# Frat boys



## 32rollandrock (May 1, 2008)

I was never big on fraternities (and the feeling may have been mutual), but this strikes me as strange: https://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/23/...-region&region=bottom-well&WT.nav=bottom-well

It seems to me that you deal with problematic fraternities by shutting them down, not by expanding membership.


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## WouldaShoulda (Aug 5, 2009)

Article~


> Phoebe Bodkin, a Wesleyan sophomore, said she thought it would be beneficial if men and women were *forced* to interact socially as housemates, "not only in a drunken, prowling setting."


This one has caught on!!


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## SG_67 (Mar 22, 2014)

The entire institution is somewhat arcane and I'm really surprised it's still around.


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## eagle2250 (Mar 24, 2006)

More than 46 years back, as a college freshman, coming from a small central Pennsylvania town and having lived an admittedly sheltered life, I participated in several fraternity rush activities at which I witnessed such acts of juvenile debauchery that it turned me off on fraternities. I am honestly surprised that we do not see more reports such as those described in the article to which the OP refers.


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## WouldaShoulda (Aug 5, 2009)

My experience was opposite.

Freshman dorm was such a horror, I escaped to the relative sanctity of a fraternity house that included more responsible upperclassmen as well as a never ending kegerator!!


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## Chouan (Nov 11, 2009)

What you are all describing appears to be a purely American institution. No criticism intended, just an observation.


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## SG_67 (Mar 22, 2014)

Chouan said:


> What you are all describing appears to be a purely American institution. No criticism intended, just an observation.


Yes it is. Isn't there something analogous to this in the English schools; Oxford and Cambridge? Members of a certain house or collegiate organization?


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## Chouan (Nov 11, 2009)

SG_67 said:


> Yes it is. Isn't there something analogous to this in the English schools; Oxford and Cambridge? Members of a certain house or collegiate organization?


No. School Houses, where residential, are fairly strictly controlled by live-in House Masters. University Colleges are more administrative and sporting organisations. Some, certainly in Cambridge are accommodation for students, like Halls of Residence in other institutions, with individual rooms, common rooms, bars, dining rooms (Hall), kitchens and washing facilities. But they aren't what I understand to be Fraternities. The College that I attended at Cambridge, for example, has currently 600 students living in halls, that is within the College itself. 
For example, I lived in the dormer room, the window half visible to the right of the chimney stack to right centre of the picture below. Nothing like a Fraternity House, I would imagine.


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## SG_67 (Mar 22, 2014)

^ I guess what I meant is that it is a source of identification for a particular student. The Oxbridge student can say I'm with such and such house. Is that a common association that students make? 

I realize that the physical characteristics may be different. I guess I'm referring more to the psycho-social aspect.


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## WouldaShoulda (Aug 5, 2009)

(From the Trad thread)

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/...ools-1980s-revealed-charming-photographs.html

Cripes, the whole school is a Frat!!


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## SG_67 (Mar 22, 2014)

^ Those pictures look like they belong in an Abercrombie catalogue.


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## WouldaShoulda (Aug 5, 2009)

SG_67 said:


> ^ Those pictures look like they belong in an Abercrombie catalogue.


Especially this one...


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## SG_67 (Mar 22, 2014)

Yeah...that one was disturbing.


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## Chouan (Nov 11, 2009)

SG_67 said:


> ^ I guess what I meant is that it is a source of identification for a particular student. The Oxbridge student can say I'm with such and such house. Is that a common association that students make?
> 
> I realize that the physical characteristics may be different. I guess I'm referring more to the psycho-social aspect.


No. Houses are subdivisions of schools. Colleges are subdivisions of universities. Some universities anyway. The photo I showed was my College. Although I attended the University, that was the College that I was a Member of, where I socialised, ate, drank, lived, for a while and played sports, and for which I had the honour of representing in rowing (8, bow). Members, obviously, had a socially cohesive commonality; their College is there home, sort of, even when living out. However, I studied with people from other Colleges.
Langham would be able to tell you more about Houses in boarding schools.
The link is to an online article in the Daily Heil's women section; That particular example of what could loosely be called popular news media, loves that kind of thing, as part of it's vaguely lower middle class deference to one's betters ethos.


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## Earl of Ormonde (Sep 5, 2008)

The presence of young women will force some respect into the boys that need it, as well as an extra dose of maturity for all of them. All male school environments are unhealthy and unsafe.


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## Shaver (May 2, 2012)

Earl of Ormonde said:


> The presence of young women will force some respect into the boys that need it, as well as an extra dose of maturity for all of them. *All male school environments are unhealthy and unsafe*.


