<p>@ bay
“It’s the First Amendment, hello. Freedom of association”</p>
<p>This was the same argument supporters of segregation said, that it was freedom of association, and like all rights, there are limits. An all male frat or sorrority is allowed because they are private groups, and no one has made a credible case that the discrimination they use has any harm associated with it. Very different than a golf club, where because networking and business goes on there, excluding minorities and women is a form of business discrimination that is not allowed, it is as bad as not promoting women and so forth. </p>
<p>Then I hear people talking about freedom of speech, but that only applies to the law. A university, even a public one, is allowed to constrain speech, to different levels. A public probably has a lot stricter standard, a public university probably can restrict speech only if they show that allowing it would cause major disruptions or other threat to the working of the university, they would have a lot harder time if simply the speech was distasteful. A private on the other hand can suppress speech, the same way an employer can, for whatever reasons they wish. A fraternity whose members yell racist or misogynistic things could face consequences at a private university, at a public one I suspect it would be a lot harder. </p>
<p>It doesn’t mean I think frats or sorrority houses should be made illegal (I don’t), it is simply that I get tired of people throwing around ‘rights’ like freedom of speech when they very well may not apply. </p>
<p>@bay, the college as a whole is not complicit in this behavior. The frat is. If they want to turn themselves into a “Students 4 Rape” group, I think the college should be shutting them down. You’d like to call this free speech, but I think many would call it sexual harassment. I’m not an expert on this area, but as far as I know free speech is hardly an absolute freedom in every setting. </p>
<p>"Bill Frezza, the president of the alumni house corporation for MIT fraternity Chi Phi Beta, wrote a post on Forbes’ contributor network on Tuesday entitled ‘Drunk Female Guests Are the Gravest Threat to Fraternities.’</p>
<p>The post contains disturbing lines like, ‘Although we were once reprimanded for turning away a drunk female student who ultimately required an ambulance when she passed out on our sidewalk, it would have gone a lot worse for us had she collapsed inside.’ (No matter that it would have “gone better” for the girl had she not been left in the street.)"</p>
<p>“Fraternities increasingly have been beat up in the press, but not without reason. Falls and injuries at fraternities are not uncommon, hazing has too often turned deadly, and members of male fraternities are more than three times more likely to commit rape than other men on campus. For all the news about philanthropy from Greeks, it’s buried by news of offensive behaviors committed by frat members.”</p>
<p>Mathyone
You want to pick and choose who is “complicit” and who isn’t. If two guys in the same fraternity hold up an offensive sign, why does that make the entire fraternity complicit in their behavior? When people join an organization, it does not make that organization responsible for every individual action it’s members take. </p>
<p>No one claimed that free speech is an absolute. Even non-experts know the story that you can’t yell “fire” in a crowded theatre. But it is a fact that public universities have a higher bar that privates when it comes to regulating speech. </p>
<p>Is this frat a University sponsored organization, living in University owned housing, conducting University-sanctioned events? Would it also be OK for other University sponsored organizations to display signs like this on University-owned walls? Is it OK for the Business club to decorate their space with pro-rape signs? The school newspaper room should have pro-rape signage if some individual wants that? How about in the library? Should University employees have to work in buildings where pro-rape signs are displayed?</p>
<p>The entire frat saw the signage and no one took it down. In cases of hazing this is a group activity planned by leadership and attended by the entire frat. </p>
<p>Much2learn, as I stated at the outset in my previous comment, I am no fan of fraternities. I was an undergrad at UT-Austin in the late '70s, and there were many Animal House type frats at UT then. Not only did they often engage in overtly misogynistic and racist behavior, there was even a case where a white male student passing by on the street was grabbed and raped at a fraternity party. I often passed by a frat house or two on my way to class, and I would sometimes get accosted by frat boys for having long hair.</p>
<p>But if you are going to allow freedom of association to the point that you allow all-female colleges, you will need some extraordinarily compelling reasons to bar all-male or all-female Greek houses on coed campuses. </p>
<p>Odd - doesn’t MIT have coed fraternities and assumedly this should help with gender relations? Or is this from a male-only fraternity at MIT which is upset about the coed fraternities?</p>
<p>Oh, and a high school not too far from me may have their football team suspended because of one incident by one student which was interpreted as racist, but he said was not intended as racist (involving a banana but no racial writing or verbal content at all). Everyone suffering for one person being stupid is very common in sports and other group activities.</p>
