A Rose by Any Other Name?: Co-ed Fraternity and Heteronormative Traditions
 

Hello Everyone! My first post, please let me know if I am doing anything wrong.

At my school we have a lovely tradition called the Running of the Roses (A.K.A. Running for the Roses). Near the end of fraternity rush, groups of new members from each sorority go around campus to each fraternity. They stop at each fraternity and the new members of the two organisations exchange songs before the gents give their favorite ladies a rose. It is a very fun, sweet tradition but it gets a little awkward when the hosting institution is my social co-ed fraternity. Each year some of sororities skip my fraternity. The ones that do come are greeted with a song sung by both our male and female pledges. We usually give the sororities freezy pops rather than roses. Most sorority girls seem happy, some seem offended.

Being co-ed also makes formals or mixers strange. Resultingly we have not done any since my chapter went co-ed. We were looking for some other way to get more involved with the Greek community at my school. Perhaps philanthropy?

I know we could "solve" these problems by splitting the chapter and sending only one gender to each social event but I am sure that would not jive with my brothers (the women are brothers too!). Philosophically the chapter was made co-ed to ensure equal treatment. Segregation is not an option.

I would love to hear what you think about any of these things in general. Any ideas/advice?:confused:

To everyone: Would you go to a three-organization social event? (1 traditional fraternity, 1 traditional sorority, 1 co-ed fraternity)

To the sorority women: Are the freezy pops OK? (Imagine it is a hot summer night and you are dressed to impress) Would you rather get roses? Or some other non-rose non-food item?


P.S. Anyone who goes to my school clearly knows what fraternity I am in. I left it out of this initial post because that seems to be the style around these parts of the internet. It does not bother me if others wish to post it. However, to be clear I am writing this on individual initiative. It does not necessarily represent the views of my chapter or my international fraternity.
P.P.S. Heteronormative is a fairly pretentious word, but it I cant think of a better way to say what I mean-- that the traditions were made to help a group of straight girls meet a group of straight guys. To be clear the above problems arise because of the co-ed nature of my fraternity. The use of the word heteronormative is not meant to convey a gay rights issue in this case. (Although we do have gay brothers)

I think I'd give roses if that's the tradition.

Would it be too weird to have the female members of your group kind of take a background role in handing the roses or singing on that night? I don't mean not be there, but have the guys be in the front and be the ones to hand the roses to the female new members?

I don't think that new sorority members should be offended to take a freezer pop or rose from a female member of your group, but if there's a romantic/crush element to which individual members hand the roses at all the other groups and a suggestion of potentially reciprocated interest, then I can kind of understand why it can get awkward for the heterosexual sorority women.

If you all just let the dudes do the handing out, it kind of goes away.

I think the three group mixer sounds like a great idea to me.

It starts to get into a grey area there. My guess is that my fraternity would insist that each pledge be able to hand out whatever they want. So if we do roses and freezy pops every pledge gets to decide which to give (regardless of gender). I feel like that system would result in very few roses getting handed out. (That is a reflection on the shyness of our male pledges, not the quality of the female sorority members. lol)

EDIT: Maybe there is another middle road. We could have some cute rose-themed gift perhaps? You know... like something you would find on pintrest. DISCLAIMER: I have no idea what pintrest is really like. In my mind it is where the collective female arts-and-craft unconscious resides. Its like the Matrix... but made entirely of finger nail marbling techniques and scrap-booking tricks. I think I will pick the blue pill.

Well, you kind of have to make a choice with this if you want your guests to be comfortable or if you want to honor your perfect group equality.

If you stick with your internal group equality, then I've afraid you have to accept that by doing the non-traditional thing, some of the sorority women won't want to participate with your group, and you probably aren't helping yourself with expanding your social role on campus with the other greek groups.

Do you think other people generally say, oh, let's have a social with the group that doesn't care if they make us uncomfortable and where the heterosexual dudes won't talk to girls?

ETA: I may not understand the campus culture enough, but, if you aren't doing the traditional thing, I don't think the particular gift matters that much. If this tradition is kind of a courtship deal, then same-sex gift giving is going to be different than the other groups. If you all just want to honor the new pledge classes and not be anti-social, send them a cake at their houses or something.

1) Lots of people don't name their schools simply because individual GC threads can come up in Google. So, a lot of people aren't trying to "hide" their school so much as they just don't want it to be the first hit in a Google search.

