number of occupants, we've yet to find documentation that proves this.

Some municipalities do indeed have zoning laws prohibiting more than a specified number of non-family members (male or female) from living together, but not even in those cases would a household in violation of those codes be labeled a brothel.

Brothels earn such designations solely on the basis of what goes on in them, not upon how many women inhabit particular buildings.

Even in communities that carry such housing restrictions on their books, sororities and fraternities are exempted from them. The thrust of such laws is to set limits on how many people may reasonably inhabit what were meant to be single-family dwellings, not to enjoin those who are living in more communal settings in buildings meant for such purposes. Were such laws to apply to those latter forms of housing, local YWCAs would have been shut down and padlocked, as would a variety of nurses' residences.

Collegians have been explaining the lack of sorority houses on various campuses through this flawed factlet for many a year. Richard Roeper noted this legend in 1994, calling it "the most widespread piece of university folklore making the rounds" and estimating from entries on collegiate bulletin boards that it was being told on at least 100 campuses.

The belief that a "brothel law" bars live-in sororities from campuses is so deeply worked into the fabric of collegiate life that few now think to question it. In 1998 a group of eight students at Tulane University unsuccessfully searched city and state laws for the statute, finally concluding they'd been on a wild goose chase. "It was not found in either city or state codes," Adriana Belli, one of the student researchers, said. "We looked in every law book, every ordinance in New Orleans . . . dating back to the 1800s."

We routinely hear from students who are convinced their particular university lacks a sorority because of this non-existent law. Their vehemence aside, none have yet produce a copy of the statute they so firmly believe in, an act that would earn their city and institution of higher learning a measure of fame in the world of contemporary lore.

Men view the notion of large numbers of women living together as strangely erotic, mentally envisioning a veritable candy store of comely and available sex partners, each of them bedding down for the night virginally clutching her teddy bear close to her babydoll-clad, pulsating 38-24-36 nakedness (which they wouldn't if they'd ever been locked in a women's dorm overnight — nothing kills rampant sexual fantasy more quickly than a cold eyeful of reality.) Add to the mix the "college girl" element (young, nubile flesh) and throw in the "sorority girl" detail (presumed promiscuity), and it's easy to see why this tidbit about brothel zoning has been so stubbornly promulgated.

courtesy of www.snopes.com

That was always the story we heard when we asked why Boston U. didn't have any sorority houses. Then we learned it was because of a horribly uptight administration (the same reason there were no fraternity houses on campus).

I've heard of this so much. I also remember being told in undergrad that we couldn't put letters on our house because it was against some town code or something. We compromised by hanging banners in the windows.

I've heard that rumor on my campus. We have fraternity houses but no sorority houses. According to campus rumor though, that was the reason for not having houses at first, but now the current situation is like this because all of the sororities must be able to afford a house or no sorority can have a house.

Can we please sticky this to the top of every single forum?

And if your school has fraternity houses and not sorority houses, it's probably because YOUR SCHOOL didn't let women move off campus until after men were allowed and men snapped up all the available zoned land. It is due to in loco parentis regulations practiced in a sexually discriminatory manner by the school - NOT because of any brothel law. (Penn State, I'm looking at you)

When I was on the campus tour at the University of Richmond, the tourguide told us this myth!

My campus was also told the reason we didn't have houses was b/c of the brothel law.

It was also explained to us that somewhere in the bylaws for the campus Panhellenic (or some such document), way back when, there was a clause stating that the sororities could build houses in the order they were established on campus. Since the first sorority to be established on our campus was no longer there, we couldn't build unless that group came back.

I only heard that one once or twice though.

There is apparently a city by-law in Guelph that prevents fraternity and sorority houses.
I wish I could find the exact by-law.

Greek orgs have individual houses around Sacramento. Quite a few of the fraternities had them but they became police hangouts and actually one was condemned and is probably now destroyed. There is one sorority with an official house and I am sure two zillion other sisters of various sororities that live together in one place (ie two or three roomates.)

CSUS is a commuter school. Yeah it may be cool to have a greek row, but there is NO WHERE near Sac State that can handle ALL greek orgs on campus. No matter how often student gov campaigns claim they will make a Greek Row, it will never happen.

However I do remember one of my friends in Sonoma (not Greek not were any of her roomies) having trouble finding a house because Sonoma has some "brothel" law. It was probably the case mentioned in the article about just having too many non-related women (or men) living in one place designed for one family.

But I think we used to have sorority houses a long, long time ago. Need to double check on that though.

Why is it that Penn State is so entirely convinced that they do have a brothel law?

I talked to one girl from Penn State and she said that they couldn't move off because of NPC fair housing requirements. This would be accurate right? You can't have 90% living in dorm floors with one group with a house right? you need to have at least half or something with houses?

