Your thoughts on AI: discussion goes here.

[UGAalum94]

I apologize if it seems like I was fishing for your group's policy about AI. What I'm trying to figure out is why some folks seem to think there exists a hard and fast rule about AI communication while others in the same group have never heard of such a policy.

I was trying to get a sense if any GLOs had specifically come out and said to the general membership "Don't give out any AI information at all online."

I don't really care what your group's rules about AI actually are.

[UGAalum94]

Here’s one of the things that’s troubling me about the whole “let’s get rid of the AI forum”:

Many of the folks so adamantly against AI info online have themselves advised people in the AI forum. And no, I’m not talking about people who went through the AI process themselves.

I’m talking about a group of people who seemed to turn against the AI forum at about the same time they were complaining that their insulting and rude posts were being deleted from the AI forum. It seems to me that rather than a genuine concern about AI info online, their interests comes out of “if I cannot be mean and control the AI conversations, I don’t think they should be allowed.” After many harsh, rude, and unhelpful posts all over GreekChat, they suddenly have become very concerned about how their groups look to others online.

I agree that AI should be a process directly by the groups rather than the PAI, but since the PAI can’t force their way into a real life group, allowing people to ask questions about the public parts of the process here doesn’t seem to do any harm.

Please understand that I’m not lumping all people who opposed the AI forum into the group that I have described above. I think anyone whose read GreekChat for more than a month could take a stab at who I mean.

[texas*princess]

I think it has been mentioned before that RUSH and AI are two completely different things so to compare them is inaccurate.
I just wanted to make a clarification here that I never compared the two.
The main argument against having an AI forum is that anything that isn't on the GLO's website is ritual and shouldn't be discussed on GC.
I was merely stating a fact that details of how the bid-matching process works, I have never found, to be on any GLO's website, yet it is discussed in great detail on GC.

If you are saying "the rush forum has this, so AI should have this too" then you are pretty much implying that it's about the same thing, which it is not. Rush is the main form of recruiting new members. AI is not.

The bid-matching process is not found on any GLOs website... and why should it be? What a waste of bandwith if the pnm could ask a Rho Gamma. Heck, I don't even think I fully understand bid matching.

The bid matching process is not member selection information, it is telling everyone how the process works - i.e. if you put ABC first on your bid card and ABC puts you on their first list, there's a chance you'll have a match. That is not at all stating *what made ABC want to put the pnm on their first list*.

Again, Rush is the main form of recruitment. AI, however, is not.

Adpiucf made a wonderful point in some other thread that NPC sororities do not mainly recruit in the alumnae world. Recruitment is done at the collegiate level.

I just want to clarify that i never said that AI's mainly recruit from the alumnae world. In fact, I haven't seen anyone post that yet.

I never said you did... just going back to the fact that Rush is NPC's main form of recruitment. AI, however, is not.

AI is not the "wave of the future" when it comes to recruitment - it is an exceptional circumstance in which a woman is offered membership because the alumnae organization pursued her due to outstanding community contributions/contributions to the professional world/contributions to the sorority.
I never said it was the "wave of the future".

Once again, I never said you said that... just going back to the fact that Rush is the NPC's main form of recruitment and AI is a very exceptional circumstance.

It is one thing to tell a pnm where she can get recs, what is appropriate to wear, how NOT to behave, etc so that she can go into recruitment and find a mutual match in Sorority World. This information is not membership selection in any sorority. It's common sense. Don't go into Sorority Skit Night wearing a bikini and talking about how you slept with 65231265 guys in high school.

I think you just made my point here. When you are telling a PNM that would otherwise be the type of women to sleep with every Tom, Dick and Harry and openly discuss her sexual conquests with anyone that will listen, you are actually encouraging her to not be herself and to hide information or else she won't get a bid. So on 'bid day' you get an image of a sister, and not the one you really got.

