They should certainly cut their long blonde hair and maybe gain some weight and dress dowdy, NJSUe. That will make a real difference.
Again, Iām not sure, @boolaHI, what you want from these young women. What concrete actions should they take? RE Silicon Valley, I donāt think the sorority landscape is quite the same thing. Part of the problem with Silicon Valley, or Wall Street, etc. is a work culture that is not hospitable with the desire of many young women to have children and a family life, or indeed some kind of balanced existence where there is a boundary between work and personal life, where the existence of a personal life outside of work is even accepted as a legitimate thing . Itās not ādiscrimination,ā per se. Many men would also not want to make the kinds of tradeoffs these work cultures demand (see the recent kerfuffle over the work culture at Amazon, for example).
Resentment of the attractive is an unattractive trait. Very few people are inherently ugly. You either work at your appearance, to varying degrees, or you donāt. There is hostility, also, toward women who aspire to a bland ācheerleaderā aesthetic. However, I see many young women in the NYC area working very hard for that exotic ethnic chic. Why are they exempt from criticism over their superficial concern for looks?
I donāt hold young people, male or female, to account for the failings of institutions and historical bodies. Theirs is a complicity of merely following the malfeasance of the previous generations. Again, prior to the last two years, there was a single AA member in the last 50 years. Does anything about that sound reasonable or acceptable? Now factor, that the state itself is almost 30% blackā¦
@joblue Nope. I donāt think Iām superior (post #440).
I do think, though, that some people are missing out on getting to know really interesting folks for reasons that seem, well, parochial.
Maybe sensible, academically oriented women of any race or ethnicity donāt want to join Alpha Phi at Alabama. I donāt know. I know that discrimination is a hurtful historical wound, but I donāt think that this particular arena (college sororities) is particularly meaningful. These affluent attractive white girls are involved in some kind of mutually reinforcing social ritual, but again, it yields them no particular advantage or influence anymore outside their immediate circle.
Iād be more concerned about access to higher ed rather than access to Greek social life, which, when all is said and done, is trivial. I donāt know whether Alabama is making serious and sustained efforts to educate all of its residents, regardless of race or SES. That is the more important question. Greek life is an anachronism, especially in a globalized environment where super-local aristocracies no longer hold much sway.
There were private clubs for businessmen in this town for many years after women had started being in business too. They were very unfair, of course, but none of them bothered me as much as the University Club. Open to any MALE who had graduated from any university. This was in 1995! I donāt know how long it took them to open to women, but by then I wouldnāt join if they begged me. I think men had stopped joining because they couldnāt be with female co-workers or entertain women clients at the club. They let women in because they needed the members and the money.
What is the problem with these private social clubs and country clubs? A lot of business takes place at them. Four guys golfing and one asks for referrals for an attorney, a doctor, a general contractor? āOh, Bob is a member of this club, talk to him.ā They are having a drink after golf and who is right there? Bob himself.
I think the sororities needed the kick in the butt and got it. Now they need to get the minority students more interested. At Ole Miss, the student body president is a black woman in one of the oldest Sorority Row houses. I think her presence goes a long way to showing all sides that integration can work and everyone benefits.
^Good points. That there are quite a few men on this thread essentially laying the blame for decades of discrimination on the backs of a few dozen teenage+ young women is almost perverse.
That is untrue. This Iāll concede, the Greek system is very influential in regional businesses and economies. Several studies have actually said as much, and provide in some instances, a private and personal entry into large assortment of industries. On the other hand, by my own moral imperatives, benefits or not, the historical shortcomings in and of themselves, are sufficient reasons to warrant change.
Does anyone REALLY think Alpha Phi at Alabama has any influence on anything other than a few coffee klatsches in Alabama? Please.
Posts, such as this one, I find intriguing because I always wonder what people mean by integration. If one is talking just color-coded visuals (a person with black skin is president), then I get it, but that is superficial and shallow.
However, if using the word integration to mean different fundamental beliefs getting along, how would one know this represents integration unless one actually talks to the people involved? Or asked another way, who is defining integration, and what does it mean when he / she uses the term?
I experienced this directly with a young black male at my school, two years ahead of me. He was a typical college student, fun to hang out with, part of a standard frat, a leader in a couple clubs, and just an all-around member of the school. This was 30+ years ago, and looking in from the outside, it sure would be integration to white onlookers UNTIL the black students came into the mix.
It turns out this particular male was the conservative, science-type and did not self-segregate and hang out with other black students in an āall racism, all the timeā mode - his words, not mine. Literally, the other black students were upset he did not feel oppressed or act oppressed. It also did not go over well that his girlfriend was a hot blonde with long hair (yes, they existed at the top schools), who took pride in looking good every day. She was (and still is) hot.
Funny, none of the white kids seemed to care, as they were just another couple - if someone did, it was never expressed overtly. But wow, the names and nonsense the black students would use and say about him were another story, even though he never did them anything and was just loving life. He ignored those students in stride and continued to love life - btw, they went on to get married, have two great boys, who are both now at the top schools as well.
