So, why didn't YOU join a fraternity or sorority in college?

In My Humble Opinion
21

When I went to MIT, they tried to fill up the frats, so you got a temporary room the first week, and went to fraternity parties or decided on a dorm. I visited a few, and wound up one night at a party where I got drunk and picked up a girl. (My success record went rapidly downhill from there.) When I woke up in the morning I decided I did not want to join, and hightailed it back to campus. I don’t know whether I would have been asked or not. Most MIT fraternities were a bit of a hike from campus, and I was pretty happy where I ended up.

I don’t know why I didn’t decide to stay - it just seemed obvious at the time.

22

If I had joined a fraternity in college, my parents would have cut off money to pay for college. They despised them. And my father didn’t go to college and my mom went to a small women’s college with no sororities.

I think overall they were against the concept of binge drinking and not thinking for oneself.

23

I’m currently in my final year of undergraduate studies at University of Kentucky which is a large public university in the Southeastern Conference. Suffice it to say there is a significant presence of frats and sororities here. Early on, I considered joining a frat since I did not know anyone here upon arrival since I grew up out of state. I did not join one, however, since I quickly had made enough non-greek friends to satisfy my taste.

I think it takes a certain personality to want to join a frat here: a personality that I refer to as ‘collegian.’ I fit that personality to some extent but just didn’t feel the need to extend my social outreach.

This year, I rent a house that’s adjacent to several greek houses. Late one night a few weeks ago some pledge (well, I assume he’s a pledge) was walking around our street buck naked while other guys teased him. The greek folk don’t generally annoy me but I would prefer not to encounter that situation on my way home again. Somehow I don’t think I will ever regret my choice to not join a frat.

24

This may be a bit long, sorry. :slight_smile:

I grew up in a University town. My dad was a professor.

Everything that the City and University overlooked as per transgressions of fraternities rankled me. The rowdy parties … sure … I know rowdy parties are a part of college life. But the sovereign rule of the “frats” . . I know first hand many stories of humble girls whose lives were trashed from the reps the frats gave them.

The kicker for me was one Christmas season when my friend girl’s family was in a terrible accident. On account of a drunk frat rat. The frat was drunk and driving over the speed limit. He hit my friends family’s car. All of their Xmas presents spilled out over the road. They had no Xmas that year :frowning:

On top of that the cops had the gall to give her brother (he ws driving) the ticket even tho the frat was at fault. :frowning: 'Cause money talked in this small town.

I worked my way thru this same college. I never ceased to be amazed at the fact that the progeny of the richest people in Mississippi were some of the rudest and most ungrateful kids I have ever had the unpleasant chance to wait on. Years upon years of having this arrogance rubbed in your face tends to turn a person against frats.

I wouldn’t spit on some of these guys if their asses were on fire. Come to think of it, I might even fan the flames. Sorry if that’s un-civilized. In the place where I grew up, frats ruled over everything. Including and up to unplanned abortions and strange mystery deaths at the frat house.

So there ya go, no, I’d never counsel any student to join a frat.

YMMV.

25

I actually pledged, against my better judgement. I just didn’t actually join.

One night, they liquored up all the pledges, confiscated all keys, wallets and cell phones, and then drove us to a closed, deserted dunkin’ donuts parking lot along Route 1. There we were told that we were being left there, and our task was to find a way home (like hitchhiking) or walk back to campus. Six girls, alone and without money or communication methods, out in the middle of nowhere by a highway at 2 AM. Some drunker than others, too. Right.

The plan, among the sisters, was to hide nearby, watch us freak for a while, and then offer us rides just as we started to panic. I learned this later. The situation as it stood was one I found unacceptable. Using a trait that has come in handy all my life, I came up with a split second alternative solution no one had planned on.

As the other pledges began to look around at each other and wring thier hands, and the sisters walked back to their cars. I made a run for it, beating them there and hopping onto the hood of one car. I announced I was taking the car hostage. I’d trade it for a lift, of course. But they couldn’t drive it with me sitting there. The driver laughed at me and said she’d just get a lift with the others. I stared her down and calmly, seriously said that was fine, I’d just break a window and then hotwire the ignition. (Bullshit, of course, but she bought it).

At this point I no longer wanted part of this sorority (it was supposed to be a service sorority, and I was dumb enough to believe them when they said ‘no hazing’). All I wanted was to go home. There was a small stand-off where she threatened arrest for vandalism, and I threatened to see a detailed account of thier dangerous and very illegal hazing made it to the desk of the Dean of Student Affairs and the front page of the Targum-- you didn’t really want your Charter, didya?.

After that, I never saw sororities/fraternities as anything other than nutty, irresposible and even downright dangerous.

