braxtondiazhazinginfraternities

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What Really needs to Happen

After seeing the hazingprevention.org website I was very surprised with how ineffective their “solutions” were. To continue my research, I looked to find ways that fraternities have successfully moved past hazing rituals. In an article by Time Magazine, Katie Reilly investigates different hazing stories and how effective the school is at resolving the issue. She first talks about the death of Penn State freshman, Timothy Piazza, whose death resulted from a hazing incident. Reilly continues to explain how the lawyer representing the Piazza family criticizes the resolution Penn State offers for not being precise or detailed enough.

Throughout the article, Reilly not only criticizes fraternities but offers solutions based off of her research and other experts. The first solution is to focus on investing not only the big hazing incidents. It is very commonly known that hazing exists on most college campuses so why are schools waiting for the worst-case scenario before stepping in? Schools should be trying to stop these things before they happen. One way Reilly suggest for this to happen is to end the practice of pledging all together. One chapter, Sigma Alpha Epsilon has already made this change for all of its houses and they have noted significant improvements. The last suggestion Reilly makes is to ban alcohol at fraternity houses. This is believed to be an effective strategy because of most hazing instances being alcohol related.

Katie Riley offers an effective source through her thorough research of college hazing along with the help of experts. She explores different stories and situations that have seemed to improve hazing on college campuses. In her research she proves the past solutions for hazing have not been effective and something different needs to happen soon before more students are hurt.

From this article I’ve learned that the current solutions being implemented in the Greek system are not working. More intense measures need to be taken on houses that have been found guilty of hazing. One piece in the article I found interesting was when Reilly talks about a Franklin college professors’ opinion on the topic. Nuwer believes that no solutions will effectively end hazing long term. He thinks that the only way for hazing to end is for the undergraduates and the alumni to put an end to it. This baffles me because I believe the colleges need to try different solutions especially because the undergraduates and the alumni are the ones who initiate the hazing.

Citation

Reilly, Katie. “Fraternity Hazing: 4 Ways Universities Can Fight It.” Time, Time, 7 June 2017, time.com/4805920/fraternities-hazing-universities/.

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Current Attempts to Solve Hazing

This website is the home for anti-hazing and has everything you need to know about what hazing is and the best ways to prevent it. Hazing has been recognized as a very big problem that needs to be fixed so organizations like this have come together to advocate against it and raise awareness. Hazingprevention.org claims that their mission is to empower people and to prevent hazing. At the top of their anti-hazing page they have written, “Hazing is everyone’s problem. That’s why it’s also everyone’s responsibility.” Often times, bystanders of hazing hesitate to step in because it isn’t directly affecting them, hazingprevention.org tells that whether it affects you or not, it’s your responsibility if something happens to someone so you should always stand up for them.

The website continues to go over information on stopping hazing with the first idea being to learn what hazing is. This is very crucial to putting an end to hazing because many times, students don’t think they are being hazed. Being more educated on what it is can allow students to be more prepared to take responsibility and speak up about situations they see happening. The second step the website suggest is to familiarize yourself with laws and policies because every organization may have different definitions or procedures for hazing. Knowing these policies can make people more aware of what is acceptable and what isn’t. Another suggestion was to start an anti-hazing movement on campus. This could potentially help students feel more comfortable standing up for themselves and reporting issues.

The most useful resource on this website in my opinion is the Greek Anti-Hazing Hotline. This hotline allows students to call and anonymously report hazing incidents. I find this to be the most effective because it doesn’t put students at risk of being exposed or ridiculed for reporting an incident. This source is the hub for hazing prevention and is effective for showing laws, regulations, and potential solutions around hazing. When someone first seeks to learn about hazing prevention, this may be the first source to come up.

