College is something everyone dreams about while in high school. It may seem fun and exciting, but there is a tremendous number of mistakes that can happen. For instance, imagine someone has just been accepted into college, and it is her first day. She thought it was a dream to be in a sorority, but in reality it was a nightmare. After a week, she knows “Hell Week” is coming, but she wants shake everything off, and think everything is going well and the other members will accept her with no hesitation. Today is a lazy day, and she is just sitting in her dorm watching television, and out of nowhere, she was blindfolded and thrown into a car. Her fellow frat members start to beat her with random objects, and they say harsh words to break her down. This ritual is only one example of the practice known as hazing. Although, hazing may seem like a tradition, and start out as having just a little fun, it can quickly intensify and become dangerous or even fatal.
As a teenager, most of them often talk about getting into a fraternity or a sorority. In movies and maybe even someone you know might have a friend in a fraternity or sorority, and they make everything seem like fun, but the worse part of trying to get into these groups is the pledging. Everyone must pledge to officially be one of the groups they are trying to join, and often you will get hazed. What is hazing? Hazing is when a ritual of some type that requires individuals to participate in activities that make you stress physically and psychologically. (Hazing).
Hazing has been around for centuries, but it has been getting worse every year. Never think that someone is not at risk for hazing, everyone can become victim to this act. Hazing does not only occur in colleges, bu...
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...t ~ Http://www.gannett.cornell.edu/hazing/issues/research.cfm. Hazing.Cornell.EDU, n.d. Web. 11 Oct. 2013.
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Hazing ~ Http://www.insidehazing.com/definitions.php.
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Laws ~ Http://www.stophazing.org/laws.html. StopHazing, n.d. Web. 11 Oct. 2013.
Plano ~ "Five Plano High Students Charged Over Possible Hazing Incidents" (http://chicago.cbslocal.com/2013/08/28/five-plano-high-students-charged-over-possible-hazing-incidents/). Chicago. Retrieved 8 September 2013.
Rookie ~ Rookie NFL Player Refuses To Be Hazed. News One, 26 July 2010. Web. 12 Nov. 2013.
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One of the many forms of dangerous pressures girls face from their membership in a sorority is body image. Being a member of an organization with typically 100 women opens the door for pressure to conform to a certain ideal look. Forms of hazing often would include activities that brought down the girls’ self-confidence. “During circle the fat, pledges undress and, one by one, stand in front of the entire sorority membership. The sisters (or, in some chapters, fraternity brothers) then use thick black markers to circle the fat or cellulite on a pledge’s body....For many sororities, thinness, as the pledges discover, is a priority” (Robbins 259). These types of activities are not uncommon for sororities. From day one of pledging, the idea of having a perfect body is obsessed over. Even girls with healthy, fit bodies are criticized just as much for the sake of the upper classmen to break them down, so they could build them back up they way they want. Its manipulating and confusing. The pressure to be accepted by the sorority was a common outcome from the priority of perfection, which could also lead to eating disorders. A study was done and found that “the most consistent finding was...
Since 1843 there has over 200 cited college hazing deaths. Fraternities are responsible for the overwhelming majority of those deaths. That is not to say that sororities
When you are a senior is high school your main focuses are finishing your college applications and if your a girl of course prom, you don't realize you are a year away from entering college and the world of "rape culture". It is said that rape culture exists because we don't believe it does. Rape culture is defined as "an environment in which rape is prevalent and in which sexual violence against women is normalized and excused in the media and popular culture." We already have an idea that in colleges where sports is glorified that some professors will allow athletes to get away with numerous things from cheating to missing numerous classes but fraternity events can be high risk for rape. First I will summarize "Fraternities and Collegiate Rape Culture: Why Are Some Fraternities More Dangerous Places for Women?" written by A. Ayres Boswell and Joan Z. Space. Then I will use information from my criminology class to better define violent crime . Lastly, I will explain rape on campuses is not a cultural component. Colleges should hold clubs such as fraternities and sports to the same level than others and be harshly punished for crimes they commit so they don't feel more superior and think they can get away with rape.
