The UTSA chapter of the leadership development fraternity, Alpha Tau Omega, was investigated by UTSAPD and the Student Conduct and Community Standards office after allegations of hazing and hate crimes. Going as far back as 2022, the accusations list humiliating acts that students were forced to perform by their fellow members. The fraternity was sanctioned by the university after the conclusion of the investigation by the Student Conduct and Community Standards office. UTSAPD’s investigation was forwarded to the Bexar County District Attorney.
Students have to prove themselves and usually pay a considerable amount of money to join a fraternity or sorority, which by itself is not a bad thing. What is wrong is to exaggerate the ways in which they must prove themselves and victimize them for entertainment, this is most famously known as hazing.
While fraternity hazing is an aspect of American culture that is often treated as a laugh in the media, being featured in movies and television shows as a part of the university experience, it is nothing more than childish, dangerous behavior unbecoming of any decent person. The need to humiliate and hurt a person in some crazed idea of an initiation ritual for the mere sick enjoyment of others is illegal, immoral and inexcusable.
Fraternities, both academic and social, can be amazing experiences for college students, but they must remain closely monitored to ensure that they remain so. Hazing has been reproached on paper and ignored in real life for too long. No matter the contributions of fraternities to an institution, whether financial or reputational, universities have a responsibility to their students to provide a safe environment. Any fraternity that violates a hazing policy must be investigated and expelled from campus immediately and have their charter revoked.
Young people come to university to expand their knowledge, both academic and cultural, and to discover their passions and interests as they become their own person. To have this beautiful privilege tainted is the painful result of a perverse violation of authority. To allow hazing, especially in a university where the fraternities do not have their own headquarters and operate from campus, is nothing more than straight negligence on behalf of a university’s administration.
UTSA must reestablish its authority and punish Alpha Tau Omega for any misconduct. Further, the administration must put in place a stronger system of oversight to minimize the chances of more hazing incidents happening on campus and work to reestablish trust with the student body they have failed to adequately protect.
