Amherst scores triumph over "male white privilege", bans fraternities

[Kevin]

I just love how posters like Lief and BRTD(you both are just butt hurt because you never got a bid from one) are stereotyping the whole Greek system based on negative incidents.

Most of our Presidents have been Greeks, and so have most of the members of Congress as well as most of the country's governors. Not to mention that large numbers of CEO's, inventors, artists, writers,  academics, scientists and others have been all been Greeks.

To judge a whole system like that is unfortunate and completely neglects the fact that Greek life adds tremendously to campuses across the country.

I think Amherst's administration will suffer tremendously from this decision as their student life and overall reputation of as an institution will suffer in the long run.

Like mentioned in an earlier comment, I hope they enjoy the wrath they will feel from all those pissed off older more moneyed donors who have had generations of connections with the school.

[Kevin]

In my experience, fraternities exist to further a long list of social ills. There are exceptions to every generalization, but by and large frats were interested in: drunken debauchery, academic cheating, questionable semi-consensual sexual practices, new hazing rituals, frat wars, frat brands/tattoos, and kissing enough ass to keep the frat funded and in good standing with the university.

If universities knew what frats were doing, they wouldn't sully their academic institution by recognizing frats or giving them houses on campus.

Again clearly you have no idea what you are talking about.

[Kevin]

As someone who's in a fraternity, this decision and this entire thread is full of bulls[inks]t.

Instead of just banning fraternities altogether, why don't they take steps to actually solve the problem of rape, hazing and binge drinking on campus rather than ban organizations that take part of them? Greeks aren't the only ones who take part of this. In all honesty, I went through more hazing to join my current acapella group than my fraternity. In my experience, non-brothers are more likely to binge drink because they don't get access to alcohol as often (though this is also an argument to lower the drinking age).

This is also ignoring the clear benefits of being in a fraternity. At my school, it's required of fraternities to hold study hours for brothers, and fraternities usually have access to class resources that help brothers exceed in their courses. Also, I'm not close with all of my brothers in fraternity, but I always know they will be there for me if I need help, and I'm always going to be there for them. Fraternities encourages a group mentality that is immensely helpful later on in people's careers.

I haven't even mentioned the impact that fraternities and sororities have in their college's communities. Our vice president recently informed us that we successfully completed over 2,000 hours of service as a whole in our fraternity. At my school, this is the norm for fraternities and sororities, not the exception.

Are there fraternities out there that are sketchy and deserve to be shut down because they encourage criminal behavior? Absolutely. But don't take out your personal anger because some frat bro made fun of you once, or because you didn't get a bid. And especially don't blame Greek life as a whole for problems on campus. There's a damn good reason why almost every single president has been a part of Greek life when they were in college.

Amherst is making a colossal mistake.

Agreed with everything you said,

Yes there are bad apples in fraternities that engage in some of the bad  behaviors you mention but they are a minority. Although hazing is problematic with many chapters, fraternities are by far not the only organizations on campus that do this. For example, sororities and traditionally minority fraternities have been known to engage in some pretty serious hazing as well. The same goes for other organizations like band, choir, etc.  And this is just a big as a problem for them is it is for the stereotypical "all white male" fraternities.

Hell at my school there was a academic honor's society had been disbanded for hazing.

Frats being alot of benefits as a whole to the student body. They engage in providing a place for people to belong, they raise a ton of money for charity and often have the most successful alumni among other benefits.

So I def agree with you bBall on this one!