Bless this column from beginning to end.

Well said!

nicely done – hopefully this will also lead to more equality between frats and sororities

Last year during the SigEp controversy, where a SigEp brother was disrespectful towards women and the other brothers refused to punish him, the sororities went to the Kim administration and presented their grievances, including allegations about hazing and details about how the fraternities degrade women. Not surprisingly President Kim ignored them and continued to live in his false reality that says no hazing is occurring and everyone on campus loves him. Now that Andrew Lohse’s article has come out, people are finally starting to look at the type of men bred by fraternities. It is sad that the administration has allowed this to go on for so long. Let’s hope David Spalding and April Thompson are brought to justice for ignoring this problem for far too long. I’d like to see them both resign.

I have always perceived national fraternities to be subversive of the fraternity/sorority that is Dartmouth itself. Why not scrap the whole system and replace it with clubs and random local bonding ? Joe Herring55

Dani — thanks for continuing the conversation about hazing (preventing this issue from getting lost in the fleeting news cycle, which is probably what most of those on the defensive are hoping for). You’ve done so in an eloquent way that acknowledges the broader implications of hazing. It seems too obvious to me that the inner politics of fraternities and sororities impact the broader campus culture and mentality, whether said organizations care to admit it, so thanks for speaking to that.

This column is absurd. There is no chance that the author can believe half of her sentiments. Respect, accountability, duty? The reason why people join fraternities and sororities is not because they are intellectual societies. They are the manifestation of the desire to engage in debauchery and enjoy life at its most basal form. Throughout history man has had this impulse, it is nigh impossible to deny. If we took away these qualities from the Greek system, it would fail. A new system of eating clubs or social societies would rise and begin the cycle anew, as evidenced in any number of small liberal arts colleges that tout their lack of a Greek system. This article fails to accept these truths, and therefore comes across as a speech filled with empty rhetoric and implausible requests. Please, just stop trying Dani, and Lohse.

Joe, you’re stuck in the 1950s. National fraternities reinvented themselves (they had no choice) in the 1980s and 1990s. Today, they provide the encouragement and programming ideas that support what this op-ed encourages.

The lack of national affiliation will not make things better. As Dean Johnson admits, hazing also takes place in Dartmouth’s athletic teams and clubs.

In short, welcome to the 21st century, Joe. Today’s national fraternities and sororities can be an important part of the solution if only Dartmouth’s social culture would stop clinging to obsolete myths about behavioral conditioning.

April Thompson is incompetent and should be fired immediately.

@Reeeeeally?

What is being objected to here is not that people join fraternities and sororities to engage in Dartmouth’s hookup and drinking culture. People could argue against that on the sorority part, but that is definitely a part of the reason to join a frat. What Dani is arguing is that the dehumanization that pledges undergo during pledge term gives them reason to dehumanize others, which ultimately leads to sexual assault and an environment where sexual assault is okay.

That said, she is completely right. Fraternities are the primary social space on campus because they are the only ones that can serve alcohol and throw parties (individuals can’t do it because of space issues, dorms can’t do it because the college hounds drinking in dorms, and the national sororities can’t do it because of the rules of their nationals). If you want alcohol and don’t want to go to an all-male frat, your choices become the co-eds, SD, EKT, and KDE. It’s not a lot of choices, and SD and Panarchy are out of the way if you weren’t already at TDX or Psi U. So, for unaffiliated individuals and sorority girls to get alcohol and attend parties, they are pretty much forced to go to the frats, which is a male-dominated space.

Encouraging the hookup culture within the Greek system is fine, but what isn’t fine is encouraging sexual assault within the system. Right now, girls are being strongarmed into being guests at male-dominated spaces where the guys are conditioned to view sexual assault as acceptable.

Well said as usual Dani. Your vision for a better Dartmouth and a better world never fail to inspire.

Dani, your words are a breath of fresh air. Let us hope that both the Dartmouth administration and undergraduate population takes this to heart.

To Reeeeeally?: Just because the cycle would, theoretically, begin anew, doesn’t mean we should endeavor to change things. That’s like saying just because people rape (“enjoy life at its most basal form,” perhaps?) we shouldn’t try to stop rapes from happening. Yes, underage binge drinking, sexual assault, and other forms of degrading our fellow students happen at schools without fraternities. But to turn a blind eye to the fact that this sort of behavior, at its most virulent, is often prized and enshrined in Dartmouth’s fraternities, is at best naive and worst glorifying this sort of behavior. Perhaps this extreme hazing and all its accompanying squalor is happening in a minority of frat/sorority spaces—when I was at Dartmouth I observed little of this—but we should be honest with ourselves, as a broader Dartmouth community, that is does happen. And it would be beneath us to allow it to continue. I hate to think that the only time Dartmouth hits national news is when some ugly scandal rears its head. Embarrassing.

@Reeeeeally?: Yes, really. You have no understanding of the history of fraternities if you genuinely believe that debauchery and baseness are what they’re all about. Sure, that’s what they’ve become, and especially at this school, but go read some wikipedia articles on fraternities and you’ll see that they were actually all founded on passing down values and principles of dignity, respect, and gentlemanliness. Ironically, SAE is the fraternity that is one of the most grounded in the concept of the gentleman, with its “True Gentleman” creed being the cornerstone of the organization’s principles.

It is not far-fetched whatsoever to push for a renaissance of fraternities and sororities' pledge terms focusing on cultivating values of leadership and respect both for oneself and for others. There is plenty of room for both drunken fun and the empowerment of people through the tradition of shared principles like these. I often hear fraternity members comparing pledge term to boot camp, as if the act of bonding and “becoming” can only follow a period of proving yourself and suffering together. But in the military, men are still taught that they are leaders and that they should take accountability for their own actions and their fellow soldiers' actions, and look out for each other whenever possible. They still abide by a code of dignity and responsibility, which as you yourself admit is blatantly lacking in the fraternities on this campus.

