Adam Oakes, 19, died on February 27, 2021. Stone Foltz, 20, died on March 7, 2021. Neither had Covid. Both were white males. Both are in the news this week because their parents are pushing for accountability. What happened to them? Fraternity hazing. Yes, even in the midst of a pandemic, frat parties are still a thing. Both young men, along with many other potential new members, were pushed to drink way too much alcohol. Their parents and some schools and organizations want the individuals involved charged with murder and other serious crimes. Surely this time things will change?
No, things will not change. Tragically, I don’t believe that hazing deaths will decrease until our culture changes. I remember fraternity hazing deaths in the news back when I was a child — I’m now 60. I asked Mom, she remembers fraternity hazing deaths in the news back when she was a child — she’s now almost 90. So I looked into the history of hazing more fully. Hazing deaths in the United States go back to at least 1737. [Trigger warning: The link contains details of harassment, bullying, and worse.] The vast majority have been young men joining fraternities, or new students joining particular classes, but there have also been incidents in the military, sports teams, and the first one was in the Masons. Deaths have been caused by a variety of reasons, not only too much drinking. There have also been a few women who died from hazing at sororities; although the numbers are much, much lower than the numbers of men who have died, the humiliations sometimes might even seem worse. [Trigger warning: The link contains details of harassment, bullying, and worse.]
Whenever these deaths happen, everyone involved makes the appropriate noises and takes some appropriate, if inadequate, action. Certainly, our “boys will be boys” culture has left a lot of young bullies without accountability for very serious crimes, and that needs to change. We see that repeatedly when young women are attacked by young men, don’t we? And it looks like the girls want to imitate the toxic male culture in their own in-groups. Certainly individual and organizationally-backed bullies need to be charged with the serious crimes they have committed and face the consequences. It should be noted, though, that many a fraternity and sorority have been banned from many campuses and delisted from national organizations. They just set up informal frats off campus, and the illegal (most being below legal drinking age) partying and hazing continue. And imprisoning the worst of the bullies leaves about 74 million more for the next time. Whilst individual accountability and criminal charges would be great, overall nothing will change unless we change the culture.
What causes this intractable problem, in my opinion, is this persistent notion that young people somehow do not deserve success unless they prove themselves to be “elite”. They need to prove their worthiness, their toughness, to be “acceptable”. Despite our nods to a “classless society” without royalty, we persist in breaking down to in-groups and out-groups, those “with class” and those “without,” to congregate in close-knit groups who can count on each other (as long as nothing goes too horribly wrong) and who not only keep those who are "out" at arm’s length, but actively look down upon and sneer at the “non-elite”. Membership with in-groups can even be the key to getting good jobs, business loans, and other assets that make a “good life” in America.
So how do we combat this toxic elitism? It’s not only targeting women and minorities and those who are “different”. It’s even killing young white men. I don’t ultimately have any answers other than to combat classism wherever we find it. But maybe it will help a little if more people know, hazing deaths didn’t happen for the first time earlier this year, they happened well before you ever first heard about them. They are not a symptom of the pandemic, nor particular colleges nor organizations, nor male-only, nor Democrat versus Republican, nor the breakdown of the American family, nor the decline of Christianity, nor a harbinger of the End Times. They are a symptom of something much deeper, more widespread, more historic, more systemic, and much harder to root out. Also, for all our sakes, teach your kids to resist peer pressure and to be responsible bystanders. This is an age-old problem, so we're probably not going to solve it this week. Nevertheless, please discuss in the Comments.
In Other News
Violence
NEW YORKER on Dehumanizing of Asian Women www.newyorker.com/…
A Minnesota court bizarrely overturns a rape conviction, ruling that intercourse with a drunk, unconscious woman isn't rape because she drank the alcohol voluntarily.
The problem is not just MN. We need stronger laws nationwide. From the link:
Minnesota is among a majority of states that treat intoxication as a barrier to consent only if the victim became drunk against their will. As of 2016, intoxication provisions in 40 states did not include situations where someone chose to consume drugs or alcohol, according to Brooklyn Law Review.
-snip-
Of the nearly 10 million U.S. women who have been raped while intoxicated, according to background in the court opinion, Moller said most become drunk by choice. She pointed to Khalil’s case to argue that some alleged offenders seek to prey on people in that kind of condition.
Of course they do!
Trevor Noah video: Violence Against Women & Why It's Up To Men To Stop It :
By changing young people's attitudes, we can tackle violence against women: “The school workshops I run have shown me that damaging attitudes towards sex, gender and equality start early” — Cordelia Morrison
https://www.theguardian.com/…
Just write STOP: The teenager helping Polish women flee abuse
Schoolgirl’s fake cosmetics site helps hundreds of women as domestic violence rises during Covid
https://www.theguardian.com/…
Self Defense
Model mugging has a weekend course in the Los Angeles area in April and May http://modelmugging.org/…
She fought off her attacker. Love it! She's also donating her whole GoFundMe, about a million, to address Asian racism "because it's not just about her". My new hero! 75-yo-Chinese-woman-who-fought-off-attacker-in-SF-to-give-$900-000-GoFundMe-to-combat-racism.
