Importance of Collegiate Social Structures

The Role of Social Organizations

Social organizations are a pivotal crutch for the development of individuals entering such a dynamic world.

Everything in this world, from single-celled organisms to chickens to humans, is looking to move from point A to point B. The situation you are currently in to one that is presumably better based on the crux of what you value most.

What you value most—big question, no? Value is the system that keeps us moving or aiming towards something. Without it, we are aimless and stagnant, lost without rules in the fundamentally complex game of life.

The College Experience and Identity Formation

When someone goes to college—yes, they are there for academia, that is undeniable. But, in my personal experience, it's the first opportunity for many in Western society to get their first real taste of life. To finally start walking up the doorsteps of this social world, and garner the freedom they spent the last decade longing for. That is what they value. If it wasn't, the fear and the palpable anxiety of applying, getting in, and waiting to move in wouldn't be so mind-crushingly intense. To this day, the months prior to my college move-in have been the uttermost crippling in terms of anxiety and depression—purgatory—stagnant in the middle of moving from point A to B.

So a college kid finally gets there, gets moved in, now what? What's next? The school might set up some activities for their initial week—then poof—gone until you inevitably trip and make a mistake—then they swoop in faster than you can say “fuck” to slap your wrist.

So now, lost in this massive world, this new student has to find their own way—rightfully so—they are adults now and will never learn if someone is constantly holding their hands.

So, at that age and that pivotal time in your life when your individual identity is most malleable, what do you crave? The answer is you crave something firm to stand on, a group with which to identify, and a space where you can tussle with who you really are. This need is explained by Social Identity Theory, which states that our identities are crafted through our affiliations and group memberships. These affiliations provide us with a sense of belonging and integral self-esteem, acting as the solid ground we seek during formative periods of identity exploration.

Humans have an innate longing for culture and tribalistic entities. It’s satiating, and seems to be an apparent necessity for people. Culture and the need to belong to a group is so deep-rooted, that at times individual people will tailor their entire being to a group at its whole. Think about sports culture; some fans will hold emotions for their teams that will be nothing in comparison to the emotions they feel towards anything that happens in their own lives.

Take the Stanford Prison Experiment for example, a mere coin toss determined if a person would be a guard or a prisoner during the simulation. What followed was surprising, to say the least; the prisoners and guards instantly conformed to their fabricated social roles. Their behaviors adapted, and their values changed. It was concluded that the effect of innate and individualized personality is no match for the weight external situations have on our lives. This goes to prove how crucial societal and cultural structures are to our existence.

Think about it, if you are just floating in space you will never fully understand what your ceiling is, where your walls are, or what your ground is.

Social groups with confined social parameters of their nature provide us with this, that way your silly putty self, who's trying to figure out who you are, can learn where your ceiling, wall, and floor are so you can become an individual.

This notion ties with Stage 5 of Erikson’s Stages of Psychosocial Development, Identity vs. Role Confusion. During the tumultuous times of adolescence, we're all over the place, trying on as many hats as possible. Places like colleges or Greek life become our testing grounds, where we can experiment and hammer down our sense of self.

They provide microcosms that help us make sense of our lives, no matter how big or small the world may be. Whether it’s a fake prison experiment, the Greek life system, or the socio-political world at large. Same shit, bigger shovel.

Hierarchies, Values, and Societal Impact

We operate society in hierarchical natures, a small number at the top, whatever that may be, and a much bigger number at the bottom, whatever that might represent in that given value hierarchy—what I mean by “given value hierarchy” is that the world is filled with a plethora of different ladders.

Someone may be in a much lower half of the hierarchy when it comes to finances, but they might be in the top 1% hierarchy of people that are the best Pac-Man players in the world.

The same translates to a college community, and this is most evident when it comes to Greek organizations. There are literal websites, Reddit feeds, group chats, etc., dedicated to the hierarchical nature of fraternities and sororities, each who sort themselves based on various stipulations.

Hundreds of thousands of newcomers get warped in this game every single semester, each playing it tailored to the hierarchical rules and values of the Greek life system.

But why the Greek system? Why don’t they just go and join another club, like debate or theater? I believe the answer to this question has two parts.

