Who Has Removed Preferential Treatment for Legacies?

[ASTalumna06]

Originally Posted by Cheerio

In the very early 1990s NPC groups were also grappling with the issue of diversity, although not to the intense extent of today's concerns and demands. Recent readings of online-archived NPC magazines from that era confirmed what I remember of that era, when I served several area collegiate chapters.

You think what the NPCs are facing right now is "intense"? I beg to differ.

I would be curious to know what those NPC magazines of the 90s are confirming for you, though. Care to share?

Personally, I think many sorority chapters have long given healthy promotion to being as diverse as possible given the choice of some WOC preferring not to become members of an NPC group [as carnation and others here on GC describe].

Can you clarify this statement?

Do some chapters promote diversity and inclusion? Sure. But to pretend like most of them do is laughable, and I don't just mean in terms of welcoming different races.

Do a Google image search on "Panhellenic bid day". Scroll for a bit. How many WOC do you see? How many young women are in a wheelchair? How many young women are curvier or have a little more weight on them? How many young women aren't picture-perfect (straight) white girls?

Seriously. Look at the photos and tell me what you see. And then we're going to claim that we're welcoming to everyone, and "if those 'other' girls aren't joining, it's because they choose not to!"? Even if they're choosing not to, do you think it might have something to do with the system? With how we recruit? With some of our practices and procedures? With how we present ourselves? With who we choose to exclude?

Either way, let's not act like ALL WOC are turning away from NPCs simply because they want to join a BGLO. Let's also not pretend that WOC who join NPCs aren't experiencing microaggressions from their own sisters. It happens. I've seen it happen and I've heard people say that it's happened to them.

We could all be doing sooo much better. Acting like we don't need to is the real issue here.