I totally understand your opinion but there is no reason to despite fraternities & sororities– maybe certain practices they have, but as a whole the organizations do a lot of good + cultivate awesome lifelong friendships! But agreed on the no bashing and no judging part. 🙂

I see two separate topics that seem to be mixed together. The person and persons PERSONALLY attacking the members involved in this video, and the video itself.

I have been responding solely to the video, as I thought that was the topic.

In response to the attackers, they will always be present, and are best ignored! However, when gaining major social attraction, perhaps the response needs to be focused on their manner of attack, rather than the actual girls or video. It is a much clearer message that most will support- unfair personal attacks and assumptions. By mixing up your defense or response to the bashing article and the video, it confuses the real issues.

My belief is that no individual should have personal comments made about them based on pictures or a video, where there is no discussion on a persons beliefs. This is an issue that has been in the public domain for awhile: personal attacks on individuals with no supporting evidence . If the girls were interviewed, it would be appropriate to comment on their viewpoints etc, however assumptions are biased and often rude etc. That being said, this video is the perfect setup for someone in that state of mind, to attack and make assumptions. The sorority members are each responsible for being a part of this video, and what it promotes and what it is lacking. That being said they may individually have had no idea how it would turn out, or the message it promotes.

I would love to see more comments separating these two issues 🙂

UHHH, excuse me??? I should not have an opinion because I was never a part of Greek life? Here is what you said, did you really mean this as I am reading it?
” I am going to guess that the majority of people around the internet commenting negatively about this video are not and were not apart of greek life in college…that being said, they should not even have an opinion. ”

Isn’t a RECRUITMENT VIDEO aimed at girls that ARE NOT A PART OF GREEK LIFE??? Your comment makes no sense to me. A recruitment video is for someone not already a member! This applies to any type of recruitment video. How do you know that this is not the ONLY INFORMATION someone or a prospective member may see. You cannot ASSUME a prospective member will choose not to look or investigate further after watching this video. Not to mention, the affect it has on society in general. I do not understand the defense of this video! I am not judging the individual members, only this video and it’s message do I question the validity and value it may provide today in our society.

I totally agree with you. Many responding here are coming from the position of being in a sorority or responding to an article that bashed the video. What about a truly open unbiased response to just the video? This means don’t read anything into it knowing what you may about sororities etc. What does this video show and tell you ? Is that really the message we want to send to young girls and the world?

I think you are reacting from the stance of a former Sorority member and cannot view this impartially. I went to college and lived in the dorms. The Fraternities and Sororities were present, but not really a big deal other than watching rush week challenges sometimes (guys running through street after midnight etc). Loved to go to the parties- they always seemed to be at the Fraternities. Anyway, I am in my 50’s now and I see this as purely promoting the way they look. There is no indication of why I would want to be a member, what they do etc. You mention ” It’s not that I am concerned that the women of Alpha Phi are not engaged in academics or philanthropic activities- I am absolutely confident that they are and pretty sure their presence has an incredibly positive impact.” But there is no indication of this in the video. YOU are adding this. You need to look at this from the perspective of someone without any information; the same as many high school students who have no other information. What would you want them to know? Do you want to continue to propagate the notion that beauty and looks are what is the most important for women? I have nothing against fashion etc., but it needs to be kept in perspective, especially since it has been ill used for judging the value of women. I knew Hiliary Clinton would not win the Democratic nomination over Obama, and I based this on one simple fact; black men were afforded the right to vote BEFORE White Women. I even said this to my daughter during the race prior to the choice. I never considered myself a “Feminist”, because it was always associated with radical behavior, but it is now being used as a more general term. Women today- My Daughter- 27, have grown up with many rights that women had to fight for, and still women are paid less etc. I think many women today, are not aware there are still issues of equality, and these types of videos promote the wrong attitude toward women. Maybe you are reacting to the bashing which I have not read. I only read your post, then watched the video and I do not get your defense of this video…..

I totally agree with you. I didn’t read the bashing comments- they may have been extreme. But there is nothing to be proud of in this video 🙁

So the question I ask is why is it these girls that are being attacked for their post? I thought the video was phenomenal it was unique and showed genuine friendships, just as you had noted in your article. It may have looked forced at points, but come on they are filming a video that is completely unnatural and honestly I would feel pretty uncomfortable doing this. So props to these girls for their confidence and ability to do this! I feel that those who are criticizing Alpha Phi are looking at this video in such a narrow mindset. Have they ever considered looking into the statistics of what girls (diversity wise) have pledged sororities at the school in the past? Have they looked at the statistics of the recruitment process for Alpha Phi? I have not seen one article that lays any of this out. For all we know the only ones who could be pledging this sorority are those who reflect the girls seen in the video.

Basically what I am trying to say is that there is no one doing any “real” reporting here, it seems like it has been a very slow news day. If you go on some websites that were the first to report this video, there were no negative comments. Every article stated how great this video was and talked about the ways in which it was edited and gave the girls credit for their time and effort (which they deserve)! There is not sign of alcohol in this video so you can not even connect it to drinking and if you say that there is a statistic between drinking and being involved in Greek life, then you should do a comparison between schools that have greek life and schools that do not. I can tell you from experience that going to a school that had no greek life did not make a difference. There was still as much partying and underage drinking as there would have been had I attended a school with greek life.

If you look at any other youtube video similar in nature, do you think you can make a judgement call of those who are featured simply in 5 minutes? The girls do not even speak. Quite honestly I think this is really ridiculous and these girls need to be left alone. If they genuinely did something wrong then the school should recognize this and do something about it. I do not think that it should be up to the general public, most of which have very narrow minded views, to make a call on.

Now that I have gone on a huge rant I will leave this one last note: Girls of Alpha Phi, you should be proud of yourselves for what you have done, and should walk around with your heads held high because you did nothing wrong. You are all beautiful and should be proud to be a member of this sisterhood. You have made life long friends, and for that you are fortunate. I would genuinely be lucky to be a part of this sisterhood and wish i had the opportunity to pledge Alpha Phi. <3