2) I don't see why sorority women would be offended. They know that you guys are different when they show up, and it's kinda on them to understand that your situation is unique. If they are offended, that's on them, IMO.

3) Personally, I like freezy pops, but they can be messy if the women are dressed up. I kinda think a different type of candy could be totally appropriate, though. I am also partial to instant lottery tickets as a cheap gift-type item that could easily be stashed away while they hit the other houses.

4) I think multi-org mixers are a little tricky, but I don't know your campus, and I don't know what people do for mixers. For example, if you have a bar rental as the mixer, and, as you say, the main goal is to meet the opposite sex, it can be very weird for three groups. If you instead, say, host a kickball game and mix people up on teams, it could be a fun way for people to meet each other. Again, I have no idea what the norm is on your campus, but you should try to think of the type of events where it wouldn't be weird for people to be meeting new people of their own gender.

5) Are you focusing mainly on the NPC and traditional IFC groups? You may wish to think about what other groups could be fun to mix with.

I can understand why socials with only one group would be weird for a co-ed group, assuming that the underlying social motivation is meeting folks you're likely to want to date.

But I don't understand why formals or multi-group mixers would be weird.

Why haven't you all had a formal? In that case, wouldn't people just be inviting their own dates? It seems like it would work like the social events of any co-ed group.

Is that in response to me? It can be weird if that's not something done on his campus. However, if you target the groups who don't have every begging at their heels for social events, I bet there'd be some who were willing to try something new.

Might I suggest a three group mixer with a all male fraternity, a sorority and your co-Ed group to make the other groups feel more comfortable. After mixing with you guys and seeing that you are not a bunch of weirdos, they'll be more receptive to one on one mixers.

I'm happy to hear from you always, but I was really thinking more about the OP.

I understand being co-ed making interactions with other GLO odd since they aren't going to fall neatly into the typical paired events. But once I started thinking about it, being co-ed shouldn't stop you from having a formal, assuming that you want to have one.

4) I also don't know my campus social norms either. As a result of being in my fraternity I have never been to a greek mixer or formal! (strange, right). But I think your suggestions are very good. I would do something like that.

5) Subconsciously I was thinking NPC, but truthfully it would include IFC as well. Being a guy myself IFC seems easy while NPC seems daunting. I mean for IFC I could throw together a video game tournament like nothing. For NPC I would not know as easily... co-rec sports and philanthropy sound very do-able ways to start. And you are right, there are many other groups not included in NPC or IFC worth considering.

Truth.

Double truth. I guess that is what this whole thread is about. Maintaining that we are different, but we aren't here to rub your face in it and make you uncomfortable. As for getting the boys to talk to girls... thats hopeless :P

Do you think the female members of your group want better relationships with the NPC groups or do they deliberately define themselves as non-NPC?

Oh, I agree. We lived across the street from Evans Scholars, which was co-ed, and I'm pretty sure they had formal, barn dance, Impromptus (called grab-a-dates elsewhere), and so on.

It was also my experience that hosting (i.e. PAYING) for an event and asking another group or groups to come is a little easier than trying to split something the first time out.

Maybe the female members could give the chapters their flowers as a sign of friendship? Or yellow roses for the same reason? That avoids the whole sticky popscicle thing and isn't likely to offend anyone.

I think it would be easier to have a social event that is more on the fun side. Obviously stepping up philanthropy will help your chapter's standing on campus, but also supporting other chapter's charities will help as well. I think a 3 social event is a good idea. The traditional sororities may be more on board with this, but it may be hard to get the traditional fraternities on board (egos, wanting to be Alpha males, etc).

I think if you have a variety of social mixers that appeal to both males and females, you'll find a happy medium and you're likely to get a better response.

Yellow Roses...
 

I like Yellow Roses as an idea, showing friendship and equally appropriate to receive from a man or a woman...

And the Original Poster was right, I'm pretty sure I've figured out his group in less than 30 seconds of googling. (And my answer to the question posed in their chapter description is "Chthulu would easily beat Beowulf".)

And while it may seem like somewhat of a cop-out, have you considered doing a social event with Alpha Phi Omega, the co-ed community service fraternity? (The Alpha Phi Omega chapter at the campus where I think the OP is at runs 40-50 brothers returning each year)

Oh, good idea! We always thought it was adorable when a fraternity brought our flower instead of something generic.

Also, are you participating in THEIR philanthropies? Like, do you have a team for Anchor Splash and Derby Days, etc.?