Why I desire to be an Alpha man? The answer to that question answered in its entirety would far exceed the three page limit allotted for this essay. In the Army we are taught to K.I.S.S things meaning, keep it simple. The mission statement of Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, Inc. is to develop leaders, promote brotherhood and academic excellence, while providing service and advocacy for our communities. This mission statement embodies the backbone principles of why I desire to be an Alpha man.
Lee, Grace. "How We Can Prevent Hazing." RCL Grace Lee. N.p., 15 Jan. 2013. Web. 20 May 2014.
Hazing is an issue that has attracted much attention over the last few decades. College fraternities, high school programs, professional sports, and the military have all had their fair share of attention. The military is frequently held to a higher standard than these other organizations and has developed a bit of a black eye since the 1991 “Tailhook” scandal. Motion picture portrayals like that in the 1992 film “A Few Good Men” showed the public, not inaccurately, the dark side of command sponsored hazing. Hazing is not in keeping with the high standards of conduct that the U.S. Military aims to uphold and the ethical implications of these behaviors are diverse.
"Statistics about Sexual Assault and College Campuses." Statistics about Sexual Assault. Sarah Lawrence College, n.d. Web. 28 Nov. 2013. .
So it’s common to accept any form of hazing a seniority figure found necessary to complete the bonding process when you arrive to your initial duty station. Hazing, or how they liked to formally call it as “Traditions”, is supposed to bring the group closer together. I would like to take a moment to recognize the “Stockholm Syndrome” in comparison to this statement. As such, research has shown that being subject to pain will have tremendous psychological symptoms. The victim starts feeling loyalty toward the group and eventually that feeling of abuse becomes more acceptable. Older members depart and new members fulfill those spots and the cycle just replicates its self. The abused becomes the abuser. They want to share their “Traditions” because its old fair since it happened to them. The process was designed to promote discipline and cultivates shared pride but to what extend is pain and humiliation is tolerable before someone hurts themselves? How about over 60 death reported to fraternity hazing since 2005. In perspective, that’s averages out to about 7 death a year and one related incident that could be linked to a university would bring a lot of media attention and could potentially shut a chapter
When teenagers leave the safety of home and enter college life, they can feel very out of place. In order for them to feel that they belong when joining a fraternity or sorority, they can be pressured into binge drinking and other types of behavior that they wouldn't normally do. By doing what the fraternity brothers or sorority sisters ask them to do, they think that they are proving themselves to be worthy of a place in the organization. This can be very dangerous for many reasons. "Results from a recent Harvard School of Public Health College Alcohol Study provide the first national picture in almost fifty years of just how widespread and harmful heavy episodic or "binge" drinking has become, not only for those students who abuse alcohol, but also for others in their immediate environment" (Wechsler, 178). Binge drinkers put themselves at high r...
Everyone has their limit on almost about everything. Their limit when to stop drinking, or when to stop physically straining their bodies. Hazing can be defined as any activity expected of someone joining or participating in a group that humiliates, degrades, abuses or endangers anyone, regardless of a person’s willingness to participate. The most common hazing practices include alcohol/binge drinking, public humiliation, isolation, sleep deprivation and even sexual acts. In addition, these hazing rituals may lead to traumatic injuries including beating, branding, consuming nonfood substances and simulated drowning. In these rituals everything is all fun and games until someone dies or kills themselves from the embarrassment. Then who is to blame? Who can you blame legally? Hazing must be put to a stop or strong rules and regulations must be put on these frats, and sororities to make sure that all students are safe.