I believe that what this source offers and suggests is extremely ineffective and a major reason that hazing continues to get worse. The biggest problem is that anti-hazing organizations are sitting around waiting for students to report incidents, something very unlikely for people to do. While people are waiting for other people to report accidents, thousands of kids are facing hazing rituals every day. Large, powerful organizations such as this need to take more initiative and do something about it like the parents of Maxwell Gruver are. As long as people are not being proactive about fixing the situation, hazing will continue to take the lives of innocent children. 

Citation

“What You Can Do .” hazingprevention.org/home/hazing/what-you-can-do/.

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Hazing’s Background and Supporters

This was an article written by Alexandria Robbins and was adapted from her book Fraternity: An inside Look at a Year of College Boys Becoming Men. Robbins begins with telling the history of fraternity hazing in colleges in America. Hazing has been a part of college fraternities since the beginning of the 1800’s when it was just a simple way for upperclassman to pick on freshman. In the mid to late 1800’s, hazing began to get much worse with the return of students who experienced hazing in the Civil War. Since this time, fraternity hazing has continued to get more dangerous.

Between the years 2010 and 2017, 17 pledges had died in school recognized fraternities due to hazing. Currently, hazing it at its worst point in history and despite its dangers, 73 percent of Greek houses haze. Although many houses participate in hazing rituals, 95 percent of hazing victims never report it. Most students fear getting the group in trouble or are afraid of other members thinking bad about them, so they chose to not report it. Many students also reported that they didn’t report hazing because most advisors already knew about it.

Research by Robbins shows that many alumni and older members actually want hazing rituals to continue. Often times they will publicly say they are against it but behind closed doors tell the members to do it anyway. Older members believe that it is their responsibility to make the pledges “better” men by knocking them down and building them back up. Many Alumni also believe that it simply is tradition and should be continued. They look back on the friendships they built during these adverse conditions and wish for the new members to have the same experience. Although they believe this is an effective way to build brother hood, it is not the only way, and this is proven through Alexandria Robbins’ research on a non-hazing New York chapter. This chapter makes their pledges cook for their brothers’ girlfriends, study together, and organize events together as harmless ways for them to bond. The chapter believes that their brotherhood is no weaker than other houses and that there are much more effective, less harmful ways to build brotherhood.

Robbins does an outstanding job diving into the history and past time of hazing rituals. She proves not everyone is against hazing through showing the opposing viewpoints of alumni and older members. On top of this, members being hazed tend to not report these incidents. With so many people for hazing rather than against it, hazing may be a much more difficult problem to solve.

Citation

Robbins, Alexandra. “Why Does Frat Hazing Still Happen? Because Alums Want It To.” Medium, GEN, 11 Feb. 2019, medium.com/s/story/why-does-frat-hazing-still-happen-because-alums-want-it-to-801491d6d36d.

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Physical and Mental Effects of Hazing

While hearing so many disturbing stories involving hazing incidents, I was curious to see what effects these activities will leave on the students. In an article for Theravive, Lisa La Rose explores the long term and short-term consequences hazing may lead to. As a result of hazing, college students may face a variety of physical and emotional abuse that can sometimes even lead to death. Although death and serious physical injuries are rare, 71% of people hazed suffer from some kind of emotional consequences. Effects of hazing may impact people in a variety of ways from their mental health to their physical well-being. Rose finds that these consequences may include, decreased self-esteem, anxiety, difficultly forming relationships and lower grades. These effects may be detrimental to college students going through a very important part of their life.

Digging deeper, Lisa La Rose discovers that the consequences of hazing may be much more extensive than this. Psychological symptoms don’t always appear immediately but may impact the victim at a later time in their life. Those with a history of trauma or psychological problems may be more susceptible to the negative effects of hazing. Further, she finds that people who have been exposed to hazing are more likely to haze others in the future, creating a dangerous cycle.

As a licensed professional counselor (LPC), Lisa La Rose provides insight on how hazing is not just a temporary problem. Hazing is not something that comes and goes but something that could leave psychological scars on victims for the rest of their lives. She writes this article to inform people about the true dangers and how hazing may be much more consequential than thought before. Rather than a survey or other article, Rose provides a perspective from a licensed professional who has been dealing with and observed many cases like this.