Umm no I didn't make any of your points, thankyouverymuch. If a girl wants to go into recruitment and talk about that, more power to her! Maybe she will find a home in sorority world. For all we know there might be a chapter of XYZ who thinks she's still a great girl and gives her a bid. That's XYZ's business on why they do or don't bid her. (membership selection info!)

There are several AIs here that are hiding info about themselves (interesting hobbies, the fact that they are sorority shopping...) and you can bet your bottom dollar if some of that info was given to the groups being pursued they would drop those AIs like a bad habit.

The whole point of that part of my post is that AI is DIFFERENT than RUSH. RUSH is different than AI.

Information such as the info I posted before is the stuff you mentioned being in the RUSH forum.

Furthermore, membership criteria is spelled out for pnms on most of the sororities websites or Greek Life websites. You can't have a 1.0 and expect to get invites from all the houses. You need to understand the financial implications of joining a sorority. You need to understand that a sorority will also take up some of your time. You need to understand that by joining a sorority, you will likely have to do philanthropic work. Once again, no membership selection top secret stuff here and this information is readily available on credible websites.

I would probably have to say that if you joined a sorority as an AI, shouldn't you want to be a member that would have to participate? Otherwise, what would be the point? Obviously, you have to pay fees to join, a local alumnae chapter should never, ever AI someone who won't participate after initiation.

Ummm yea. Once again, I think you're missing the bigger picture because you dissected every sentence in my last post.

That was referring to RUSH. Not AI. That is info that pnms can find in the Rush forum, or by talking to the Rho Gammas, or by talking to the sororities themselves.

That info is part of the "requirements" of UNDERGRAD membership that is not membership selection information. (hence not top secret)

It is quite another thing to ask about the "requirements" of AI for sororities on an internet chat board, WHEN THAT INFORMATION IS NOT EVEN AVAILABLE ON THE HQ'S WEBSITES. I think that is the bit some people are just not getting.

If it's not on THEIR websites, why the hell should it be here? And who's the say the information posted by anonymous internet users is valid anyway?


When you say "Who's to say the information posted by anonymous internet users is valid anyway"...this could easily go for anyone that posts to GC. We just assume, if someone says that they are a member of Alpha Delta Pi, that they are, actually a member of ADiPi. Whenever an individual sorority members gives advice on the board, he or she is really speaking of how they do things at their school and at their chapter.


Yes you are right... and you know what they say about assuming? When you ASSUME, you make an A$& out of U and ME.

That is why in GC and Internet Land, you DO NOT discuss ritual. Because we don't know for sure who is really at the other end of the computer.

What is the point of taking someone's advice just because they had Greek Letters in their signature? How do you know that person is really in the organization he/she says she is? Or that they are even in a sorority to begin with? That doesn't mean anything. Anyone can come on here and put letters in their signature. That doesnt make them a member.

Which is why a lot of people don't want "AI policies" posted on GC, because unless it is coming from a "REPUTABLE SOURCE" those policies may be wrong.

For example, I can put Sigma Kappa letters in my signature and come back to this board and say "Sigma Kappa doesn't do AI". That doesnt make me a Sigma Kappa, and I don't even know what their official policy is on AI to begin with.

And just to let you know, there have been several "perps" who come on GC and pretend to be members of XYZ and eventually they do get found out. And at the same time, there are several members of GC who actually know each other IRL so they know they really are who they say they are.




Another poster had an excellent comment if you limited your discussion on GC to what was easily found on the GLO's websites, that would have a severe impact of what you could discuss on GC.


I never said anything about limiting discussion to what was on GLO's websites. You will find many things being discussed that are never really clear because some chapters do it one way, and other chapters do it another.

They will say things like "my chapter does it this way" and someone else will say "my chapter does it this other way".

Until they get official word from their HQ on how that is supposed to be done, everyone will be just talking in circles and doing things they way that they have been.

