Black sororities and fraternities have become a staple of HBCU’s and the Black college experience. Movies like Spike Lee’s School Daze focused on Black Sorority and Fraternities in conjunction with the Black college experience overall. He showed images of stepping, parties and other positive experiences linked to Black Frats and Sororities. He also showed the darker side which included stressful and competitive hazing. However Lee managed to do so with humor. He never alluded to any real threat of danger being placed on the pledges.
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Reality paints a different picture about Black sorority and fraternities. At Rutgers this year, six members of Sigma Gamma Rho were arrested in January and charged with aggravated hazing, a felony, after a pledge reported that she had been struck 200 times over seven days before she finally went to the hospital, covered with welts and bloody bruises.
Both the university and the national sorority suspended the Rutgers chapter. The charges were reduced to simple hazing, a disorderly persons offense. The trial, originally set for this month, has been delayed because of the prosecutor’s surgery.
In the San Jose State case, Courtney Howard, a former student at the university, charged in a civil lawsuit, filed Aug. 31, that over a three-week period in 2008 she was subjected to progressively more violent hazing from Sigma Gamma Rho members. Ms. Howard states in her suit that they beat her and other pledges with wooden paddles, slapped them with wooden spoons, shoved them against the wall, and threatened that “snitches get stitches.”
“One of the girls who was a big sister told me it was supposed to be so you can feel what your ancestors went through in slavery, so you will respect what you came from,” Ms. Howard said.
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In 2008, San Jose State suspended the sorority chapter until 2016. Four of the sorority members have pleaded no contest to misdemeanor hazing charges, and been sentenced to 90 days in county jail, two years of probation and barred from any further involvement in the sorority. Incidents like these portray a darker almost street gang like atmosphere in the Black sororities. In street gangs, in order for you to become a member, you usually have to do one of several things. You could be asked to harm a stranger and this act is you showing your obedience and loyalty to the gang. If you are female then the male members of the gang could have sex with you one after another in a style that is referred to as “running a train”. Or they could “jump” you in. A process where the current members beat on the recruit for several minutes. Sounds familiar?
Obviously not ALL Black fraternities and sororities subscribe to this type of violent hazing but it seems that quite a few do. Perhaps more than what is being reported. A question needs to be asked. Why is it that the Black fraternities and sororities implement violence so heavily into their hazing? While the White Fraternities and Sororities focus more on the use of alcohol during their hazing. Both are equally destructive activities so I am not upholding one over another. I am also not implying that the White fraternities and sororities never use violence as a tool of hazing. I’m sure they do. However it would seem from the cases that have surfaced to the news and also from the personal experiences of some sorority and fraternity members that this is where the division lies between the two.
I know that I might make a lot of members of fraternities and sororities who are Black upset by suggesting this question. Tell me, am I way off? Are the cases that have surfaced in the news that confirms the usage of violence among Black sororities and fraternities overdramatized and not an accurate portrayal? Or are they right on the money? Just so we are clear, I am not knocking Black fraternities and sororities. I do have respect for them when they are about positivity and I love to see camaraderie among Black people. However, no organization is without flaws or secrets. Instead of becoming angry, please feel free to let me know if there is any truth to this analysis?
Do Black sororities and fraternities use violence as a tool more often when hazing? While White fraternities and sororities appear to use alcohol as a primary tool?
Quotes Via: NY Times
I just finished pledging a white fraternity, and i would like to let you know that, at least for southern fraternities, your assumption that we use alcohol for hazing is way off... First of all, how is getting drunk hazing? I would have much rather have gotten wasted than put up with the actual hazing... I don't know about black fraternities but as far as white frats go, you are incorrect.
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