On this point, as with so many other things, I defer to the wisdom of Mr. James Murphy.
[LCD Soundsytem – “Drunk Girls”](- YouTube)
Yikes. Are these relatives of Insane Clown Posse? I think I’m going to have nightmares tonight, SOG.
Coming back stateside after an Afghan deployment, the guys in my old unit held some parties that got pretty raunchy but never close to this extreme, the most damage we caused were probably only a few hundred dollars worth. Here they even trashed the bloody ceiling, $75k looks like a conservative estimate which probably doesn’t cover the cost of labor or loss of business.
This is a classic demonstration of groupthink. No one said, “Hey guys/girls, this really isn’t the brightest idea?” Or not enough of them did? Shows you that not all college-educated folks are extremely brilliant or even just plain polite.
I think this incident highlights something I have thought all along. All this talk of college students being “adults” and parents needing to get out the way is fantasy rather than reality. Seems to me that many of these kids could use more parenting and a lot more oversight. They are not even remotely as mature as the popular mantra of todays parents make them out to be. Our college campuses are a mess with out of control partying and sexual assaults. Somehow these kids have gotten the message that the purpose of college is a 4 year party and that their bad behavior will be chalked up to the frivolities of youth. That or their parents will bail them out.
I hope these hotels make these kids pay for every cent rather than file an insurance claim for reimbursement. And I hope no parent gives these kids one cent toward restitution but makes them pay for it themselves.
It’s amazing how everyone is so quick to point fingers and punish every UM student who was at the resort that weekend. Most of you are only aware of what you’re being told by the press or university. I suspect most if not all of the commenters do not even know anyone who was there. If you did, you would know that a significant number of the kids who were there did not participate in the destruction. Those who did have taken responsibility and will be paying the price. Yes what happened was disgusting and wrong, but unless you are part of the investigation or have a child who was present, you don’t know enough of the facts to start pointing fingers at all the people you think are guilty and demanding that sororities be suspended or criminally charged. I’ve seen accusations of the kids acting with a group mentality, and I’m seeing the same behavior on this thread.
Willful and malicious destruction of property is a felony in Michigan, punishable by up to ten years in prison if damages exceed $10,000. If your kid wasn’t involved, I would think he or she would welcome a law enforcement investigation that prosecutes the culpable and clears the rest.
If one happens to be part of an organization or group involved in criminal activities as this case demonstrates, sometimes the law, organizations and/or educational institution are legally allowed to punish the entire organization along with those who were actively involved.
One national pan-hellenic organization has already done precisely that by suspending their entire UM chapter.
Moreover, colleges have practiced collective punishment in other contexts. For instance, when a friend’s dorm floor had a couple of damaged ceiling tiles in the common area and a cracked toilet bowl, the entire floor was assessed for the damage.
Fraternities Pi Kappa Alpha,Chi Psi, sororities Delta Gamma, Alpha Phi were at the Highlands and Sigma Alpha Mu and sorority Sigma Delta Tau were in Gaylord.
According to Boyne, one of the groups units were far worse than the other but it sounds like there was not near the amount of damage that occurred in Gaylord.
I agree with Cobrat. Re dorm damage, every one on the floor is held liable and is charged for damages.
It’s pretty standard.
I imagine that is in hopes that peer pressure will work to limit destruction, but also to spread out the costs.
What did the supposedly non-involved ones do to stop their fraternity brothers from doing $100K of damage? Are they voluntarily remaining in the same fraternity (a fraternity they chose to join) with drunken hooligans? If it was my brother trashing a hotel, I’d try to stop him, up to and including calling the police. I thought fraternity brothers were supposed to have responsibility toward one another.
"I hope these hotels make these kids pay for every cent rather than file an insurance claim for reimbursement. "
Those aren’t mutually exclusive.
“organizations and/or educational institution are legally allowed to punish the entire organization along with those who were actively involved.”
