School Daze question.

[orighu]

Originally Posted by shinerbock

If you truly want to get into why black fraternities were founded after white fraternities, its not only because they werent allowed in white fraternities, but also because they weren't even in college when many IFC fraternities were founded.

are you sure about that? i'm gonna echo what others have said - PLEASE do some research. HBCU's were founded because blacks were not allowed to attend the white universities - but i would bet there are African American families that have college degrees older than your fraternity.

Originally Posted by bows&toes

I made the comment earlier about most black fraternities that I have seen being more like a street gang then a traditional fraternity and that is due to personal experience on my campus, and other campuses my friends attend. I can bring up many different examples, such as a girl in my ex-gf house @ Oklahoma State which got shot because black fraternity members werent allowed at their private function. A guy pulled out a pistol and started shooting through the door of the party. I can recall numerous such instances at OSU, my school, and others. I'm not saying this has never happened @ an IFC chapter, but it doesn't seem nearly as frequent.

I also see much of the hip-hop culture that black fraternities try so often to emulate as contributing to the "thuggish/gangster" image and not something any respected IFC fraternity, especially in the south would tolerate. In my opinion there is nothing respectable about emulating criminals in a higher learning institution and then calling yourself a fraternity which is supposed to be the cream of the crop of any given campus. Don't get me wrong, I like hip-hop at parties as dancing music and all, but there is a difference between listening to music and trying to live it.

I feel like these are a few of the many factors that give your organizations the image of being thuggish. I will repeat what I said earlier, i'm basing all this on my personal experience and I realize that not all black chapters fall into this category. This is my OPINION, and an honest one at that, I will not beat around the bush and be PC about it so i'm sorry if I hurt anybodys feelings.

are you sure those that pulled out the gun were members of a NPHC?
and if i were to say all the IFC's that i have seen are rapist and get girls drunk just so they can sleep with them that's ok cause its my opinion? even if i know girls (now women) who that actually happened to? i am now to associate EVERY IFC w/that or those experiences?

its not about hurting anyone's feelings, and yes we all should be honest with each other and ASK honest questions, but stuff gets stupid when individuals make ASSumptions about a WHOLE group because of one or two experiences or STORIES that they have heard 2nd or 3rd hand.

I would hope that you both could/would use this forum and site to do some research, read some of the threads about the Divine 9 - and begin to understand that its more than just your surface looks.

Education is important to me and it is my assumption that every member of this board feels the same way - and therefore educating one another should be of importance - not tearing down and not saying i don't really care about XXX but say comments that have no place in the dicussion - except to upset others

Originally Posted by DSTCHAOS

(How did this thread get HERE, btw? Where did School Daze go? )

Yeah, i was wondering that too..... so are there still aux groups hanging around? I don't hear about them as much.......

[f8nacn]

Originally Posted by orighu

Yeah, i was wondering that too..... so are there still aux groups hanging around? I don't hear about them as much.......

I have heard of some ...but I think its in certain areas...

[shinerbock]

Well my comments about blacks not being in college at the time IFC fraternities were founded wasnt an all encompassing statement...of course there were black college students at the time. I didn't do any research on this, so you can if you'd like, but I still imagine you'll agree with me that the huge majority of all college students at the time most IFC fraternities were founded were white. I pulled up a stat saying only 21 percent of white americans had college degrees (BA) in 1997, and only 14 percent of blacks did. I'm guessing that in the mid to late 1800's, this number was much lower for whites, with the gap between them and black americans being much larger than it is today given the social climate.

[DSTCHAOS]

Originally Posted by shinerbock

I didn't do any research on this, so you can if you'd like, but I still imagine you'll agree with me that the huge majority of all college students at the time most IFC fraternities were founded were white.

Correct and, for the record, this obvious point requires no research.

[DSTCHAOS]

Originally Posted by orighu

are you sure about that? i'm gonna echo what others have said - PLEASE do some research. HBCU's were founded because blacks were not allowed to attend the white universities - but i would bet there are African American families that have college degrees older than your fraternity.

Yeah but there isn't a substantial amount of blacks who received college degrees in the 1800s and early to mid 1900s--so no need to debate a point based on what are perceived as outliers to a generality. Shinerbock's post was an exaggeration but I understand what he was getting at.

The general point is that blacks were overwhelmingly shut out of most social institutions back then. There was a very small percentage of blacks matriculating at historically white colleges and universities back then and a larger percentage matriculating at whichever HBCUs were already founded.

[shinerbock]

Yeah, my point was that I don't think it was the IFC fraternities denying membership to blacks in the late 1800's. Thats not to say they would have been welcome, but I don't think the IFC fraternities at the time even had the opportunity to reject their membership.

[DSTCHAOS]

Originally Posted by shinerbock

Yeah, my point was that I don't think it was the IFC fraternities denying membership to blacks in the late 1800's. Thats not to say they would have been welcome, but I don't think the IFC fraternities at the time even had the opportunity to reject their membership.

It is called a self-fulfilling prophecy. You (meaning: the powerful whites who hoarded the opportunities) don't allow them into your institutions of higher learning in the first place so you don't have to worry about them trying to join your fraternities and other organizations once they get there. It didn't have to be the IFC fraternity men themselves but they were a product of their environment and cashed in on their privilege.

[shinerbock]

You're right about the point I was trying to make. However, I think your association of the IFC guys benefitting from the University's actions is like someone calling me racist because my family had a plantation.

[DSTCHAOS]

Originally Posted by shinerbock

However, I think your association of the IFC guys benefitting from the University's actions is like someone calling me racist because my family had a plantation.

There's no denying that people both intentionally and unintentionally benefit from privilege and opportunity/resource hoarding. It happened back then and it happens now. It's not about playing the blame game so no need to fight for those IFC members' causes.

I see the point behind your (perhaps incomplete) analogy and for the record I do not use the terms "racist" and "racism" loosely. If your family owned a plantation (as many families in the South did--even some black families) then they are economic opportunists who participated in the exploitation of cheap labor in the form of slavery. It wasn't until later that the economic base became about race and racist ideology. So, no, neither your family nor you would necessarily be racist JUST because of the plantation----but this doesn't mean that your family or you aren't racist, I would have to know more about your family's situation and ideological foundation to make such a statement.