I didn't mean that Penn State (the college or the students) think they have a brothel law. I mean the women weren't allowed to move off campus - whether they were living together or not - and by the time they were, the 5368 fraternities that are there had taken all the zoned land. It would be difficult for one sorority to build a house, let alone the 19 that are there now. Like the girl you talked to said, the "what one has all must have comparable" thing comes into play.

http://www.collegian.psu.edu/archive...03dnews-01.asp

The sororities did have on-campus houses at one time, but had to give them up to the returning GIs.

I heard there is a brothel on the moon full of sorority pins left there by Neil Armstrong for all of his ex-wives.

DeltAlum, I think I love you.

Don't forget about the Library of Congress branch on the moon where all of our ritual books are stored. Except Sigma Kappa's of course, because a Sigma Kappa was the president of the Neil Armstrong ex-wives club.

adpiucf-
I was told that the brothel law was the reason that there were no College Apartment complexes in Oviedo that had more than 3 bedrooms. (More than 3 women in an apartment was supposedly a brothel) That story got chucked after Grandeville, Tivoli and Northgate were built!

adpiucf: (Blush)

Seraphimsprite:

I hadn't heard about that. You learn something new every day!

I've heard the "brothel law" thing for several schools... one of them being TWU, which is seriously 5 minutes from where UNT is building the Sorority Row :p So I figured that was not a real reason why some campuses have houses, and some have only "lodges" and some don't have either.

DeltAlum is mine!;)

He is a fun Guy!:cool:

Sorry D A!

In many instances, The Brothel Law is Brought up and is untrue as has been shown.

Private and Realigious Affiliated Schools have different Rules to abide by.

That is called the Law of The Land. They Dictate the circumstances of living Facilities.

LXA lived in a School Owned House after Theirs Burned. William-Jewell, in Mo.

I was in it a couple of times and asked the Brothers, what are you doing living here, this house should be condemmend!

Well, not a Problem now, a new 3 1/2 Mill. house!

But The Cardinal House was scarry as Hell!

A fire would have wiped out almost all of the Chapter.

But, many times, maybe the Brothel Law is brought up to disway Soroitys from expanding on campus.

Dont Know, but am sure you can go to the Legal City Ordaninces, LAWS and find out about this from the Zoning Department!

shima_mizu said:


Cat, I'm almost positive we did. I'm not sure if Phi Beta Chi (for anyone who wants to know, that was our local chapter heritage before going to an NPC sorority in 1998) had a house, but I'm pretty sure I saw in a yearbook somewhere a sorority house. I might've even read it in the Valpo urban legends/myths spread that The Torch did towards the end of the semester. Perhaps one of our sisters in our chapter can shed some light on it.

at my school this is a true law...and the is being fought as we speak...the school is trying to get it removed to build a sorority row on campus...but there is another law too, not sure what, but it is the reason we only have on fraternity house

THERE IS NO BROTHEL LAW. ANYWHERE.

The laws your school is trying to get reversed are ZONING laws. They have NOTHING to do with brothels or the fact that it's women, not men living in the house.

Thank you.

Seriously, consider for a moment who would create a brothel law. Ever recall a time in the history of Puritan-founded America that brothels were just popping up all over the place?

In Fairfax County (Virginia), you cannot have more than 4 unrelated adults living in a single dwelling. It isn't because we might all become prostitutes, it's because of other reasons such as parking, traffic, square footage of dwelling space per resident laws, and more--all under the umbrella of Zoning Regulations.

On the campus of George Mason University, there are student apartments with 3 bedrooms holding two people each. So, you could have 6 girls in a single dwelling. It doesn't matter what the residential zoning laws are because a university is its own zone.

Greek Housing is generally considered unnecessary to a campus unless your organizations happen to do more good things than bad things, and then follow that up with Public Relations exposure. It's also prohibitively expensive. I know you pay a lot of tuition, but universities spend it on things like salaries and maintenance--they don't just sit on piles of money laughing at how you can't have cool things.

Also, if the reason you can't do something begins with, "there is an old bylaw buried away somewhere..." then that's not the reason.

You mentioined days of yore, not today!:)

Those days of Laws that were enacted too are far gone from Ordinances (City) Laws (State).

Schools cannot make laws, they can only have rules and if they are private schools, that makes it so much easier. They can rule against said Ordinances and Laws, but not disobey them.

While we're on the subject of debunking myths, the Puritans founded Massachusetts Bay Colony, and as a result, were influential in New England. There was also some emmigration to the Chesapeake Bay region, but the Puritans never had the influence there that they did in New England. Puritan dominance of politics in New England had waned by the early 1700s.

Undoubtedly, Puritanism influenced the founding of the American Republic, but America is not "Puritan-founded."

