Nice Read: Manifesto... Why You Shouldn't Pledge A Black Greek Organization

Written by Dustin J. SeibertTuesday, April 21, 2009 - BlackVibes.com

My Facebook page has been inundated as of late with updates regarding anniversaries and milestones related to historically black National Pan-Hellenic Council (NPHC) Greek-letter fraternities and sororities. Since most of my FB friends are several years graduated from college, it got me thinking how there are two kinds of people who approach the Greek thing: those who represent it for life, and those who looked at it as something cool to do in college and let it go as they proceed with their real lives.I tend to think the latter approach is the righteous way to go. But still...was it really even that cool in college?Anything appealing about the black Greek organizations is soundly overshadowed by the amount of pernicious behavior involved in pledging new members. They promise solidarity, academic focus and lifelong business connections; but it's all at the price of a notorious, very long-standing culture of hazing. Ask any member of the black Greek organizations about hazing, and they'll stare at you like deer in headlights and say something to insult your intelligence. But the level and nature of abuse administered to willing participants is about as well-kept a secret as O.J. Simpson's role in his wife's death.

I'll preface the remainder of this piece by admitting that I know little about the behind-the-scenes machinations of these secret societies; I simply go off of what I know, and what I know is simply unacceptable. Early in my college days, circa 1999, I considered following in my parents' footsteps and getting involved in the NPHC (father is an "Omega Man," mother is a Delta Sigma Theta). I thought there was something cooler and more, well, fraternal than their white Greek counterparts that were, comparatively, relatively innocuous: they rush, they party, they wear their letters on the ass of their pants and they keep it moving. My mother has historically been pretty open-minded in allowing me to make my own life decisions while offering up a few cautionary nuggets here and there. But pledging as a freshman is one of the only things I can think of that she was expressly adamant in not wanting me to do.Since mama fits into the category of "I did it because it was cool at the time," I didn't need to get a sex change, cross and learn the secret Delta decoder handshake for her to tell me, in detail, about the deplorable physical abuse administered to her line in the early-to-mid 1970s. It didn't surprise me considering the myriad stories I heard about those sadistic Delta dames on the University of Michigan campus when I was there. So it didn't take long for me to completely sour to the idea of joining a frat. If it wasn't the hazing that did it; it was that the idea of getting castigated by or taking stern orders from my peers was entirely laughable. What would I look like catching hell from a 5-foot-6 stooge playing the hardass by taking a childhood worth of insecurities out on me just a few hours after we sat across from each other in a Cultural Anthropology lecture? And of course, if any of them put their hands on me, I would respond in kind and subsequently lose my opportunity to be associated with an organization infamous for wearing animal collars and biting women in the ass at social events.It's not just physical abuse either: shame, humiliation and sleep deprivation round out the gamut. If pledges even make it to class after staying up all night doing activities that will in no way advance their road to the degree that their parents took out a second mortgage to pay for, they show up looking and smelling like hammered sh!t. How does any of that advance us as a people? It's difficult enough for black folks to matriculate at universities; why make the experience more trying? I get the idea that people should have to earn the right to make it in these organizations, but why via common street gang initiation practices? Hell, force pledges to explain in detail the cosmological argument, beat Guitar Hero World Tour on Expert or watch a 12-hour marathon of the Tyra Banks Show. If I had a frat, I'd let you in for accomplishing cool stuff like that. Dropping people off the top of ladders, feeding them hot water with instructions to vomit in the draws of another and initiating hospital visits is not a good look by any stretch of the imagination. My pops laughs when recalling how he got his ass beat with a paddle by his "big brothers;" but seriously, are we talking about a professional organization or an episode of "Roots"?

In a perfect world, the pledges that endured the abuse would expiate for the actions of their predecessors when it comes to bringing in fresh blood. But of course, everyone feels like they need to make the next man go through the same hell they did; so the cycle continues, resentment grows and the whole brotherhood/sisterhood thing is overshadowed by traumatic memories of how their fellow members almost killed their stupid ass on line. Any NPHC members reading this can spend time trying to convince me of the "depth" behind the process and how I'll never understand as an outsider. But the bottom line remains: if you suffered or administered the indignities of hazing, you know that's not what your organization's founders had in mind, and you can't say a damn thing to me.


Be proud of what you believe in put if you been out of shool more than 5 years stop repping you greek organization like a gang, grow up and get a life.