Sorority Life: The Final Episode!

[Optimist Prime]

Originally posted by lovelyivy84
This argument about tougher pledging policies goes straight to the heart of what is tearing apart some of the best and brightest.

I won't go into details but here's my opinion: If you want interested members who fully understand the history and significance of your organization and can work succesfully together as a whole group, exhibiting selfless sisterly traits, then I don't see how you can be against a REAL pledge process.

I couldn't agree with this more. There is a big difference between pledging and hazing. Our pledges better know who James Holland is. Thats important. They will never be touched with a paddle or forced to drink, but they better know damn well the history of our fraternity, what the helping hand means, the greek alphabet, our creeed, etc. Otherwise I have no problem with black balling everyone. I would rather have 20 people in a chapter who are all very dedicated to the ideals than 45 people where only 20 people care. We don't need extra dead weight numbers just to make people happy that there are a lot of us. There is strength in numbers, true, but a chain is only as strong as its weakest link.

[dzandiloo]

Mara-
I have enjoyed reading your posts & think you really have your head on straight. I have a couple of burning questions-which may have been addressed elsewhere-if so, feel free to ignore.

Do you have any regrets about this experience (besides the obvious re. MTV twisting and mangling reality)?

and

If you had it to do over again (or even now), would you consider pledging another organization--specifically a national organization? I ask this b/c from my observation, you would be a real asset to any sisterhood (faults & all!!! We all have them!), and I think your depledging was a real loss to the Greek world.

Just curious!

[volgirl2376]

Originally posted by dzandiloo
Mara-
Do you have any regrets about this experience (besides the obvious re. MTV twisting and mangling reality)?

I hate to go against the grain here - but in every interview I have seen with the pledges and the sisters - they said everything was pretty much portrayed realistically. The only things they didnt show on camera was the girls studying and doing community service...which why would anyone watch a show where the main storyline is someone reading a book or going to class. MTV didnt make some of these girls act the way they did - as you said people make mistakes but shouldnt blame everything on the network that was invited by Sigma to come in.

I work in the television business and if they hadnt shown what they did - there wouldnt be like a million threads about this show.

[MysticCat]

Originally posted by CrucialCrimson
I think it is a generalization that the terms are used differently - the specific acts of crossing and initiation are secret but generally crossing precedes initiation. They may seem to mean the same thing to some people because people generally refer to their crossing or initiation in terms of a season: fall 69 or spring 82, etc. and the two rituals will probably occur in the same season so to the outsider it sounds like the same thing.

Maybe this is another twist thrown in. I have heard brothers in my own fraternity as well as in some NIC fraternities (Sigma Nu, for example) use the term "crossing over" as a synonym for initiation. E.g., a newly-initiated brother might be told "Congraultions on crossing over."

FWIW.

[dzjen27]

FYI:

Making pledges wear pins at all times is hazing if the sisters do not have to do it, too.

Jen

[volgirl2376]

Good lord - what isnt hazing? Isnt part of the pledge process to do things that lead up to being a sister? Of course you are going to be doing things that the active sisters arent doing - like wearing a pledge pin or taking new member classes or not being able to wear letters yet. Hazing, in the simple form, is doing anything that embarrasses you, brings physical harm to you etc - wearing a pin or doing pledge events is none of those

[pledgemarasl]

hm, regrets...well i don't know. i don't think i have any. and before all of you go crazy on me for saying that let me just say, that what was shown was me. the person i was before and during this experience is what is shown, and i do not regret being me. i made choices, and some might not have been the most agreeable choices, but in the end everything worked out for the best.

i used the term crossing because a good friend of mine is in a pre-med sorority and that is what she calls it. so it just kinda stuck in my mind. i think it sounds a little nicer than "initiated" which for whatever reason has some weird conotations in my mind. i don't know why.

as far as joining another sorority...i just don't know. you know, when i was a freshman i was on the gymnastics team and it was just like a sorority. rituals and bonds and sisterhood. so i didn't feel like i needed to pledge. i think that without that, maybe a national sorority would have been good for me! but sigma was and is just not for me. if i were younger, i don't know if i would pledge again. as i am really really old to be pledging in the first place, i won't do it again in the fall.

i am not bitter towards all sororities or greeks or anything like that. i think many of these organizations obviously benefit their members. all of my roommates the whole time in college have been sorority members. i think that for a lot of people there is a great benefit, it's social, it's community based, it's sincere and wonderful. i think having one bad experience can't turn you against everyone or everything. i am a little bitter about what happened because i was denied a chance based on who i became friends with, which is really unfair. but i don't hold this against all other groups.