Therefore, I always question what people mean by integration, especially when used by liberals. I voucher that white libs see visuals, thus this desire for color-coded mixing by skin color in dorms and the like. Pretty much like the silly busing of decades past. In contrast, I venture the majority of black people, who are libs, seem to only see integration if the black person in power who gets along fine with white people thinks that the world is dutifully oppressively racist and stifling like they do and presents such an image.
One thing I can say for sure is the vast majority of black students at my school 30 years ago did not see any benefit from that one black student loving life and fully enjoying his college years without complaint. They openly did not like his existence on campus. So, understand when I see blanket statements to the tune of āby mixing people, everyone benefits,ā I am a bit skeptical until I know the details because visual color-coding means zilch in my book.
Is there justification for someone whoās not black stating what a vast majority of black students were thinking? Even though I was a blonde, southern, sorority girl, I donāt know what the young women in the video were thinking. I have to do my best to keep that in mind. My kids keep reminding me to let people speak for themselves. I find it a difficult task.
awc: We sort of had this same conversation on another thread when I felt you were telling us what some women think. I donāt think you agreed with my point then, and I donāt really expect you to now. But I bring it up again anyways.
PG, you are again wrong. While you comfort yourself with your cognizance of white privilege, you still revel and enjoy such status. So, seemingly simple and benign actions like sitting at a diner or riding in a section of a bus were all part of the complex and tragic history of civil rights. So, in a similar vein just let the pretty privileged white girls have their fun, becomes part of the mantra to extend the status quo.
So, while I agree that sororities in the giant panoramic of the world,at least for me, donāt amount to a hill of beans, it does mean something to each of these women who were previously denied membership because of their race. What you fail to say or realize, these events either in the aggregate or cumulatively, just add another layer to a basic wrong-- treating people with fundamental decency and an open door. You present a parochial and provincial view that is not unlike folks who insist on the usuage of a thoroughly pejorative terms like redskin. So, despite specific protest from the affected group, they choose to pivot to protect their own personal enjoyment or social activity, while the others have something fundamental to their basic culture and identity attacked-- there is a profound difference between the two.
These segment of people, shroud themselves in the ignorance that because it takes them to a time that is warm and cuddly, at least in their minds, and that they have like-minded company, that itās ok to continue. Every event, small or big, adds to the tapestry of racism. Either you address it or you donāt. And if itās the later, you acquiesce to participate in its prevention.
Boolahi,
I would agree with your last post if it were established that the Alabama Alphi Phi house has no minority members; that minority women wanted to join the house and were denied due to their race. We donāt know whether they conducted outreach or extended invitations to any or all of the black women who rushed. Perhaps the black women did not like them. Yet they are being maligned as the poster children for decades of racism and that is not right.
That said, I donāt need sophisticated social science analytics to determine something was janky (as my youngest D puts it) when you have a single AA woman in 50 years, prior to 2013.
It seems to me that more and more women are finally achieving what is right, i.e. greater representation in the executive suite and in the boardrooms based on merit. And clearly they are usually capable executives just as most men are, and some are not just as some men are not. And it seems equally likely to me that at all levels, from middle management on up where there is authority to make decisions in hiring, promotions, etc. there is will be cases where there is favoritism and extra networking opportunities based on membership in a Greek organization. Certainly that has happened with men for many decades. Why would it be different with women? Just to be clear, I am not saying all women that were Greek will do this, just as not all men that were Greek do it. But it happens enough that to say
i.e. that exclusion from these organizations is benign after college, seems naive based on history and human nature. It is indeed more than just the principle of doing the right thing in college for its own sake.
Yeah, it does give off some stereotypes and make the sorority look a little ditzy. But I wonāt deny it, I liked the videoā¦ ;))
People who read newspapers, Internet sites, and who actually talk to blacks can sometimes state what the vast majority of black students are thinking, basing their statements on public opinion polls and observation of black student behavior. No one can do this for certain, but merely having a black skin does not give one some sort of magicall ability to know things that others do not.
I would be interested to read any studies evidencing that sorority membership confers benefits in the business world any more than general friendship does. This was not my experience, but I entered the working world at a time when women in my profession were not common, so there would not have been many women doing the hiring at all, let alone women from my same national sorority.
I can see women from the same chapter house āhelpingā their sisters find a job, if they liked them. This would be no different from residents of the same residential housing dorm at ND, or Yale, helping one another. Which is no different from high school friends helping one another. I am skeptical that an NU Alpha Phi would favor an Alabama Apha Phi in the hiring process, simply because they share the same letters. From my own life experience only, I feel that women are much less likely to do this than men. We used to say that women donāt vote for/support women just because they are women. I donāt know if this is still true (if it ever was) or not.
"I can see women from the same chapter house āhelpingā their sisters find a job, if they liked them. This would be no different from residents of the same residential housing dorm at ND, or Yale, helping one another. Which is no different from high school friends helping one another. I am skeptical that an NU Alpha Phi would favor an Alabama Apha Phi in the hiring process, simply because they share the same letters. "
Exactly. How dumb would that be?