341–350 of 402 posts
Don't blame the administrators. They have simply given the students exactly what the students wanted.
I spent 3 years living in one of the co-ops briefly mentioned in the article ("In 2013, the administration took over the student-run anarchist house and painted over the old murals."). I wouldn't call it an "anarchist house" but it sure as hell was a lot of fun to live there. I painted some of those murals that are now apparently gone. We built a giant illegal loft in our room to make it two stories (which we would d…
I was in the co-ops and also a frat in the early 2010's. I knew about XOX, SAE, and KA but not theta delt or sigma chi -- let alone french house, slav, haus mitt, or casa italiana. Aside from undergrads, the school will miss out, too -- my pledge class founded thirteen companies in the few years after graduation, and I hired several friends from EBF for my own -- but the administration will probably never realize wha…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
>They can't even organize around a common interest unless it passes some bureaucrat's standard of diversity? At what point do we admit that the people who cried slippery slope and said this power would just be used as a cudgel for their bureaucrats to enforce whims they could not otherwise justify were right?
Does it matter? We’re at least a generation away from the pendulum swinging back.
Long-gone graduates mourn the loss, but I think the student body is cloaked in the righteousness of their culture-less confinement.
In fairness, this sort of transformation has taken place in every station of American life. My dweeb chemist parents regularly hosted and attended parties with their dweeb chemist colleauges. My wife and I have hosted 3 parties in the last 17 years. We had to fight for the modicum of freedom our kids had growing up. Our oldest now has a car but his licence forbids him taking friends along.[1] Our youngest built his f…
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Meanwhile, the coop system at Berkeley is alive and well.
God bless the USCA (or BSC, or whatever they call it now). It breaks my heart that other students don’t have that opportunity for community. It’s not for everyone, but by far the most interesting years of my life were living in the Berkeley coops 2002-2005.
[0]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barrington_Hall_(Berkeley,_Cal...
In fairness, this sort of transformation has taken place in every station of American life. My dweeb chemist parents regularly hosted and attended parties with their dweeb chemist colleauges. My wife and I have hosted 3 parties in the last 17 years. We had to fight for the modicum of freedom our kids had growing up. Our oldest now has a car but his licence forbids him taking friends along.[1] Our youngest built his f…
Freedom is wonderful because you can go out and build what you want to see more of in the world. Chances are, if you're missing "third places" in your life, then other people are. Or, just as likely, there is a reason you gave it up, and maybe you weren't aware of the trade-offs at the time, and now it's time to correct it. Universities are (somewhat) unique in that they are microcosms, with very central control over…
Denver is a very outdoor oriented place, so most of our "3rd places" are literally carved into nature. Pick just about any outdoor sport here, and there will be a group that will happily take you in. Even if you aren't in a group there's a certain community all around liking to go outside. We also have a ton of other "3rd places" like Microbreweries, bars, etc.
Miami is a very different place, very very different. I visited my friend there and the culture I got at least was that people just liked to party. The clubs there would open at 10:30PM and close Noon the next day. Overall very fun place, part of the fun was seeing just how different people were. The folks I met there couldn't believe that I didn't find clubs all that fun and I couldn't believe that they didn't find hiking and camping fun. There was this mutual respect there that we were just very different people and sorted ourselves appropriately.
I totally understand the feeling if you live outside of these areas that have a ton of "3rd places" where options like this might not exist. I used to live in a place pretty devoid of "3rd places" that I liked, so I moved to a place where I liked the "3rd places" better.
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I was in the co-ops and also a frat in the early 2010's. I knew about XOX, SAE, and KA but not theta delt or sigma chi -- let alone french house, slav, haus mitt, or casa italiana. Aside from undergrads, the school will miss out, too -- my pledge class founded thirteen companies in the few years after graduation, and I hired several friends from EBF for my own -- but the administration will probably never realize wha…
Isn't that pretty much definition of nepotism? Those jobs would go to someone , they wont disappear out of economy. However, they should go to "the best person for the company" rather then the school friend. I can understand giving jobs and promotions to friends, it is tempting. I am surprise over it being treated as a "something to strive for".
I think what gets missed about greek life in general is that its just a group of students. It's not inherently more dangerous or not than any other group of college age students. In my experiences in undergrad, organizations like club rugby or even the marching band were where you seriously got hazed or had risky partying going on. Greek parties in contrast were regulated. Representatives from the interfraternity cou…
The logic makes perfect sense from one line of thinking, but it's stupid because it overlooks the benefits of these places. I almost can't describe why they are beneficial, part of it is the community and part of it is just having to deal with problems and conflict.
I look at greek life as "partially structured community building". This is where a university gives you a piece of land and a building, some funding, and tells the students to figure the rest out with a framework to guide them. Inevitably there will be messy moments, but that's kind of the point, because greek life is basically a giant class on figuring out life. You drink on a tuesday afternoon on the front lawn when you're a greek so you can realize that's not a worthwhile thing to do as an adult.
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> Communal living houses (“co-ops”) encouraged casual nudity, while fraternities threw a raucous annual “Greek Week” If the access to professional social network requires participation in the above, then I see why people see issue with that. In an ideal world, your professional future would not be dependent on your willingness to walk around naked or your enjoyment of raucous party. (Neither should damage your future…
Meritocracy isn't real. It's a nice ideal but it isn't real.
Are you claiming that each individual's capabilities are the same as everyone else's?
The amount of control American universities exercise over their students is mind-boggling to me. I went to Uppsala University in Sweden, which has a rich and varied student life. But none of that has anything to do with the University (any of them, there are 3 in town). The universities provide education, period. Housing is not run by the University, and it certainly has nothing to do with student social life. What s…
Technically nothing, but often times its funding. If it's a university sponsored club, the school will give you money in certain cases. Often times students rely on that money to keep the club going, depending on what they do.