Humiliation, homoeroticism and animal cruelty: inside the frathouse

Humiliation, homoeroticism and animal cruelty: inside the frathouse | The Guardian, Sean O'Hagan ,Mon 10 Dec 2018

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Photographer Andrew Moisey uncovered ritual hazing, extreme drunkenness and toxic masculinity on one college campus – from men destined to be America’s future leader

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In his book True Gentlemen: The Broken Pledge of America’s Fraternities, John Hechinger notes that around 100,000 young men choose to be initiated into chapters annually, despite these all-male societies now being associated with what he describes as “the unholy trinity of fraternity life: racism, deadly drinking and misogyny”

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The article then goes on to Photographer Andrew Moisey’s book. Moisey is a Berkley graduate and now teaches at Cornell.

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Moisey, whose older brother was a member of the frat house in the book, began photographing there in 2008, when George W Bush, “the ultimate frat guy”, was president. “I was angry with Bush and the culture of white privilege that produced him and his values, but no one was that interested in the pictures. But now, suddenly it’s 2018 and the temperature has changed

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“Out of a fraternity culture that protects bad seeds, one of the worst seeds gets elected to the Supreme Court.”

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Moisey on Kavanaugh.

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When young women appear in the photographs, the sense of danger is amplified. Some collude in the laddish behaviour, baring their breasts and appearing unconcerned about being groped and leered at. Others seem more uncertain, slightly spooked, yet they are there of their own volition despite the heightened atmosphere of male entitlement – even threat. Whichever, the image carries a disturbing charge, all the more so given the recent studies that have found that women in sororities are 74% more likely to be raped than other college women.

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“These all-male campus spaces have been around since the 1820s,” elaborates Moisey, “but they changed perceptibly during the so-called culture wars of the 1970s, becoming a safe space for guys who didn’t want to have to worry about having their kind of fun.” Many fraternities, he believes, now view themselves as embattled institutions, maintaining their conservative core values of brotherhood, privilege and machismo against a perceived liberal onslaught.

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Andrew Moisey:



Sean O'Hagan:


John Hechinger:



What form of masculinity is not "toxic", in these people's eyes?

What "spaces" for men, if any, should be allowed to exist in these people's vision for the world?