Coming from Columbia, I don't have much familiarity with Greek life. In fact, I don't have much familiarity with campus life in general (there's frisbee, right?). But apparently at some schools, like Dartmouth, being in a fraternity or sorority can mean the difference between an enjoyable college experience and whatever it is everyone else is doing when they're not wishing they were in a fraternity or sorority. In a Monday Op-Ed piece in the Daily Dartmouth, Sam Buntz, Dartmouth '11, addresses the fate of the 24% of rushees shunned by campus sororities.

A Greek-affiliated senior girl once told me that the meetings where they determine who they want to let in are “the cattiest things imaginable,” and the discussion focuses mainly on looks and clothing. Face it: Sorority rush is just a somewhat more refined version of neighborhood kids not letting other, less-cool neighborhood kids into their totally sweet treehouse. More local sororities would solve this problem, but only in the same way that a greater proliferation of treehouses would solve the analogous one.

I never had a treehouse. Now I'm really beginning to feel left out. After the jump, Buntz explains the upside to not having friends to hang out with or parties to go to. Read the rest of this entry »

Enraged estrogen came to a boil yesterday when 200 angry Dartmouth ladies took to the streets of Hanover to protest sorority Alpha Xi Delta's eviction at the hands of rowdy frat Beta Theta Pi. Following decampment in 1996 for racist, homophobic, and criminally violent behavior, the Betas' history gets complicated and all, you know, Greek to me, so here's Dartmouth correspondent Ben O'Donnell with all the tawdry deets.

As any red-blooded administration-hater at Dartmouth will tell you, nine years ago the authority figures tried to take away that which is most precious to us students: our Greek houses.  The plan was jettisoned after students and alumni brought to the administration's attention how lame ice cream socials and movie nights are, but many still harbored suspicions of an anti-Greek conspiracy.

The administration's news a few days ago took those suspicions, poisoned them, shot them repeatedly, beat them with clubs as they attempted to stagger away in escape, and threw them into the ice-covered Neva River.  The headline in The D might have read "Awesome Frat to Return to Campus," and, indeed, some may have received the news of Beta Theta Pi's impending reinstatement that way. 

Many students, however, have been tripping over their retro-'80s sneakers with the neon laces in their rush to condemn the administration's decision, and I'm not just talking about the half with the two X chromosomes and sometimes questionable interpretations of the concept of "fun."  Because, of course, there's much more to this story, which has a "permanently" derecognized jock frat moving back into the house its alumni still own and kicking out the sorority that leases the house in the process.

After the jump, the Dick and Jane version of the story, in which Dick is a network of twelve hundred well-connected and deep-pocketed ex-frat boys who passed their time at Dartmouth beating up other dudes and shouting at gays, and Jane is a beleaguered sorority widely viewed on campus as pretty OK.  

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Dartmouth in the summer must be a lonely, spooky place. According to Hampshire lore, when a heat wave breaks through Hanover, the sycamores and oaks of the forest speak these words to obnoxious frat boys: "Harass Kappa Kappa Gamma... Call them bitches and whores... Beware... Beware!"

Last Wednesday night, the brothers of Theta Delta Chi heeded Ancient Master Oak's advice. Quoth The Dartmouth:

Wednesday night around 9:30 p.m., a group of Kappa Kappa Gamma sorority members going to Theta Delta Chi fraternity were met at the back door of the fraternity by its members shouting slurs and throwing items in their direction from the windows above them. The Kappa members were on their way to a prearranged, private function they were to hold in Theta Delt's basement.

In an e-mail to five of the other six Dartmouth sorority presidents, Kappa President Amanda Young '09 described the scene and called for a Theta Delt boycott for the term:

We arrived at TDX tonight at 9:30, the time we had agreed upon to arrive, and were treated worse than I could have ever imagined. We all walked up and boys came pouring out of the windows, the doors, the woods, yelling obscenities at us. We are women. We deserve to be treated with more respect. The words, "bitch" and "whore" were yelled in every sentence. These are guys who we thought were friends of ours. We were proven wrong. Following the screaming, they proceeded on to trash their basement and tip over all pong tables. The state that the basement was in when we entered was atrocious.

Young told The Dartmouth that she was "pleased with Theta Delt's behavior" the next day; the two might learn to love again, she said, but it "depends on the continued response."

Theta Delt, which has a recent history of harassment issues, wants the Greek community to know their side of the story. Frat President Ben Beisswenger '09, after covering his own ass by saying he "was in his room and did not personally witness the events in question," attributes his frat's behavior to the tense meetings they had held beforehand:

"The guys were all hyped-up and very testosterone-filled," [Beisswenger] said. "It was an atmosphere before any of this happened and a lot of guys didn't even know [the girls] were there."

Hmm... At least it's better than "Those Kappa sluts must all be on their periods and shit."

After the jump, Amanda Young's full letter to other sorority heads.

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