New College Fraternity thread

Pick your battles carefully gentlemen. Your states have laws and your universities have regulations against hazing. On most campuses your faculty would like nothing better than to get rid of you, thus assuring that they control campus life. They are patient, they will wait for you to get caught in the act of hazing, or for someone who get's hazed out to turn you in, or a rival fraternity to turn you it--and then they will boot your chapter off campus.

Also, you national organization, in an effort to protect its assests and reputation will jerk your charter if you get caught.

Have fun while you can, but you will eventually get caught. And don't forget that there are far too many lawyers in our society (sorry Slick, aren't you a lawyer) and not only will you get booted from campus but you will get sued as well.

PS... there are very few people that I truly hate in this world, but one of them is a "brother" who tried to haze me.

[edit on 4-8-2004 by CarltonDoorman]

Originally posted by qwerty99

If you look at it in that light then the world is hazing me for making me go to college to get a job. I did not want to go to college but if you want to survive in this world you have too. On top of that i am paying lots of money to be hazed by all my teachers.(Engineering Student if you wondered)

So you decided to go to college because "society" said you must go to college to get a job? I know plenty of people who barely graduated high school and became very successful. Actually a majority of all the people I know never attended college and became local celebrities.

[I know that hazing is bad, at least the physical part is cause i have never heard of anyone dying from being yelled at.

Here are some sites where hazing produced injury or death (suicide) and no alcohol was involved. Of course, there are many more stories.

english.pravda.ru...

mepham.us...

www.capitalnews9.com...

www.lsj.com...

www.wral.com...

www.kansan.com...

Originally posted by CarltonDoorman

Have fun while you can, but you will eventually get caught. And don't forget that there are far too many lawyers in our society (sorry Slick, aren't you a lawyer) and not only will you get booted from campus but you will get sued as well.

[edit on 4-8-2004 by CarltonDoorman]

I'm a freshman lawyer, but a lawyer nontheless.

Do the hazers on the board mind giving me the school, chapter, and fraternity you all belong too?

Originally posted by 71Vegas
I really don't care what my school or state's position on hazing is. Fraternities are not sponsored by schools or states. In reality, they have about as much business in my Fraternity house as they do in my Church (absolutely none if you didn't get it). [edit on 4-8-2004 by 71Vegas]

Fraternities are in fact "sponsored" by universities. They must be approved before they are allowed on campus and can be taken off of campus for anything that does not conform with the university's policies.

National fraternities are "sponsored" by the state's they are incorporated in. (Yes, all national fraternities are incorporated). They must conform to all the policies of the state to continue their incorporation.

Originally posted by CarltonDoorman
Also, you national organization, in an effort to protect its assests and reputation will jerk your charter if you get caught.

I agree with what you said. And the thing is, we follow our national organization's guidelines on hazing (and their policies definitely wouldn't contradict any outside laws). Like I said before, nothing that I have witnessed would be considered hazing according to them. One of our rivals got in trouble over a hazing incident recently... so we definitely have no business in taking part of any hazing. The chance of getting caught would be almost certain.

Fraternities are in fact "sponsored" by universities. They must be approved before they are allowed on campus and can be taken off of campus for anything that does not conform with the university's policies.

National fraternities are "sponsored" by the state's they are incorporated in. (Yes, all national fraternities are incorporated). They must conform to all the policies of the state to continue their incorporation.

You're right, I just got caught up in the moment I guess. I know it is incorporated, but I just wasn't putting 2 and 2 together. So if the policies that are passed down by nationals conform to state laws and the regulations of the school, then I suppose my Chapter is following all the rules. That's good to know.

Originally posted by qwerty99

From my understanding (slick you can correct me if i am wrong) hazing is defined as any sort or act that lowers your self esteem or makes you do something you don't want to do.

