Why don't people like the idea of eating clubs, etc?

Colleges & Universities Princeton University
1

<p>Princeton’s eating clubs are looked upon negatively, yet such eating clubs helped form Princeton’s image today as an prestigious, elite, ivy league school. </p>

<p>If people don’t like eating clubs, finals clubs, secret societies, etc, then why do they apply to HYP in the first place? These organizations helped form the ivy league image. Don’t people want the prestige that comes with a HYP education? If not, why not just go to a state school where there are no such traditions? Does anyone think that eating clubs contribute to Princeton’s rich tradition and culture? </p>

<p>Some criticize certain eating clubs, etc for being snobby, pretentious, privileged etc. But without these aspects (which probably exist to a much lesser extent today), Princeton wouldn’t be Princeton. </p>

<p>It’s just that I’ve never heard anyone advocate eating clubs before. Just throwing it out there.</p>

2

<p>“It’s just that I’ve never heard anyone advocate eating clubs before. Just throwing it out there.”</p>

<p>That’s because you’ve never met me. I’m probably one of the biggest eating club apologetics in my class. That being said, your arguments are… pretty flimsy. Most people applying to HYP know nothing about Ivy League tradition and culture - they’re just doing it for the brand name. If they do know about (and dislike) the club system, then they are applying IN SPITE OF such a system. Since the attraction of an Ivy League school is so enormous for the average overachieving high school kid, people who are REALLY opposed to the clubs will still apply. Also, people want the prestige that comes with an Ivy League education, but not the associated accusations of elitism and snobbery. Of course, applicants don’t realize that the two are often inextricably intertwined, and therefore seek to separate one from the other by bashing aspects of their schools that could cause society to associate them with “unseemly” traits.</p>

<p>If you really want to advocate for eating clubs, start by learning more about the way they’re run. Then compare and contrast them to final clubs, secret societies, and Greek systems.</p>

3

<p>from an earlier post of mine:</p>

<p>I have seen many a Princeton student join an Eating Club as a quiet, shy, introverted kid and become a well rounded social intellectual by the time they graduate Princeton. The atmosphere, support, relations and friendships that Eating Clubs provide the students are perfect for the social maturation of the shy kid that enters Princeton.</p>

<p>The Eating Club system is one of the strong points of attending Princeton, and any attempts to discredit this wonderful institution are just plain silly. The close friendships developed at the Eating Clubs last for decades upon decades after graduation.</p>

4

<p>Something I’ve heard and was skeptical of, so I wanted to ask Princeton alums here–</p>

<p>Is it true your family must have a certain net worth to get into the “Ivy” eating club (the best of the 10)? Is there no official standard but one that everyone seems to meet?</p>

5

<p>No, that is completely untrue and frankly was not even true when I went to Princeton a long time ago. Two of my best friends were in Ivy and both of them were middle-class students without anything that seemed snobby or pretentious about them.</p>

6

<p>Not true. I know of several students from a lower income household that were members.</p>

7

<p>WRT the OP, I attended the Princeton preview with my D last week and the Eating Clubs were really the only thing that left a “negative” impression. We took one of the tours and both came away with the impression that they were something that you would expect to find in middle school.</p>

<p>With that having been said, we realize that it was a 15 minute tour and the Eating Clubs must serve a real purpose. We just do not get it yet. I put “negative” is quotes because that was just an impression which may be better described as “perplexed.” They were low on the priority list, so we did not pursue additional info. If my D decides to attend Princeton, we have a while to figure it out. Right now she would fit into ray121988’s attending “IN SPITE OF” category.</p>

8

<p>I don’t have a problem with the eating clubs on the whole. The bicker thing though, is another story.</p>

<p>I am bringing my son down this weekend for the preview. I think if he likes Princeton, he will definitely be part of the “in spite of” group.</p>

<p>It has been said a gazillion times on this forum that there are many options other than bicker clubs for students to choose. Still the culture is there and it does affect the overall experience. As the previous poster said…very middle school.</p>

9

<p>Another question. Do the people in eating clubs like eating clubs?</p>

10

<p>A complete outsider perspective:</p>

<p>When I was applying to college many years ago, I hated the idea of eating clubs and fraternities. I didn’t apply to Princeton, in large part because of that. Unlike the senior societies at Yale and the final clubs at Harvard, the eating clubs at Princeton were absolutely central to the life of the university and to students’ experience there – something you can tell from the way the Princeton alums on CC talk about them – so they mattered a lot more than Bones or Porcellian (which pretty much affect no one but their very few members, and in some cases not even them).</p>

