Greek Life: the Negative College Experience

Rachael Susco Mr. Rose ENGL 1302. 13 6 November 2012 Greek Life: The Negative College Experience? Most people do not have the ability to think of college without thinking of some sort of Greek life organization. Whether that thought is negative or positive may vary, but it is rare to think of any time in a college of any sort without thinking of a fraternity or a sorority at all. This is to be expected because most of these groups have somewhat dominated their campuses for hundreds of years, or since their particular chapters were formed.

Supporters of Greek life, especially of fraternities, argue that being involved in Greek life organizations encourages brotherhood, the development of leadership skills, and the participation in philanthropic organizations throughout the students’ collegiate career. The bonds of brotherhood within fraternities have proven to be some of the strongest bonds among young men across the country. When it comes to supporting each other, it appears that the young men of collegiate fraternities are masters in the field.

Whatever problems are faced by one brother can easily be backed up or even repaired completely by another, and the massive amount of time that the members are required to spend with each other due to meetings or rituals or any other function for the particular fraternity does nothing but strengthen the bond that was already set by initiation into the group. It is rare among college campuses, especially at Sam Houston State University, to see a member of a fraternity walking alone or spending any amount of downtime doing anything but socializing with the other members of their organization.

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This type of bonding can most certainly be considered to be a very positive aspect of participating in a fraternity, especially when the ability build relationships and work together as members of a team is one of the main concepts behind the organizations in the first place. These organizations may seem harmless enough in the settings that are viewed by the public, but if a closer look is taken at specific time periods of brotherhood, especially pledgeship for the newest members of the fraternity, it is obvious that these groups are anything but innocuous.

There have been many reports of underage binge drinking at the parties for all different fraternities and requirements of the pledges to consume extremely large and ultimately unsafe amounts of alcohol, all in the hopes of acceptance into the organization and done out of fear of rejection. For example, it has been observed for many years that the Tau Kappa Epsilon fraternity at Sam Houston State University requires their pledges to finish an entire handle of Jagermeister liquor among themselves within a small window of time, and if they fail to do it properly, they are handed a new bottle and forced to start again.

This activity is done on Bid Day, the very first day that the young men announce their desire to join the fraternity. Another example of this type of encouragement of binge drinking would be the two deaths of the pledges of completely different fraternities and two different college campuses during 1997. The first, Scott Krueger, an “18-year-old Massachusetts Institute of Technology freshman honors student” who died after a party that was thrown off-campus by the “Phi Gamma Delta fraternity” that Krueger was in the process of pledging (Scrivo 1). His blood alcohol level was a determined to be a “. 1,” which is “more than five times the legal limit” (Scrivo 1). The second is Benjamin Wynne, a pledge of the “Sigma Alpha Epsilon” fraternity at Louisiana State University (Scrivo 1). His blood alcohol level after death was reported to be “. 58,” a level that is “nearly six times the legal limit” (Scrivo 1). This type of strict enforcement and fear of rejection by the pledges must be taken into account when discussing what constitutes “brotherhood. ” The definition of the word itself is “the feeling of kinship with and closeness to a group of people or all people. One could easily question how the requirement of new members to binge drink to the point of alcohol poisoning or potentially even death equates what is described so often as “brotherhood. ” Another aspect that must be taken into consideration when defining “brotherhood” is the racial profiling that has gone into choosing and accepting members into fraternities in the past and how it has translated into today. Many different fraternities were originally founded as specifically one race organizations, such as “Pi Kappa Alpha,” which was rimarily an “all-white fraternity” (Black, White 1). Now, there are laws set into place that prohibit “membership bias and exclusion based upon race” in both United States educational institutions as well as in the “corresponding fraternities and sororities” of the institutions, but this brings up the question of whether or not the organizations would be any different in modern times than they were when originally founded (Black, White 1). Are these organizations only accepting racially different members because they are required to by law?

This question is very difficult to answer, but is something to consider once again when determining whether or not the term “brotherhood” is used genuinely or if it should be replaced by something a little more truthful: forced acceptance. Focusing again on the Pi Kappa Alpha fraternity and their lack of true brotherhood, there was a reported case of a student member of the PKA fraternity at the University of Tennessee being sent to the hospital during the month of September, 2012, with a blood alcohol level “well over a . ,” induced by the alcohol ingesting practice called “butt chugging” (Jacobs 1). This practice is more formally known as an “alcohol enema” and is essentially when an individual ingests alcohol into his or her system through the rectum, where it is then directly absorbed in the intestines (Jacobs 1). By consuming mass amounts of alcohol in this manner, the effects of the liquor “come quickly and potently” and are extremely dangerous for the individual partaking in the practice (Jacobs 1).

Also, when members of this particular fraternity are asked about their experiences in the organization so far, all of their answers are overwhelmingly positive and many of them wholeheartedly support the claim that there is absolutely no negative aspect that comes with being involved in a Greek organization. How can a situation so incredibly terrible for the members such as the one that occurred at the University of Tennessee be encourage among the members and still be seen as “positive” in any way?

Anyone with any amount logic or concern for the young men who join these organizations must take situations like this one into account when deciding on whether or not these groups are a positive aspect of the collegiate experience. Although all fraternities across the country are run in different manners and have different sets of rules that, all of them have some sort of executive board or positions that are deemed the leaders of the organization.

