My Sorority Pledge? I Swore Off Sisterhood
 

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/02/fashion/02love.html

She had been my sorority sister, and not just any sorority sister, but one who had played a leading role in the unraveling of my young life. During rush week, she had interrogated me about my parents’ home and father’s profession, inexplicably wincing when I said “dentist.” She also was among the girls I found in my room one afternoon, rubbing my pearl necklace against her teeth to determine its (and presumably my) authenticity.

Great article...I love it.

-Rudey
--HAHA

:eek: greeaaaattttttttt... :(

interesting article. what college is this?

I don't think it's a great article, but that's not because of its negative portrayal of a sorority. What I find sad is that this woman who was badly mistreated still cannot find the strength to stick up for herself after 20 years despite becoming an attorney, a wife and mother.

I'm not blaming her for her mistreatment though. Women (and girls of all ages) can be catty. The sorority setting only intensifies that fact. At 18-years-old, many young women aren't able to fight back. Feeling the same "dirtiness" 20 years later though only speaks to this woman's lack of self-esteem. It's unfortunate.

What should she teach her daughters? That they should be proud of who they are; that they shouldn't allow petty people to affect their self-image; and, when wronged, they should have the strength of their convictions and stand up for themselves.

That was basically my exact thought in a nutshell. We all know that 20+ years ago the Greek system wasn't exactly moral and pure so the sorority portrayal really doesn't bother me. What bothers me is that this woman appearsto have no backbone whatsoever, which, as a lawyer, you don't really want to be admitting to any potential clients in a national publication.

You're blaming the victim and whether she is 18 or 38, has nothing to do with it.

-Rudey

I think that you all are being really hard on her. Her sorority experience was a trauma that she admits that she never really dealt with; in not dealing with that trauma, when she encounters those people again, she experiences the same sense of helplessness and defeat.

Just because means that she has never really figured out how to deal with these particular women because of the cattiness and viciousness, not to mention the rape, that she experience at a very young age, does not mean that she was not able to function normally and well in other arenas of her life. I am sorry, but if law school is anything like graduate school, you just don't get through it if you lack self-esteem.

It seems odd to blame the victim.

Other than that, not a great article; a sad commentary.

Rudey,

I do not (and never would) blame a rape victim!

What I feel is sad is letting a petty woman make her feel bad for something that wasn't her fault 20 years after it happened.

Since it's been 20+ years and she still can't handle cheering moms on the sidelines the only thing I'd blame her for is not having the sense to get some therapy. Pronto!

There is a "dark side" to sorority (and fraternity!) life; no amount of protestations and denials will moot it. It may not be the predominant experience of most but we all know of these things, just as I hear women speak of the negative female relational dynamics all the time which the author describes from her own experience. I hope this article and this phenomenom will get a real hearing rather than it (and the author) being attacked or marginalized.

That's the best article I've ever read. And true.

But how can you blame her, when as an 18 year old who just endured a horrible experience and looked to her sisters for support, she instead experienced condemnation and betrayal. 1700 miles from home, her support system abandoned her, and she never really dealt with it; because on top of a rape, how do you reconcile that type of betrayal.

I say bravo to her that she had the fortitude to stay in school and finish and that she went on to law school and seems to have established a healthy family life for herself. She admits that she has some work to do, but I find it odd that all the comments focused on the one thing that she has not managed to accomplish yet.

I am guessing that none of you have any kind of experience with that sort of severe emotional trauma.

Have you ever been treated really badly for something that wasn't your fault? Years later, it still hurts. I STILL resent some sisters for things they did to me 6 or so years ago.

When something someone did has such an impact on your whole college career (and in our cases sorority life), it's really hard to forget.

I can honestly say when she referred to the "ledges" happened quite often. There was one fraternity at our school that did it on a regular basis. They lost their charter and have now recolonized...but not in the house with the ledges.

I wonder if there's more to the story that she hasn't told us (I'm sure there is). Getting drunk at a fraternity party and passing out would certainly earn you a visit in front of the Standards board, back then as well as today. She said that the final straw was her picking the wrong music/routine for Greek Week....I'm guessing it wasn't just that. It doesn't say what sorority she was in (as well it shouldn't), but in most groups, it takes a lot to terminate someone.

We do?

No, we don't. I wouldn't say the system now is any different from the way it was 10, 20, 30 years ago. In the way we recruit, yes, but in other ways, not at all.

I know. I was there.

Nope. I was standards chairman and I would not have been able to do this 25 years ago.

There could be another side of the story, but remember that girls are catty as hell.

Bottom line... if people want you out, they'll find a way.

