Cpw - a parent's nightmare! Please help

mitalumna
Sat, 13 Apr 2013 20:06:39 +0000

collegealum314, an awful lot of your argument appears to be predicated on the assumption that there is a lot of hazing in the MIT fraternity system that is not optional for pledges. Although I have no direct experience being a member of a fraternity, I do know many people who are, and no one I know went through the kinds of things you are describing. I also know for sure that there is at least a subset of fraternities that are very strict about no hazing of any sort, or anything that could even appear to be hazing. Not just having no drinking rituals, but not having any kind of ritual servitude. I think the entire FSILG system has worked very hard to stop hazing.

So while it is possible that this kind of thing exists in the fringes of the system, I think it is way less common than you think. Further, I experienced something very close to hazing inside the dormitory system, though I will hasten to add that I also think that hazing in dorms has declined markedly since I went through that system as well.

In any case, I really really didn’t mean to start a conversation about Freshmen on Campus. There are lots of other reasons to be concerned about MIT’s attitude towards its students, which was the point of my original comment.