University of Virginia Library

Grim

When Fred Bronner, a brother of Chi Chi
Chi fraternity at Pierce College, fell 500 feet
to his death last week, he was supposedly
"learning a lesson" his brothers were trying to
teach him. The whole incident dredges up
memories of the worst atrocities perpetrated
by fraternities over the years, and renews our
fears that the system may yet have some flaws
despite the claims to the contrary from the
contemporary fraternity representatives.
When a houseful of supposedly mature
brothers can gang up and intimidate,
humiliate, and ultimately kill another brother,
it is more than a simple case of insanity or
misguided adolescents.

But the role of the fraternity system itself
is really neither here nor there in this case. It
is rather a classic instance of man's
inhumanity to man; where human
communication breaks down and our most
savage instincts take over...Tribal slaughter,
we might call it.

And we think we are civilized.