Feltner 1

Madison Feltner
Professor Morean
12 July 2015
Hazing in Greek Life
Hazing is a complex problem all across the country that receives a lot of controversy and
skepticism. Most people look at hazing in one way, that all cases can be handled and assessed in
the same way, which isnt probable. When looked at in different angles, a quick solution can be
found in order to end hazing. Hazing is a complex problem without a definite solution or end
because it is found all over the world. There is always a negative light on Greek life when it
comes to the topic of hazing, due to the negative stigma derived from movies and stereotyping.
Many people look down on those involved in Greek life due to these preconceived notions, along
with some cases where this has been brought up in the news and outwardly publicized. I
personally have a lot of experience on this topic. Though I was never hazed, there are chapters
that I know of that clearly do mild hazing and no one notices. Some solutions are the best
solution having an anti-hazing policy on each campus harsher punishments, having an
organization that is strictly anti-hazing, knowing that a new member is more than just a pledge.
First and foremost, there needs to be an anti-hazing policy on every campus, with special
focuses on each Greek chapter. Some states are beginning to set the trend of having a law that
forbids hazing. I believe it will serve as a very strong deterrent, she said. Now, we have
policies that prohibit hazing, but I think we could use more support. It will help people who don't
understand hazing is more than just harmless pranks (Anti-hazing Bill). Having these policies
will be very helpful to universities in that state not only as a chapter or campus rule, but also as a
state law. Once these are true laws, students will think twice before engaging in illegal activity

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such as hazing. The state of New Hampshire is now the 36th state to instate this law, making
strides in the fight to end hazing. The two fraternities, Delta Tau Delta and Phi Gamma Delta,
later were suspended as student organizations - the maximum penalty the administration had at
its disposal at the time (Vaidhyanathan). While the Universities can only suspend the chapter for
a short amount of time, this punishment should not lie only on the university but the Fraternity as
a whole.
Setting up rules and regulations against hazing along all campuses will make the
guidelines clear and understandable. If a campus is all on the same page, then people are more
likely to hold each other accountable, and holding the organizations on campus to a higher
standard. On many campuses like Vanderbilt, The Office of Greek Life page has a direct link to
their hazing incident form stating that, State law requires each college and University in
Tennessee to adopt a policy prohibiting hazing. Hazing is defined in the law as any intentional
or reckless act in Tennessee on or off the property of any [college or University] by one (1)
student acting alone or with others which is directed against any other student, that endangers the
mental or physical health or safety of that student, or which induces or coerces a student to
endanger his or her mental or physical health or safety. (Vanderbilt Office of Greek Life). This
is showing at this particular campus that the school itself is making strides with the state to
eliminate all hazing, along with owning up to prior mistakes. Not only is it a campus law, which
students generally undermined, but it is a state law that can be punished by jail time. While
continuing to look at the hazing law in this state, it shows that hazing is being cracked down on,
and will hopefully be eliminated altogether eventually. While including the statutory limitations
of hazing above (i.e., student acts directed at students on or off campus), the University expands
its definition of hazing to include any act that may produce, or is intended to produce, mental or

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physical discomfort, embarrassment, harassment, or ridicule; or any acts that are humiliating,
intimidating, or demeaning, or that endangers the health and safety of another person
(Vanderbilt Office of Greek Life). As stated by this source, no matter what the concept of hazing,
it is about the same no matter what or where it is happening.
Next, if there is campus wide support, then generally that implies that no matter what is
happening in each organization, there will be other members of other organizations holding each
other accountable. Not only focusing on hazing in Greek life, but focusing on hazing in other
organizations will help to relieve the negative spotlight on just sorority and fraternities. While the
general public focuses on hazing in Greek life, it also happens in other organizations, the
incidents are just less publicized. On the National Hazing Prevention Week website, it touches on
how hazing happens in all organizations, This week allows us to educate students, parents,
faculty and staff, coaches, community members, local and campus police, national organizational
leadership and others so they can more easily recognize hazing. More importantly, they can gain
the knowledge and skills they need to prevent hazing (National Hazing Prevention Week).
Generally the only hazing that makes it to the publics eye is hazing among Greeks, but in all
reality, it happens in all organizations. The National Hazing Prevention Week mainly focuses on
not only prevention of hazing in all organizations, but the education of hazing and what is and is
not considered hazing. As stated in this quote, It provides an opportunity for individuals,
organizations, campuses and communities across North America to raise awareness about hazing
and to promote hazing prevention (National Hazing Prevention Week). This is a very successful
project that Bowling Green participated in this fall, and it generally had a very positive effect on
organizations in their community.