<p>However, as life flowed on, I noticed that people who were more or less just like me, but who had gone to Princeton or Dartmouth, absolutely adored their eating clubs and fraternities. They weren’t stupid people, they weren’t horribly snobby people, they weren’t frivolous and they didn’t lack social consciousness. The clubs really worked for their members. What’s more, I knew people who went to Princeton and weren’t in eating clubs, and they didn’t love Princeton any less, and they didn’t show any signs of feeling oppressed by or resentful of the clubs. The eating clubs seemed to work like frats to some extent – especially the positive aspects – but without quite so much insularity, or hazing, or general stupidness. (When I say friends whom I respected loved their frats, that doesn’t mean that I didn’t think then or that I don’t think now that some of what they did there was monumentally stupid. I never heard about anything monumentally stupid at Princeton.)</p>

<p>Since that time, the role of the eating clubs at Princeton has diminished somewhat, and there are more intermediate options (non-bicker clubs, 4-year residential colleges). I know my kids refused to look at Princeton in part because of the eating clubs, but I think that was a dumb reaction on their part. As offensive as the idea of eating clubs may sound to someone who is not a “social club” or frat kind of person, there really is no evidence that they are other than positive institutions that everyone actually at Princeton feels more or less good about. I am confident that anyone who goes to Princeton is going to wind up feeling that way, too.</p>

<p>If you really don’t want to go to Princeton, it’s fine to use eating clubs as the excuse. Some people do that. If you didn’t get into Princeton, it’s fine to say you wouldn’t have gone there anyway because of the eating clubs. Lots of people do that. But if you LIKE Princeton, or if Princeton looks like your best educational option, there is no valid reason to let the eating clubs make you hesitate about going there. And five years from now you, too, will probably be earnestly explaining how special and wonderful they are.</p>

11

<p>I have to say that I now feel the Eating Club concept has been very often misrepresented here on CC. Back when Princeton was just a great school on my D’s list, the references I saw to the Eating Clubs on varying forums gave me pause about the place. It is often insinuated by non-Princeton students and other CC members that they are snobbish, exclusive, for the rich, etc. and it made me think my daughter would hate to be around that. But since she was accepted and we have both looked more deeply into all aspects of the school, I can’t understand what all the negativity is about. Sure it would be nice if there were no Bicker and all the clubs were sign-in, but the fact that half are by lottery, and anybody who wants to can join one doesn’t sound like an exclusionary system at all. I’ve heard many comments from Princeton independents (here and elsewhere) saying they enjoy eating or partying there occasionally with friends and they have no problem with them. </p>

<p>I just wish that on CC (especially) kids would limit themselves to describing things that they actually know about and not try to plant misconceptions in others for what may be ulterior motives.</p>

12

<p>@GSharpM7: The University is scared that, if they were to fully explain the clubs to prospective students, they would scare away applicants. So instead, they dispense warped and superficial explanations of the clubs while simultaneously trying to play them down (you probably heard a lot about how they’re “not a big deal” and how there are “plenty of other dining options”). In fact, I volunteered to give an eating club tour last weekend, and one of the deans called all the volunteers together to let us know what we could and couldn’t say about the clubs. This serves to spread the regrettable confusion that you and your daughter are experiencing.</p>

<p>@pigs<em>at</em>sea: Yes, of course we like the clubs. If we didn’t, why would we all pay an extra two to three thousand dollars every year to be a part of them?</p>

<p>@JHS: While a very small proportion of students at Yale and Harvard belong to societies and clubs, respectively, I believe that this causes more exclusivity and elitism. That type of system allows a small group of students to more effectively distinguish and separate themselves from the rest of the student body. If 70% of all eligible students belong to eating clubs, then how exclusive can the clubs possibly be? Here, the assumption is that just about everyone belongs to a club, thereby allowing Princetonians to bond through our mutual association with the Street.</p>

<p>Btw, here’s some food for thought: for all the bicker-bashing we hear about, fully half of every single sophomore class chooses to bicker. That, IMO, could serve as a testament to just how appealing the clubs are from an actual student’s perspective.</p>

13

<p>ray, w/re Yale, it’s really only three of the societies that have anything elitist about them (or at least that was the case back in the day), their total membership at any point was about 60 people, and all it meant was that those 60 people vanished for a few hours a couple of times a week. It didn’t affect anyone else. No one was trying to get into the Skull & Bones prom because there wasn’t any Skull & Bones prom.</p>

