We have a generation of men who want to use their presence and their power and their creativity for the benefit of other people they want to do that but they don’t know how and so I said well I I’ll at least give them a framework for what that can look
Like welcome to Socrates in the studio uh I am particularly uh excited as I think you will see I I honestly get so excited about this subject I was thrilled you wrote about it so before I tell the audience what it’s about why don’t you do that uh and and how you
Came to write the book yeah great question again thanks for having me on the show you know we have about 350,000 men currently in fraternities in this country wait na now today 350,000 men in fraternities today in in okay I wow yeah in about in about 4,000
Chapters and I see this as an opportunity to do two things one is to make University life better but also to produce the next generation of America’s leaders because if you look statistically uh and historically at the history of fraternities and the types of men they produce is something like in
The 70 to 80 percentile of all CEOs all members of Congress all presidents and vice presidents if you look at the Supreme Court Etc where do those men come from they come from fraternities and so we sort of talk about the crisis of men and masculinity in America I’m
Thinking well one of the best places I think to resurrect the sense of of producing America’s leaders is fraternities now I came to write the book because I was concerned that a number of fraternities were getting suspended in fact what I noticed in the news cycle this is before
Covid is that once a week somewhere in America a fraternity was being suspended like every single week and I thought what is happening with fraternities and I began to look at the data and as you look at those stories I began to see these patterns right I mean they were
Being suspended for hazing violations they were being suspended for alcohol abuse and things like that and at the Kings College I taught a class on the history of masculinity in America we did a a unit on the history of fraternities and when I looked at the history of
Fraternities and I looked at the current Express of fraternities I was confused at the disparity and what’s fascinating about the disparity is that in the beginning fraternities were organizations that were primar that were primarily literary societies so many in the 19th century in the 19th century in the early to mid 19th century
Fraternities were places where men would come and read Socrates they would read Aristotle they would read the classics and they would debate them together that’s this is what they would do for fun in fact the libraries and a lot of fraternity houses were better than the than the libraries at
The University so it was a it was a sort of a finishing opportunity for men of arts and letters to prepare them for leadership and what I noticed when I looked at the the narrative in the story is that fraternities began this way and then we found ourselves and currently
With all these suspensions and what I noticed is that in 1978 and you remember this there is a film called Animal House I the only reason I remember it was because it was uh required viewing by people in my high school you know like you everyone had to go uh to to see
It and I guess I I guess I thought it was 1979 but maybe it was made in 78 but it had such a powerful impact that when I entered College in 1980 where I went to School everywhere they were doing toga parties which was so it this was this was one of those
Films Animal House and I’m glad you brought it up because obviously I was going to at some point it really was a cultural Landmark it’s like a film like The Godfather that it’s more than just a film it basically affects thinking about college life about uh fraternity life obviously um and was very
Influential probably mostly for ill but it had it had huge cultural impact it had massive cultural impact in fact I I’m I’m willing to say that the reason that we see some of the the the challenges with some chapters on some schools is actually because of that film
We can trace it back to that oh no question because what happened right as you said a bunch of middle school and high school boys watched that film in 1978 and they said when I go to college I’m going to do that right and then they went and they did that and every
Fraternity film after Animal House is a variation on the theme of that film it’s probably I would say one of the most impactful cultural film sort of projects in in modern American history and for people who don’t know what it’s about because there are tons of younger people
Watching right now who you know they were not uh they were not around or it’s so far back now that they they don’t you know they they think it’s like a classic film from the 30s that that film glorified uh drunkenness I mean in in in
A lot of ways this gets into a larger conversation about media and the glorification of bad behavior but you had one of the biggest stars of the time John baloi who was one of the main figures on Saturday Night Live starring in this film as what a kind of a model of debauchery
Like that was his thing and it was cool it was you know know cool funny that whole idea was pushed very very strongly in the culture with with a with a principal figure and then you fast forward you know 20 years later or so and you get will frell another huge
Figure in films and an SNL appearing in a similar film called old school or whatever but it definitely started with Animal House absolutely and what’s really fascinating to me quite sad is that what we see in the animal house that is not what for are about in fact I
Was in fraternity when I was in college we weren’t about that most of fraternities at Clemson were not about that but that genre that media project right has really sort of stereotyped in a negative way what fraternity culture is like so here’s a problem there are lots of parents who who are dissuading
Their sons from joining fraternities because of that film and they’re missing out on all the good things that fraternities could possibly produce and and and provide and so I wanted to get back right this crazy project I have to try to sort of Infuse virtue back into Greek life it’s
A crazy project but I just believe that we have a generation of men who want to use their presence and their power and their creativity for the benefit of other people they want to do that but they don’t know how and so I say well I
I’ll at least give them a framework for what that can look like talk a little bit about your own uh biography with regard to uh fraternities you said you were at Clemson you because obviously that’s what gives you the principal credential to weigh in on on the subject