Caroline Heldman’s lecture, Confronting Campus Sexual Violence, really opened my eyes. The shocking statistic that one in five college women face assault/rape was a lot to take in. As she stated, college for us women is a risk factor, we face a higher risk that our non-college peers, and that frighten me. After sitting and lecture and taking in all of the statistics, I reflected upon on myself, and everyone I know on this campus, and I could not leave behind the idea that perhaps one of them have gone through that. Nonetheless, as captured in Sexual Assault on Campus: A Multilevel, Integrative Approach to Party Rape by Elizabeth A. Armstrong, Laura Hamilton and Brian Sweeney focus on the high rates of sexual assault on college campuses. Based on their study, they show that sexual assault is a predictable outcome. They focus on the gendered process such as fraternity control every aspect of their parties, in terms of themes, admission, access to alcohol and even the movement of guests (617). On the other hand, women are expected to be nice and grateful guests. Therefore, this demonstrates the idea of power, and how is in control of who and this is what generates room for sexual assault. From a personal experience my freshmen year, I went out with a group of friends, nonetheless, once we got to the fraternity party they only allowed my female friends and I in, and the
First, the sororities need to be given more power. Second, misogynistic fraternities should be held more accountable for their members’ actions. As previously stated, sororities ban alcohol, and many ban parties as well. This ban is not a national law however, it’s just a rule instituted by sororities to drive insurance rates down. Sororities could easily reverse the rules and allow alcohol and parties on home turf, putting them on the same level as fraternities in terms of social power. This may cause sorority membership prices to go up, but the good it could do is well worth the price. Take Dartmouth’s Sigma Delta for example. A sorority with no national affiliation, Sigma Delta members hold house parties with alcohol at will (Schwarz). With girls in charge of the parties, female students have “routinely said they preferred parties there rather than at fraternities” because they feel much safer (Schwarz). Besides allowing sororities to host parties, the problem of fraternity misogyny can also be remedied by holding fraternities more accountable for the actions of their members. When members promote or commit sexual assault, they are usually punished individually, while the frat as a whole receives only a few slaps on the wrist in the form of short suspensions or minor sanctions. That is like cutting the stem off a weed but leaving the roots in the ground: the problem will only grow back. In order to
Are the new standards and expectations the world has for teenagers really creating monsters? The amount of stress that is put on students these days between trying to balance school, homework, extra curricular activities, social lives, sleep and a healthy lifestyle is being considered a health epidemic (Palmer, 2005). Students are obsessing over getting the grades that are expected of them to please those that push them, and in return, lose sleep and give up other aspects of their lives that are important to them, such as time with friends and family, as well as activities that they enjoy. The stress that they endure from the pressures of parents, teachers, colleges, and peers has many physical as well as mental effects on every student, some more harmful than others. The extreme pressure on students to get perfect grades so that they will be accepted into a college has diminished the concept of actually learning and has left the art of “financing the system” in order to succeed in its place (Palmer, 2005).
...n, hazing education should not be limited to members of Greek and other university organizations. All members of the university community should be educated on the topic since according to the Theory of Reasoned action and the research by Richardson et al. (2012), “relevant others”, such as close friends outside of the organization, can influence the observer’s decision to report. Furthermore, because the severity of the situation influences the likelihood that an observer would report, emphasizing not only the physical but the psychological consequences of hazing would increase awareness on how detrimental even hazing situations that may seem mild can be (Richardson et al., 2012). Integrating these findings into educational anti-hazing initiatives has the potential to increase effectiveness in efforts combat hazing within student organizations on college campuses.
In today’s modern time, college and universities are competitive and impacted; a lot of students work hard and compete to attend the best. Nowadays, high GPA and grades are not the only important factor that college and universities look for, but being an all-around student who is involved with volunteer work, campus clubs, and sports. Many students take the easy route and turn to clubs or bigger social organizations such as the Greek life. Unlike the average clubs or student organizations participating in a fraternity and sorority is a lifetime affiliation and students are only allowed to be committed to one. These social/cultural groups are filled with members who share similar values and interests that can also offer a college life experience, good or bad.