Less popular sororities

[UGAalum94]

Originally Posted by Elephant Walk

Well they were not doing terribly well before hand, so initial shunning had nothing to do with a minority.

Given the position they were in at the time (doing poorly on campus with no traditions/connections) and knowing the attitude of the campus towards this sort of thing at the time, it was not a good choice to pick a minority. If one wants to look at reality and what it set off, then there's no way around it.

Top sororities can pledge a minority and everything be great because they rest on their tradition. A relatively new sorority (and struggling) cannot do the same. At the position they were in at the time, it was not a good idea but of course this is all in hindsight which is an important thing to consider.

The entire point of what I have been driving home repetitively is that it is about tradition and connections, which was what I said in my initial post. If they have the tradition and connections, a sorority can do whatever it likes with it's pledge classes and be successful (resting on it's laurels, essentially), regardless of the social attitudes in the area.

I don't have to express "sadness at the injustice" etc, because this is evident as well. It is my cousins sorority and I hate to see it fall off like it will because of poor decisions and certain social taboos. It was her only shot at a sorority because she was from out of state.

If you care about not coming off as racist, I think you have to be more careful about how you present the circumstances.

I don't dispute for a minute that a new or struggling chapter faces a different level of risk if they innovate in any way. But when it comes to losing even more status for making a membership decision that is punished, for lack of a better word, for the race of the new member, either in whole or part (meaning maybe it's race, maybe it's half class), it's the system with the problem rather than the chapter.

It doesn't change the outcome for the chapter, but it should change how we think of the situation and it should, if you really are interested in racial justice, provoke a desire to change the system.

ETA: I'm not trying to get on some moral high horse with you. A couple of years ago, Macallen and I went a few rounds on this issue in one of the fraternity threads, and I don't really care about doing it again. It's just a tough situation. It requires that elite groups recognize that they have a greater responsibility than any other groups for the continued segregation of the system and, if you care about moral leadership, really requires that they step up and behave differently. Members of these groups don't necessarily want to. They want to have the same kind of effortless associations with other people like themselves that they've had for generations and since they pride themselves on being the most selective groups, they are particularly resentful of being pressed on membership decisions from the outside.