The success of frats is, first and foremost, tied to one thing: Free beer. Without the ever-flowing tap of free libations, the popularity of fraternities at Dartmouth would plummet.
Without free alcohol, underage students -- unless they know upperclassmen who will buy them alcohol -- will remain legally sober. For those of us fortunate enough to be of age, there are more options -- ranging from drinking in town to inviting a few people over for a room party, freshman-year style. For the under-21 crowd, social choices are severely limited.
The reason that most sororities and coed organizations have a less popular social scene is twofold: Their alcohol distribution is far less, and their houses are not open to just any underage student who wants a place to drink. They are not willing to take on the risks of allowing underage students to drink illegally on their physical plants (nor should they necessarily be). These same risks rarely scare off fraternities.
Creating more sororities would do great things for female students who would then have more options when joining a Greek house. If they were local sororities, it would also create more female-controlled social (drinking) space on campus. But a question emerges as a consequence: How open would these spaces be?
As a freshman male, I set foot in a sorority twice -- once because I had a senior friend invite me to play pong at her house and another time because a girl on my floor told me to come by to her sorority's party. So where is a freshman male to go without these connections? Fraternities -- where free beer and chances to awkwardly mingle abound.
If sororities and coed houses -- or the "Residential Interest Groups" that Nathan Bruschi '10 proposed ("RIGs, The Greek Replacement," Jan. 29) -- are to have their fair share of the Dartmouth social scene, they will need to be willing to take the same risks regarding underage drinking as fraternities.
They do not need to become bastions of debauchery, however, rather social spaces where underage students can safely experiment with alcohol. As far as I can tell, the facilities on campus are policed far too well to allow any pre-existing residential or social space (like Collis) to allow anyone to comfortably circumvent the law.
Back in 2005, when I was still a freshman, I visited a friend at Brown University. We attended a birthday party in a dorm's common room -- there was lots of alcohol -- but no one seemed to find that abnormal except me. By providing residential social space and not policing it, Brown had neutralized half of the problem (getting the alcohol was still a problem). Though room parties are all the rage among Dartmouth freshmen, most alcohol supplied to underage drinkers comes from fraternities. Until that changes, the dominance of fraternities on campus will continue
I was pleased to hear new Dean of the College Thomas Crady talk about his support for liberal alcohol policies, specifically when he said, "I think if you become very heavy handed with alcohol, you'll drive it underground" ("Crady Backs Liberal Alcohol Policy," Jan. 30). Crady also said that his focus is on safety and self-governance, which I am sure most of campus would support. This is a working framework for creating new social spaces for drinking, just as long as the organizations maintaining this social space are willing to take on the risks of supplying alcohol to minors.
You will find few students who support a legal drinking age of 21, but since it exists we have to acknowledge the legal issues. Any organization that supplies underage students with alcohol takes the risk of getting in judicial trouble, and also needs to come up with the cash to fund the consumption of mass quantities of alcohol. Short of charging at the door, what are these organizations to do?
On the plus side, we appear closer to creating new social spaces on campus that could really make a difference -- closer than I have seen at any point during my three and a half years at Dartmouth. The administration, or at least Dean Crady, seems willing to meet students halfway, which is all that students have been asking for over the past few years.Let this be the time it happens.
