Dear Abbey
As a member of a Greek organization, I've heard all the usual snide remarks- that I pay for my friends, that my uniform is Bean Boots and a black parka (side note: I'm a proud individual, and I own a gray parka, thank you very much) and that my hobbies include crafting and Instagramming. Confession: I do love that Valencia filter.
None of these stereotypes bother me, and if you want to classify me as "basic," then so be it, I'm unashamed of my love for Gossip Girl and Buzzfeed articles.However, one Greek stereotype does irritate me- and now that recruitment is done, it's been more prevalent than ever in hushed conversations on campus and rude remarks on social media.
It's the idea of tiers within the Greek community, and it may or may not be one of the most ridiculous things you've ever heard.
Thanks to websites like Greek Rank and social media apps like Yik Yak, college students tend to be under the impression that some fraternities and sororities are better than others. This argument typically revolves around sororities, and is generally a review of who is seen as attractive or not attractive.
If I prescribed to this view of sorority life, I would purely base my love for my sorority and my sisters off of whether or not they look "attractive" on a daily basis. I would be concerned with such things as whether I'm seen eating a salad instead of a three cheese panini while sitting in Farmer. I would put on makeup before stepping outside of my room wearing my sorority letters. I would base my recruitment conversations off of whether or not a girl would improve the "image" of my sorority, to put it politely.
What type of person would this make me? Certainly not someone I would want as a sister or friend.
To girls who opened their bid cards on Sunday afternoon only to feel bitter that they wound up in a "bottom tier" house rather than a "top tier" house, I would like to say in the nicest way possible: It. Does. Not. Matter.
Being in a sorority has been a wonderful experience for me at Miami, and that has absolutely nothing to do with whether or not my sorority is seen as "attractive" on an anonymous website.
Didn't we leave the idea of the popular kids and the losers in our high school cafeterias? Weren't we told we could be whoever we wanted to be once we got to college? So why would we want to revert back to the idea of some people among us being better than others?
Every person on Miami's campus is unique, even if a lot of us share a fondness for black leggings and Starbucks lattes. Joining a Greek organization should be based on seeing yourself being comfortable there, on seeing lifelong friends in the people who are already members and sharing the values that a particular sorority or fraternity promotes.
My Greek experience has been defined by the women I share my time with, the friendships I've made and the unconditional support I've received from my sisters throughout my time at Miami. If my experience was at all defined by where my sorority falls within a "tier" system, I probably wouldn't want to be a part of Greek life anyways.
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So for all those reading this who have been laughing at sometimes-funny, sometimes-mean posts on Yik Yak about sororities, or vehemently defending their sorority's position as a "top" house on Greek Rank- please put your Lilly Pulitzer-cased phone into your Vineyard Vines bag and move on with your life.
Being in Greek life is about being part of something bigger than yourself, looking out for your peers and caring about others. If all you can say about your Greek experience is that you were in a popular organization or that you dropped because you got a bid from an unpopular one, I'd say you didn't have an experience at all.
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