From: kristyp@coos.dartmouth.edu (Kristy Patterson)
Newsgroups: soc.college
Subject: Re: Frats
Date: 5 Nov 92 19:20:29 GMT
Organization: Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH

In article <4ey_LV600WB=EWT3FQ@andrew.cmu.edu> es2q+@andrew.cmu.edu (Erik Warren Selberg) writes:
>The exclusion of women into a fraternity (and similarly the exclusion
>of men in a sorority) is the belief that the close interaction with
>women among the brothers will cause friction between them and thus
>provide a detrement (sp) to brotherhood. What it all comes down to is
>if you allow women as brothers, you'll have them going out with other
>members of the house, and then you'll have them break up with other
>members of the house and start going out with yet a different member
>of the house. This tends to put brothers at each others' throats,
>which tends to be bad.
>
>Granted, I'm sure that lots of people in co-ed fraternities (and other
>folks as well) will say that there shouldn't be a problem; but on a
>global level, this tends to be the case: in an organization dedicated
>to male bonding, women screw things up.

Judging from these paragraphs, you appear to have no concept of what a coed
fraternal (for lack of a gender-neutral term) organization is at all.  You say
that the fundamental purpose of your organization is male bonding, and that
women would screw it up if they were allowed to join.  But if they were, male
bonding wouldn't be the purpose of the house any more.  You seem to be
envisioning a house in which the brothers are still the foundation, and the
few token women are there to date the brothers, and that the problem with this
would be "[putting] the brothers at each others' throats."  Well, in a coed
house, women are full members, not play-toys of the brothers.  Inter-house
relationships can, of course, cause problems, but the sole problem is NOT
that it puts the men at each others' throats.  Try imagining a house where
the men and women are EQUAL.  The women aren't little sisters, and the
men aren't the "real" members.

>[anti-flame shield up]

This wasn't meant as a flame, necessarily, but you really don't seem to have
a clue as to what coed houses are about.

>The basic reason I don't want women in my fraternity is I don't see
>my house (or the Greek system, or for that matter 90% of college
>students) as being mature enough to deal with close relationships very
>well. I doubt very much if these are the same reasons for excluding
>blacks / Jews / pre-Law people, etc. However, I do see these reasons
>as being used for justification for some fraternities to exclude gays
>/ lesbians [incidentally, my house doesn't (we did pledge at least one
>gay member), but I don't know what kind of reaction we would have if a
>brother started dating a brother].

And how do you expect anyone to gain the maturity to deal with relationships
if they don't experience them?  My house has had LOTS of great internal
relationships and LOTS of nasty breakups, heterosexual and homosexual. Some
people didn't think it was wise to get involved with others in the house,
while others had several relationships with other members in the course of
their college years.  Whatever you think of this personally, I can honestly
say that I think EVERYONE in the house had at least vicarious experience
dealing with close relationships, on the whole more than other students.

>Erik

-Kristy
-- 
   +==========================+============================================+
   |Kristy Patterson          |"One more date and we would have had a Greek|
   |kristyp@mac.dartmouth.edu |tragedy on our hands."     -Jeffrey Anderson|
   +==========================+============================Soapdish========+
Newsgroups: soc.college