Kool and Right!:)

Oh, do not spit on the sidewalk!;)

When are some of these Kids get over the question of being Whore or not being a Whore?

It just isnt there anymore!:D

While we're at it...America is not founded upon judeo-christian principles. It's founded upon the principles of freedom of religion and separation of church and state. OMG it pisses me off when people play that card. Or the fact that In God We Trust wasn't added to money or the pledge of allegiance until the 50s I believe.
I'm not even American and I know this!

LMAO at the username change! I first saw it, I thought you were a troll or alter ego, lol.

It shocked the hell out of me too, all of a sudden I was someone else and then I got a PM from John.

Just FYI, it wasn't until the ratification of the Fourteenth Amendment, after the Civil War, that the "establishment clause" of the First Amendment was applicable to the states. Prior to that time, while the Federal government was constitutionally forbidden from establishing a particular church as the state church, state governments were not so forbidden, unless their own constitutions contained a similar provision.

The Congregational Church was not disestablished in Connecticut until 1818, and although Massachusetts de jure disestablished the Congregational Church in 1780, it was not de facto disestablished until 1833, when the laws requiring every man to belong to a church and giving churches the power of taxation over members were repealed.

At the time the US Constitution was adopted, the overriding concern was not the complete disestablishment of any church. Rather, the overriding concern was that decisions regarding establishment or disestablishment should be made by the states, not by the federal government.

"In God We Trust" was not made the official national motto until 1956. However as far as money goes, the motto first appeared on the two-cent coin in 1864, under general authority given by Congress for the Mint Director and the Secretary of the Treasury to develop and approve of designs for coins. (There had been a fair amount of sentiment expressed that the motto be placed on the coin as the Civil War progressed.) It was in 1873 that Congress specifically said that the Secretary of the Treasury "may cause the motto IN GOD WE TRUST to be inscribed on such coins as shall admit of such motto."

It was used off and on on various coins for a while after that, but every penny since 1909, every dime since 1916, every gold coin or silver dollar coin, half-dollar coin, and quarter-dollar coins since 1908, and every nickel since 1938 has had it. It was not added to paper money until 1957.

Just trying to keep the info straight. ;)

Knew you would! :)

Well, it also depends on what you mean by "America" and "founded."

The formation of the United States as a separate and independent political entity or the actual settlement and survival of the early colonies?

The influence of the Puritans in New England really was pretty darn important for a long time in US history, and Georgia's colonial success depended a lot on the Methodists.

And to be honest, even the Deism of the Revolutionary documents probably wouldn't have been possible without the contributions of the Judeo-Christian Western tradition. It's not like the Enlightenment happened in a cultural vacuum or under Confucianism or Islam.

I misspoke when I suggested that actual Puritans founded the whole of America. America was founded by many distinct groups, sects, organizations, corporations, and more. We're a great big ridiculous melting pot.

Nevertheless, I do not believe so many brothels were appearing that every township/county (and generally only those containing or that would one day contain a college or university) felt that anti-brothel laws were necessary but that instead of saying 'no brothels' they referred to it vaguely in terms of number of women in a household.

Given that this is a "stickied" thread regarding the brothel law, try and focus on that rather than the philosophical reasoning behind the founding of the country which is extremely loosely tied to local zoning laws. The only thing relevant about the influence of religion or whether many aspects of our society are too conservative is that these are probably the reasons (or perceptions) that lead to people believing in a stupid reason for the lack of Greek Housing.

Hey, you're the one who brought the Puritan influence up. ;)

But you're right in that in the 1800s, unless one was going to school in New York City, Philadelphia, Chicago, Washington or New Orleans, keeping brothels from being established near campuses probably wasn't high on any municipality's list of things to worry about. (And I'm doubting that they worried in New Orleans.)

Why isn't this dead yet like the law?:confused:

I came across this thread and found it interesting. Apparently this myth has been circulating for so long even LAWMAKERS don't even question it.

Here is an article from Wikipedia.com...where even the Tennessee Legislature had to address this very issue, on a law that evidently never existed to start with:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Middle_...ate_University

Is it really a Myth
 

I know for a fact that in Detroit Mi, the law stands. There are no Sorority houses but there are several Frat houses. It is a law that is actually on the books here.

Can you actually cite to the ordinance? 'Cause otherwise, I'm not buying that it's "actually on the books."

I'm sure his brother's girlfriend's aunt's third cousin's husband's dog told him. So of course it's true. Disregard the rest of the thread and everyone else who ACTUALLY knows what they're talking about. The Brothel Law is absolutely true.:rolleyes:

BTW, MC - love the new sig.:)

I really don't care what you buy or don't. I know for certain that at the several universities in this city, none of them have houses that are inhabited.

I can assure you that the law exist