I feel really sorry for this woman. She was apparently raped but instead of feeling rage against the man who did it to her, she has placed all of her anger on the women who failed her. I can't argue that her sorority sisters were callous and unfeeling, though for all we know they thought she'd had public sex willingly. She never stated in the story that she told her sisters that she was a victim of rape. She even says now that she has no problem interacting with men...even after being raped publicly by one. I hope she does get some therapy soon so she doesn't poison her daughters with her attitude about their shared sex. I am more outraged by the paper for publishing this story which seems to me like some kind of exploitation of a hurting woman. We all know women can be catty, and that sisterhood can fail, but that part of the story is not the disturbing part.

First of all, I AM NOT BLAMING HER!

And, yes, I have been badly mistreated for something that wasn't my fault. I was abused for years as a child and then asked by an adult what I had done to deserve it. As a child, you can't help but blame yourself. As an adult, however, (and I am the same age as the author) you realize that those who blamed you are horrible, insensitive, ignorant people. At this point I wouldn't allow someone to get away with trying to make me feel bad about myself for it. (I'd bitch-slap them before I would allow that.)

I've also seen what my chapter did in response to a sister who was gang-raped at a fraternity. I was so disgusted that I took alumna status and left those petty women behind.

I'm not unsympathetic to this woman's situation! What bothers me is that as an accomplished adult, she still let's this woman make her feel shame for something that wasn't her fault. Worse yet, she admits that she doesn't know what to teach her daughters.

I don't doubt that she feels rage for the guy. The difference with men and women in this story is that the women-- her SISTERS-- failed her badly. The men apologized to her. That's pretty sad.

Ummm...

Did this woman ever TELL her sisters what happened? Did she let them know that she passed out and was taken advantage of against her will (not that she had a will when she was passed out)?

That detail seems to be missing from the story, and it would make a lot of difference. If you don't share things with your sisters, you can't expect them to know what happened and get pissed off if they don't sympathize with you. It sounds as though she was on iffy footing with the sorority from the beginning, and I think the sisters believed she did this willingly, on purpose, to make them look bad, and that's why she was terminated.

If she still can't stand up for herself at this late date (in her Gymboree situation I think my response would have been "you fucking bitch, you terminated me after I was raped, I do not want to have a latte with you"), and is still that wary of all women, then she needs therapy, YESTERDAY.

Oh, and depending on the school, getting drunk and boinking in the fraternity house could have been a big deal or nothing at all. 20 years ago, 40 years ago, OR NOW. Considering how many young women consider Paris Hilton a role model and seem to see nothing wrong with the fact that her pooter is all over the internet, it would be a little hypocritical for them to terminate someone just because she had sex in a fraternity house.

Yup--people suck. And its worse when its "family". While I don't blame her for what happened--she was lucky that she wasn't raped--I do agree with others that it is unfortunate that she is still feeling this way about women after 20 years, a career as a lawyer and while raising daughters. For the sake of her daughters, she should get some therapy. Brave of her to share her story, but I don't know how appropriate it is to do so in a national publications.

If she doesn't figure this out soon, what will she do, heaven forbid, if one or more of her daughters wants to join a squad, a team or *gasp* a sorority?

You can't look at this through today's lens. And I am sure she tried to explain the situation, but you know how pervasive rumors can be on a campus. The fact the the fraternity brothers apologized and the dude was disciplined would have been out there, too.

Minnesota is known for "Minnesota Nice." I can really see how this 18 year old left home, probably having led a sheltered life only to have this traumatic experience. And I can understand how she is still affected by it. If her basic personality is "Minnesota Nice" then the ideas of cussing, calling anyone a bitch, or even being rude would not cross her mind.

I'm the same age (a little younger) than she is. If a sister in ANY of the sororities on our campus would have told her sisters what happened, I don't think she would have been terminated for it. Even if she would have done it on purpose, I still kinda doubt it. Like I said, it sounds like there were other problems - that she just didn't fit in in general, and after the rape instead of reaching out for help and telling people what happened, she made it a point to do things she knew would tick people off.

And I don't care where she is from - I realize at 18 maybe she couldn't have stood up for herself but I'm talking about NOW. If she is still that freaked out and distrustful of women, she needs to be in therapy.

I agree that her sisters failed her badly...but, it doesn't seem like there was much of a sisterly relationship there from the start. My problem with the story is that she has used her experience to color her relationships and ability to function with women. Women, as a whole, are not evil...I think we can all agree on that. She says in this article that she basically avoids any contact with women. That is very pathological especially given that she is the mother of two girls. How can these poor girls grow to feel proud of themselves as women if their mother won't even interact with women?

I'm sure my friends mother who was kicked out of Chi Omega for having the audacity to be black in the 1970s would feel differently. I'm sure the Catholic and Jewish women who were turned away from houses would feel differently too.

