One day in August, I shadowed an alumnus physician at his clinic. I sat in his examination room as unobtrusively as possible, jotting down notes as he tended to his patients. Between his appointments, we passed the time by comparing notes about our experiences at Dartmouth. Like most other alumni whom I have had the pleasure of meeting, he reminisced about his undergraduate years with warm fondness. He asked about the current makeup of students, the local eateries and the professors. We were surprised to discover the sheer number of similarities between our narratives, despite the nearly two decades that separated our respective classes. We attributed this phenomenon to the College's strong adherence to traditions.
Yet there is a dark side to our traditions. Many of our initiation rites include elements of sadism inflicted by upperclassmen upon underclassmen, to which the latter voluntarily subject themselves for the promise of proper inclusion within the Dartmouth social community. The underclassmen then adopt these traditions and inflict them on future classes. Lest I mislead anyone into thinking that this is solely about the Greek system's initiation rites, I would like to call attention to the upcoming event commemorating the greater Dartmouth fraternity the Homecoming bonfire.
According to College archivist Peter Carini, the tradition of putting down freshmen during the Homecoming bonfire began in 1904, when upperclassmen chased first-year students around the bonfire. In comparison, the more recent iterations of the bonfire seem to be more brute. Rough shoving is the norm; punching, spitting and tripping are all too common. This is in addition to the jeers and the imperatives to touch the fire. All of this is done within the context of the great "Dartmouth tradition," and the perpetrators, more often than not, defend their actions by claiming that "it's all in good fun."
But there is a fine line between humor and humiliation. University of Michigan biology professor emeritus R.D. Alexander describes humor as a social activity that alters the status of the humorist positively and that of the object or victim negatively. Taken within the context of human interactions, both humor and humiliation can be used to create social cohesion in one group at the expense of the "other" individual or group.
According to Alexander, the initial act of humiliation notifies members of the social group that the person is to be an object of ridicule. At Dartmouth, this is established by our collective insistence that we annually refer to the entering class as "the worst class ever." Second, Alexander states that the continuation of humiliation lends legitimacy to the actions by members of the victimizing group. We call freshmen names and push them into the fire, and we believe it must be OK because others do it and we've always done it. This ritual humiliation of the few tightens the cohesion of the greater social fabric. In their first quarter, the first-year students will have been conditioned to believe that physical and verbal abuse, no matter how minor, are an appropriate means of gaining social acceptance, thus setting a tone for what many of them may encounter in the following year when entering the Greek system.
Of course, bonfire jeering is, in fact, distinct from hazing in organizations in that the College sanctions the former. Moreover, unlike more severe hazing, bonfire jeering is unlikely to result in damage beyond mild bruises and burns. However, despite the lack of imminent dangers, perhaps we should view our unbecoming conduct at the Dartmouth Night bonfire as a symptom of a deeper and conditioned psychological malaise that allows us to believe that the putting-down of initiates whether in the Greek system or in the greater College community is acceptable.
Perhaps we should forgo our penchant for schadenfreude by sending a more positive message to '16s. While our tradition won't turn over in a single year, change can be achieved through piecemeal progress. Last year, one student successfully organized a small voice of support for the freshmen at the bonfire. Upperclassmen, rather than jeering, brandished colorful signs with messages ranging from neutral to positive, a demonstration of support that the '15s appreciated. We should think critically about even the most cherished of our traditions, because in reality, we can too easily cross the fine line between rough play and actual hazing. The norms of conduct at the bonfire in the beginning of the 20th century were far from what we see now.