All states and universities have different definitions on what hazing is. You can go to stophazing.org and read each state's statute on it. I think the general consensus in the fraternity world on what hazing is is defined:

No chapter shall indulge in any physical abuse or undignified treatment (hazing) of its pledges or members. Hazing is defined as any action taken or situation created intentionally, whether on or off Fraternity premises, to produce mental or physical discomfort, embarrassment, harassment, or ridicule. Such activities and situations include paddling in any form, creation of excessive fatigue, physical and psychological shocks, quests, treasure hunts, scavenger hunts, road trips or any other such activities, kidnapping of actives by pledges or pledges by actives as well as the forced consumption of alcohol, wearing apparel which is conspicuous and not normally in good taste, engaging in any public stunts and buffoonery, morally degrading or humiliating games and activities, late work sessions which interfere with academic activity, and any other activities which are not consistent with Fraternal law, Ritual or policy with the regulations and policies of the host educational institution.

Abusive Behavior

The Fraternity will not tolerate or condone any form of abusive behavior on the part of its members, whether physical, mental or emotional. This is to include any actions directed toward members or non-members. Such behavior includes, but is not limited, to hazing and fighting.

Thanks for the link Slick. It puts any questions I had to rest. Now I know that my Chapter is following state law, university regulations, and the guidelines passed down from our national organization... I knew we weren't hazing.

Phi Delta Theta has a decent manual on how to get rid of hazing. You can find it at:

www.phideltatheta.org...


Some good questions to ask about any activity are the following:

Would you photograph or videotape the activity and proudly present it to the public?

Would you be comfortable telling your parents about the activity?

Is it secret or can others attend? Like university officials?

Some things to think about when there is an activity such as pushups for not answering something right or a pledge is made to stay up all night.

I don't get it slick, you post links about deaths due to hazing and only 2 of the 5 were from fraternities and only 1 was an actual death. I thought we were talking about frats not high school or the Russian milatary.
You will find that more people kill themselves for not passing college, so should we take college out complete so the students won't kill themselves.

Don't get mad about this slick but you want to know our information and you are the one who won't reveal anything about you. I have given enough info so far on this site for you to know fraternity and school.

[edit on 5-8-2004 by qwerty99]

If I were hazed, I would sue the chapter and nationals for everything they had. I would sue the school too for allowing the chapter to be on campus.

If someone was yelling at me I would probably spit in their face and tell them to shove it. If they told me to do pushups I would tell them to make me. If they told me to eat dog crap, I may pick it up and shove in their face.

If you ask me nicely to give you a pencil, I would. If you asked me nicely who the founders were, I would tell you, and if I didn't know, I would say I haven't quite figured it out yet. And then if they told me to do pushups, I would just look at them. If they put their hands on me, I would contact the cops.

Luckily I was in a chapter that didn't haze. I was one of the lucky ones. I knew a guy in ATO who attempted suicide after being yelled at and doing pushups all night. Luckily he didn't die and nobody really found out about it outside of the greek orgs. A really good friend of mine dropped out of school and left town after going through the Sig Tau initiation week. Actually they had 35 pledges at the start of the week, and only 13 went through initiation to become active, the rest dropped the fraternity.

I guess some guys on here would say that they needed to test the guys to see if they were good brothers. Since they couldn't take it, they didn't need to stay around regardless if they were cool guys who got good grades and made the fraternity look good.

I'll answer those questions.

Would you photograph or videotape the activity and proudly present it to the public? Sure would, I don't think they'd be interested in hearing me recite the names of our Founders and such though.

Would you be comfortable telling your parents about the activity? No problem. They would be pleased to know I cleaned up someone's house.

Is it secret or can others attend? Like university officials? I wouldn't stop anyone from watching me do push-ups. I might do a few extra to impress them too.

Look, I realize the above will probably come off as being a bit "smart," but that's honestly how I feel about it. No, I'd never promote any kind of activity that would harm someone. Nothing I went through harmed me at all, I actually enjoyed it. But enough of that, I've done made my stance on this matter known and I've learned what I needed to know about it. Thanks for the information though Slick.