<p>Furthermore, they were actually pretty meritocratic organizations. There were a few legacy members like W Bush, but by and large people got tapped because of public accomplishments that were fairly universally respected – like being captain of the football team, or editor-in-chief of the Yale Daily News, or the Whiff with the best voice, or the best campus actor, or the guy who pulled a series of brilliant pranks. </p>

<p>Also, because those guys (all guys then, not now) were public figures, lots of people knew them, and they remained public figures as seniors. Everyone in Bones or Key had dozens of friends and associates who would have noticed if the person was withdrawing from the relationship, and basically that didn’t happen. At the time, at least, it would have been utterly, totally uncool for anyone to “effectively distinguish and separate themselves from the rest of the student body” – anyone who tried that **** would have become an instant laughingstock and social pariah. Anyway, the Editor-in-Chief didn’t get to stop doing his job, or the Whiff singer didn’t get to stop showing up for gigs, because they were in Bones, and if they were the kind of people who might have done that, they wouldn’t have had those positions in the first place.</p>

<p>I promise you, it didn’t feel oppressive at all.</p>

<p>The structure of the final clubs at Harvard is a little different, and I don’t know as much about them. What I do know is that I had a whole bunch of relatives and friends at Harvard, I visited Harvard several times a year, I went to parties there, I dated a Harvard student for awhile during college, and I never once heard anyone even mention a final club. If I hadn’t read about them in some book, I wouldn’t have been aware of their existence. They were irrelevant to the point of invisibility in normal social life.</p>

14

<p>One of Princeton’s most prominent history professors, Anthony Grafton, grumbles about the eating clubs, in this article in the Daily Princetonian comparing Princeton and Yale:</p>

<p>“As an inveterate grump about the eating clubs, I prefer Yale’s social system to ours. Yale boasts plenty of exclusive, snobbish social life — the student body doesn’t suffer, any more than ours does, from a privilege deficit, but it doesn’t happen in public space, at the official core of the campus, as it does on Prospect Avenue.”</p>

<p>[Tiger</a>? Bulldog? Tiger? - The Daily Princetonian](<a href=“http://www.dailyprincetonian.com/2006/10/23/16303/]Tiger”>http://www.dailyprincetonian.com/2006/10/23/16303/)</p>

15

<p>Yes, but mancune, I notice you didn’t quote Grafton’s final lines explaining why he prefers Princeton to Yale</p>

<p>

</p>

<p>I think that eating clubs are one of those things that sometimes turn off prospective students and parents, but that once you see them in action, they become a net positive. The bicker process is nothing like rush can be at other schools, in general, anyone who wants to join a club can do so, and on any given night, there are club parties open to all. There’s lots of other stuff to do on campus, but it’s nice to know that the clubs provide a fun, safe, social option for those that are interested.</p>

16

<p>Do eating clubs detract you from academic/other commitments? Cause I would just spend my time doing something productive or sleeping. (Im’ a prefrosh so i don’t know anything yet)</p>

<p>What’s the experience of the eating clubs besides meeting other people? can’t you just meet them elsewhere?</p>

17

<p>Essentially, the eating clubs are just a place to eat, and since you have to eat anyway, they don’t affect your schedule at all or detract from your academics/other commitments. You can only join them sophomore year, so you have a year to meet people at all the usual places. In addition, I would say that although you make friends in your eating clubs, you probably make even closer friendships with people who share your interests and activities, and that continues throughout your time at Princeton. Furthermore, even students who are in eating clubs will often get meals at Frist or buy sandwiches at Wawa or eat with friends who are in different clubs, at a residential college or are independent. It’s much looser than is often portrayed here on CC.</p>

18

<p>midat, when I was at Princeton, sophomores joined in the Spring semester, but weren’t full eating members until Junior year, so they spent the first two years eating with the rest of the class. Has this changed now?</p>

19

<p>@mancune: I’d rather have the “snobs” be out in the open than be hidden and unavailable. Every Thursday and Saturday night, I know that a certain “type” of kid will be found at a certain club. And y’know what? Even though I don’t really belong to that circle, if, for whatever reason, I want to go party with them, I know exactly where to find them - I don’t have to call them, search for them, get an invitation from them, or anything like that. </p>

<p>@ChairmanGuo: Any institution with such a strong emphasis on socializing is bound to reduce the amount of time you have for academic commitments. As for the experience, I’d say it centers around eating and partying with friends both old and new.</p>

<p>@JohnAdams12: No, that has not changed. Sophomores are still limited to social memberships.</p>

20

<p>no, sorry John Adams, I meant that you don’t even form a connection with them until sophomore year, but you are correct, the actual full membership happens junior year.</p>