26

They’re in the ‘virtually non-existent’ category here. My actual school doesn’t have any–if they did, at just over 1000 students across all years, I’d probably know. Our sister school does have a couple frats–not sure about sororities, but one of my friends did join the Jewish frat so I know they have those. Even if I was aware of a sorority, I probalby wouldn’t join. I’m not really that social of a person, and 'sides, it’d probably be full of shudder Dal students.

27

There weren’t any at my school, not that I would have joined anyway. I was a prig. I’m still a prig, I think, but I’m not in a position to be quite as annoying as I used to be!

28

I went to Union College, sometimes call the “mother of fraternities” (about four of them started there). But this was in the early 70s, when frats were out of style. I went through the rush process (which consisted of attending beer blasts – and I didn’t drink beer) and heard from other guys on the floor what they were required to do (hazing was mild: counting the posts on the fence that surrounded the college, for instance, or doing work around the frat house, or having to recite the Greek alphabet before a match burned down to your fingers). No one asked me to join, and I didn’t see any frat where I wanted to belong.

Later, I started taking my meals at Alpha Delta Phi (posessors of the best frat house and the best cook on campus). By my junior year, I considered pledging, but I decided I didn’t want to be junior to people of classes after mine. However, I would occasionally surprise people by my knowledge of fraternity traditions, since by my senior year, I’d been there longer than most of them.

29

I played rugby. No need to join a frat, we had our own house and we partied harder than any of the frats on campus. Plus we didn’t have to worry about all of those silly charter rules and secret handshakes and such.

30

I personally didn’t join one because I didn’t think I needed to be an alcoholic at age 18. However, for several years, I was the security guard for a sorority in Austin, and when I left, the girls awarded me an honorary membership. So in one way, I guess I can say I’m A Greek.

31

Not interested.

My school had fraternities and sororities, but they weren’t a huge or essential part of campus life. I wasn’t an athlete, so I couldn’t join those sororities and I had lots of friends, so I didn’t need to join for the social boost, either.

I did go to some frat parties freshman year. Not really my thing.

32

The frats didn’t want me? Not that my heart was broken by their lack of interest in me.

I did eventually get invited to join Phi Beta Kappa, which was the first “greek” fraternity in the US anyway, so there!

33

I don’t know how it is in other schools or parts of the country, but the sororities and frats here are segregated. There were 2 sororities, one for black girls and one for white girls, and it was the same with the frats (except they were for boys). I felt that this was unacceptable behavior in 2003 and 2004, and had no desire to contribute to what I felt was a racist situation. Maybe it is like that in all schools and I am upset over nothing, but it sure didn’t seem like nothing at the time.

34

I had considered pledging Alpha Phi Alpha, but decided that the BS wasn’t worth the benefits.

35

I was invited to join a Greek frat, & was “tapped” for a non-greek outfit, but turned them down.

I was living at home, & saw no reason to join a frat under those circumstances.

Also, there were a string of date rape incidents, & the frats had a bad rep.

36

I couldn’t afford it.

37

That was the way it was in my school, except there were a few more than two of each. I only know of a single crossover incident during my time at the school (a black guy in a “white” fraternity.) I went to school in south Arkansas, which isn’t exactly the most enlightened of areas.

38

Several reasons:

1.) I live at home. So I don’t feel like hanging around a frat house when I’m not in class or studying.
2.) I’m not much of a joiner. I haven’t found a non-frat organization/club at university I actually want to be a part of.
3.) I may be biased, but the impression I have of frats is that they are mostly about: Partying, drinking heavily, and Hell week. I’m not into heavy drinking, Every time I’ve been to a party I spend the time reading a book, and if I’m going to be going through Hell Week, I want them to pay me for it, not the other way around.

39

I’d already been in the Army before going to college and I couldn’t see myself going through that piss-ant Hell Week as a subordinate to guys younger than me. Over time, I also found myself disliking the fratboys in general. I can’t say if all fratboys everywhere are assholes, but the ones at my university in the early 1980’s certainly were. I never saw people so proud about so little.

40

My university has fraternities and sororities. I avoid both; I’m here to study, not associate with people who think they’re still in high school.

The sororities on campus gained quite a bit of exposure this semester when a columnist for the student newspaper referred to the girls as “sorostitues.” This resulted in a flurry of letters to the paper from sorority girls talking about all the diversity and service opportunities offered by sororities. At the end of the week, they held a protest in front of one of the student centers. The student paper was kind enough to run full-color photos of the event. I would say that 99% of the girls in attendance were white, skinny blondes wearing tight t-shirts, shorts, high-heeled sandals, and big plastic square-lensed sunglasses.

Yeah. Diversity. :rolleyes: