Too fat to recruit: or, DePauw, the Sequel

[33girl]

You're completely missing the point.

Maybe they can "hide" women during rush, but then all of a sudden the sorority that had 50 skinny girls during the parties has 50 skinny girls and 20 fat girls at bid day.

If you were a new pledge, wouldn't you feel a little bit like someone was trying to pull the wool over your eyes?

[BetteDavisEyes]

Originally Posted by 33girl

If you were a new pledge, wouldn't you feel a little bit like someone was trying to pull the wool over your eyes?

Yes. If I were a new member, and all of a sudden I saw a bunch of girls who were mysteriously missing throughout recruitment, I'd probably wonder why they weren't around and if all the missing girls happened to be bigger than a size 6, then I'd downright get pissed...but that's just me. Obviously, everyone else would react differently.

[adpiucf]

I realize I come from one of the "larger" chapters, but in all honesty... recruitment is a blur. You maybe meet 10 women in the chapter during the week, and prob. only remember half of them. Come Bid Day, there are a lot of strange faces.

If it's as drastic as 30% of the chapter disappearing and reappearing on Bid Day, and those members looking drastically different than the rest, ok, that's weird. At that point I'd call shennigans.

But in a typical recruitment, there are several sisters who can be missing from the floor for several reasons: behind-the-scenes work, study abroad, medical, emergency, conflict with athletics/band, etc. I don't think anyone can legitimately feel cheated on Bid Day-- you still have a couple dozen sisters and a couple dozen new members to get to know.

As far as the heavier women in your chapter-- I don't think it's a weight issue-- it's an issue of how you carry yourself.

At the end of the day, recruitment is a very superficial process-- you are having the most basic surface conversations, after all. If you are bidded, you have a 6 week period (approx) to determine if you're in the right place or not. Granted, you may not have an opportunity to re-rush in the future, but you're not locked in if the sorority you thought you were joining turns out to be something else.

And if anyone finds that unfair or horrible-- well, don't rush at those schools. It's not going to change-- you're trying to bring in 18-20 year olds as your members and you're trying to appeal to what's important to them. Sad as it sounds, while many are in it for the academics/sisterhood/service aspect, the look of a chapter can heavily influence someone of this age.

Those of us who are a little older may find the whole process silly or disturbing, but we aren't their target demo.

[33girl]

There are ways to "take one for the team" other than telling someone to not come to rush at all. From what I'm getting, the national consultant didn't even suggest kitchen duty or ask the women of the chapter what a good way to deal w/ this would be - she just said DON'T COME TO RUSH AT ALL.

And if this chapter IS ALREADY APPRECIABLY SMALLER THAN THE OTHERS, which apparently is the case, the rushees are going to notice that anyway. I'm sorry, but if anyone, national consultants or chapter officers or advisors, think the rushees won't notice this chapter has 80 girls while the other chapters have 200, they are too stupid to exist. That in and of itself is "different" enough to scare rushees away from the chapter, if we're operating on the principle that different = kiss of death.

Bottom line, if your chapter's numbers are a lot smaller than the other groups' to begin with, keeping the "image impaired" ladies away from rush isn't going to help your recruitment. You have to explain it in some way and it would be better to use your time thinking of a positive spin to put on that than figuring out who's skinny enough to rush and who is not.

[ΑΓΔSquirrelGirl]

Originally Posted by 33girl

There are ways to "take one for the team" other than telling someone to not come to rush at all. From what I'm getting, the national consultant didn't even suggest kitchen duty or ask the women of the chapter what a good way to deal w/ this would be - she just said DON'T COME TO RUSH AT ALL.

And if this chapter IS ALREADY APPRECIABLY SMALLER THAN THE OTHERS, which apparently is the case, the rushees are going to notice that anyway. I'm sorry, but if anyone, national consultants or chapter officers or advisors, think the rushees won't notice this chapter has 80 girls while the other chapters have 200, they are too stupid to exist. That in and of itself is "different" enough to scare rushees away from the chapter, if we're operating on the principle that different = kiss of death.

Bottom line, if your chapter's numbers are a lot smaller than the other groups' to begin with, keeping the "image impaired" ladies away from rush isn't going to help your recruitment. You have to explain it in some way and it would be better to use your time thinking of a positive spin to put on that than figuring out who's skinny enough to rush and who is not.

Great post.

I still fail to understand why after decades and decades of this no one will even lift one finger to change it...one person can't do it, but a lot could. Probably not drastically. And probably not even in ten years. But EVENTUALLY the Greek system could become something that those of us that have (and had at 18) a value system that doesn't involve judging someone on nothing but their appearance won't be ASHAMED of. Because let me tell you...it does embarass me to be lumped in with the SEC crowd. It's not one that I in general want to be associated with. I support the values of the founders, the ideals of the organizations...but I don't support the current atmosphere. At all. Because it, based on what I've seen and heard, does not mesh in any way with what the organizations were founded for.

[dgdramadawg]

Originally Posted by 33girl

And if this chapter IS ALREADY APPRECIABLY SMALLER THAN THE OTHERS, which apparently is the case, the rushees are going to notice that anyway. I'm sorry, but if anyone, national consultants or chapter officers or advisors, think the rushees won't notice this chapter has 80 girls while the other chapters have 200, they are too stupid to exist. That in and of itself is "different" enough to scare rushees away from the chapter, if we're operating on the principle that different = kiss of death.

Bottom line, if your chapter's numbers are a lot smaller than the other groups' to begin with, keeping the "image impaired" ladies away from rush isn't going to help your recruitment. You have to explain it in some way and it would be better to use your time thinking of a positive spin to put on that than figuring out who's skinny enough to rush and who is not.

You make a great point here. If the chapter has 100 as opposed to another chapter's 150, one missing member might not be a huge deal because the chapter isn't THAT much smaller. But what if the chapter does have 80 when the others have 200? At a lot of schools, in-the-know PNMs are probably going in planning to cut this house after round one anyway, so it probably wouldn't help or hurt to have this member rushing people.

[AlphaFrog]

I'm surprised in the PC-ness that NPC is becoming, they don't make a rule that all sororities can only have as many rushers on the floor as the number of members of the smallest chapter on campus. That way PNMs aren't judging on size.

I think it would be going completely PC-overboard, but I can't say that I don't eventually see it happening.

[33girl]

Originally Posted by AlphaFrog

I'm surprised in the PC-ness that NPC is becoming, they don't make a rule that all sororities can only have as many rushers on the floor as the number of members of the smallest chapter on campus. That way PNMs aren't judging on size.

I think it would be going completely PC-overboard, but I can't say that I don't eventually see it happening.

Some schools already do this for activity days or the first Meet the Greeks type round - you can only have 15 or however many sisters at the table. Obviously, though, once you go to the next round you realize who has 20 and who has 95.

Unless you mean doing it for all of rush, and (depending on the group's voting rules) that might go against some groups' bylaws. That is - if everyone can only have 20 members rushing cause that's the size of the smallest chapter, the larger ones might only have 1/4 of their members who have met the PNMs. Either they wouldn't be able to vote anyone in or PNMs would have to be voted on sight unseen.

Yikes. Talk about a cluster#$%k.

[dgdramadawg]

Originally Posted by SECdomination

Haha, I'm definately NOT a woman. I just noticed how popular this thread was and thought I'd better tell it how it is. Besides, would a woman really write that?

Haha, we just figured only a girl would understand.

[Tom Earp]

Originally Posted by dgdramadawg

Haha, we just figured only a girl would understand.

Maybe that is the problem, High I am a Barbi and I should fit!


Or not!

Maybe small minds fit?