An article in the IDS last week, “Another Drunken Saturday,”
has received a lot of attention for being inflammatory toward the Greek system.
It wasn’t. This will be.
A gross example of obstruction of justice occurred last
week. Here are the facts.
An article ran in the IDS detailing the Saturday morning of
an Indiana University student. The student was under-age and a member of a
sorority. The article showed her consumption of alcohol, both within the
context of fraternities and also at family tailgates.
Here is the reaction. The Greek system responded with a
twitter campaign, meant to show the great things that members of the
fraternities and sororities across campus do, both for one another and for the
university as a whole.
The problem is that the members of the Greek system decided
to make the article about them, rather than about the social issue that the
writer raises. Drinking culture is deeply ingrained in the IU community. Anyone
who goes here knows that drinking is not only popular, but in many cases is a
social expectation. An exposé
meant to shed light on the situation of excessive drinking, both underage and
otherwise, is something that was not only well done by the writer, but also
incredibly important and necessary for the community as a whole, not just the
Greek community.
Indiana University has focused an incredible amount of
attention in recent weeks to the way alcohol is handled on campus, especially
in response to two freshmen who, earlier in the semester, died, seemingly from
alcohol related incidences. The Greek system has been very responsive to this,
attempting to limit the amount of hard alcohol permitted at their parties, and
other self-imposed restrictions. But their biggest opportunity to come out
looking like they cared about the safety of not only their people but also the
college as a whole resulted in a sad dropping of the ball.
Instead of accepting the article for what it was, the Greek
community decided that it was a personal attack. The IDS was accused of being
anti-Greek. While the Opinions staff has had something of a history of coming
out against fraternity and sorority life, the news and features departments
don’t really have the vehicles with which to be overtly biased. This argument
blames the newspaper, rather than the reaction to it.
It is also important to note the distinction between the
Greek system and its members. When saying that there is a drinking problem
within the Greek system, that does not automatically infer that every member of
every house is a raging alcoholic. It simply means that, as a collective body,
the organization as a whole does not do nearly enough to promote healthy and
safe alcohol consumption.
All too common this week has been the notion of “I know tons
of really great people in the Greek system.” By saying this, people are not
helping to dissuade the stereotype. It is, rather, perpetuating the notion that
those two things are mutually exclusive, which was never addressed. Whether
they would like to believe it or not, drinking is most definitely a piece of
what fraternities and sororities do. It is not who they are, though. Instead of
jumping to remind everyone of that, the organization should own up, appreciate
what the article was trying to say, and do what it can to help the university
improve.
The newspaper article last week had the potential to open a
lot of eyes to the scary drinking activities that go too far on this campus. It
had the opportunity to raise awareness of just how wide-spread an issue this
is. It had the chance to cause a very real change for the better in the way we
understand drinking on our campus. Instead, it was turned into an opportunity
for hurt feelings and hostility.
Members of the Greek system are extremely embarrassed after
the article. And they should be. But they are embarrassed for the wrong
reasons.
