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‘At [American University,] two sororities and one fraternity were [recently] forced to dissolve because their membership numbers ran too low. At Vanderbilt University, more than 300 Greek members have dropped; meanwhile, Northwestern University’s Sigma Nu chapter suffered a loss of about 75 percent of its pledges, and dropout numbers across the country continue to rise.’

It’s always embarrassing when an institution founded on hyper-exclusivity, on the imposition of degrading, sometimes fatal, initiation requirements on desperate wannabes, begins to be shunned. It’s like that painful scene from Apollo 13 where NASA is breathlessly beaming capsule footage to no one cuz the nation has lost interest in the whole space thing. Only here it’s like What if they gave a lethal overdose and nobody came?

George, a UD reader, sends her the absurd, unsurprising disciplinary statistics on frats and sororities, for instance, at Indiana University. This headline captures it nicely:

Vast Majority Of IU Fraternities & Sororities Disciplined Since 2016

So, you know, having written about Greek dégueulasserie on this blog for years, I don’t need to revisit the abattoir here; I just need to update you on the faltering fortunes of these freshman fatality factories. As in, they’re faltering.

But here’s the thing. No one will ever actually kill them. They will stagger on, rotting brick Colonials inhabited by rancid remnants financed by hedgies who used to be members.

Margaret Soltan, April 23, 2021 1:17PM
Posted in: STUDENTS

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UD REVIEWED

Dr. Bernard Carroll, known as the "conscience of psychiatry," contributed to various blogs, including Margaret Soltan's University Diaries, for which he sometimes wrote limericks under the name Adam.
New York Times

George Washington University English professor Margaret Soltan writes a blog called University Diaries, in which she decries the Twilight Zone-ish state our holy land’s institutes of higher ed find themselves in these days.
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It’s [UD's] intellectual honesty that makes her blog required reading.
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There's always something delightful and thought intriguing to be found at Margaret Soltan's no-holds-barred, firebrand tinged blog about university life.
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truffula, commenting at Historiann

Margaret Soltan at University Diaries blogs superbly and tirelessly about [university sports] corruption.
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University Diaries. Hosted by Margaret Soltan, professor of English at George Washington University. Boy is she pissed — mostly about athletics and funding, the usual scandals — but also about distance learning and diploma mills. She likes poems too. And she sings.
Dissent: The Blog

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