Sorority racism article Crimson White

<p>Cool, Shrinkrap! The second D found out HBCU’s existed she was all over the idea. We’ve been to a couple of tiny HBCU fairs in the PNW and a larger one in CA. But she’s always had a plan. I’m sure she’d be interested in your input. I can PM you.</p>

<p>Very cool.</p>

<p>My kids grew up in California, and the hubs and I grew up in a very different, but neither better nor worse world. We were happy to be able to send our d to a school in the south, even though she got into plenty of UC’s.</p>

<p>My H’s parents landed in Oakland after escaping small town Louisiana. His (much) older brother and sisters were born there. They got to Seattle around 1960 or so. H’s plan was to go to an HBCU but both his parents had died by the time college came along so he stayed local (UW). I’m an white girl from NH-we didn’t have much in common. </p>

<p>Neither of us have been to the deep south and we’ll be vacationing/visiting colleges there this summer. We know a lot of people-mostly in D’s church, who went to HBCU’s and they would all do it again if given the opportunity. I wish there was and HBCU forum on CC or SOMEWHERE, though. More information is always better.</p>

<p>I’d love to hear your travel plans! Feel free to pm me.</p>

<p>Newcomer to this thread and foreign to the Greek system. It existed at my college in my time (Michigan in the early 70s), but it very nearly died out and was held in low esteem by everyone I knew and, I believe, by most Michigan students at the time.</p>

<p>My question is this: Isn’t the Greek system by its very nature exclusionary? The exclusion at Alabama may be by race which seems particularly appalling in this day and age, but even apart from race, the exclusion is going to be by ethnicity, or SES, or appearance, or “personality,” or some other (probably pernicious) criterion at other Greek organizations on other campuses. </p>

<p>The whole point of Greek life, it seems to me, is to create and maintain an “in” group by defining that group in opposition to a larger “out” group who are not members. And that, I submit, is inherently divisive, and rather pointedly hurtful and exclusionary toward those who are not invited in. Of course, the outsiders may not care; I didn’t feel the least bit offended by not being invited to join the fraternities on my campus in my day because they seemed at the time to be dying relics whose passage few of us lamented, and because they offered few if any advantages over normal campus life. But where Greek organizations have any vitality, it seems to me they thrive on their exclusionary character.</p>

<p>Am I missing something?</p>

<p>^^^I couldn’t agree more.</p>

<p>Bclintonk, it only creates “in crowds” and out crowds" if there’s some kind of restriction on socializing “outside.” Otherwise, isn’t any set of friends who find one another “exclusionary”?</p>

<p>^^^ I agree Pizzagirl. There are a lot of situations where “everyone” doesn’t “get in”. My dd rushed this year and is now interviewing to be an ambassador for her school. The numbers and the amount of kids that will NOT get to be an ambassador are much greater than those that are “excluded” from a sorority. Honestly, it appears the ambassador program is looking for the same type of things that she felt the girls in sorority rush were looking for - smart, nice, able to be professional, and an outgoing personality.</p>

<p>I agree with bclintonk"s post because – as I’ve said repeatedly on this post and others about the greek system – sororities have a secret admissions policy (aka “rush”), secret pledging and initiation ceremonies, and are generally not just different dorms or different clubs on campus where someone can just drop by and hang out. You’re either in or you’re out.</p>

<p>Reasonable people can disagree. Pizzagirl and I went to the same college but had vastly different experiences. I really have said all this repeatedly, so I’m going to stop posting about the subject.</p>

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<p>I think that if I were a member of a very visible minority on a campus and heard that there had not been a member of my minority accepted into a top sorority since 2003, I don’t think I would feel very motivated to pledge. Just sayin’!</p>

<p>^^^^It may be that there are some girls who want to be trailblazers. They may feel that the act of opening some doors is more important than the individual benefit they may or may not receive. Or maybe they are just different than you.</p>

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<p>Not all HBUs are in the deep south.
<a href=“https://maps.google.com/maps/ms?ie=UTF8&oe=UTF8&msa=0&msid=105498859145129241400.00046ac1a1d2e74636922[/url]”>Map of Historically Black Colleges & Universities (HBCU) - TodaysDrum.com - Google My Maps;

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<p>There may be some HBU talk on [African-American</a> Students - College Confidential](<a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/african-american-students/]African-American”>African-American Students - College Confidential Forums) as well as the specific forums for each school.</p>