They tend to have jobs, such as running the meetings, managing the money for the fraternity, filling out necessary paperwork for every different type of function, or taking care of matters of law breaking within the fraternity. Holding this type of position is considered to be prestigious because it means that that particular member is an excellent example of leadership towards their peers, and by being voted into a position of executive power, these leadership qualities are refined by the work required of that position.

Refining leadership qualities can be used later on in life in the setting of the adult work environment, which can ultimately lead to better paying jobs and a more impressive, well-respected position in life. Again, this is a nice enough concept, but not necessarily as true as it seems if examined in the actual fraternities.

Personal interviews with the members of Tau Kappa Epsilon at Sam Houston State University have revealed that even though a member is elected into position by his peers, his position is not necessarily respected, especially if the elected member is young in both age and amount of years they have been involved in the organization. The amount of time that a member spends within the fraternity ultimately equals the amount of power he holds in comparison to his peers, and according to the members of the TKE fraternity, this type of power tends to overrule the executive position holders regardless of the title that they may hold.

This type of thought process will not always be functional or acceptable out in the workforce of the country, and many times if executive position rulings are ignored, the result is a loss of a job or even jail time. If the development of leadership skills is supposed to be a positive aspect of Greek life, then the type of leadership qualities and the acceptance of them should be modified to reflect more real world attributes. Another positive feature of Greek life is that each organization has a particular philanthropy that they participate in and donate funds to every year.

This annual participation with so many different organization is in fact one of the most positive aspects that all Greek life organizations have to offer, especially because of all the constructive repercussions that occur because of it. Not only do the fraternities and sororities donate to their particular philanthropic organizations unrelentingly, but they also raise awareness about the many different types of charity groups in the surrounding communities and in the world altogether among the other students of the universities.

Each Greek life organization usually has a minimum time p, usually a week or a month, where they try to recruit the help of the students around the university in supporting their particular charity. By having a particular time p, such as “Movember” for the Delta Tau Delta fraternity which encompasses the whole month of November every year and encourages male students across campus to not shave their facial hair in order to raise awareness about testicular cancer, the organizations are able to plan events and different types of advertising in order to maximize the amount of awareness about their patronage.

With all of these differing types of events for the philanthropic organizations, it truly helps to make such types of charitable work more approachable and even more exciting to an entirely new group of unknowing people, such as the non-Greek affiliated students on the campus.

It would seem that fraternities and sororities helping out with charitable organizations would be somewhat difficult to undermine and find any negative aspect with, but it most certainly is not that difficult when you consider that most of the Greek life establishments are only participating with these charities because they are forced to by University rule. If the Greek groups were not required by their Universities to participate in at least one philanthropic event every year, it presents the question of whether or not these groups are participating with pure intentions, or if they are only doing it because they are forced to.

Something that should also be taken into consideration when comparing the positive aspects against the negative ones is again whether these patronage events are done with purely wholesome intentions of helping out the less fortunate, or if these events are done simply to add on to their future resumes in the hopes of again increasing their potential for better job opportunities.

On the surface, it appears that fraternities and Greek life organizations as a whole have many positive aspects, until further inspected and genuinely analyzed. When the majority of an organization’s positive features are required by law or chapter by-laws and the members willingly participating in such dangerous or negative activities, the question of how constructive the organization truly is comes into context and has the ability to destroy any positive reputation that the establishment had to offer in the first place.

If the laws and by-laws monitoring and ruling the fraternities were made stronger, or if more people spoke out about all of the negative aspects of the organizations in a more public manner, then the opportunity for such harmful results to come out of such groups that play such a major role in the collegiate experience could be greatly reduced or eliminated overall. Works Cited Arriaga, Robert. Personal interview. 5 Nov. 2012. “Fraternity Not Allowed on Campus Next Fall Due to Hazing Activities. Houstonianonline. com. Independent Student Newspaper of Sam Houston State University, 3 May 2010. Web. 6 Dec. 2012. Huchting, Karie K. , et al. "Comparing Greek-affiliated students and student athletes: an examination of the behavior-intention link, reasons for drinking, and alcohol-related consequences. " Journal of Alcohol & Drug Education 55. 3 (2011): 61+. Gale Opposing Viewpoints In Context. Web. 6 Dec. 2012. Hughey, Matthew W. "Black, White, Greek ... like who?

Howard University student perceptions of a white fraternity on campus. " Educational Foundations 20. 1-2 (2006): 9+. Gale Opposing Viewpoints In Context. Web. 6 Dec. 2012. Jacobs, Don. “Charges Stemming from Butt-Chugging Night at UT Frat Heard in City Court. ” Knoxville News Sentinel. Knoxville: Knoxville News Sentinel Co. , 2012. Knoxnews. com. Web. 6 Dec. 2012. Scrivo, Karen Lee. "How Colleges Have Responded to Teenage Drinking. " Teen Alcoholism. Ed. Laura K. Egendorf. San Diego: Greenhaven Press, 2001.

Contemporary Issues Companion. Rpt. from "Drinking on Campus. " CQ Researcher (20 Mar. 1998). Gale Opposing Viewpoints In Context. Web. 6 Dec. 2012. Stevens, Ashlei N. "Greek Members Are More Likely to Binge Drink and Use Drugs. "Student Life. Detroit: Greenhaven Press, 2010. Opposing Viewpoints. Rpt. from "Report: Fraternity, Sorority Members More Likely to Drink, Use Drugs than Non-Greeks. " Spartanburg Herald-Journal 18 Feb. 2008: A1. Gale Opposing Viewpoints In Context. Web. 6 Dec. 2012.

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