I guess we need to start over with everything. It's a pretty good compliment. We had nearly 25,000 views and 350 posts on the old thread. I'm sure we can do it again if they don't tear us down. Of course if they do, I'm sure there will be a lot of people who would leave this board.

I've been interested in the changes with the traditional fraternity and the black fraternity. I wonder what the future of black fraternities is going to be when more and more national fraternities are bringing in minority members.

I think to compete, the black fraternities are going to need to begin expanding to more schools. I'm not sure they have the resources. Maybe they will open up and desegregate their fraternities.

In the tradition of the old thread, I wanted to find someone to trade rituals with. Let me know what you have and what you want. u2u me.

[edit on 11-7-2004 by slickwilly95991]

that folks that are not a part of a fraternity seem to feel they are entitled to:

a) Know the secrets of the group
b) comment on the private activities of the group
c) regulate the activities of the group

By what RIGHT does anyone feel they have a claim to know what goes on in a group to which they are not invited or a member?

How much paranoia does it take to screw in a lightbulb? Just because you do not know what is going on behind closed doors does not make what is going on behind them nefarious. Do you swing the doors open to the world on your sexual practices with your wife/significant other? Do you post your checking statements on the internet for the world to peruse? If not, why not?

I do not care what Sigma Chi does... that is between them and their members, and if they want to stand on their heads in a coffin and sing glory be to the highest while holding a cooked turkey... who cares?

As for conspiracies... oooohhhh aaahhhh, key the X Files music.... get a life. The Old Boys network is alive and well, and why not? If I am hiring for a job, I do not see anything wrong with hiring a known quantity. As a Mason, I go out of my way to find a brother providing a service I need, because, I KNOW I CAN TRUST A BROTHER, and since I am contracting the service, I can hire whomever I want.

Can anyone else say they don't? If someone you went to school with was a mechanic and you needed a mechanic... and you could trust the guy, wouldn't you go our of your way to give him your business?

So all this paranoia and sturm und drang is just wasted energy.

slickwilly95991
Whether you or I agree with a decision of ATS administration or not is pretty much irrelelvent. When you joined ATS, you agreed to abide by its rules. While I personally feel the concept of trade secrets for fraternities is simply a smoke screen to avoid embarassment to certain members, if ATS decides not to post the topic, that's perfectly within their right. ATS is not owned by the public. No one on this board has any "rights". We have priviliges granted to us by the owner, nothing more. Some may choose to call this censorship, it's not. Censorship can only be carried out by the state, not an individual or organization. I guess I point this out so that you will not become one of those one-week wonders who jump in with both feet only to be banned quickly for not observing the rules. In any event, I certainly don't think ATS is going to lose any members over this issue as you had indicated.

The concept of this board is to deny ignorance. I find it ignorant that speaking on fraternities is bad, but other things are ok. It does not make any sense.

As for the trade secrets thing....whatever. I'm in a fraternity. I trade rituals to learn and study the esoteric symbols and create a greater understanding of the role fraternities and sororities have made to American culture and American history. I'm sorry if this is a bad thing.

I think I've made enough posts on this board in several different topics to not be considered a one week wonder. I've received several emails about how well discussed my posts have been. Edit the content of a post...fine. But why delete the whole thing. There was decent information in those posts. Positive information on fraternities. Many of which I started. Being a greek man I want to show the positive light from fraternities. ATS I guess feels this is not appropriate unless there is controversy.

Originally posted by slickwilly95991
In the tradition of the old thread, I wanted to find someone to trade rituals with. I have the following:


EDITED


The reason the last topic was removed was because of posts of this nature.

[edit on 11-7-2004 by SimonGray]

If this is the reason things have been edited, why haven't other similar posts below this not been edited and taken off the board?

Sigma Chi secrets, Chi Omega secrets, "Anyone want to trade rituals". All these are still on the board. Seems like hypocrisy to me.

If anyone knows of a board that allows a free discussion on college fraternity and sorority issues (both POSITIVE and negative) let me know.

I think the discussions we had on the old board topic were pretty decent conversations about fraternity issues. But I guess others felt differently, and I wouldn't want our open discussions on the religious aspects of fraternity rituals, or social demographics of national organizations violate some part of the code of conduct.

but if you don't like the policies, go start your own board.

I agreed to abide by the polices of this board when I signed up. This does not grant me a share ownership, it grants me the privledge of posting. Period. Not a vote...

Theron, why have a board on "Secret Societies" if we can talked about the concept of college fraternities? Masons are ok, other organizations are ok, but not fraternities. I'm in a fraternity and I know others would like to discuss the issues.

I regret to see how posting a discussion on social demographics of fraternities violates the terms of membership. Maybe someone could give me a hand on this. I know I have no rights, but I see no violations. Unless the theory that if ATS doesn't like the discussion they can blow it applies. If that's the case, just say, we don't like you guys discussing fraternities. Talk about the masons instead.

I'm tired of arguing about the other thread. If it's ok, I would like the discussion to roll back onto the future of black fraternities. I posted this earlier, and hope our discussion can return to it. With approval of ATS of course.

Originally posted by slickwilly95991
I've been interested in the changes with the traditional fraternity and the black fraternity. I wonder what the future of black fraternities is going to be when more and more national fraternities are bringing in minority members.

I think to compete, the black fraternities are going to need to begin expanding to more schools. I'm not sure they have the resources. Maybe they will open up and desegregate their fraternities.

This may be leading to a whole co-ed greek organization as well. I know there is a sorority on this campus near my town that is not greek but nontheless a sorority that is involved with the Panhellenic council. I do not know what their ritual contains, but they do not have any greek letters in their name. Of course, they are a local organization.