<p>Yes, it may be. All I am saying is that it would take an atypical person to enter college as a black freshman and want to rush a white sorority that hasn’t taken a black pledge for 10 years. </p>

<p>On the other hand, I think that after the events of the past month at UA, black students who were inclined to consider nonblack sorority membership would be more likely to pledge, knowing that the administration and fellow students including current white sorority members had spoken out against segregated sororities.</p>

<p>It also pays to consider that, as in society at large, black students tend to come from families with fewer resources and surely there are many who could never consider sorority membership because of the expense.</p>

<p>UA also has an active traditionally AA fraternity/sorority system.</p>

<p>Re: the fraternities/sororities being exclusionary. I attended a college which was about 1/3 greek (still is, I looked it up). At the time I attended, there were at least one group of guys and 2 groups of girls who rejected the greek system but had their own social groups who lived together in rented off campus houses or in blocks of dorm rooms. The groups even had names that they chose for themselves. It was very clear that there was some sort of process of deciding who was in the group. The groups had parties, but they were restricted to people who were invited (the sororities were not allowed to host parties and the fraternity parties were almost always open to all). I can’t see much difference here. I also don’t think that this is unusual.</p>

<p>I had no issue with this.I was aware of these groups and knew several people in them. I felt that they were free to associate with whom they wanted.</p>

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<p>Kind of like Jackie Robinson.</p>

<p>Bclintonk, the Greek system was going pretty strong at Michigan in the early 80s. But it is such a large university that you can avoid it if you want to.</p>

<p>My mom convinced me to rush my freshman year at Michigan. I was a geology major (at that time) in flannel shirts (a frilly flannel shirt, but still…) and corduroys… it was a disaster. Just being asked my major when I got to a house was a “lead balloon” conversation experience. No one knew any other female geology majors, that is for sure. I found it superficial and really pretty revolting. I got a couple of invitations from the first round of rush, but decided not to continue. I think many Greek organizations find a lot of reasons to exclude (skin color just being one obvious one).</p>

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<p>That can be a very difficult life for an 18-year-old to choose.</p>

<p>About 20 years ago I had a black friend here in Brooklyn who told me frankly that there were neighborhoods here where no one would ever sell him a house. I was outraged and said that I’d be happy to go to a realtor and test this discrimination and then publicize it. He said that he would never subject his family to that kind of pressure, that his friends and family would never be comfortable visiting, that it took someone who may have been at least a little crazy to subject him/herself to that kind of social pressure, if not physical danger. Now that I am a parent, I can definitely see this. As a white woman, I have long lived in predominantly African American neighborhoods, and this is where I raised my daughter, who I adopted from China. It has worked out fine for us, but I know African Americans who didn’t last long in white neighborhoods because the pressure was more than they could live with.</p>

<p>Jackie Robinson was 28 years old when he started playing for the Brooklyn Dodgers. Not 18!</p>

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<p>There’s a gulf of difference between a private individual or set of friends and college sanctioned/approved campus organizations using forms of social exclusive criteria to determine membership among students.</p>

<p>The former is covered under right of free organization. The latter comes under purview of college authorities/campus community. </p>

<p>Hence, a reason why in the 1870s, the admins and many campus community members at my LAC concluded the latter was creating an unacceptably socially divisive dynamic contrary to their values and opted to completely ban Pan-Hellenic organizations or any campus organization which uses membership criteria other than straight academic merit. </p>

<p>Unless it’s an academic merit oriented organization like Phi Beta Kappa, student organizations at my LAC must be open to all who are interested in joining as members. </p>

<p>That policy also prohibits students from joining such socially exclusive/“secret societies” during their undergrad career as a condition of matriculation and continued enrollment. </p>

<p>Not really an issue as students inclined towards joining socially exclusive organizations whether it’s Pan-Hellenic or not(i.e. Harvard’s Final Clubs) usually are aware enough of my LAC’s reputation/campus culture to not apply there just as much as students who desire a campus free of such organizations are more likely to add colleges like my LAC to their list.</p>

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I believe this is one of the strongest selling points of delaying rush. If a AA student was in a tight group of friends from a dorm all of whom wanted to rush I would think rushing a historically white sorority would be a vastly different experience then if the student knew no one in the sorority or anyone who was rushing.</p>