<p>I say it when I’ve gone off topic. ;)</p>
<p>I think “carry on” in this context means “don’t mind me.”</p>
<p>I’ve been wondering if anyone would care to take a small bet on whether Janet Reitman of Rolling Stone will be running down there to hang with The Machine and write a steamy article about it all. 
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<p>Maybe it’s too soon after her last outing.</p>
<p>Carry on.</p>
<p>I just sign on and saw this topic. Since my D just joined a sorority so I am interested in sorority related topic. I went to college in China so I know very little about them other than they are party groups. So I told my D not to join any. But she was heavily recruited by 2 Asian sororities because she is super pretty I guess. She ended up picking one of them which are mostly pre-med or pre-pharmacy girls. </p>
<p>I wonder why these sororities only have Asian girls and can get away with racial profiling. She also said there are fraternities are all Asian boys. they party with the Asian sororities.</p>
<p>Anyone can tell me why such groups are in existence? Is it normal.</p>
<p>If they are excluding girls on the basis of race, that’s racism and it’s no different than what allegedly happened at Alabama. I doubt you’ll ever hear about it on NPR or other mainstream outlets though.</p>
<p>oh. yawn. Why bring NPR into it?</p>
<p>Or Rolling Stone. I’m guessing you missed the NPR coverage.</p>
<p>Because Rolling Stone has run articles about the Duke situation, about Dartmouth, and about the Boston Marathon bomber who was a student at UMass. </p>
<p>Duh.</p>
<p>Oh, since Rolling Stone isn’t on my radar I didn’t make the connection. There’s a thread on the NPR coverage if you want to check it out.</p>
<p>JH8888, Asian sororities and fraternities and multi-cultural Greek organizations often servie as additional support groups as well as networking groups. In addition to social functions, it is a way to meet people with shared interests. Their is nothing wrong with joining a group that highlights certain cultures. The problem with the UA situation is that these sororities are integrated throughout the country and their national mission is not to promote a particular culture.
Historically the African American sororities and fraternities have rather prestigious alums and commitments that extend well beyond the college years. It is possible that the connections that your D makes through these organizations will make her college experience more memorable at the very least.</p>
<p>^^^^ Thank you for the explanation. D told me she can do charity work through it. Since she is in school of nursing, it will be helpful to belong to a sorority with so many pre-med girls. She hope the connection will help her when she look for a job. She wants to go to NYC, and many girls want to go there too.</p>
<p>If you understood her explanation, can you explain it to me? I don’t get it.</p>
<p>There is a difference between a group that brings together a minority group and one that is designed to exclude minorities for racial reasons. I get annoyed by comments (not many here, but elsewhere) suggesting that the African-American houses at Alabama are “just as racist” as the all-white ones. This suggests a willful failure to understand history. The existence of all-Asian houses is a somewhat different issue, because there isn’t as much history. However, they may exist, in part, because of failure of Asian kids to get into the other houses. The reasons may vary at different schools, as well.</p>
<p>Well said, Hunt.</p>
<p>@Hunt,
When I was in college, I had a white friend who joined a black fraternity. He was fully welcomed and accepted by his black brothers, and he even took a brand-- yow!</p>
<p>It’s difficult to draw the line between unacceptable exclusion, and membership restrictions based on acceptable shared interests. At my alma mater, there was recently an issue over a group that wanted to start a fraternity of men who all shared the same religion–they wanted the fraternity to be about this religion. The issue is whether they could exclude people who didn’t share that religion. I don’t find that to be an easy question.</p>
<p>U can change your religion. U can’t change your race.</p>
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<p>Actually, Asian-Americans have also faced exclusion and violence due to racial discrimination and bigotry dating back to the 19th century. Whether it was racist violence by White Californians against Chinese immigrants during the Gold Rush, the Chinese-Exclusion Act of 1882, systemic exclusion from higher-paying/white collar jobs/educational opportunities, racist stereotyping in mass media…some of which continues to the present, or the Japanese-American Internment during WWII, it’s far from recent if one actually examines the American historical record.</p>
<p>However, this history tends to be forgotten not only within the American popular consciousness, but also within parts of the Asian-American community itself. </p>
<p>Especially considering the great differences in backgrounds of Asian-Americans who emigrated to the US before and those after the mid-60s when the low max annual quota on Asian immigration was effectively lifted. </p>
<p>What’s also forgotten is there were many Asian-American groups involved in the Civil Rights movement/struggles. Most of those groups were composed of mostly working-class/lower-middle class Asian-Americans whose families had been in the US for decades.</p>
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<p>In many universities where they are wary of exclusions of any type…including ones which are covered under EEOC special classes like religious creed, the practice has been to mandate no exclusions on the basis of religious beliefs or the lack thereof, even for leadership positions.</p>
<p>This was put into practice at Middlebury during my friends’ undergrad years there and divided some religious groups who tried to exclude some students from leadership positions because they didn’t believe/agree with the religious tenets of that religion. </p>
<p>Didn’t matter, the college ruled that the ones who had a problem with that cannot exclude on that basis and consequently, those religious groups ended up being split up with the more observant ones meeting off-campus as their “discriminatory policy” in leadership positions meant they weren’t allowed to use campus facilities to meet per the college’s policies. Really riled up the more religiously observant friends at the time. </p>
<p>Coincidentally, my college has similar policies, but the contention for leadership positions in our religious organizations never encountered such controversies during my time there as far as I know. </p>
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<p>Considering one’s religion/creed is a protected class under the US Constitution and Civil Rights/EEOC policies, I’m not sure it’s that simple.</p>
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<p>My personal experience is that AAs are inclusive and hospitable. I have been to a number of AA events and as a caucasian, I have always felt welcome. AA houses have a unique history and role.</p>
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They do, and as a result the situation at someplace like Alabama is difficult for them. Do they support integration of the “traditionally white” (I can’t believe they use that term at Alabama, but they do) houses, even if it means a possible threat to their own existence?</p>