Universities and clubs have to take the bitter with the sweet on this. Every student takes pride in the sports wins and Rhodes Scholars at Michigan, even if they played no part. Every member in the Greek organization gets credit for its philanthropic work, even the kids who didn’t carry their weight at the fundraisers. Likewise, everyone has to share in the embarrassment when members of the organization reveal themselves to be criminals. That’s what it means to put the same letters on everyone’s shirt and stand behind the same mission statement. You rise and fall together.
@Helenfrances “It’s amazing how everyone is so quick to point fingers and punish every UM student who was at the resort that weekend. Most of you are only aware of what you’re being told by the press or university. I suspect most if not all of the commenters do not even know anyone who was there. If you did, you would know that a significant number of the kids who were there did not participate in the destruction. Those who did have taken responsibility and will be paying the price. Yes what happened was disgusting and wrong, but unless you are part of the investigation or have a child who was present, you don’t know enough of the facts to start pointing fingers at all the people you think are guilty and demanding that sororities be suspended or criminally charged. I’ve seen accusations of the kids acting with a group mentality, and I’m seeing the same behavior on this thread.”
First, it is not true that “everyone” is wants to punish every student who was at the resort.
Second, if the news reports are correct, I think we do know enough to know that someone should be criminally charged. Additionally, some greek organization should be suspended, if this was an organized greek event as reported.
Third, clearly there are different levels of responsibility. Typically there are a few individuals who lead a group in this type of incident. Then there are followers. Then there are students who saw what was happening and did nothing to stop it. Then there are students who saw what was happening and tried to stop it. Then there are may well have been some students who were outside skiing, or staying in a different building, or asleep and did not know what was happening at all. I don’t think that anyone thinks that all of the students should be punished equally. Additionally, I think that it would be important to know how cooperative different students were. If a student is covering for others, then, in my opinion, they would bear more responsibility.
“If it was my brother trashing a hotel, I’d try to stop him, up to and including calling the police.”
Meantime, in the real world of 18-22 year olds…
"I hope these hotels make these kids pay for every cent rather than file an insurance claim for reimbursement. "
@Hanna “Those aren’t mutually exclusive.”
Well in a way they are. The hotels may not collect twice to compensate for their damages - any amounts they collect from the greek societies or individuals would be offset against any amounts paid by the insurance company. The most likely outcome is that the insurance company will pay out promptly to the hotels so they can get the repairs done quickly. Then the hotels will assign their right of action against the greeks to the insurance company. The insurance company will then proceed against the greeks to try and recoup whatever they paid the hotels.
“Then the hotels will assign their right of action against the greeks to the insurance company. The insurance company will then proceed against the greeks to try and recoup whatever they paid the hotels.”
Thank you for explaining more clearly what I meant – filing an insurance claim doesn’t mean the responsible parties won’t have to pay. That said, what I’m more worried about is that parents will pay for the damage, and they will NOT require the kids to work off the debt, because if the parents were invested in teaching the kids consequences, this wouldn’t have happened in the first place. There are all kinds of bad outcomes that can happen to good parents: kids can be bad students, become drug addicts, etc. despite parents’ best efforts. But in my experience, this kind of selfish wanton destruction by well-off college kids doesn’t happen when the parents do their jobs.
In some families and cultures, siblings…especially older siblings or those considered more mature/responsible…even at that age range or younger…are given the responsibility and disciplinary power over less mature/responsible siblings or family members.
One example is an older friend who recounted how when his parents passed away and his older brother who was only 18 at the time and 3 years older, he acted as his effective parent while working long hours to support him through high school and to some extent…college. This included disciplining him by strictly limiting his basketball playing time and mandating studying/tutoring hours when the older brother found his basketball obsession was starting to take a toll on his HS academics.
He credits his older brother for turning him around to the point he went to MIT, had a decades long successful career in engineering, and enabled him to support his family as an upper-middle class parent…including being a full-pay parent for two sons who graduated successfully from elite private universities.
^^^Nice story. I highly doubt this person would be traveling with his brother on a fraternity ski trip while he was enrolled as an underclassman in college. That was the point of my original comment.
I think that story was written by Horatio Alger.
Cobrat, the same was true of my father-in-law, who was orphaned at the age of 11 and raised by his teenaged brother and his brother’s teenaged wife. Something about that generation, perhaps.