So uh talk about that you were at Clemson and you how what was your experience uh in what’s called Greek life since I’m Greek I always have to like pause it’s like no it’s not about that it’s about uh frat houses uh and maybe you can actually before that tell
Us why it is that you know tell us about the word fraternity but then tell us about why did they adopt um Greek letters so that we now know of uh you know fraternity life as Greek life what what was that classical influence in the 19th century education that’s exactly right so
Fraternity started at Union College in sken New York there were three men who were veterans and they missed the camaraderie of serving together serving in the military so they got together at Union College and decided to form a fraternity they met with a professor in
His office and said hey we want to do something and because at the time you you sort of being grounded in the classics was so normal unlike it is today that of course they wanted to sort of resurrect sort of sort of Greek influence of of of camaraderie and
Brotherhood got a deep connection and Community it was it was out of that it was it was out of a longing for camaraderie and this strong sense of of Brotherhood they chose the word fraternity okay so this is so I mean this is 1824 in skty a bunch of veterans now I
Don’t know what what war were they in the war of the War of 1812 or or I guess maybe they were just serving in the military together and then they decided to go into University we don’t need to talk about this now because I want to talk about
Your Clemson experience but it is fascinating that men seem to long for Brotherhood for camaraderie there’s something in men that longs for that uh and that can be for good or for ill obviously as you write about in the book um so I want to touch on that because
That’s so fascinating that that’s how it all started but what was your uh what what pushed you you know as a very young man at Clemson to say I want to be in a fraternity well I mean I I was like a lot of my students sort of seeking a
Deep connection with a group of brothers sort of have a pack to sort of have a a tribe right you sort of want to be a part of a group guys want to be part of a group this idea that that you know sort of Americans are individualist and
Kind of Lone Rangers is absolutely false right guys want to be a part of the group in fact from way way back they were like The Little Rascals if you can remember that that that program right that’s one of the greatest things ever H roach or gang com
That’s like the greatest yeah ever I didn’t think we were going to go there thank you well you can go from there to The Three Stooges I mean all the way happy days I mean sort of all these media projects right sort of explain and you can see the Deep longing that guys
Have in the community it can be for good yeah or ill like a gang for example right but how roaches our gang was innocent so it’s kind of funny the the word Gang has taken on this thing but we this is my gang this is my group this is
My you know and there’s something really beautiful about about that and that is particularly masculine that that there’s something about guys that long for for having something like that well and I’ve seen some great psych data on this what what actually happens that when when men are are deeply embedded in a community
Of support with brothers and and sort of comrades if you will they’re much more willing to take risks they’re much more willing to be brave they’re actually they’re actually much more willing to be compassionate and empathe atic they’re much more willing to put their lives on the line for others they’re actually
Much more likely to live out the cardinal virtues when they have a community around them to encourage them and push them right to encourage right to put courage in them to be great men and great men cannot be great without other men it’s absolutely impossible we’ve never seen it in American in not
Just American history but in in the history of human culture we’ve never seen a culture where men have been great outside of a community of men to put courage into them to do amazing and outstanding things and guys want to be heroes they really do I mean we we we
Are in a season of Halloween and costuming and what do you see kids do boys put on costumes often of Heroes and they have this intuitive sense this sort of intuition that I cannot be a hero alone I can only be a hero when I have a squad with me right
And so what do they do they want to join a community of men to make them great they have that intuition and when I was in college there someone who wanted who had aspirations to be a leader things like that I knew because of the the history of fraternities particularly in the
Black community so I I play as alpha alpha Incorporated which is a historically black fraternity uh some of our most famous members are third Good Marshall and Martin Luther King Jr you may have heard what some of our most famous men that’s pretty famous you may
Have heard of WB de Boyce and and people like that right also WB de boys yeah our fraternity is it is there any Fraternity in the world with like three names like that that’s kind of impressive it is impressive we have more I could there’s there’s a long long Liston there’s a
There’s a long long there’s a long long list of of men and alha F Alpha who’ve essentially changed America but that’s a that would be a different conversation but my fraternity was founded at Cornell in 1906 uhhuh and it served as one of the divine nine so the the Divine N is a
Is a collection of historically black fraternities and sororities that really saw themselves one as as forming leaders out of college to be placed in the community to be leaders later second secondly so when I was growing up I mean part of what it meant to be an an
African-American in the community was to be a part of Greek life I mean my my mom’s in her 80s she pledged Delta Sigma Theta and she still goes to sority meetings once a month so in the black community Greek life is not simply about the first few years of college and then
Sort of ends afterwards this sort of college is the Preparatory phase for pressing into being a community leader and so during the Civil Rights Movement for example the fraternities and sororities in the black community were involved in organizing and and fighting for for freedom and Justice and things
Like that so when I was in college sort of growing up in a community in Atlanta where sort of postgraduate Greek participation is really really high I thought well it’s a natural thing for me to want to be a part of as an African-American one of the divine nine
Greek organizations in order to be a leader in in this country I know the Good Marshall was at Howard University in 1930 because Dietrich boner when he came to America he visited the South and visited Howard um so that’s another thing to mention is that when you join a