Originally posted by qwerty99
I don't get it slick, you post links about deaths due to hazing and only 2 of the 5 were from fraternities and only 1 was an actual death. I thought we were talking about frats not high school or the Russian milatary.
[edit on 5-8-2004 by qwerty99]

I think Slick is right. Just because the hazing doesn't happen at a fraternity makes it ok? Or is fraternity hazing the only kind that is ok? There is a lot more out there that doesn't get much press. It's important to note that there are a lot of injuries that result from hazing also.

You can get a pretty good list of deaths from hazing at hazing.hanknuwer.com...

The list goes back to 1999. I'm sure all of our national fraternities are mentioned there.

Will everyone please stop u2u me about the picture of the SAE robe I had on here awhile ago. I posted the website where you can find it and others on there. So there is no need for me to continue to direct people there.

Originally posted by qwerty99
The black ball thing doesn't happen at our chapter. To get a bid you must have a majority vote, then it takes 2/3 of a vote to cut someone. But once you get to a certain part of pledging you can not get cut, this is about 3/4 of the way in. We have never cut someone while i have been there yet, we have tried but it didn't pass.

We don't blackball. You can depledge if they screw up on something really bad, like steal or something. The chapter advisor or consultant can automatically depledge and the chapter can do it by a 2/3s vote. We did it for a guy who got drunk one night with his friends (not in the fraternity) and as a joke they dumped him in front of the house next door to his. When he couldn't get in to the house he broke in and passed out. The next morning the woman of the house found him passed out on the floor and called the police. He went to jail for several weekends for that. We depledged him for that, it was unanimous.

We sure have gotten through a lot of info. I'm still trying to get through it all. There were a lot of posts even when a bunch of us were gone to conventions.

Where was everyone's conventions? Mine was in Denver. It was pretty good, we went to a Rockies game.

Originally posted by qwerty99
I don't get it slick, you post links about deaths due to hazing and only 2 of the 5 were from fraternities and only 1 was an actual death. I thought we were talking about frats not high school or the Russian milatary.
You will find that more people kill themselves for not passing college, so should we take college out complete so the students won't kill themselves.

I was simply showing some instances where death and injuries were a result of hazing. It has nothing to do with whether it's fraternal or otherwise. All hazing is the same and the results are also the same. There has been a lot of news on high school hazing, but it also exists in the military, athletics, and even honor societies.

Don't get mad about this slick but you want to know our information and you are the one who won't reveal anything about you. I have given enough info so far on this site for you to know fraternity and school.

[edit on 5-8-2004 by qwerty99]

I was making a joke. Notice the wink smiley face a put afterward. I don't need to know anyone's organization and vice versa. I do not want to divulge my organization here because of the office a formerly held on our national council and because I trade rituals for academic purposes which may not be looked upon highly in the greek community.

Hey DTD one of those guys who died was at my school. He was on drugs, not a plegde and drunk walking home and fell. Hit his head and died. I remeber him, it was a sad time.

Denver was great. Beautiful city. MMMMM...Coors....

The Conference went very well I thought. We got a great deal acomplished and I think everyone had a good time. The only catch I saw was some spooky looking kid walking around dressed like Marylin Manson, he was like 6'3" wearing 4" Knee-High Black patent leather boots. I have never hazed before but man I almost made an exception in his case. It isnt illiegal to haze active brothers is it?

I didnt get to check out the game but I heard everyone had a good time. It was the first time I have ever seen mountains like that. Absolutely breathtaking. I wanna go back during the winter and hit a few of the slopes they looked great.

This must be a new fashion trend on the east coast, but many members from that area wore the strangest thing almost everyday. They would wear polo shirts that had stripes of some sort, none were solid. They would all wear the collars up, kind of like Elvis. Sometimes they would wear a tie while still wearing the collar up. It looked really bad.

The southern boys wore bow ties and I would prefer that to what the east coast boys wore.

Coors Field was cool. Not the nicest stadium I have been to, but at least Randy Johnson was pitching. He got his butt (you can't say @$$ I guess) handed to him, but oh well.

[edit on 8/5/04 by slickwilly95991]