Peace
When I think of the Vietnam war two pictures come to mind, the picture of a little girl on fire from napalm running down a street, and the Kent State photo. This is about the little girl who has grown up and become an advocate for peace and for victims of serious burns.
https://www.facebook.com/…
Sports
CNBC: Congress wants answers from NCAA after weight room disparity at women's basketball tournament
Led by U.S. Rep. Mikie Sherrill, D-N.J., 36 members of Congress wrote to NCAA President Mark Emmert seeking answers for last week’s weight room disparity in San Antonio, the site of the women’s Division I basketball tournament.
Officials claim the NCAA has “stark differences in the conditioning facilities, food, publicity and marketing, and even the use of less accurate Covid tests” around the women’s event. The letter calls for the NCAA to honor Title IX, which forbids gender discrimination throughout federally funded education institutions.
Religion
ABC News: Growing number of Southern Baptist women question roles
Among the millions of women belonging to churches of the Southern Baptist Convention, there are many who have questioned the faith’s gender-role doctrine and more recently urged a stronger response to disclosures of sexual abuse perpetrated by SBC clergy.
For many SBC women, even those committed to staying, the topic of gender became more volatile this month when popular Bible teacher Beth Moore said she no longer considered herself Southern Baptist. Moore, perhaps the best-known evangelical woman in the world, had drawn the ire of some SBC conservatives for speaking out against Donald Trump in 2016 and suggesting the denomination had problems with sexism.
Pregnancy
Reproduction without pregnancy: would it really emancipate women? It may sound far-fetched, but a breakthrough in Israel has brought us a step closer to creating artificial wombs for humans
https://www.theguardian.com/...
Good News
Diana Trujillo: She Came to the US (from Colombia in 2000) to Study With Only $300 in Her Pocket - Now She's a NASA Director For the Mars Rover
Along with her ongoing scientific endeavors, Diana Trujillo continues her mission to lead by example, encouraging women from marginalized backgrounds to pursue careers in STEM fields.
Picture a Scientist: Researchers expose longstanding discrimination against women in science. NOVA, premieres on PBS April 14, 2021. Preview video at the link.
Along the way, from cramped laboratories to spectacular field stations, scientific visionaries, including social scientists, neuroscientists, and psychologists, provide new perspectives on how to make science itself more diverse, equitable, and open to all.
Generation Equality Forum kicking off March 29 this year:
If someone can't read tweet:
"This is the #GenerationEquality moment–to act decisively, urgently, collectively & for equality for all."
Our Director of Civil Society Division, @LopaUN talked to @jackhar about the Generation Equality Forum, kicking off on 29 March.
via @Forbes
And the Forbes article is here, UN Women Kicks Off Generation Equality to Accelerate An Equal Future by Jackie Abramian.
On the 25th anniversary of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action, UN Women is bringing together change makers of all ages and genders to “tackle the unfinished business of achieving gender equality” and accelerate the implementation of commitments made in Beijing in 1995, by launching a groundbreaking, multigenerational campaign: “Generation Equality: Realizing women’s rights for an equal future.” For the next five years, the Generation Equality Forum, the Action Coalitions, and the Compact on Women, Peace and Security and Humanitarian Action prioritize urgent actions for implementation.
-snip-
In a virtual interview with Banerjee, we discussed her innate commitment to gender equality, which sprouted in childhood, living in her native Kolkata and Delhi, India and how her academic interest in literature and gender studies put her on the path in 2000 to realize her “childhood dream to work at the UN.”
Interview follows at the Forbes link.
A Mighty Girl's Empowering Easter Gifts Collection
Some of my favorites:
Tiny baking science kit, Coding critters, She is Fierce T-shirt; and Cat Crimes, the who's to blame logic game. YMMV!
RIP Beverly Cleary: The well-known, multiple-award-winning children's book author died at age 104 - almost 105 - on Thursday, 3/25/2021 (Officebss: Birthdate 4/12/1916).
You may be familiar with her characters Henry Huggins and Ramona Quimby. The most important part of her bio to me, of course:
“Socks,” about a cat’s struggle for acceptance when his owners have a baby, is told from the point of view of the pet himself.
Read more about her and her books at her own website.
As always, the This Week in the War on Women column is a group effort! Many thanks to ramara, Angmar, Tara tAsSW, mettle fatigue, the WOW gang, and this week the TPR gang for links and discussion behind the scenes. Opinions are my own, not necessarily that of the groups.