Many HQ have official policies on AI. The official policies are not shared with the general public in any way, shape, or form. If they wanted this information to be shared with everyone, they would do so. If the information is not shared to the general public, it's not shared for a reason, so who's to say I should come up to GC and say "This is how my sorority does AI. Oh! And if anyone is interested, send me a pm!" I am not an authority in my sorority, and I will leave it up to them to decide how they want to handle AI and who they want to share that information with.

I don't see anything wrong with asking general questions about AI membership requirements. All organizations have them. I would assume one would have to have a college degree, do they take graduate students, is their an age limit, does the sorority that they want to AI have to be at their alma mater, etc. These types of questions are so silly and general I can't imagine a National would "freak out" over them being discussed on GC.

See above.

It is nobody's business what my or other sorority's policies are on AI except OUR OWN.

And while there are thousands of registered users on GC, only a very tiny percentage of them even post on here to begin with. Most of the "regulars" are actually posting in this very thread.

I think that this hits the nail on the head. If a "very tiny percentage" of posters that are members of a sorority post wanting to do away with the AI forum, how do we know that you speak for your national as a whole? We don't. I think if something was that important to a sorority, I could understand national not wanting to give credibility to GC, but you would think sorority members would be coming here by the hundreds.[/QUOTE]

Once again, I didn't make any of your points. You make me giggle.

I said a very tiny percentage of registered users post out of the thousands that you claim must not mind AI because they are not voicing their opinions on this thread. That's because thousands of registered users don't ever post at all!

Many sororities have national officers who frequent GC. But what is the point of them posting when we don't really know who it is FOR SURE.

I can make up a screen name with the name of my International President and say "Our sorority doesn't share AI information because we don't do it." That doesn't make the me international prez. That also doesn't make the information I posted correct.

This goes back to my point above that this is an internet chat board. Seriously. It's not the NPC Alumnae Convention.

I thought using paragraphs would nicely organize my thoughts, but alas, it looks like I just confused you because you missed the big picture of the original post.

[texas*princess]

Originally Posted by midwesterngirl

Whether or not they want us to talk about it is irrelevant. It used to be public and now it isn't. To me that infers that the rules have changed and they are trying to reign it in and keep it under their control. No gray area there. Anyone who doesn't understand that is deliberately misunderstanding.

Thank you Midwesterngirl!!!

Alphagam - if the information is not shared with the public in any form, why should it be on a random internet chatboard?

[Adelphean]

Help me understand.

Do those who are against an AI forum believe that we shouldn't have one because the general public should not know about AI? Or are you just tired of questions about AI? Or something else?....

If that is the reason should all the women on GC who are AIs NOT discuss that fact that they are AIs? Aren't we kinda taking away from their sisterhood if they can't discuss how they became a sister?

[UGAalum94]

Some groups do share some information publicly.

What was wrong with the idea of letting members of each group follow their own national policies again?

[midwesterngirl]

Originally Posted by Alphagamuga

I apologize if it seems like I was fishing for your group's policy about AI. What I'm trying to figure out is why some folks seem to think there exists a hard and fast rule about AI communication while others in the same group have never heard of such a policy.

I was trying to get a sense if any GLOs had specifically come out and said to the general membership "Don't give out any AI information at all online."

I don't really care what your group's rules about actual AI are.

I think GC has evolved over its course. It has gotten enormous and taken on a life of its own. As it has gotten bigger more and more HQs felt the need to keep a closer eye on what was being said here. I know of at least 8 groups here who are represented by a poster who is or was a national officer and I think that is absolutely necessary. I think those of us who have been around for awhile and have seen what GC has done to the process, and it has affected it profoundly, are perhaps more aware of the changes that have been made and why. That might be why some may have heard of the policy and some may not know it was changed.

I don't think there are any hard and fast rules about what is online and what isn't. Other than we can infer that the changes made should be viewed as a decision as to what is best for our organization as a whole.

[UGAalum94]

Midwesterngirl, I have no doubt GreekChat could be a thorn in the side of the officers of any group for many reasons. I'm glad to hear national officers are on here and I'd hope they could keep a lid on any off-limit discussion.

