<p>“The key here of course is that no one had to do it alone”</p>
<p>If it would be really obnoxious to make one person do this alone, I’m not sure why it’s good to make a bunch of people do it.</p>
<p>I don’t have any problem with goofy college traditions. I did a naked lap of Harvard Yard at midnight in January…twice! But no one forced, coerced, or suggested that I do it, and anybody that wanted to participate did so, frosh through seniors.</p>
<p>You can build cohesion and unity among the newbies with positive and productive shared experiences. I don’t believe there’s a hazed sports team or frat in America with a closer bond than the one we have in my a cappella group.</p>
<p>But why??? I can’t comprehend the psychology of wanting to bond with someone who wants to humilate you…even if the “you” is a collective, rather than an individual “you.”</p>
<p>Yes, the Yale Precision Marching Band has been in hot water a number of times over the years (although most of the outrages seem pretty tame in retrospect), but I don’t think it’s every been accusing of hazing. I guess it’s pointless to make newcomers do ridiculous things when the whole band is doing ridiculous things all the time.</p>
<p>I didn’t say it was humiliating. Humiliation involves feelings of disgrace or loss of prestige or self respect. Quite the contrary–I was proud to be a member of the team and having to demonstrate so publicly that I was part of it was not the least bit humiliating.</p>
<p>Playing on the team together, practicing long hours…that in itself promtes bonding. Why is a shared hazing experience necessary?</p>
<p>D is a drill team girl. The team goes to sleep away camp together for 3 days. When they come home, they have daily 4 hour practices for the two weeks before school starts. By the time school starts, they have bonded and form a cohesive team. Why would hazing be necessary?</p>
<p>If there was nothing humiliating in running around with a cup on outside your shorts, how come it matters whether others were doing it with you?</p>
<p>ncram65, different people have different levels of sensitivity, based partly on what they’ve already experienced in life. </p>
<p>Let me ask you this–if the intention is to “promote bonding,” then why is it always only the newcomers who have to do it? Wouldn’t you want bonding to be teamwide, and not just among the newbies? If it really was teamwide, I don’t think I’d have a problem with relatively harmless hazing rituals such as you describe. But the fact that only newbies are asked to do it shows what the real intention is: to reinforce hierarchy and put the newcomers in their place by embarrassing them. And that’s not so innocent.</p>
<p>Nightchef and Missypie are 100% right–this is not about bonding–this is about demonstrating and taking advantage of your power over the vulnerable.</p>
<p>It’s only the newcomers, because the upperclassmen on the team have already done it or something like it. By doing it yourself, you are joining the upperclassmen and continuing a tradition. </p>
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<p>Actually I would not have minded doing the run by myself. Singing the school song in the cafeteria was much worse–I’d have hated doing that alone.</p>
<p>Last time: a lot of hazing rituals are dangerous and degrading and I would not want a child of mine to suffer through one nor do I respect anyone that would inflict that on anyone. But many are harmless–more good natured ribbing than anything else. It is not hard to see the difference.</p>
<p>Hazing is defined by DD’s sorority as any activity that singles out one person or group of people within the organization. The problem with saying “many are harmless – more good natured ribbing than anything else. It is not hard to see the difference.” is that many people cannot see the difference and where do you draw the line between acceptable and unacceptable. So the definition has to be set and applied in a way that doesn’t require interpretation.</p>
<p>My social psychology is a little rusty, but I believe studies showed stronger group bonds were formed when joining the group involved some “cost” to those joining. Going through some moderate form of hazing would be such a cost.</p>
<p>Even if we grant that the “cost” hypothesis is true, barrons, and even if we grant that in many cases there is no effective way to extract the needed “cost” other than subjecting people to hazing–and I’m somewhat skeptical on the first count and entirely so on the second–then we are still left with the question of whether the particular group bonds in question are so valuable as to justify treating people badly. If a group can’t command the loyalty and identification of its members without subjecting them to humiliating and (in some cases) dangerous rituals, then we have the right to question whether there is any pressing need for that group to exist.</p>
<p>I believe that several fraternities at my alma mater have lost their charters for hazing over the years.</p>
<p>I find hazing a particularly sensitive issue as we had an extended family member who died in his prep school dorm (boarding school) due to a hazing accident…</p>
<p>At our alma mater–there were other really distasteful traditions–equally offensive as soe of the hazing we have heard about…
such as “staking out” a frat guy after he got engaged…His big brother and friends would catch him unware…he’d end up naked, tied to a basketball pole in the quad and they’d pour all kinds of gross stuff on him…and at some point his fiance would be called to come let him loose.</p>
<p>There were many that flat out refused to get engaged until after graduation to avoid that humiliation.</p>
<p>At one time my husband joined a mens organization that had some hazing type of things --and this was grown men—It was not innocent and if wives knew–they’d be furious. Since then DH has long since resigned from that “club”</p>