Hazing: What Is It and Why Does It Happen?

According to the article on hazing on the campushealthandsafety.org website hazing is defined as "any humiliating or dangerous activity expected of you to join a group, regardless of your willingness to participate."Hazing can be found in multiple groups on colleges such as sororities, fraternities, peer groups or gangs. They state in this article that hazing can result in physical and emotional consequences. Among these consequences are low self-esteem, depression and upset feelings towards the group enforcing the hazing. Hazing has been around for a while and despite the fact that so many people know it's wrong, it is kept a secret among the campus because as claimed by the website, fellow peers are afraid to tell on their friends, they don't know who to go to or they don't think others will understand. Hazing is a problem in every college, on every campus. Whether it is mild hazing like a frat telling a pledge to make them a sandwich or hardcore hazing such a sorority making their baby pledges walk on glass, hazing is serious! Two ways to prevent this type of crime on campus is to regularly have check ups by older authoritative figures or if one would like to get very serious about the issue, by having an undercover rush for different sorority/fraternity/peer groups.
 
Fortunately for me, I am in a sorority and I can tell you that FGCU has no hazing going on in our Greek life. Although many of the fraternities around here joke around about hazing, it is never enforced nor have I seen it take place. My sorority has strict rules on hazing and if they are broken we could get in a lot of trouble. Even though FGCU is very good with hazing, I know for a fact other colleges and universities are not. One way I can help with hazing on our campus is by promoting the fact that "Hazing is for Losers." Zeta Tau Alpha, another sorority on campus actually has a campaign called "Hazing is for Losers" which all of our Panhellenic Council gets involved in.

Hazing