In this article I was able to find a lot of the information I was looking for. Searching for more details on the effects of hazing, I chose to examine a reliable source that would effectively show the true aftermath hazing can bring. A piece in the article that stood out to me was the unfortunate fact that hazing victims are more likely to haze others themselves. This chain of events creates a viscous cycle of abuse that can be very difficult to stop. Furthermore, I wish to discover how this cycle can be stopped or changed to better the lives of potential victims in the future.

Citation

Rose, Lisa La. “Beyond Bullying: The Long-Term Effects of Hazing on Young Adults.” Theravive, www.theravive.com/today/post/beyond-bullying-the-long-term-effects-of-hazing-on-young-adults-0001766.aspx#aboutAuthor.

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How Media Influences Younger Generations

Growing up, I remember thinking of hazing as normal, fun, and something all fraternity members go through. Before understanding the truth about hazing, I could not imagine how cruel and dangerous it really can be. This distorted perception I had likely originates from media and how I was exposed to it as a child. A popular youtuber I used to watch, Jimmy Tatro, built a career off of making funny videos representing experiences he had in college. One of his most popular videos The little Bro was eventually taken off of YouTube because of how it represents, glorifies, and attempts to make hazing funny.

Being a channel where people go to laugh, viewers see this video expecting something lighthearted and funny but are given a serious epidemic made into a joke. The video takes place in a fraternity house and is shown mostly in the perspective of a pledge being hazed. Throughout the video, the pledge is belittled, made fun of, and forced to do things he doesn’t want to just to prove himself to his “big brother.” All this time, his big brother, someone who should be helping their brother, is initiating most of the hazing and making it seem funny. One of the more interesting scenes is the final scene. In this scene, the pledge stands up for himself and confronts his older brother about how he feels but is immediately dropped from the fraternity. This forms the idea that the only way to be a part of something like this is to do what older members say, and you can’t stand up for yourself.

Jimmy Tatro is a very popular entertainer with over 3 million subscribers on YouTube and his own tv show. With so many people being fans of Jimmy’s content, he can be very influential especially for the younger audiences. Similar to my experience, Jimmy’s videos may cause kids to think hazing is not that serious when in reality, it is something that should be taken very seriously. Jimmy’s videos glorify hazing by allowing his audience to believe that it is the funny thing to do.

After analyzing this video, I learned that it is very easy for media to distort how things really are. In this specific example, an issue that takes the lives of kids every year is made into a joke for people to laugh at. Videos like these promote the acts of hazing, normalizing it for younger generations. If people begin thinking that behavior like this is normal or expected, the cycle of hazing will continue to worsen before it gets any better.

Citation

“The Little Bro.” Total Frat Move, 1 Jan. 1963, totalfratmove.com/the-little-bro/.

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The Tragic Death of Maxwell Gruver

In a report for CNN, Emanuella Grinberg covers the tragic death of 18-year-old Maxwell Gruver as well as the court case following the incident. On the night of September 14, 2017, an alcohol related hazing incident took the life of the innocent freshman pledge. Maxwell was a freshman pledging the Phi Delta Theta chapter at Louisiana State University where he faced many different hazing incidents, one taking his life. On the night of his death, Grinberg explains that Maxwell was called to the house to participate in a popular chapter ritual known as “Bible Study.” During this event, active members of the fraternity would quiz pledges on the chapter and force them to drink alcohol when they answered incorrectly. The seemingly impossible questions led to pledges consuming dangerous amounts of alcohol and becoming extremely intoxicated. As for Maxwell, he was heavily intoxicated and eventually became unconscious due to an alcohol overdose. At this time, the active members layed him down on the couch and periodically checked on him throughout the night, assuming he was fine and needed to sleep it off. By the next morning, members in the house were unable to tell if Maxwell was breathing and noticed he had a weak pulse. Maxwell was taken to the hospital where he was pronounced dead due to “acute alcohol intoxication with aspiration,” which means he died from choking on his own vomit. The coroner’s office ruled Maxell’s blood alcohol level at 0.495% at the time of his death, which is more than 6 times higher than the legal limit in the state of Arizona.