Why do you think black fraternities tend to have better alumni retention than traditional fraternities. I can't remember the exact figures but I remember at one conference someone gave some figures that says the retention of alumni (those who remained involved with the fraternity in some form) for traditional fraternities was about 40-60%. While in black fraternities, their alumni stays around 95% of the time. Those are outstanding numbers. I couldn't imagine what the traditional fraternity would look like if they were able to keep 95% of their members involved throughout the rest of their life.

You could argue that the black fraternity (being racially centered) can better realize the needs of the black students thus giving the black alumni a reason to stick around, while in the traditional fraternity there is so much diversity that for the average student, the fraternity life only lasts 4 years. It's an interesting juxtaposition. I would really like to see what it would be life if traditional fraternities had the black fraternities numbers.

I bet recruitment would be huge. Alumni would be giving more money since there were more of them that dues would go down and money wouldn't be as much as a factor as it is today. More scholarships would be able to be offered. More programs could be established and paid for. It would be awesome to see. What do you think?

I find it discerning that we are supposed to be "Above Top Secret" yet we're not allowed to discuss things because they are too "secretive." seems to me like an oxymoron... oh well... e-mail me at blueagle1829@aol.com to compare views on different fraternity/sorority information. I would say that i have a quite extensive list of rituals to trade, but that wouldnt be true... i find that other rituals are far too secretive for me to study for educational/entertainment purposes. oh well... U2U me or email me....

Ya know I can understand going back and removing any specifics about a fraternity. By that I mean any reference to their grip, signs, letters or whatever. Its one of those things best left unsaid anyway, and for all intents and purposes its just too close to call for the whole court issue. But I have to agree with slick that there was other valuable discussion content that was absolutely wasted by wiping the thread. If its possible to dig up the old posts and just remove the controversial materal I think everyone would be alot happier. Regardless the band marches on and there are plenty of topics left to ponder. Happy posting all.

To reply to your question slick, I think that Black Fraternities and Sororities will be around for years to come. Eventually they will start to get a clue about how the grander scheme of things work in the fraternal world. I also believe that they will have to compete on some level with the white fraternities and sororities in the north more than the south. The culture down here is too old school to allow for much intermingling. Although its sad to say that because I have many black friends that I wouldnt mind calling brother at all, not to mention a few white ones that I wish I didnt have to.

I've never been to the south so I wouldn't know the culture. That does sound sad that differences have subsided after all these years. I knew there was still some animousity, but I thought the younger general (those in college, would have different opinions. Of course, that's probably how southern kids were raised.

I do remember one time at a conference in Texas. I was talking to a freshman chapter president (I know, I couldn't believe it either). He was a little afraid because his chapter had recruited several mexican pledges. He didn't know what the national office would think. He thought he would be told that he had to depledge them. I couldn't believe he was serious. I told him not to worry, but he was still scared. I wish I would have kept in touch to find out what happened to the guy. I know his chapter is still puddling along. Of course when you elect a freshman for president and he hasn't even initiated yet, you're going to have problems.

I think you are right about having to compete with the north. It might actually get pretty bad, I think. I can see a black fraternity getting on the back of a black who pledges with a traditional fraternity. Which in turn will result in less diversity in traditional fraternities which may cause the stereotype of traditional fraternities to be upper class white guys.

Why do you think that it seems to be socially acceptable for black men and women to have their own organizations, i.e. all black fraternities/sororities and what have you, but if there was a faternity that would not admit blacks, or mexicans, or asians simply because they are not white, there would undoubtedly be a cry of racism on the part of the organization? This is a constant source of aggravation for me. I have read several posts on this board where people were up in arms because they thought Freemasonry would not allow blacks to join. I'm pretty sure there are exclusively black lodges, and what's more they actually go so far as to label themselves as "Black Lodges" or something like that. And here we are discussing "Black fraternities and sororities". Why the double standard?

I think any group that restricts membership due to ethnic background is ultimately doomed to fail, be it a college fraternity or whatever the case may be. Just my opinion. It seems a great hypocrisy that whole civil rights movement was about equality for black people, yet it seems (and this is just my opinion base on my experience) alot of them go out of their way to alienate themselves from the society they fought so hard to be accepted in.

Sorry to stray off topic but I think that fratenities/sororities that only accept blacks should be held to the same social standard as fraternities/sororities that only accept whites.

I personally don't think it's right either way, but I do think that the same social stigma should be placed on ANY organization - white, black, yellow, purple or other that limits membership based on race.

Just my $0.02

Hispanic people arent really a problem, I had two pledge brothers who were Hispanic and the best Chapter Pres we ever had was Hispanic. I suppose its more along the lines of everyone just prefers to be with their own down here more than it is any type of racial hatred. We have had plenty of parties where lots of black people were there and we all had a great time. But when it comes to joining another council most just prefer to stay drawn within the lines and just get along with everyone. You will always have your good ole boys who will be hateful just for the purpose of being hatefully stupid but for the most part everyone just gets along and parties together! Ain't America beautiful!

i have a masonic ring that has been handed down to me. ( circa 1940's?)
my ring only has the compass/protractor symbol with the "g" inside it.
what makes mine unusual, is that the compass is taller than the wideth of the protractor. ( unlike the avatar of this symbol above)
when my ring is turned upside-down. it has the perfect likeness of the "goat of mendes". i wouold like to know if this is of any meaning to anyone out there.

Originally posted by dr goodrich
i have a masonic ring that has been handed down to me. ( circa 1940's?)
my ring only has the compass/protractor symbol with the "g" inside it.
what makes mine unusual, is that the compass is taller than the wideth of the protractor. ( unlike the avatar of this symbol above)
when my ring is turned upside-down. it has the perfect likeness of the "goat of mendes". i wouold like to know if this is of any meaning to anyone out there.

Sure, it means you've got a defective ring.