Any other stereotypes that need reinforcing?

Which is to say, when folks act like jackasses they do so as individuals, not representatives of an entire class, race, group or nationality.

nah... im pretty sure all frat boys are drunken idiots
its in a book of note i read once

Janosh

Apparently the Monterey Park area of Los Angeles has the most expensive car insurance rates....Monterey Park is mostly Chineese

As much as I dislike frat guys, these guys really acted on their own in the scene. Idiots. They deserve every bit of ridicule and alienation from the community. Dumbasses. It's like they broke the law and have to serve their sentence, only this sentence is the most fitting and just.

Also, signing a waiver while drunk??? You are responsible for yourself at all times (and I know drinking!) so when they signed the waiver with their own hands and motor skills, they signed. Schmucks. If I were their parents, I'd disown them, but then again the dads probably taught them all they know. Another stereotype about the types of dads these guys have? Yup! And I'll reinforce that one for as long as I live. Idiots breed and teach idiots.

Agreed - these two are blue ribbon dumbasses that no one would want to be associated with. But what I found particularly ironic about mdler's post was that this was in reference to Borat. That movie was one whose brilliance (when it wasn't hackneyed) came from the moments when he was exposing his victims hidden prejudices, waiver or no waiver.

frankly what those drunken white boys said was no more extreme than the shit you hear coming out of drunk white boys at the bar all the time. I have no clue why there is such an issue made about this. I'd be shocked if they had black/female/minority friends to offend in the first place.

Yeah, I'd be surprised if they had any female friends in the first place. Well, guess they don't now! Hi-oh!

Hmm I think by in large we criticize and condemn that which we don't understand. This holds true for religion, other cultures, and certain architecture to an extent. However I think that to stereotype these types of things only sheds light on ones own ignorance.

Sure you see these types of things in the media that reinforce the stereotypical image of a frat boy, just as you see things in the media that reinforce the popular opinion of the war in Iraq. That doesn't neccessarily mean that what you see is the be all, end all on the given topic.

I don't mean to be critical, but simply wanted to offer a counterpoint to the multitude of drunken frat boy bashing posts that are sure to follow. Some of which no doubt stems from the fact that the studio gives architecture students a sort of fraternal connection, so they typically don't experience fraternity life. I was in a fraternity, ironically enough the same one as the kids in the video (although from a different school) and believe it or not don't consider myself to be a burned out drunk capable only of ethnic slurs and mistreatment of women. I only ask that you don't write off group because of the mistakes of a few. Correct me if I'm wrong but I think historically thats proven to be a bad idea.

yes, but the architectural bond is much more about a specific culture that has a more altrusitc goal and aim in mind ... I know that all the frats and sororities have beneficial "projects" in mind, but let's just be frank, in general, it is about giving eachother hand jobs, in a metaphoraical sense, and that, in my mind, deserves more condemation than any so called support you can give to any of these organizations. I'm not denying organizations in general, it's just the culture that derives from them is highly outdated and deserves a tight investigation through the microscope and most likely a termination.

i don't know, knock. my dad's fraternity was about turning their frat house into a beach after it was condemned by having a truck dump a load of sand in through the front window, setting up life guard stands, and bringing in coolers and blankets. certainly a more thorough transformation of a space and real adaptive reuse than anything i learned to do in architecture school.

I don't think the media had to form my opinion of frat guys. I went to college and SAW guys acting like that. There were dudes in my dorm that were like that, I had a roommate like that (Yo Bob, some bitch called-fine classic quote). I also knew some guys that were in frats and were fine. I get sick of the "I was drunk" excuse. Most people that drink heavily do so in order to get drunk. It's a shitty excuse. THOSE guys were stupid, got burned, and I laughed a lot. T

what i wonder is that i'm sure this movie has been popular along the fraternity rows and what their reaction must have been to the scene. I can imagine them laughing their asses off and making lewd remarks only to realize that Borat has put them and their lifestlye up onscreen. Maybe some of them gave it a serious thought even if it was just as simple as "i don't want to be like him." But i imagine that many of them just shrugged or laughed it off, seeing their brother's make asses of themselves only to later claim "that's not how we do it at our frat, or...that's a different fraternity chapter and we don't know them."

