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Agreed, ktsnake. It is somewhat unfair to judge our founders by today’s standards. But you do have to at least be aware there were different standards, so you don’t get too carried away with how wonderful your founders were. In 1860 you could be an educated, moral, upstanding young man and still consider a black man inferior and unworthy of membership. In 1960 it was obviously a different story.
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Absolutely. The organizations (as all are) are simply products of their cultures and times. Sigma Nu's founders were former Confederate Soldiers studying Civil Engineering at the Virginia Military Institute. While I'm almost 100% sure they would not even have allowed ME in as a Roman Catholic -- or for that matter any non-WASP persuasion... I still think they got it right.
They gave us a wonderful creed to live by and some great values -- Love, Honor and Truth. These concepts don't exist in a vacuum... So I'd imagine that your concept of these would be different from mine -- mine different from my founders... etc..
This doesn't change the fact that what they did was stand up in the face of adversity (the institutionalized hazing at VMI) and stand for something they believed in.
To follow in the footsteps of such men is a true honor for me. The organization and the men running it have changed a great deal since 1869.