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I'm not a member of a GLO but saw the movie when it first came out. I think I was in my mid-teens (okay, I'm dating myself). I found the movie to be a mixture of fact and fiction. The intra-racial color discrimination issues can be found outside of Black Greek Life so I thought that was a stretch to attach it to fraternities or sororities. The educated vs. non-educated and class issues within the Black community were not limited to Black Greeks. Why should BGLOs shoulder the blame alone for those issues? And were was the representation of BGLO's doing community service?
When I saw the film, initially, I remembered Dap's girlfriend trying to justify her decision to pledge and mentioning community service but no one was trying to hear that. The irony was when I returned home and began college two years later, I had the same conversation with my parents and they refused to support my decision to pledge because they too weren't trying to hear about the work these orgs. do in the community. All people focused on was BGLO's changing a person. My contention to this day is that if a person is going to change, they don't need membership in any org. to do that.
Fortunately, I saw the movie during a summer program for high school students at UC Santa Barbara and the only Black female resident assistant was a Delta and she gave us an opportunity to ask generalized questions about Greek Life. I think the reason why I was able to separate the fact from fiction in my later years was because I had someone introduce me to Black Greek Life who was a part of that community but who also wanted us to be informed, regardless of whether we choose to pursue pledging a sorority or not.
I think the movie can be a good teaching tool for BGLO's working with youth. But I do think that there should be some degree of balance when giving this information such as talking about the reality that hazing isn't 100% wiped out. When I was at UCSB in 1990 (again, dating myself), the member intake process was not in place and the Delta who showed us School Daze informed us about the real possibility of us experiencing some hazing. While much of the pre-1992 hazing is gone, there are enough cases in the news to warrant having a discussion with young people about it. School Daze's value (even with its limitations) is that it provides a springboard from which BGLO's can have discussions about the realities of Greek Life which will hopefully change the image of these organizations.
PhDiva
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