On a side note, I liked the scenes where Borat would set up a situation and see how it played out. I wasn't so impressed when he would directly instigate something through hurtful language (ex: dinner scene where he says, "In my country they would go crazy for these two [points to the two ladies on his side]...not so much for this one [points at the pastor's wife]."

I think the biggest question from this movie was: why am I laughing at this ridiculous scenario? Why do I laugh harder at this scenario than others, why don't I approve of this, why do I approve of this, and so forth. To me, Borat is trying to get to the dirty underbelly of America's bigotry by paroding a foreigner...so question your own.

No doubt what they did in the movie was retarded, I'm not in any way trying to defend those actions. Its a shame because now I have to try and avoid dropping my fraternity's name because of the connotations that the name brings with it thanks to the movie. But hey more power to Borat for making a movie criticizing almost every part of american culture and then turning it into a blockbuster.

I have always been interested in the differences between the bonds made in the studio as compared to a fraternity. In my experience it is usually either one or the other, has anyone else tried to balance both of these in undergrad? It always seemed like the two sides couldn't understand each other. My bros in the fraternity could never understand why I was spending all night in the studio instead of partying. My friends in the studio couldn't understand why I wasn't spending every waking hour zap-a-gapping my fingers to my models.

I actually think it makes a good balance to have both those experiences, to keep things in perspective and provide a break from one or the other. But I realize that the stereotypes of fraternities are there for a reason and many people won't agree or appreciate this, but I feel like I got more out of my college experience by being connected to both of these networks/cultures.

Didn't mean to interrupt, continue flaming the drunk frat boys.....

as a member of a fraternity during undergrad i was always a bit surprised by the amount of animosity many non-greeks felt for us and sororities.

admittedly i was busy with arch school most of the time but i felt that the fraternity experience was surprisingly enriching. in an era of narcissism and alienation especially on large campuses i found the community of the greek experience to be refreshing. it felt very much like a kind of family on campus. we had a variety of people in our chapter from all over the country and with varying experiences. it was a pretty good dialogue within the house. moreover, we contributed to a varity of charitable causes throughout the year (something i'd have never done on my own as a student) and there was the additional benefit of dealing with organization & bureacracy. parlimentary procedure was expected to be followed at chapter meetings and negotiating the politics of the chapter has proven to be excellent practical experience for dealing with people in the professional world as well.

besides i've seen just as much of the stereotypical boorish frat guy behavior in plenty of undergrads who had nothing to do with the greek system.

As an ex-greek, I have to say: hear, hear, puddles. There are idiots everywhere, not just in the uni greek system.

In *some* schools the greeks do seem to attract a disproportionate amount of foolish rich kids, however...

thank you myriam

Its funny how there are certain groups of people we are encoraged to discriminate against and judge blindly, even when we are involved in a convresation (even tho over a post) with members of that group that are being rational and polite. ... I say blindly because every school is different, so it is impossible to know every frat... my school had frats that were straight up dorky.

People used to do this to catholics & jews (this is obviously much, much less serious) anyway, it's just an interesting thing. . Human nature, I guess.

Human brains are built to reduce complexity for more efficient processing. We are reductive creatures, but oh, so productive.

lol -- well, most of us are productive... some of us just procrastinate on-line. Not that I do that or anything....

Interesting comments. During my undergrad I was a greek member. Over half a decade later I'm much closer with studio friends than greek friends. While in college I was originally much closer to the greek friends but into my 4th & 5th year it had completely reversed into spending most social time with studio mates.

The good was exactly as puddles said. I know parlimentary procedure and even more about conflict resolution. The experience taught me leadership. I learned how to organize fund raisers, how to lobby the university and how to negotiate. All skills that have helped me get where I am today.

Of course there are idiots out there in any organization. Drunk frat boys get the press because they come from a recognized organization that's easy to exploit. Meanwhile there are drunken college students everywhere doing stupid things.