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While the community has a large policy that is effective for all of the chapters, each
chapter needs to also have their own anti-hazing policy. Chapters and organizations cannot rely
simply on a rule that is held for the whole campus to make sure that each chapter follows rules
and regulations. Each member needs to make sure that they are holding themselves accountable,
as well as others accountable for the policies provided. As the Vanderbilt Office of Greek Lifes
page says regarding one of the myths of hazing , Its difficult to determine whether or not a
certain activity is hazing its such a gray area sometimes (Vanderbilt Office of Greek Life). If
the rules on hazing become strict and cut and dry enough, there should never be a conversation
about a gray area. There is no gray area when it comes to hazing: someone is either hazing
another member of the organization, or they are not. There is a list of questions on the site after
this that focus around what is and is not hazing, similar questions include; Are only the new
members doing it?, Would you not want headquarters to know about this?, Is there a safety
problem. All of these questions are easy to answer, if the answer is yes or maybe odds are
hazing is involved, it is as easy as that.
Objections to this solution may be that all campus organizations cannot be on the same
page. While this is true, there are a lot of ways to make it so that they are at least on the same
track line of ideas for all of the organizations. Generally having all councils of Greek
organizations agreeing on one exact rule can be close to impossible. There is, however, a simple
way to change it and make sure each council has the same rule, and each councils rules can just
have minor variations. There also needs to be a stricter campus policy so that all organizations
need to participate. Whenever hazing is brought up normally, the topic of alcohol will enter the
conversation. Generally underage students do drink and party but that does not mean in any way
that is because of hazing, some people just make poor decisions.

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A main reason this will not be successful is because Greek life needs to have harsher
punishments for hazing on campuses and no well just let it go this time way of looking at the
allegations. While there are so many different things that happen both positive and negative
things that happen that is all considered hazing. It's unclear how often U-M's Greek council has
acted against other fraternities. Those actions have no relevance to this action, and so I choose
not to provide that information, said Chris Haughee, assistant director of Greek Life at U-M
(Jesse). This quote shows that there were probably a lot more problems with hazing than have
been reported. While the campus should have been more careful when making this statement
because they made it seem as though they have had multiple problems with this in the past. In
other scenarios, chapters and headquarters alike try to cover themselves before allegations are
even made. My reaction to the fraternity's press release is that it's premature, and we need to
wait for the outcome before any decisions are made, Margolis said (Fahy). This sounds as
though there was a suspicion in relevance to the allegation, there should not have been a head
turn in this specific allegation. Showing that in the end no matter who started the allegations
generally there are not harsh enough punishments to punish but Fraternities and Sororities alike.
While campuses are enforcing harsher punishments, the punishments that are being enforced
become less harsh over time, making the original punishment that the chapter was given
nonexistent by the time the punishment should be lifted. This may be due to the fact that the
chapter ignored the punishment in the beginning, because it is hard to focus on the fact that there
needs to always be following through with the chapter.
Some other ways that hazing in Greek life can be changed is acknowledging that new
members are more than a pledge and they are more aware of their terms and to strike out the
word pledge in its entirety. Other fraternities abandoned the pledging process in years past, but

