24. These Guys Like It Greek Style

Well, it’s hump day or Wednesday or whatever you call it, but where I live, after the University opens, they call it Wild Wednesday.

That means certain bars offer one dollar beers to students and probably do not really check their IDs or are very forgiving of the fake ones. I picked up several carloads of students from one such establishment and took them back to their dorms.

They tried to pack in 6 to 7 people into my car and I told them “No. Four is my limit”.

They pleaded with me. One young lady even offered me $20 if I would allow two extra people to cram in. 

“Against the rules,” I reiterated. “If I lose my job, you think that twenty will cover my bills? Or if we get in an accident because there are too many people in my car…?”

They were annoyed, probably because I sounded like a parent. I’m imagining I will not get many stars from them, but they limited themselves to the four-person per ride. Since they had more people, they should’ve ordered the XL ride. But I’m guessing they didn’t want to pay the extra. Probably would have cost them $20 more.

But the story I am going to tell tonight does not deal with the crowds of unhappy college students trying to get themselves a discounted ride. Tonight’s ride share involves two gentlemen from the Greek system who sat in the back of my car for 20 minutes and discussed what the Greek system means to them, what their fraternities will be doing this semester, and how misogynistic the Greek system actually is at the university here. 

First, they discussed the differences of how their fraternity handles rush. One frat seems to take joy in the punishment and hazing of their pledges, making sure that they would come out as top material for their house after enduring weeks of torture. The other said that grades were the most important thing for their pledges to maintain and so they were told to have a hands-off policy of their pledges Monday through Thursday.

The other man scoffed and said, “We never have a hands-off period. But if they get below a grade point average of 2.75, they will be kicked out.

The other one said that their house had the same GPA rule. The one from the more sadistic house talked about how he loved being a pledge and he would do it all over again if he could because it taught him responsibility and he just had a lot of fun with the things they made him do. Soooooo much drinking! Oh boy!

(Side note: later on in this story, you will see how he is such a responsible member of his fraternity)

The discussion of their pledges and of the upcoming rush evolved into what their frats were planning for the semester. They discussed how magnificent the houses their frats had were and those brothers that lived in the house were the alpha males on campus. They were two such individuals and enjoyed all the privileges that come with being a member of their particular fraternity. They both beamed with pride about how great their fraternities were.

They talked about some of the other frats, referring to them as the “nerd frats” that they got to do all the hard work in the Greek system. The “cool” frats had all the seats on the council while the “nerd” frats did all the work. This was straight out of an 80’s movie and I wouldn’t have believed it if I hadn’t been listening. The funny thing is, the guy who was from the violent frat looked like a total geek and I pictured him being let into that frat because they needed to raise their GPA or he was a legacy.

Then they started discussing events at the fraternity, particularly formal events. Apparently, their dates for all events must be vetted by the other brothers in the fraternity. Only nines and tens are allowed to be dates. Anything below that is not acceptable.

The sadist nerd asked the other one if his frat required that the dates actually be “involved” with the fraternity member.

He replied “Oh, yes. You can’t bring a girl just because she’s hot if there is no connection.”

The sadist said that was not such a big deal at his fraternity. The girls just needed to be supe- hot.

The other one explained that this was to prevent other brothers from making moves on their brothers’ dates.

The violent nerd then said, “Oh, our fraternity did that does that all the time. We’re always fucking each others dates. The last formal I went to I actually slept with the vice president’s date. I don’t think he knows. And I’m not going to tell him. But it’s not against the rules.”

See how he has learned so much about responsibility? 

They went on to discuss the caliber of ladies that are allowed to be associated with their fraternity and which sorority had that level of a girl that was allowed to be invited to their events.

Every time I have given members from one of the Greek organizations at the University a ride and listen to their discussions, I am more and more disgusted. I keep hoping to hear a positive discussion about the good activities the fraternity does for the community or how they help raise money for the poor or that they help at an orphanage on weekends. But it just seems like the fraternities here are all a bunch of immature boys who judge girls on their looks, see how wasted they can get, maintain the lowest GPA that will keep them in the frat, and work on how abusive they can be towards their pledges.

 

Is this really what it means to be in the Greek system?