<p>MIT has about 30 fraternities, of which two or three are coed. One of them is a community service fraternity; another one is known for being LGBT friendly. The third (Number 6) is really not thought of as a fraternity and I don’t think they were connected to a national organization; they don’t even go by Greek letters even though they have them. MIT has a bunch of Independent Living Groups (ILGs) which are mostly coed, and these don’t have the problems associated with fraternities. However, they weren’t traditional fraternities that were converted to coed; they were different when they were founded. </p>
<p>One thing about the ILGs is that they don’t have any pledging either. I think the introduction of females would curb a lot of the bad behavior, but I don’t think it’s really the all-male part at its core that is driving the bad behavior. It is the identification as a fraternity. If you had an all-male ILG, even with the same people, I don’t think you would see the same behavior or at least not the same degree. </p>
<p>@Bay, I’m thinking that if the University is investigating that they have some connection to this frat. I don’t see that the University would have any authority if the party occurred in private housing by a private group that had no University recognition. Perhaps someone with legal knowledge can comment on this.</p>
<p>Without knowing the specifics of this school and fraternity, at my son’s public university, the fraternity houses are privately owned and on private property, not University property. At the same time, the fraternities are regulated by the school – the school can put them on probation or suspend them for a period of time for actions committed by members. </p>
<p>Mathyone
Which incident are you referring to now? I thought you were speaking in generalities. But you are helping to prove my initial point on this thread, which was that it is annoying when people draw conclusions about incidents involving men who belong to fraternities without knowing all the facts and it benefits no one to do that. </p>
<p>There are plenty of gray areas of legality, I think. If it is an official organization on campus, then may be a tacit endorsement by the university about the fraternity’s activities, particularly ones which have gone on for years and years. This would be the case even if the fraternity is privately owned and on private property. In addition to this, I know MIT promotes the fraternities as good places to live to the freshman and their parents and also has subsidized them. I don’t know if other universities do the same.</p>
<p>@Bay, no I am primarily talking about the case of the pro-rape signage, as I discussed in posts 61 and 64 and you responded specifically to in post 63. But I can see how you got confused with the many incidents being discussed in this thread. Some of the other cases involve clear criminal acts and aren’t as interesting to discuss, repulsive as they may be. </p>
<p>Is a university legally required to lend approval and official sanction to any student organization whatsoever, no matter whether their activities violate the core values and mission of the institution? Must the activity be illegal before the University even has the option of saying no?</p>
<p>@Bay “If you are going to allow freedom of association to the point that you allow all-female colleges, you will need some extraordinarily compelling reasons to bar all-male or all-female Greek houses on coed campuses.”</p>
<ol>
<li><p>I don’t think this is something that happens on a National Level. I think that fraternities may be fine, and well behaved at some Universities. To the extent that they are able to conduct themselves in a manner that is compliant with the law and University polices, and do not experience higher rates of deaths, rapes, druggings, alchohol-related offenses, and misogynistic incidents than occur in the general population, I have no problem with their ongoing association with Universities and colleges. </p></li>
<li><p>At many universities, fraternities operate on campus, are recognized by the university, receive support, access to facilities, and the ability to participate in university-sanctioned events. They do not have the right to these things. It is a privilege. </p></li>
</ol>
<p>If fraternities are not able to adapt to better behaviors, and conduct themselves as gentlemen, then any association is a potential liability to the University and in violation of Title IX. If they are not able to stop the misogyny, I think that Universities should disassociate from them, and accord them the same limited rights that they would give to a group such as the fraternal Fraternal Knights of the Ku Klux Klan. Like the Klan, they may still operate independently and off campus, as long as they comply with the law. </p>
<p>@Bay, an organization which displays signage reading “No means yes, Yes means anal” <em>is</em> a students 4 rape group. I don’t think I’ll respond further to your queries which all seem deliberately to miss the point. I think Much2learn’s description in post 76 sums it up pretty well. Fraternities do not have a right to University-provided privileges. If they choose to violate Unnversity standards of safety, civil behavior, and respect, they may lose that privilege. How is that unreasonable?</p>
<p>@Bay no not related. I guess Much2learn is a bit better informed than I. </p>
<p>Sorry for my error. I see people here trying to think of ways that the frats could change in order to avoid the same problems they haven’t escaped for the past few decades anyway. I would think that those who have a fondness for the frats would be hardest at work trying to make necessary changes, but it seems they are most vocal about why things should remain as they are and are quick to shoot down others’ suggestions. </p>
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