Frat Exclusion Nothing New

Last week, several dozen male Harvard undergraduates received invitations for an invite-only event hosted by the fraternity Sigma Alpha Epsilon. While SAE still held its usual open and widely-publicized first rush event last Thursday, the invitations offered a select group of students entrance into the pre-rush event that took place the preceding Wednesday evening.

At first glance, SAE's hosting of an invite-only pre-rush event may seem like a worrying harbinger of a selection process starting to deteriorate into something akin to the closed punch process of final clubs. What effectively separates fraternities from final clubs, after all, is the difference between rushing and punching; everyone can rush, but only a few will be punched.

On closer inspection, however, this new pre-rush style of event appears merely to be a substantiation of the way fraternities and other social organizations have always worked. Reportedly, students who did not receive a pre-rush invite were still able to attend Wednesday’s event, despite its lack of publicity. Even so, the fact that the pre-rush event technically allowed non-invited students doesn’t undo the de facto result of this move. The reality is that if you weren't invited and you didn't know an invitee, the prospects for taking part in this special preview were slim. Rather than encouraging more students to rush and stimulating interest in SAE, pre-rush is problematic because it discourages those from rushing who didn't have an envelope slipped under their door. An invite-driven event advantages undergraduates with connections to the fraternity, and disadvantage those without.

Together, these factors exacerbate the already subjective nature of the selection process that is inherent to any social organization. Such organizations, be they fraternities or social clubs, survive by judging prospective members on their supposed ability to blend with their existing pool of members. This train of events will take place regardless of whether rush is open or not. Perhaps the most telling consequence of SAE’s pre-rush event is in reminding us that a fraternity’s selection process is ultimately not that different from that of a final club, which points to a larger social problem on campus.

Instead of focusing on the relatively inconsequential decision of SAE to door-drop invitations this year, our campus should use this occasion to consider the larger issue of gender discrimination within student organizations. Fraternity brothers often make a point of spelling out their organizations’ differences from male final clubs. Yet, like final clubs, they do not allow women to become members and their social spaces remain exclusionary ones during the day. At night, however, scantily dressed females are welcomed with open arms. When members of Greek institutions sought official recognition from the College last year, administrators replied that nothing has changed since 1984 when Harvard ceased to recognize them because they discriminate against women. We reaffirm our agreement with the College on this matter. The gender-based exclusion of women from fraternity membership continues to warrant official non-recognition of Greek institutions on campus.

In short, while SAE's invitations may have been merely just an extension of the status quo, they shine a light on the real problem with all-male social organizations at Harvard: female exclusion.