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sometimes that decision has been met with resistance from alumni, who resent the change and
withhold donations (Reimer). While this organization is doing away with the pledging process,
there is also a good point brought up by the author that, Other fraternities abandoned the
pledging process in years past, but sometimes that decision has been met with resistance from
alumni, who resent the change and withhold donations (Reimer). This could easily be a problem
because most chapters rely on money from alumni to make their chapter work while this may be
true, valuing the student is more important. Without new members the chapter would no longer
exist. Even though hazing may have been a tradition, making steps to value the student as a new
member not just ass a pledge can bring a lot to the chapter. New members normally have
wonderful things to give top a chapter because they were chosen for a reason that needs to be
remembered. The new member is a human not a piece of property. While the new member
process is important there are chapter that while hazing is hard for them to cut down on the
chapter is just changing the whole process. This particular chapter has totally changed the way to
recruit, The fraternity's new procedure calls for chapters to initiate candidates as full members
within 96 hours of making the offer. The education that once took place during the weeks of
pledging is now supposed to be spread over a member's entire college career (Keilman). While
some may find this absurd, how would someone know a member in that short of time, well this
makes it so that it all comes back full circle to recruiting. Recruiting which used to be very loose,
now has a lot of pressure because in three days after the member has received their invitation that
now will be initiated and then there is no going back from there. While fraternities and sororities
alike can be told to stop calling their new members pledges, there will always be groups of active
members and alumni that will refuse to focus on the fact that this person is an equal no matter if
the person has gone through initiation or not.

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While on most other campuses there are the beginnings of having a profound
organization on campus that is an anti-discrimination and anti-hazing not only having the
organization there are reasons this is unsuccessful. Also the organization having mandatory antihazing events throughout the year so that there is constant education and so that hopefully there
are more times when the members will remember the pledge they took and they will not do
anything negative to the new members. Had Florida's new anti-hazing law been in effect in the
spring, some members of the University of Florida's Kappa Alpha fraternity - who told pledges
to steal signs, forced them to exercise without water and drive other members from bar to bar could be facing jail time (Sikes). While in most places there are organizations that having antihazing policies, Florida has taken the step to ending hazing on the wide spread manner by
making an state law that hazing will punishable by jail. I couldn't be more pleased to have
students taking a stand against hazing in our fraternity/sorority and university community, said
Patrick Romero-Aldaz, director of the university's Fraternity & Sorority Life office. Fraternal
values do not embrace the practice of hazing and it's important that students are willing to act to
make sure that this deplorable activity is not welcomed in our chapters at USF (Melendez).
This along with the law passed by Florida shows how students and student organizations can
have enough power to make it so that there are organizations on campus to enforce the state law
and make it so that all chapters on campus are watched close enough so that the hazing can stop
in a quick manner. This will not work because, with put campus involvement and campus
participation it is just another organization that no one pays attention to.
While all of this is true there are multiple ways to find a solution for hazing. While
alumni may think it is a prized tradition it really is something that is outdated and breaks many
bi-laws. Making hazing illegal in states is now a trend, while this will not stop hazing with other

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things like organizations that are anti-hazing do help to make it so that the campuses can make
hazing non-existent in the near future. There are laws in most states and rules on almost every
campus to help with the hazing and help to limit this problem on campuses.

Works Cited
"Anti-Hazing Bill Gets Support at UNH." Boston Globe 28 Feb. 1993: 5. ProQuest. 15 June
2015.
"Anti-Hazing Resources." Greek Life Vanderbilt University. N.p., n.d. Web. 15 June 2015.
Fahy, Jill. "UVM Fraternity Denies Hazing." The Burlington Free Press 6 Apr. 2006. ProQuest.
15 June 2015.
Jesse, David. "Hazing Charges Close Fraternity." Detroit Free Press 19 Mar. 2011. ProQuest. 15
June 2015.
Keilman, John. "Embattled Fraternity Bans Pledging." Chicago Tribune 16 Mar. 2014: 5.
ProQuest. 15 June 2015.
Melendez, Barbara. "Rally on Friday against Hazing." Targeted News Service 1 Sept. 2010.
ProQuest. 15 June 2015.
"National Hazing Prevention Week." - About Us. N.p., n.d. Web. 15 June 2015.
Reimer, Susan. "Fraternity Ends Pledging." The Baltimore 17 Mar. 2014. ProQuest. 15 June
2015.
Sikes, Janine Young. "Hazing Crackdown." Gainesville 8 Aug. 2005. ProQuest. 15 June 2015.