Grinberg reflects on the details of Maxwell’s story to introduce the work Maxwell’s parents, Rae and Stephen, are doing to raise awareness about the serious dangers of hazing. In an interview, Stephen Gruver explains, “We want this to send a message to the country that hazing should not exist, we have to all work together to bring an end to hazing.” Being parents of a child involved in a hazing related death, Stephen and Rae bring a very personalized and emotional opinion to the argument. Now as advocates against hazing, they are very educated and aware of the dangers and are seeking ways to get rid of it.

As a part of my hazing awareness and prevention requirements I need to be in a fraternity, I had the opportunity to listen to a speech and to talk with Stephen and Rae about their tragic story. Hearing the genuine sadness and despair in their voice was much different than reading the article. I felt I could connect with them, even though I couldn’t exactly relate to what they’ve been through. Talking to someone who’s gone through this experience allowed me to realize how hazing really can affect so many people, not just the pledges. No house ritual or tradition is worth risking the lives of someone’s child, whether someone dies or not.  

Citation

Grinberg, Emanuella. “Former LSU Student Convicted in Fraternity Hazing   Death.” CNN, Cable News Network, 17 July 2019, www.cnn.com/2019/07/17/us/lsu-hazing-trial/index.html.

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Personal Interview with Victim of Hazing

As I began my research, I wanted to start with the most accurate information possible. I chose to do this by conducting an interview with one of my classmates, Cristian Delgado, a student and member of Greek life at the University of Arizona. Being a new member of the fraternity, he is faced with the challenge of completing what is known as a pledge process. A pledge process is the process that new members of a fraternity must go through before they become official members of the house. This process is supposed to be a time for freshman to learn about their fraternity and build connections with the active members, but usually doesn’t end up this way.

In my interview with Cristian, we discussed different things that he has had to do as a pledge and how he feels about doing them. When Cristian began to share his experiences with me, I got sick to my stomach. I was shocked to discover that new members are forced with facing emotional and physical abuse. During weekly meetings, pledges are forced to line up with their foreheads on the wall and their shirts wrapped around their eyes. In these meetings, the older members yell, spit at, and throw things at the helpless pledges. Cristian tells me, “they get very personal and try their hardest to humiliate and degrade you.” On top of this, throughout the week, pledges are forced to be at the house for hours cleaning or being forced to do other things they don’t want to do. One specific night Cristian told me about, the new members were forced to do wall sits for hours while being yelled at and if they fall or moved from the position, active members would make them drink copious amounts of alcohol. Cristian told me he rarely gets a full night of sleep and often times doesn’t get to finish his schoolwork on time.

When I asked him to describe this process, he replies “it’s very physically and mentally draining, but it will be worth it in the end.” Hearing this caught my attention because I couldn’t imagine anyone thinking that this type of abuse is worth it. Cristian tries to explain to me that the process is all worth it because nothing good in life will come easy. He believes that they are teaching him lessons and that this is the way that they earn their spot in the house. Hearing his side of the experience and why he chooses to stay opened my eyes to how much a fraternity really means to some people.

This interview offered a strong inside perspective of what it’s like to be pledging a fraternity. Being a friend and classmate, Cristian trusted me and was able to open up and be honest about his experiences. I was able to ask him the questions I wanted to ask and have a real conversation about it, rather than reading something from an article. The horrific stories told by Cristian proved to me that hazing really is a bigger problem than most people think, and it needs to be stopped. Before I can attempt to answer this question, I still have some information to find out. Have fraternities always been like this? What makes all of this abuse worth it? Why?

Citation

*Personal interview with Cristian Delgado (anonymous), in person, 11/3/19.