Zeta Beta Tau
Alpha Tau Colony
NO PLEDGING, NO HAZING
Pledging a fraternity is often referred to as the time between when a bid is offered to a new recruit and he is formally initiated into the fraternity. For many fraternities, this period occurs over several weeks. Pledges have limited rights and extended responsibilities and have no guarantee that they will become brothers.
Pledging was not part of the founding of fraternities; rather it emerged as a practice after World War II. The unnatural dominant/subservient relationship between the brother and the pledge leads to an imbalanced fraternity. This
imbalance may lead down a path that can spiral out of control, potentially leading to hazing.
In 1989, ZBT became the first Fraternity in the world to ban pledging and remove all two-teir membership practices. ZBT decided that pledging is not beneficial to brotherhood, it teaches that once the pledge period is over, there is no further obligation to the Fraternity. Pledging makes good pledges, not great brothers. Pledging does not build a strong brotherhood in a chapter/colony. Pledging promotes animosity within the chapters/colonies by focusing on a pledge class. Brotherhood is built over a lifetime in ZBT through the shared experiences of our brothers.
We as the brothers of the Alpha Tau Colony do not believe that it is necessary to subject our new brothers to physical and mental pain in order for them to gain access to our brotherhood. Once you are initiated, you are given the full rights and responsibilities of any brother and have access to all the events that all other brothers do. In other words, we do not force you to do or anything which would degrade you as a brother of our fraternity or a person.
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Zeta Beta Tau prides itself that our brotherhood is built upon equality and that all brothers share equal rights and responsibilities from the beginning.
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Hazing is a violation of College policy and Pennsylvania state law. Hazing includes but is not limited to behaviors occurring on or off campus that are physically, emotionally, or psychologically humiliating or abusive, or endanger the health or safety of an individual or selected group of individuals as part of the process of gaining entrance or acceptance into an established group, team, or organization. Any activity as described in this definition upon which the initiation or admission into, or affiliation with, or continued membership in an organization is directly or indirectly conditioned shall be presumed to be “forced” activity, the willingness of an individual to participate in such activity notwithstanding. Hazing includes but is not limited to subjecting an individual to extreme mental stress or encouraging or requiring willful destruction or removal of public or private property for the purpose of initiation or admission into, affiliation with, or as a condition of continued membership in any organization. The term “hazing” shall also include, but not be limited to, any brutality of a physical nature, such as whipping, beating, branding, forced calisthenics, exposure to the elements, forced consumption of any food, liquor, drug or other substance, or any other forced physical activity which could adversely affect the physical health and safety of the individual, and includes activities subjecting persons to extreme mental stress, including sleep deprivation, forced exclusion from social contact, forced conduct which could result in extreme embarrassment, or any other forced activity which could adversely affect the mental health or dignity of the individual.
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FRANKLIN & MARSHALL HAZING POLICY
