You said that you actually liked being hazed, but I think you hit the nail on the head when you say that it is “inappropriate to force girls to do things they don’t want to” because they might be shy or introverted. That, to me, is one of the biggest things with hazing: the fact that, what is harmless to some is traumatic to others, and you have no way of knowing. As TJ Sullivan wrote about recently, hazing is wrong because it has the potential to hurt people. End of story.

I look back now and realize how inappropriate it is to force girls to do things that they do not want to do. I am outgoing which is probably why I liked being “hazed.” Until now, I had not thought about the possibility that the more shy or introverted girls may have been negatively affected by the hazing experience. Perhaps you are right and they would have enjoyed it more had the ENTIRE soccer team partaken in the madness.

I write a blog called “Going Gone Greek” and it focuses on the stereotypes of the Greek system as well as my personal experiences as a sorority member. Before coming to college, I thought hazing was going to be a natural step of joining a sorority (which, let me tell you, was not something I had initially planned on doing). At my University, hazing is absolutely prohibited and if you are accused of hazing you will be kicked off the Row. In my house, Kappa Alpha Theta, and in the greek system at my university we are not allowed to refer to new members as “littles”, “babies” or any other word that could be seen as offensive. If we do, we are punished. I support these harsh rules because when a girl joins a house, she should be treated as, like Peyton Manning says, a “veteran.” She went through rush and selected a house where she felt she could make more friends and memories, NOT to be treated as little girl who is not respected by her peers.

This is college people, come on! Could you IMAGINE a workplace hazing its incoming employees? I would hope that we are more mature than that; however, we are still debating the topic today because hazing is still prevalent on school campuses, on sports teams and in various other cliques.