Sororities

1671 Words4 Pages

When people think of fraternities, a few things usually come to mind: wild parties, social status, and insane amounts of alcohol. However, fraternities have recently found themselves associated with something else: misogyny and rape. This is nothing new, considering fraternity chapters have been singing songs about the “joys” of sexual assault for decades. Only recently has the media taken notice of these actions and the results have not been pretty for the Alphas and Betas of college campuses. While some members of society defend frats with “rotten apple” and “boys will be boys” arguments, many are calling for drastic changes in how fraternities deal with and prevent misogyny and sexual crimes within the brotherhoods. They’re right to do so, …show more content…

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 effectively cut the roots, the consequences for promoting misogyny must be made more severe. Some colleges are already starting to crack down on the fraternities responsible with huge penalties for any promotion of sexism. After the previously mentioned Yale DKE incident for example, Yale “banned them from recruiting and holding activities on campus for five years” (Christoffersen). By upping the severity of the punishment, fraternities will be more likely to condemn misogyny and kick bad members out

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