Mine certainly was.


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## WouldaShoulda (Aug 5, 2009)

Earl of Ormonde said:


> The presence of young women will* force *some respect into the boys that need it, as well as an extra dose of maturity for all of them. All male school environments are unhealthy and unsafe.


Yeah, that'll learn 'em!!


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## Langham (Nov 7, 2012)

Chouan said:


> > Langham will be able to tell you all about British Army Officer shoes, as he was one. ...
> 
> 
> Are you saying I was once a shoe?
> ...


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## Chouan (Nov 11, 2009)

Langham said:


> Chouan said:
> 
> 
> > Are you saying I was once a shoe?
> ...


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## phyrpowr (Aug 30, 2009)

Earl of Ormonde said:


> The presence of young women will force some respect into the boys that need it, as well as an extra dose of maturity for all of them. All male school environments are unhealthy and unsafe.


We _are_ still talking about adolescent males here, aren't we?


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## Langham (Nov 7, 2012)

Chouan said:


> Sorry, I assumed it to have been residential. My own grammar school was described interestingly, in an article in the Sunday Times some years ago by an old boy (Mick Jagger) as having a culture of violence, in every direction. Masters' violence towards boys, boys' merciless ragging of teachers, and violence between the boys themselves.


Wasn't that Dartford?

I think violence was the norm at most schools when I grew up.


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## Chouan (Nov 11, 2009)

Langham said:


> Wasn't that Dartford?
> 
> I think violence was the norm at most schools when I grew up.


It was indeed. "Florea Dartfordia" was the school song (we used to sing it on Founders' Day) and the uplifting school motto was "Ora et Labora"....


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## JLibourel (Jun 13, 2004)

Earl of Ormonde said:


> The presence of young women will force some respect into the boys that need it, as well as an extra dose of maturity for all of them. All male school environments are unhealthy and unsafe.


Oh rubbish! My happiest and best memories are of my times in all-male institutions--my old prep school and Balliol College, Oxford. Unfortunately, both now admit females. "Women spoil everything they touch," as one member of my family once remarked. The presence of young females is highly distracting and disruptive to the educational process, and the elimination of sexual rivalry creates a much better sense of brotherly camaraderie. Some of my best friends want nothing to do with our prep school since it admitted girls. It is certainly a very different sort of institution now...and not to my liking.


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## Shaver (May 2, 2012)

JLibourel said:


> Oh rubbish! My happiest and best memories are of my times in all-male institutions--my old prep school and Balliol College, Oxford. Unfortunately, both now admit females. "Women spoil everything they touch," as one member of my family once remarked. The presence of young females is highly distracting and disruptive to the educational process, and the elimination of sexual rivalry creates a much better sense of brotherly camaraderie. Some of my best friends want nothing to do with our prep school since it admitted girls. It is certainly a very different sort of institution now...and not to my liking.


Ummm.... I attended an all boys college and sexual rivalry was hardly eliminated.

'Women spoil everything they touch' though? Gosh! I hope not for I am quite fond of those portions of my anatomy which I am given to encourage them to touch.


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## WouldaShoulda (Aug 5, 2009)

JLibourel said:


> Some of my best friends want nothing to do with our prep school since it admitted girls. It is certainly a very different sort of institution now...and not to my liking.


Should I mention our military academies or would that really set you off??


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## Earl of Ormonde (Sep 5, 2008)

JLibourel said:


> *Oh rubbish!* My happiest and best memories are of my times in all-male institutions--my old prep school and Balliol College, Oxford. Unfortunately, both now admit females. "*Women spoil everything they touch*," as one member of my family once remarked. The presence of young females is highly distracting and disruptive to the educational process, *and the elimination of sexual rivalry creates a much better sense of brotherly camaraderie.* *Some of my best friends want nothing to do with our prep school since it admitted girls.* It is certainly a very different sort of institution now...and not to my liking.


Well all I can say to that is, Oh rubbish! And good luck with your female-hating friends. Glad I don't have any friends that hate women.


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## WouldaShoulda (Aug 5, 2009)

Earl of Ormonde said:


> Glad I don't have any friends that hate women.







That you, Spanky??


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## Chouan (Nov 11, 2009)




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## JLibourel (Jun 13, 2004)

Earl of Ormonde said:


> Well all I can say to that is, Oh rubbish! And good luck with your female-hating friends. Glad I don't have any friends that hate women.


I take it, then, that all your friends are unmarried.


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## Acct2000 (Sep 24, 2005)

This is enough - - even for the interchange.


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