[MysticCat]

Do you really need to identify the groups whose rituals have been leaked?

I too have heard the claim that we keep our rituals secret so that no one will know if we don't live up to our values. I think that's a valid criticism, not of secrecy per se, but of whether we do live up to our rituals. My response is that we should all try to live up to our rituals so that even if an outsider doesn't know our secrets, they'll be able to see what we value.

I think there are several reasons that most fraternities and sororities have kept their rituals secret.

The first is tradition, pure and simple. Fraternity and sorority rituals grew out the ritual practices of Freemasonary and similar groups and fall in a tradition that goes back to ancient times. (I'm not saying that GLO rituals are modern day reincarnations of ancient rites, just that they are modern-day rites of a kind that has ancient roots.) If there's one thing that typically matters to GLOs, it's tradition.

When the granddady of GLOs, the Societas Philosophiae (alias FBK) was founded, it followed the pattern of similar organizations before it and was a secret society. In part, this was because they were doing something somewhat rebellious -- they were providing a place for the free discussion of ideas, something the faculty might find threatening. The original Phi Beta Kappa induction ceremony said: "Here then you may for a while disengage yourself from scholastic cares and communicate without reserve whatever reflections you have made upon various objects; remembering that every thing transacted within this room is transacted sub rosa, . . . here, too, you are to indulge in matters of speculation that freedom of enquiry which ever dispels the clouds of falsehood by the radiant sunshine of truth."

As other fraternities came along, they copied the pattern set by Phi Beta Kappa, even after Phi Beta Kappa ceased to be a fraternity/literary society and became an honor society. In some cases, secrecy was in a sense necessary -- be secret or be expelled. (Although that secrecy could be abused -- thus the founding of Delta Upsilon as non-secret.)

Part of the secret nature of the fraternity involved recognition signs -- passwords, grips and the like. (Trivia question -- Anyone know the original Phi Beta Kappa grip?) Again, GLOs followed Freemasonary and other fraternal organizations in this regard. These recognition signs were important, particularly as Phi Beta Kappa and others spread to more than one campus. Members needed ways to identify one another and satisfy themselves that others were indeed members. This was especially so if for fear of punsihment you couldn't come out and say, "I belong to ABG."

Of course, the time came when membership in a fraternity did not have to be kept secret. But by that time, secret rituals were part of the tradition.

I think three things contribute to the ongoing secrecy of most fraternity rituals. The first is the belief that the fact that members of ABG, and only the members of ABG, know and have shared a bonding experience in some way deepens that bond. The second is pedagogical: a belief that disclosure of the values of a fraternity only in the context of a shared experience of the initiate/initiated serves to underscore the seriousness with which the GLO views those values. Finally, and frankly, there's an element of . . . fun? . . . to it. Fun may not be the right word, but from time immemorial people have been drawn to organizations with secrets. (What kid doesn't love passwords for their club?)

Put all those things together, and I think you're getting at why most GLOs have secret rituals. No, disclosure of those rituals won't "kill" the organization. (I think, though, that most GLOs would say that it can severely lessen the impact of a ritual if an initiate goes in knowing what will happen.) The Masons have gotten along for almost two centuries with their secret rituals available to anyone who looks around to find them, which isn't too hard, especially in these internet days.

The bottom line: For all of the above reasons, most GLOs find that secrecy makes initiation an experience that it wouldn't be and gives ritual a power that it wouldn't have if it weren't secret.