I’m sure Sigma Delt has taken no part in such activities.

I agree with pretty much everything Dani says, but I would like to point out that it is well-known on campus that sigma delt also hazes, making this piece just a touch hypocritical

I agree with almost everything Dani says here, but I would like to point out that many friends of mine are sigma delts, and I know for a fact they get hazed. I think that makes this column a touch hypocritical. Maybe start by changing your own culture Dani?

Excellent piece. Glad to see a member of the Greek system able to look at this with a self critical eye.

This whole article is incoherent, asinine, and entirely redundant. The crux of Dani’s article, that “hazing does not occur in a vacuum”, and somehow extends to the whole of campus, is comically ridiculous. Imagine if, at 11 PM every wednesday night, fraternities flung open their doors, pouring out in a drunken legion to brutally haze every single student (and hopefully administrator) on campus. Hilarity of Jim Kim being hazed notwithstanding, nothing remotely like this has ever happened. Instead, young men attend and pledge fraternities VOLUNTARILY. Young women dress themselves like harlots, consume vast quantities of alcohol, and march into fraternities VOLUNTARILY. Hazing doesn’t occur in a vacuum, it happens in fraternities, but people enter on their own free will. Is everyone so blind as to miss the real problem here?

With the exception of basic laws (which somehow don’t even apply in Hanover anyways) there is no collectivist code of ethics we’re obligated to abide by, nor should there be. The problem is the INDIVIDUALS. Everyone on Dartmouth’s campus does these things voluntarily, mostly because they are too spoiled and weak to resist or even admit to themselves what they’re doing, and then under pressure, they hide behind collectivist banners of various organizations or labels (ex. “oppressed tri-sexual jews of color”, nordic moto-cross team, etc.) and deflect any INDIVIDUAL responsibility they ought to be willing to take to other collective labels (usually some form of the general social paradigm, so greek orgs). No wonder nothing ever gets solved! How many times has this exact conversation taken place-

Girl 1: That guy was totally a CREEP, totally got drunk and grabbed me! Girl 2: Whoa, how SKETCHY! Girl 1: I know! It’s going to be weird when we go to ‘tails there tonight! Girl 2: I knoooow, let’s dress and act like prostitutes, and then react in shock and disbelief when we are treated as such. Girl 1: You mean exchange our scantily clad bodies for social recognition because we’re insecure, then pretend like it’s everyone else’s fault we’re doing THIS EXACT THING? Girl 2: Too real…I mean YUP!

Well the last few parts probably never, but you get the meaning.

If you don’t like how fraternities conduct themselves, don’t pledge or attend them, or bar your sorority from attending them until they get their act together. BAM problem solved. Until then, your incoherent opinion article and inaction have solved nothing, so stop complaining.

Hazing is really a form of abuse and just as an abused child is more likely to become an abuser, a pledge who endures hazing is more likely to haze. During my pledge term, there were plenty of activities that would be considered, by a strict definition, hazing. However, I would say that there was only one time that I truly felt hazed. It was about halfway through the pledge term and about 10 of us were made, by a single brother, to play a game of pong with a concoction of substances that the brother had put together. I can’t say for sure what was in there, it certainly wasn’t vomit or semen, it tasted more like vinegar and tabasco sauce, but everybody who drank it booted. It was, undeniably, hazing. There was no purpose to it, no team building or bonding, it was just one asshole hazing us because he felt that he could. It was not a house sanctioned event, just one guy. Afterwards we found out that this brother had been singled out and hazed during his pledge period. He was forced to drink a massive quantity of prune juice, you can imagine the results. One guy gets hazed. He hazes ten. Now the house has ten new brothers who haze how many more? Does the level of hazing get worse each time? In our case, the house president found out what happened and confronted the brother directly. The brother apologized to all of us, told us his story and admitted that hazing us made him feel no better about his own experience. For my pledge class, that broke the cycle of abuse. I guess we were lucky.

For Lohse’s accusations to be true, there would have to be a multi-year progression of worsening abuse. One pledge class to the next, with nobody stepping in to stop the cycle. If the result of all this hazing talk is simply to raise campus awareness to the point that there are more people on who would step in and stop the cycle then at least some good will come from this. But the student body, as a whole and within greek houses, has a short institutional memory. Greek houses completely turn over every three years. Things can change very quickly at a house and you can’t always rely on the student leadership of a house to prevent such cyclical abuse.

I know of many students who arrived at Dartmouth having been hazed in high school, myself included, almost always involving high school athletics. When students arrive on campus with that in their background, you need some proactive force to prevent abuse at Dartmouth. It always amazed me that there was no attempt by the Dartmouth administration to give students the resources to break the cycle. I am staunchly pro-greek. My experiences in a fraternity, good and bad, taught me more about life than Dartmouth classes ever did. However, even I would suggest that there needs to be far more involvement in the greek system by the administration. And far more education of both pledges and those in leadership positions within houses. I was the president of a house and remember meeting with the Dartmouth administrators at the start of our terms. It was basically “we don’t want any problems, good luck this year. Don’t get caught doing anything wrong.” That’s not good enough from the administration. I would suggest that Dartmouth require all students who pledge a fraternity/sorority to take classes on hazing, alcoholism and the dangers of single sex groupthink before they can become official members. Ongoing education about social issues should be a requirement for greek leadership, if not all greek affiliated students. Greek houses should be required to have some form of alumni council so that the lessons learned by these kind of experiences are not so quickly forgotten. Start making changes like that and maybe you can start changing the culture of the system. Greek affiliated students will complain and think it is unnecessary. But education and awareness of issues will change behavior, whether they know it or not.