Status of all-male chapters

[33girl]

Originally Posted by lisarpotter

I am a member of Omega Phi Alpha, which I assume you all know is based off of A Phi O. I am curious about this situation because I find it strange that nationals would require all chapters to be co-ed.

APO and OPA have two different "nationals."

[lisarpotter]

Originally Posted by 33girl

APO and OPA have two different "nationals."

I never said they didn't.

ETA: I'm sorry if I wasn't clear before. I just meant that I thought it was strange that APO as a national organization would require all of its chapters to recruit women. I know our two separate organizations (OPA and APO) are similar, so I was just interested in how they, as a group, were handling this situation.

[33girl]

It seemed from the wording of your post that you were saying that. Just my interpretation.

You said that "you do not discriminate against anyone who wants to join." The problem is that some of the all male chapters were doing that (i.e. discriminating against women).

[gamma_girl52]

Originally Posted by 33girl

You said that "you do not discriminate against anyone who wants to join." The problem is that some of the all male chapters were doing that (i.e. discriminating against women).

I hope I am not out of order for asking, but are there any documented cases of this happening? That's a pretty strong statement to make.

Also another question. Wouldn't this ruling have an affect on any chapters that are all female, because to my understanding, the fraternity has a few of them as well? So aren't they discriminating towards men if that's the case?

Without quoting lisarpotter's whole post, Gamma Sig is the same way. We are mainly comprised of women, but we do have male members. However I couldn't see our organization making our chapters be co-ed. I also wonder if there were any attempts to compromise before this happened.

Again I hope I am not being out of line...but just wanting to know so I have a clearer picture.

[Senusret I]

Originally Posted by gamma_girl52

I hope I am not out of order for asking, but are there any documented cases of this happening? That's a pretty strong statement to make.

Yes.

Originally Posted by gamma_girl52

Also another question. Wouldn't this ruling have an affect on any chapters that are all female, because to my understanding, the fraternity has a few of them as well? So aren't they discriminating towards men if that's the case?

All-woman chapters don't de jure discriminate against men, and as far as I know still make a good faith effort to recruit them.

Originally Posted by gamma_girl52

Without quoting lisarpotter's whole post, Gamma Sig is the same way. We are mainly comprised of women, but we do have male members. However I couldn't see our organization making our chapters be co-ed. I also wonder if there were any attempts to compromise before this happened.

Do GSS chapters have the power to decide whether to allow a man to pledge? I believe this is the issue in our fraternity.

Among other reasons, it is a bad move legally to continue to allow all-male chapters to discriminate against women. It leaves the fraternity and the university open to litigation on the basis of Title IX rules, from which APO is not exempt.