I'd know. I'm the daughter of one of them. She was there. I'm the friend of one of them. She was there too.

So far this is the only post that states she wasn't raped... why is everyone else posting that she was?

So the guys made it look like they were doing the deed, but they in fact were not, right?

That doesn't make it any better but everyone is saying she was raped, so that's kind of confusing.

For what it is worth, 20 years ago when I was an advisor -having sex in a public place with a fraternity boy would be a reason to see standards. I've posted elsewhere about the member who chose to have sex on a fraternity pool table and in a phone booth - she chose to resign rather than deal with standards. I don't buy into the whole "Oh,in the 80s and 90s everyone was doing drugs and having sex" arguement. I think the response of the chapter might well depend on the campus and the particulars.
I feel for the writer of this piece for the same reasons everyone has noted - she has issues to this day, and is obviously in pain. I'm sorry her sisters failed her so.

I think it's a shame that those with emotional challenges and struggles are labeled weak. Obviously this incident has caused her a lot of pain and although she is successful career wise and has settled down to raise a family, emotional pain sticks and of course must be dealt with. Maybe writing this article was a means of healing for her. I don't much about greek life, standards and protocal, but I do know about the area in which she speaks. It's sad because you feel like you have to hold everything in because of peoples judgment - good or bad - it's going to happen, so you learn to keep your mouth closed.

I commend her, even at this age, exposing herself and her trauma and pray that it causes true healing and restoration of peace for her.

This is way more about how women treat each other than any thing the sorority did. It's "Mean Girls" in the framework of someone's real, actual life, and that just happened to involve a sorority.

As I've always said, most women hate their best friend. And I've always lent more credence (not much more) to girls who say "I could never stand to live with that many girls", compared to guys who say that, simply because girls do treat each other like this. Of course the guys she mentioned "owned up" and guys will confront other guys, there may be a fight, but then the air gets cleared and everyone can enjoy a beer when it's over.

I hate saying this, but it sounds like this woman simply needs to go to some therapy and move on. I empathize with her being raped, but at what point do you allow yourself to heal, and say "screw them for making me feel that way"? She said herself she tried to use other things to make herself feel better. She has low self-esteem, and I hope it doesn't get projected onto her daughters.

I doubt highly that the rape factored into their decision to ask her to leave their sorority; she admits from the beginning that she was "out of control." Truly, I think many of us ladies can relate to going a bit nuts our first year of college. Hell, I'll be the first to admit I had some issues with my sorority's ethical standards when I first entered, but they made me a better person in the long run. This just sounds too much like "Pledged" garbage to me.

I don't agree with that. I think women are evil. They will always be selfish, no matter how nice and giving they are. They are doing it for their own good or agenda.

That's a rather pesssimistic view, isn't it? I mean, I know that human beings are all flawed, but by saying that ALL women have an alternate agenda, don't you think you're insulting your sisterhood?

It sounds like this author had trust issues or difficulties getting close with women from the beginning. Her experience with the date rape and the fallout with the sorority were merely the "straw that broke the camel's back." She said she joined the sorority to finally get some female friends. That obviously backfired and she writes about her problems trusting groups of women to this day. To me, it sounds like her issues with close female relationships come from earlier in her life and joining the sorority was a bad idea to begin with. I'm surprised she doesn't have more trust issues in general because of the date-rape.

There are good people.
There are bad people.
Even good people can do bad things.
It's called being human, and it is not confined to women. Any time you are dealing with people there is the potential for being hurt. But there is also the potential for wonderful, generous people to show their best selves, and to be supportive. I'm just sorry that the writer had sisters who didn't, for whatever reason, rise to the challenge.
I'm also sorry some of you seem to have also had really negative experiences with women. Yikes. I've known a couple of awful women, but the vast majority, thank God, have been great. I'd hate to see women all tarred with the same brush.

More than that, she is insulting herself. She is saying that she herself is evil, unless somehow she is exempt from being a woman.

Yes, all people are inherently selfish, to a degree. Not just women. That is a trait of being human. But to have some measure of selfishness does not make one evil, and to say that women as a whole are evil is a level of cynicism that even I, a rather cynical person, have not embraced.

This is what she said before that. It seems he took it farther, because she was unconscious.

"I indulged, partied hard and, a scant two months into the semester, lost my virginity.

But not in the traditional way.

It happened after a fraternity barn dance. All I knew about my date was that he was festively inclined and physically stunning. My sisters considered him a catch. I felt lucky.

After the usual alcoholic overindulgence, I followed him upstairs, where I soon passed out on his sofa. There, I assumed the starring role in a garden-variety “ledge party,” my deflowering on display for anyone desiring a peek."

In the article she mentions losing her virginity then proceeds to explain her blackout and the ledge incident.