College Hazing: Initiation or Sadistic Pleasure

We are all familiar with high school initiation, but when in college, the initiation goes one step beyond and enters the hazing ritual, but is this tradition of hazing actually a initiation of rites or is it a chance to perform sadistic pleasures on the individual? Read the following facts...then make up your own mind, initiation, hazing, or sadistic pleasure. If you should find this practice as inhuman, what will you do? Will you try to end this barbaric tradition, or just sweep it under the carpet, and hope it does not happen to a member of your family or someone you are close to?

The definition of initiation, as stated in the Miriam Webster dictionary is as follows:

Main entry: initiation
Function: noun
Date: 1963

1 a. : the act or instance of initiating b. : the process of being initiated c. : the rites, ceremonies, ordeals, or instructions with which one is made a member of a sect or society or is invested with a particular function or status

2 : the condition of being initiated into some experience or sphere of activity : knowledgeableness

According to the Miriam Webster dictionary hazing is defined as follows:

Main entry: hazing
Function: noun
Date: circa 1855

: the action of hazing; especially : an initiation process involving harassment

Sadistic pleasure is defined as follows, according to Wikipedia:

Sadism refers to sexual or non-sexual gratification in the infliction of pain or humiliation upon or by another person. ...

I believe that the definitions of each of these subjects clearly shows how the act of an innocent high school initiation can quickly escalate from this common ritual, to one more serious and then to an even more degrading act.

Take into consideration these initiations, hazing rituals, or sadistic pleasures, whichever you prefer to call them and learn of the individuals who lost their lives for simply trying to fit in.

Chicago State University, 21 year old, Matthew Carrington, lost his life during Chi Tau's "Hell Week". Carrington was forced to perform calisthenics in raw sewage. He and the other pledges, were then ordered to drink from a jug of water, which was continuously filled, while cold air blew across their sewage covered bodies. They were not allowed bathroom breaks, so nature took it's toll. Eventually the hazing went haywire.

Carrington passed out, and no ambulance was called. Once someone did call an ambulance, someone's sadistic pleasure had gone too far. Carrington was dead, from water intoxication. What a waste, simply because of college hazing!

Utah State University's, Sigma Nu fraternity and Chi Omega sorority, were directly responsible for the death of Michael Starks, after a hazing, initiation, or sadistic pleasure went haywire. Starks was bound with duct tape and had alcohol poured down his throat, when Starks was found not breathing and paramedics were finally called, they were unable to revive him. Starks alcohol level was at four times the legal limit. What a sad and unnecessary loss of human life, due to the sadistic pleasures of individuals, who perform college hazing.

Cal Poly freshman, Carson Starkey, died due to alcohol poisoning, during a hazing ritual conducted by Sigma Alpha Epsilon, a fraternity in which Starkey was pledging. Starkey, 18, died from respiratory arrest, his alcohol level was 44 percent. This degree of sedation is greater than that of sedation given during surgery! Once again, someone died as a direct result of college hazing.

I still feel that this is someone's sadistic pleasure causing these deaths. It is just a way for the person to inflict pain and humiliation on an individual, without drawing attention to themselves. They are just hoping that the hazing does not go haywire, no one dies, and they will not be apprehended as the sick individual that they are.

Supposedly there is a ban on Greek organization's hazing, the National Pan-Hellenic Council's 1990 ban, but obviously this has no effect on the actual initiations, hazing's, or sadistic pleasures of the fraternity. Perhaps, there should be a law passed that would prohibit these potentially deadly rituals of sadistic pleasure, which are disguised as initiations or hazing's, that an individual must endure or die from, in order to be accepted.

Sources:

http://www.merriam-webster.com/
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sadistic_pleasure
http://www.blnz.com
http://media.www.mustangdaily.net/
http://www.mashinc.org/r