On February 4th 2017 Timothy Piazza, a 19 year old Penn State University Student from Readington Township New Jersey, lost his life after falling down a set of basement stairs in The Beta Theta Pi Fraternity home. That night Piazza was pledging the fraternity. After falling down the flight of stairs he had to wait nearly 12 hours until medical help was contacted. He was flown to Hershey medical center where he was pronounced dead.
Vice President of Student Affairs at Penn State put out a statement following the incident. He states "from what we know is that this was a hazing ritual and it involved the gross misuse amounts of alcohol." Since the incident along with many others Penn State is taking action by putting a hold on Fall Rush for all fraternities and sororities. Penn State is not the only higher education school that is having students die from hazing in Greek life. This is starting to become a rising issue on college campus across the county.
Melanie Dostis from USA Today states that "the frequency of hazing-related injuries and deaths is further cause for many students and experts to feel the outdated tradition should have no place in modern culture" Dostis article uses ethos to connect to her audience she uses the statistic presented by University of Maine that found 55% of college students across the country that are involved in clubs and organizations admitted to being hazed. Dostis also uses pathos by giving chilling hazing stories such as the 2010 case at Radford University where a pledge member in TKE (Tau Kappa Epsilon) was forced to chug an entire bottle of alcohol with in an hour. The pledge membered died with a blood alcohol level six times the limit. Six of the TKE brothers were arrested and put in jail for two years and a $1000 fine. The tone of Dostsis article is very strongly opinionated on why hazing is bad and why "disrespecting and humiliation a person in any way is not acceptable" as she puts it in her article. She also uses social proof by using the statistics and words from actual students who suffered outlandish hazing experiences she is showing that what everyone thinks about how hazing is bad is the truth. Along with using these types of stories and statistics in the article she builds a scenes of urgency that we must put a stop to all hazing which she also covers how some schools are working with their greek life organizations to enforcing no hazing policies.
When you type college hazing into google you get articles on why it is bad, but what if hazing has some benefits to it? John Talty of the International Business Times, wrote the benefits to hazing in fraternities and sororities. Although Talty agrees that some of the hazing deaths are unfortunate he shares that hazing has its benefits. Saying that some social greek life groups as part of hazing you must complete study hours which makes you focus more on school. He also puts in how many CEO's in America were once pledges of fraternities and sororities. He says "Hazing wasn’t the sole reason on why they are successful, but defiantly changed their outlook on life. Talty also makes the argument that why isn't US military training considered hazing. He states that no one calls it hazing because in the public eyes it builds character and prepares the individual for the future. He says this is what hazing on school campus' are. "It turns boys into men and girls into women". Taltys argument is tapping Pathos, although he does not use any facts or creatable sources he does speak about how hazing help others along with himself. Talty's tone throughout this article seemed hostile at the fact that everyone thinks hazing is bad although he does agree that some the of hazing stories being way to .
http://www.ibtimes.com/why-hazing-can-lead-positive-change-224185