I'm perhaps too sceptical of people making the claim that they represent the overall wishes of their group on GreekChat, especially when some of the most vocal say pretty much whatever they want to say.

I'd like someone to show me why it's appropriate to "assume" that if it's not on the official site, the topic is off-limits.

If I can google your group or my group and come up with document from your official group about AI, how can you make the case your GLO intends everything about AI to be secret?

Something else I'd like to see: could those of you who make the claim that AI threads have become train wrecks provide a few links for threads in which it wasn't one of your own anti-AI group who caused the wreck?

[midwesterngirl]

Originally Posted by Alphagamuga

Here’s one of the things that’s troubling me about the whole “let’s get rid of the AI forum”:

Many of the folks so adamantly against AI info online have themselves advised people in the AI forum. And no, I’m not talking about people who went through the AI process themselves.

I’m talking about a group of people who seemed to turn against the AI forum at about the same time they were complaining that their insulting and rude posts were being deleted from the AI forum. It seems to me that rather than a genuine concern about AI info online, their interests comes out of “if I cannot be mean and control the AI conversations, I don’t think they should be allowed.” After many harsh, rude, and unhelpful posts all over GreekChat, they suddenly have become very concerned about how their groups look to others online.

The AI forum has been out of hand for a good long time and has been a point of concern for at least a couple of years.

Originally Posted by Alphagamuga

I agree that AI should be a process directly by the groups rather than the PAI, but since the PAI can’t force their way into a real life group, allowing people to ask questions about the public parts of the process here doesn’t seem to do any harm.

I think this is where we were misunderstanding one another. Now the correct question has been asked, I can give you an answer. The problems arose, when we had PAI's who did approach real life groups and basically tried to force their way into any group that would take them just to have letters, any letters. Instead of having their motives discretely questioned, they were blindly led to believe that their behavior and the motives for it were acceptable and that sort of look at me,banner waving was accepted as the norm. Any person on GC who questioned their motives was deemed "mean and unfriendly" and often worse. Since many of these " big meanies" were national officers whose opinions were being pushed aside for dishonest blanket sunshine, policies had to change and people started to just not be nice anymore.

Originally Posted by Alphagamuga

Please understand that I’m not lumping all people who opposed the AI forum into the group that I have described above. I think anyone whose read GreekChat for more than a month could take a stab at who I mean.

That isn't fair. Yes, many of us are very direct and on more than one occasion we probably have used a poor choice of words to express our feelings and concerns.However, there is a small minority who likes to stir up just as much trouble who scream persecution. The difference is that the meanies will admit to being mean but the other troublemakers won't.

[midwesterngirl]

Originally Posted by Alphagamuga

Midwesterngirl, I have no doubt GreekChat could be a thorn in the side of the officers of any group for many reasons. I'm glad to hear national officers are on here and I'd hope they could keep a lid on any off-limit discussion.

I'm perhaps too sceptical of people making the claim that they represent the overall wishes of their group on GreekChat, especially when some of the most vocal say pretty much whatever they want to say.

I'd like someone to show me why it's appropriate to "assume" that if it's not on the official site, the topic is off-limits.

If I can google your group or my group and come up with document from your official group about AI, how can you make the case your GLO intends everything about AI to be secret?

Something else I'd like to see: could those of you who make the claim that AI threads have become train wrecks provide a few links for threads in which it wasn't one of your own anti-AI group who caused the wreck?

The information used to be public and now it isn't. Our selection is now invitation only, no cold contact. I don't think that means that it is secret or off limits, it just means that more discretion needs to be maintained and GC sure as hell is not discrete in any way. By taking it to the private side of our websites, it allow our HQs to control what is out there because the information isn't so readily available. I think that is the point.