Fraternity you’re joining a fraternity that connects you not just to that chapter of that Fraternity in that college but that connects you to all the fraternity Brothers across colleges across that that that’s kind of a magnificent uh networking if you did it only for networking possibilities that’s an extraordinary thing that that uh
Alpha alpha is that what you said that that would be um a connection to all of these people uh you know through throughout the country and all the alumni so that that that’s a very interesting other words that would just be a very attractive reason for somebody
You know to to join a frat absolutely it’s it’s a huge draw I mean to know that you will be a brother in fraternity which puts you in in in a legacy of Great Men and here’s the thing High School guys want to be great men
That is just a fact the problem is they don’t have a good road mapap for that and few people are investing in them and encouraging them on exactly how to do that so one of the big issues I’ve had in terms of in terms of how we relate to
Young adult men is we simply are we encourage them by negation what I mean by that is don’t be bad right don’t mistreat women don’t Haze your brothers right don’t abuse alcohol and drugs but they aren’t telling them what to do right they aren’t giving them the virtues of greatness and Excellence they
Aren’t giving them Prudence they aren’t giving them you know sort of Justice they are giving them the cardinal virtues it is formation by negation which is which is not formation at all and so we have a a whole cord of young men who are trying to figure out what to
Do what to be with this sort of heroic impulse that they have and what they end up doing we we’re seeing this right now is they’re on YouTube trying to figure it out and so that’s why want to ask why is it that college men are so driven to
These influencers on YouTube is there a there’s a vacuum you should do a book on this maybe there’s a vacuum of instruction on how to be an outstanding and excellent man there’s like there’s like nothing out there for them and so they’re joining fraternity try to recapture some of those virtues and to
Join a legacy of men who’ve proven and demonstrated that they’ve done it I I sort of did two books on this subject I did a book called seven men and the secret of their greatness and then a sequel seven more men in the seet of their greatness which are short biographies
Because sometimes you can help people get virtue um or get the concept of virtue as they read stories of greatness right you read a story of greatness and without telling people it’s this value and that value you you see it and you kind of pick it up so
That’s in some ways for the same reason you wrote this book I I wrote the book Seven men because I thought we lack in our culture um any uh a number of the things you’ve already mentioned but but we don’t talk about virtue we don’t model virtue we have we now denigrate virtue
Uh if anything we’re going to denigrate or mock virtue or these kinds of uh heroism it’s mocked um and as you’re saying men in particular automatically in respond to this kind of thing and so that’s why I wrote those books but the but your idea of using um
The Greek system the fraternities that already exist as a delivery system for this I I think is genuinely brilliant it’s amazing and I that’s why I was just so excited to talk to you about this because it really is it’s it’s simply a great idea it’s an amazing idea that
These things already exist uh and if we could get any number of them to begin thinking along these lines um and then even the fact as you say in the book that there’s historical precedent they used to be uh shaping men in a good way and it’s only really in our lifetimes
That this has kind of gone sideways every single campus that I speak to a fraternity and I invite them to a heroic life of virtue they almost come out of their skins and excitement and on almost every campus I go to this is the sort of response that I
Get because I say hey again why don’t you use all that you’re about right use your power your presence your creativity all that you have right your strength use all of that for the benefit of your brothers in your chapter and everyone else on campus whenever I invite them to
That I get a standing ovation every single time and this is what they say to me no one talks to us like this there’s no one inviting us to be great men no one no one no one believes in us and so what I tell them is I believe in you and
I believe that you can actually use the virtues and the values and the mission of your fraternity because they’re back you know this these were these were developed in the in the early to to mid 19th century so they’re sort of classically judeo-christian all of them they have
These all of these fraternities have fantastic values and virtues and mission statements and if they plug back into those it will not only change the campus it’ll change the country because out of that cohort will come the next generation of America’s leaders well I’m
So glad to hear you say now and to read in the book that you are being invited to speak um uh at colleges around the country on this subject um it’s interesting that their response is that nobody’s talking to us this way because uh I mean let’s face it the the culture
Has gotten profoundly confused on these basic issues even when you mention uh m masculine traits or whatever there’s e either confusion uh or derision um and I I I I’m just so grateful to you for turning that narrative because the the hunger is there as you’ve just said well I I think
I think what happens is that so much of the current cultural discourse is about how bad men are not just the word toxic but unnecessary and and that men make things things worse this is and think about your average 20-year-old 18 19 20-year-old has grown up in a society in
A culture yeah where they’ve only heard how bad men are yeah and they’ve just experienced shame and rejection not encouragement right but rebuke and shame and rejection because you’re a mistake and if we could just get rid of men the world would be yeah no Wars no serial killing how great
That would be um you use a term I wrote it down uh in the book you talk about disordered masculinity and the purpose void um that’s the issue isn’t it that that that you and I men of faith we know that God’s idea of masculinity or the tra traditional judeo-christian view uh even
The Western view of of masculinity is fundamentally heroic it’s fundamentally meant to be self um not self-serving but selfless that’s the the model you know obviously we can talk about chivalry that’s been there for the longest time and it’s only recently in a way that uh masculinity has been uh
Defined in terms of toxicity what I mean I don’t know if it’s worth getting into but how how that happened
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