[stacydphie]

Originally posted by dzjen27
FYI:

Making pledges wear pins at all times is hazing if the sisters do not have to do it, too.

Jen

Like I said previously, is there anything that's not considered hazing these days?

[KappaKittyCat]

Like I said previously, is there anything that's not considered hazing these days?

The easy response is "Not really."

NPC has tried to move away from making new members earn their initiation. Of course there is and should be a period of learning about the fraternity before initiation. However, if a woman is given a bid, then she is deemed worthy of initiation. Anything else is hazing. It's that simple.

[33girl]

Originally posted by volgirl2376
Good lord - what isnt hazing? Isnt part of the pledge process to do things that lead up to being a sister? Of course you are going to be doing things that the active sisters arent doing - like wearing a pledge pin or taking new member classes or not being able to wear letters yet. Hazing, in the simple form, is doing anything that embarrasses you, brings physical harm to you etc - wearing a pin or doing pledge events is none of those

No one said wearing a pin was hazing, but making someone wear a pin at all times and then forbidding legal activities (that the rest of the chapter is free to participate in) is. Look at it this way: say a school says all freshmen must live in XYZ dorm. Sounds innocuous, right? The freshmen move into XYZ to find that there is a 9:00 curfew strictly enforced in that dorm, but not in any other dorm. I don't think anyone would find that fair.

Pledge activities should be fun, educational or both...unless you are pledging a group who abstains from alcohol as part of their bylaws, forbidding of-age pledges to drink fits neither of those categories.

[dzjen27]

Volgirl -

Because hazing has gone so out of control, many schools and national GLOs are counting anything that pledges MUST do that members do not is hazing. Making pledges wear pins is one of them. I know of fraternities that make their pledges wear their pins on their underwear when drinking. You don't think that's hazing?

Another example: we wanted to do a big sister hunt around campus, but we were told it was hazing. Why? Because the sisters didn't have to do it. At some chapters, the sisters were sending pledges into the woods during the winter on this "big sister hunt." That's hazing.

Some chapters might not take it too far, but some do, so these controls need to be there. Girls shouldn't have to 'earn' their sisterhood. That's ridiculous.

Jen

[dzjen27]

I forgot to add that, technically, forbidding new members to wear letters is also hazing.

[dsmmi12]

Originally posted by dzjen27
FYI:

Making pledges wear pins at all times is hazing if the sisters do not have to do it, too.

Jen

This is not just directed at you BUT I think the Term HAZING is being taken WAY to far. Pledges for BGLO's are not even ALLOWED to wear the letters of the organizations. They have their own Pin that they are required to wear 24 hours a day 7 days a week....AND ARE PROUD to have on.

This is a whole nother discussion I realize...But why dont everyone just have sign up sheets and initiation all in the same hour.

[aephi alum]

Originally posted by dzjen27
I forgot to add that, technically, forbidding new members to wear letters is also hazing.

By this definition, AEPhi, Theta, and Pi Phi all routinely haze. This is taking things too far. New members are also forbidden to wear the badge worn by sisters. Is that hazing, too?

(I'm not trying to attack you, Jen, I'm just pointing out that some of the "anti-hazing" rules are being taken to extremes.)

[volgirl2376]

Hahaha exactly!

I sure wouldnt want some who has just accepted a bid to wear my letters without even knowing what they mean. Sure there is a difference between wearing a pledge pin and wearing a pin on your underwear (which as you said was a fraternity) - and yes it was said that wearing a pin was hazing.

Are these things hazing too:
--sisters wearing badges but not letting pledges?
--pledges having to go to new member education classes?
--taking part in a pledge service project? (the sisters dont have to!)