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Vaidhyanathan, Siva. "Anti-Hazing Pact also Targets Racism UT Says it Now can Punish
Fraternities in Racial Incidents." Austin American Statesman 11 Jul. 1991. ProQuest. 15
June 2015.

Annotated Bibliography
"Anti-Hazing Bill Gets Support at UNH." Boston Globe (pre-1997 Fulltext) Feb 28 1993:
5. ProQuest. 15 June 2015.
There are now 36 states with the anti-hazing rule. The bill does not just focus on Greek
life it includes other organizations also.
This source is reliable because it is from the Boston Globe and they also check their
sources.
This will be used in the final paper when talking about anti hazing and showing how this
campus is handling hazing.
Fahy, Jill. "UVM Fraternity Denies Hazing." The Burlington Free Press Apr 6 2006
ProQuest. 15 June 2015.
On this campus there have been allegations of hazing at a costume party where
the4 new members seemed to be the only ones who dressed up, making it seem as though
they were hazing. The chapter jumped on the allegations and struck them down, while
that may seem positive this actually made it look like the chapter was hazing.

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This source has quotes which makes it very reliable.
This will be used in the final paper when it comes to referencing negative allegations.
Jesse, David. "Hazing Charges Close Fraternity." Detroit Free Press Mar 19 2011
ProQuest. 15 June 2015.
The chapter had very clear situations in which they had hazed the pledges which
resulted in their suspension. The chapter while suspended is working on a plan so that
these action do not happen anymore.
This source has quotes which makes it very reliable.
I will use this to talk about all of the ways that it will be done and how the actions are
making people have opinions that are negative.
Keilman, John. "Embattled Fraternity Bans Pledging." Chicago Tribune Mar 16 2014: 5.
ProQuest. 15 June 2015.
The chapter that is reporting on this is the deadliest Fraternity in America. Their solution
being having a nonexistent new member process giving a few days to be initiated instead
of weeks that involved hazing like in the past. All of this resulting in a more intense
recruitment process.
This source is creditable based of the fact it is from Chicago Tribune which
checks its sources before posting.
This will be used in the final paper to show how not only campuses but also that chapters
are doing things to help make hazing not happen also.
"Rally on Friday Against Hazing." Targeted News Service Sep 01 2010 ProQuest. 15
June 2015.

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This college campus has started a rally to show that hazing is not accepted at all
on their campus. Not only in greek life but in any organization as a whole. This all began
when a student was hazed on that universities campus and now it is being shown that this
campus is not a campus that will turn its head to hazing.
This is a reliable source because it has many different references.
This source will be used when referencing that there is hazing outside of greek
life.
Reimer, Susan. "Fraternity Ends Pledging." The Baltimore Sun Mar 17 2014 ProQuest.
15 June 2015.
The fraternity as a whole just banned initiation rites so that the chapter cannot have the
new members do tedious things that are considered hazing. Instead there will be an
almost immediate initiation upon receiving a invitation to join the chapter. While
arguments are happening that this may weaken the bond between actives and new
members this was quickly shot down.
The Baltimore Sun checks their sources which is why this is credible.
I will use this to reference about how one chapter is fully eliminating the time
span if hazing.
Sikes, Janine Young. "Hazing Crackdown." Gainesville Sun Aug 08 2005 ProQuest. 15
June 2015.
After extreme circumstances on different campuses in Florida there is now a state
law that states that hazing is punishable by jail. This shows that the state no longer thinks
that probation from the campus for a short period of time is still a valued punishment for
hazing.

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This is creditable because it is a source that checks their sources.
I will use this to notice that many places are making strides against hazing across
the board.
Vaidhyanathan, Siva. "Anti-Hazing Pact also Targets Racism // UT Says it Now can
Punish Fraternities in Racial Incidents." Austin American Statesman Jul 11 1991:
0. ProQuest. 15 June 2015.
Most of the incidents on this campus are by fraternities. The university at this point is
working just to gain more power over fraternities on the campus.
This is creditable because it is a source that checks their sources.
This will be used to talk about how there has been people at universities trying to
do away with greek life.