I don't know how many trainwreck threads are still available. Most of the threads have been deleted for very obvious reasons. Long term posters just rememeber them because they were highly unforgettable. Not to mention that individual organizations may have individual stories that members might share but prefer to keep between themselves. If you look through the Ai forum you might find a few of them. Beyond that, it is just the rocking chair memories of the GC oldsters.

[UGAalum94]

This is a serious, I mean, non-rhetorical, question:

Why would a national officer of a group have to address the case of a particular PAI online?

I can totally see why a national officer would need try to eliminate posts containing ritual, secrets, etc.

[UGAalum94]

I'm feeling self-conscious about the edit button lately.

When I look through the AI forum, I see a pretty even mix of general, seemingly harmless questions and answers, and particular women's AI stories.
I don't see terrible violations of group rules and violations of group secrets.

Once in a while, there's information from someone who seems a little crazy, but these people don't seem to claim any authority or expert level of opinion.

(I am NOT making an comparisions between the process of rush and AI here, but it seems to me that the recruitment forum, which is the main thing I read, has about the same ratio of oddball:average posts, and yet it seems that most people are cool with rush stories, or at least they aren't asking for the recruitment forum to be shut down.)

If the system that has been in place for moderation and deletion generally works, why would it be better to get rid of the whole thing?

[Tom Earp]

Originally Posted by Alphagamuga

I'm feeling self-conscious about the edit button lately.

When I look through the AI forum, I see a pretty even mix of general, seemingly harmless questions and answers, and particular women's AI stories.
I don't see terrible violations of group rules and violations of group secrets.

Once in a while, there's information from someone who seems a little crazy, but these people don't seem to claim any authority or expert level of opinion.

(I am NOT making an comparisions between the process of rush and AI here, but it seems to me that the recruitment forum, which is the main thing I read, has about the same ratio of oddball:average posts, and yet it seems that most people are cool with rush stories, or at least they aren't asking for the recruitment forum to be shut down.)

If the system that has been in place for moderation and deletion generally works, why would it be better to get rid of the whole thing?

Are You out of YOUR mind!


Dont you know that AI is special and is not to be talked about?

Everyone that I heard is Anti! Well, maybe not so much!

[SydneyK]

This is going to sound snarkier than I want it to, since I really don't mean to be snarky at all. But, alphagamuga, why are you so interested in seeing the AI board continue?

As midwesterngirl said, the AI policy of some orgs used to be public, and now it isn't. Because the (I)HQs felt the need to move their AI policy to a non-public location (or omit it entirely, I don't know) , it makes sense that those (I)HQs wouldn't want AI policy to be discussed on GC. Since Carnation and PT already have enough on their plates, it doesn't seem fair for them to have to mod/delete/lock/edit as many posts/threads as they would have to if the forum were to continue in its current form.

I think there are too many people here (and you may not be one of them alphagamuga, so this isn't directed at you) who believe that those of us who are in favor of omitting the AI forum are anti-AI. That isn't necessarily true. It's just that there isn't a need for AIs to share their story until they're actually a sister. At that point, if they want to share the story of how they became a sister, then that's fine. They aren't second-class sisters because they are an AI.

However, due to the current state of things, some people may see AI as second-class membership. It isn't just for the sorority's protection, but also for the PNAI's, that the AI policy be known only among those who need to know it. Your basic GC guest isn't necessarily someone who needs to know.

[chitownxo]

Originally Posted by Tom Earp

Are You out of YOUR mind!


Dont you know that AI is special and is not to be talked about?

Everyone that I heard is Anti! Well, maybe not so much!

Tom, the vast majority of us are not "anti-AI". Many of us are "anti" discussing the process because we believe it contains ritual information (i.e. membership selection). There are others on this board who believe the AI process is NOT ritual. Therein lays the debate. My position is that as my organization does not publicize our AI process, neither will I, as I will respect the wishes of my organization.

I don't believe I've read any posts that disparage sisters who have joined organizations via AI. If there are posts of this sort on GC, I've missed them.