as noted in the daily citizen, one of harding university’s male social clubs has been disbanded for engaging in hazing club-related activities without a sponsor present. the “kappa sigs” are at least temporarily no more. in addition, although the citizen article does not delve too deeply into this, the possibility of an outside investigation has been raised because hazing violates arkansas state law.
perhaps more importantly, in an earlier daily citizen article on the alleged hazing, mention is made of two harding university traditions of which i was unaware. Specifically, “One popular girls club is said to require initiates and members to run bare chested through the property of a private former club member each year. One boys club…has the young men strip naked and leap through a fire in the night.” One popular girls club is said to require initiates and members to run bare chested through the property of a private former club member each year. One boys club…has the young men strip naked and leap through a fire in the night. wow.
three thoughts:
1. i hope the topless girls weren’t my sister’s social club.
2. since i was in school, i never understood why social clubs had to exist and/or be single-sex. all this time, it was totally all about collective nudity. i feel like neo when he found out about the matrix.
3. if masturbation makes you go blind and if joining a sex-segregated social club makes you run around naked, should we not consider telling kids to just have sex and get it over with so that they can get on with their lives? ed.’s note: J / K
ok, so i get the danger of naked boys leaping thru fire (uh, ow!), but what’s up with the girls running topless through some other girl’s back yard? the horrifying possibility of goosebumps? an accidental shower from the sprinkler? where’s the thrill in that??
by kathy—Nov 20, 10:54 PM
Weren’t the Kappa Sigs just coming off of probation in our time there?
As for the titillation factor of the topless runners, I bet the thrill was that it was a violation of the school’s dress code. I can imagine the dormlivers giggling: “Mrs. Gooch would never let us out the door like this!”
by greg—Nov 21, 07:27 AM
We live a block away from several sororities in IC. Every summer herds of young women in sun dresses and heels a walk from one house to the next. From one place where they’re sized up, poked, and prodded to another where they go through the same. For the old men in my church, pledge weeks marks the only time they ever manage to go downtown. But every year I’m always amazed at the inanity of what all these young women are putting themselves through. They’ll claim up and down that the Greeks do good things like service projects, but for many, the service they do is once and done; or they’ll say that the connections they build are good—and perhaps they are; but I still don’t really get it. You can do better service on your own, and you can make better connections by spending your time wisely. When I hear stories like this (once my thinking turns more sober), I always just wonder what it’s all for.
by greg—Nov 21, 10:30 PM
Hmm… I’ve been turning off conversations here for weeks now. Do I smell? You’d tell me, right?
by greg—Nov 22, 08:29 PM
i think this is a case of an illusory correlation: for the last few weeks, the semester has grown progressively more busy and depressing.
all that to say, it’s not you. really. it’s not you…it’s me. i promise. i know you’re sorry and i hear you saying that you’re trying to change…but it’s not you.
by chris—Nov 22, 09:09 PM
I wish I could believe you when I see you say that, but—
But it’s the signs: You don’t call. You don’t write. You don’t even look at me when I say, “Will you pass the beets?”
It’s just been… so… difficult. Can’t you try to understand how I feel?
by greg—Nov 22, 10:44 PM
i must admit, i’ve been seeing others…
i do still love you…i do…
it’s just there are needs…needs to feel validated, to feel loved and accepted…no…it’s not that
it’s that you don’t like the way i…oh, i can’t say it…you don’t like the way i pick my boogers
by hermit x—Nov 22, 10:52 PM
i’ve avoided this one because i pledged a club…granted, the girls in purple divorced us soon after…and by the end of my tenure near the foothills our club had been disbanded…
oh, it’s not that the guys who were a year or two ahead of us didn’t try to save the club…it’s just that i didn’t care…and aparently all my friends in the club…who were my friends before (i promise, i do, they were)...none of us cared and our proud historic club withered away on the vine
by hermit x—Nov 22, 10:56 PM
That, I think, is a prouder story than mine—I had no interest in pledging. My indifference was simply to live and let live. You, on the other hand, by joining did something I couldn’t do. You actually killed a social club. Wow. That’s really, really impressive.
P.S. How many ways are there to pick boogers?
by greg—Nov 23, 05:59 AM
i am grateful for social clubs to the extent that they provide good examples for my courses (ingroup bias, hazing, homoeroticism…j/k on the last one).
by chris—Nov 23, 08:06 AM
come on…it’s not that much of joke…clubs are all homosocial pathology
by hermit x—Nov 23, 09:38 AM
gosh, thanks greg…it’s actually just a story of apathy…though i must admit, the day was informed that we were dead i felt a little proud.
i’m actually surprised that they let me in…i spent the entire pledge night mocking them and the exercise.
by hermit x—Nov 23, 09:50 AM
My roommate was very, very aggravated when he didn’t get into TNT and had to settle for either his second or third choice, which as I understood it was a favorite of CS majors. He didn’t let his disappointment show very much, although for most of his freshman & soph years he had a real hard time getting a date for their functions. It wasn’t him—well, some of it was him—it was that his club just didn’t get good press. I don’t even remember the name of it.
It was/is in that respect that those clubs or the Greek system in general are cancerous. Although it’s less pronounced on a 20,000 student campus than on a 5,000-student one like Harding. They reinforce too many ill-formed notions of what and who people are or should be.
That’s also why it’s so impressive to have killed one. (Caveat: it’s not impressive to kill a club by way of 1) poisoning one of your members with alcohol; or 2) exploiting your friends by filming sex orgies.)
by greg—Nov 23, 10:01 AM
happy turkey day to one and all…
or as one of the professors at the very, very posh HS i spoke at calls it…happy blood-bath day…or happy massacre day…he is not refering to the 45 million turkeys slaughtered for this day of feasting…but the indians whose land the europeans robbed.
by hermit x—Nov 23, 11:54 AM
happy massacre day! i like that! greg and i were just wondering how we might subvert the traditional thanksgiving family traditions when we (ever?) have our own little mind(s) to shape, mold, and otherwise educate/corrupt.
not that our parents/grandparents/aunts/uncles/cousins wouldn’t be horrified enough just to see the tofurkey roll out of the kitchen for dinner…
by kathy—Nov 23, 05:19 PM