#1) The Greek System seems to have a much deeper and broader culture compared to any other collegiate organization. The more grounded a culture, the more opportunities it provides, therefore the more meaningful it seems. In sum, it’s a longer game, with more players.

#2) I’ll phrase this one as a question, what did you value most at 18? Was it the geopolitical status of the world, Newtonian physics, or your relationship with a higher power? No, what it was, is the same as almost every 18-year-old on this planet. The same thing that Greek life encompasses.

Backlash of Greek Organizations

Since the first group of individuals began wearing Greek letters on campus, there has been backlash against their existence. A constant dissonance exists between the school system and the Greek society. But in truth, it's more like a romance story; they need one another to survive. The school uses the system in the most practical sense to have a more organized way of disciplining students. There is a top-down method of handling trouble, so the schools can divvy out responsibility and create structure. The president of the university tasks a chairperson to oversee student affairs, who then tasks someone to oversee the Greek system, who then tasks someone to oversee all fraternities, who then finds one fraternity leader to oversee all the presidents of the other fraternities. Then the president oversees his executive committee, who then look after their respective “departments,” who then discipline the general members. Without this, all hell would break loose.

For some reason, the thought is that if you take away Greek life, you take away everything bad about the American university system. That you will be able to somehow indoctrinate these teenagers to value what middle-aged people value most.

The truth is, no matter what, they will find a way to come together and create a world based on their desires, title or not. The question is: How chaotic do you want it to be?

Now, I am not saying these organizations are the sole saints of the world, nor are they the sinners. To equate them as monstrous, demonic entities is far from the truth. They provide an opportunity for young men and women to sort themselves in their new world and assign some sort of value to their experiences.

People have this misconception that every value held is translated to the utmost "purity"; in truth, it’s rare that our values aim to achieve the highest possible moral virtue. Values are simply there to help us make sense of the structure of our worldview, especially if there isn’t one provided to us.

If universities provided a realistic outlet that didn’t treat the kids like they were in kindergarten, a true outlet where as young adults they could fail, learn, and grow in a healthy environment, then maybe not as many people would join Greek life. But the truth is, the Western public school system now dictates like an overbearing mother. A tyrannical LLC who at its macro level operates as a corporation and at its micro like a prison guard.

The Overbearing Mother

It’s Sigmund Freud’s fundamental argument: an overbearing mother who lets her motherly instincts of protection supersede the natural development of the child will inevitably be a major detriment to not only the child's growth but also a permanent impediment to the child when they are inevitably left without her.

The same is happening in a myriad of Western colleges and universities. Out of college, fewer and fewer graduates are living on their own, fewer are financially independent, fewer are in serious relationships, not to mention the rampant influx of mental health issues.

To get rid of the last thing that stands as an accurate stepping stone from childhood to adulthood just screams bad news.

Now it seems a lot of the contradictions to Greek life come more from an ideological left view of thinking. When I mention a majority of this happening from a more politically liberalized way of thinking, I am not speaking from some highly conservative bias point of view.

According to a study of 'The Relationship between Personality Traits and Political Ideologies', this relationship is grounded in the psychological profiles that underpin liberal and conservative ideologies. Liberals score higher on trait openness, tend to be more open to new experiences, more curious, and more appreciative of diversity. These characteristics can influence a preference for progressive policies, change, and social equality.

Conservatives, on the other hand, often score higher on traits such as conscientiousness and may prioritize stability, tradition, and order. Their relatively lower openness to experience can lead to a preference for maintaining traditional structures and a resistance to change.

You need a game

My argument is this: our lives are predicated on moving from one point to another based on a value system—a value system is bound to create a hierarchical structure as some people will innately be better at things than others. So, dispensing of Greek life and collegiate social organizations, and the hierarchical format it poses on college life, will then remove the ability to move from point A to B in a value-based sequence, therefore leaving an individual without value—lost.

If I asked you to play a game with me—and you agreed. And I said, "ok, you go first." You would be like, “what?”. You're left lost and confused, eager for me to explain the rules of the game to you. We need some sort of regulations to propel ourselves from a divet in the wall, to pull ourselves up and become the best possible version of ourselves.

Dispense with the rules of the game, that's fine. But you better be prepared to create some of your own, and be ready for the years of trial and error it will take to solidify them. You might as well have some tradition, because once you get rid of it, it's too late.