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HUMILIATION, ASSAULT, BATTERY, MANSLAUGHTER

5/24/2012

 
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ROBERT CHAMPION
Humiliation, Assault, Battery, Manslaughter
    The word, “hazing” is a slimy euphemism for humiliation, assault, battery, and manslaughter. I’d pin the last on perpetrators of the atrocity in Palm Beach, Florida, that took the life of drum major, Robert Champion, attacked in a bus by fellow band members, left battered, vomiting, semi-conscious, and soon to die.  Any temporizing or rationalizing is as corrupt as claiming that wife battering is a private matter, or that children molested in a church is a church matter.
    Members of hazing groups should be encouraged to come forward and describe brutal hazing experiences, also those that were welcoming, enlightening, or joyous, to show that uplifting alternatives can replace what has become an aberrant cultural perversion. Groups that induct new members should be urged to renounce hazing, or if the word is kept, redefine it to outlaw physical abuse, which will be called by what it is: crime.
    I knew a sorority girl who told about being blindfolded and given something she was told was a raw fish eye. Ordered to eat it, she did, immediately vomited, to learn it was a crushed grape. Is that hazing? In my opinion, yes, but let wiser people sort out definitions of where a joke ends and barbarism begins. Any fraternity, band, team, or club that persists in criminal hazing should be shunned and driven off college campuses.
    Cruelty not only harms victims but elicits the worst of the perpetrators. What was in the minds of Florida A&M band members when they were beating Robert Champion? Were they getting sadistic thrills? The word “sadistic,” remember, comes from the French Marquis de Sade, who got sexual kicks out of torturing. Is that what drives hazers? Are they sick evil monsters? What else could cause people to beat another person to death?

CH
5/24/2012 01:39:52 pm

The pledge's (victim's) willingness to undergo humiliation and abuse, in the belief that it leads to belonging and acceptance, is one of the reasons that hazing remains compelling on campuses.

Martha
5/27/2012 12:38:29 am

CH's comment is illuminating, indeed.

Martha
5/27/2012 12:40:35 am

I should add: In light of CH's comment, above: I went to a small, elite New England college, where fraternities thrived (in the 1970s). The same question CH asks pertains to upper-class white kids: The question is one that crosses lines of race and class and remains compelling.

Cam link
9/5/2013 04:07:08 pm

Anyone know where I can find more information?


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    Author (Yuma, AZ, 1944)

    Being 90 years in this world,  with great kids,  great grandkids, great wives (two, one at a time) and great memories, I wonder why some people seem to have stopped loving the U.S.A.? I will wonder in print right here. If you wonder too, or can provide some answers, please comment.
                                   Stuart Hodes

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           With my friend, Nero.
                   April, 2012.
        Photo by Ray Madrigal

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