A few days ago, Bloomsburg University sent out a campus email message announcing that it will no longer recognize its campus Greek organizations.
The message was short and sweet:
Effective immediately, Bloomsburg University is terminating its fraternity and sorority life and severing ties with all national and local FSL organizations currently affiliated with the University.
Bloomsburg is the latest university to lose patience with its fraternities and sororities. Hazing is illegal in all fifty states, but college Greek organizations continue hazing their pledges. From time to time, pledges have died from abusive hazing–usually from alcohol poisoning or injuries suffered while inebriated.
So, if you are an undergraduate male at an American university, do you really want to join a fraternity?
Maybe the answer is yes. Perhaps your father and grandfather belonged to the Greek organization you want to join, and you want to carry on the family tradition. Perhaps your friends are joining a fraternity, or you think being a frat boy will help you meet girls.
So go ahead and join a fraternity, but if you do, please heed two pieces of advice:
First, do not participate in hazing, which is illegal in most states, either as a pledge or a fraternity member. You could go to jail. And if a pledge dies because you poured grain alcohol down his throat, his family will probably sue you for wrongful death.
Second, don’t engage in casual sex at a fraternity party if your sex partner is inebriated. You may think drunken sex is fun, but several young men have been charged with sexual misconduct by women who claimed they could not consent to sex because they were incapacitated by alcohol.
Of course, not all drunken sex occurs at fraternity parties, but Greek social events often involve excessive drinking followed by casual sexual encounters. You don’t want to be kicked out of college because you had sex with an inebriated partner.
I know many college graduates who were in fraternities, and many of them say they formed valuable lifelong friendships with their fraternity brothers.
But I also know men who fell into a pattern of alcohol abuse after boozing their way through college with their frat pals. And some of them picked up the nasty habit of using alcohol to prey on vulnerable young women.
So do you really want to join a fraternity?
