Althouse: "The university decided to halt parties at fraternity houses, he said, because Cornell doesn’t 'have the full ability to be confident that what goes on in those houses is safe...."

October 15, 2026

"The university decided to halt parties at fraternity houses, he said, because Cornell doesn’t 'have the full ability to be confident that what goes on in those houses is safe...."

"The pause, he added, was also a chance to 'take a step and carefully study' the issue of banning fraternities altogether, a step some have called for. Addressing a speaker who supported such a ban, Dr. Kotlikoff said he had just spoken with alumni who said that 'their sorority and fraternity experience was a very important part of their life at Cornell.' 'If at the end of the day, the fraternities cannot exist in a safe environment, and we can’t be convinced that they can be safe, then we should make that decision,' he said."

From "Cornell’s President Grilled by Faculty Senate Over Handling of Crisis/Ahead of a vote on a resolution of no confidence in Michael I. Kotlikoff, some faculty members said they were not swayed by steps he announced on Tuesday, including banning fraternity parties" (NYT).

51 comments:

mccullough said...: Cornell enrollment is 54% female. Soon it will be 60%.

The fraternities will be gone because no straight men will enroll at Cornell.; 10/15/26, 12:01 PM
JK Brown said...: But, but, how will Cornell sell the "college experience" if drunken frat parties are banned?

"Cornell is middle-of-the-pack among the Ivies.

"The most female-skewed are UPenn and Columbia, driven in part by their large graduate populations.

"Dartmouth and Princeton are the only Ivies with a male majority overall, largely due to their smaller graduate programs and stronger undergraduate STEM enrollment.; 10/15/26, 12:06 PM
Leland said...: Seems prudish.; 10/15/26, 12:09 PM
bagoh20 said...: I could see not supporting them, but don't the students have a 1st Amendment right to assemble?; 10/15/26, 12:09 PM
Bill Harshaw said...: Frats/sorority alumni are more apt to contribute and to contribute more than the majority of alumni who didn't pledge.; 10/15/26, 12:09 PM
bagoh20 said...: I assume fraternities are not a net plus for the learning process, and I would not want my kid to join one, but it should be their right.; 10/15/26, 12:12 PM
bagoh20 said...: Endowment allows a University to ignore being competitive with the current market. That's probably bad for students.; 10/15/26, 12:14 PM
CJinPA said...: Does anyone there think they should make any sweeping decisions after they know what actually happened to drive those decisions?; 10/15/26, 12:14 PM
Smilin' Jack said...: The return of in loco parentis. I remember when coeds (I guess you can’t call them that anymore) were the loudest voices against it. Something about liberation or something.; 10/15/26, 12:17 PM
Aggie said...: I guess it's easier than teaching values and moral discipline. It's only a University, after all. We can't have them shaping young adults into principled grownups.; 10/15/26, 12:19 PM
The Middle Coast said...: What is the standard for being “convinced”?; 10/15/26, 12:31 PM
Dr Weevil said...: I taught at a flagship state university in the Deep South ~30 years ago, and had a strong impression at the time that sororities did more good than harm, fraternities more harm than good. I don't know if it was all sororities, but the ones the Latin majors were in had 'study night' every weekday, where they all spent 2 hours sitting around the dining room table after dinner doing their homework in full view of each other. They said the peer pressure really helped their studies. The only male Latin major who'd ever been in a fraternity had been kicked out after being pulled over by the police with multiple firearms in his back seat. The fact that he wasn't in jail suggests that the offense was esthetic, not legal. The fact that I never had a current fraternity member as a Latin major is what makes me think they were academically harmful.

To get to my main point:

What I thought at the time, and still think, is that it might be a good thing in many ways to ban fraternities and keep sororities, but that CAN'T POSSIBLY BE LEGAL! It would be obvious, blatant gender discrimination. Even banning parties at fraternities but not at sororities looks illegal to me. Surely the Cornell fraternities will sue, and the sororities (if they have any sense) will join them.

Alternatively, maybe the fraternities could all legally change their status and become trans-inclusive sororities, with all the same members now claiming to be college girls.; 10/15/26, 12:37 PM
boatbuilder said...: It is notable that while there was indeed a party at the fraternity on the night in question, the events at issue do not seem to have any connection with the party.

"I think that this situation absolutely requires a really stupid and futile gesture to be done on somebody's part."; 10/15/26, 12:37 PM
boatbuilder said...: Hey Professor Weevil--maybe the reason that you didn't have that many male latin majors was that, unlike the sorority ladies (and perhaps the guy with the firearms), post-collegiate employment was a major concern.

My experience as an attorney representing fraternities is that quite often when the schools ban fraternities and/or the national fraternity organizations revoke the charters of the local chapters, the local chapters (at least the hard-core partiers) go "underground." They still exist, and still have parties; they just don't even pretend to follow any rules.; 10/15/26, 12:47 PM
Peachy+2 said...: Until you kill all the horny white boys - the horny white leftist females will never be happy.
But please - Jane Doe would like once last snort-f**k from the guy she has a crush on. Then - off with his head.; 10/15/26, 12:48 PM
baghdadbob said...: I'm so glad I enjoyed my fraternity experience in the late 70s, during peak Animal House. Toga!; 10/15/26, 12:53 PM
Peachy+2 said...: Feminism: Women have the same rights as men to be horny sex animals. Until election time and its big money if you can smear the president as a rapist.; 10/15/26, 12:54 PM
Peachy+2 said...: Blue State Hell madness is kinda fun to watch.; 10/15/26, 12:54 PM
Ann Althouse said...: "alumni... said that 'their sorority and fraternity experience was a very important part of their life at Cornell'" — they're saying, it seems, that they won't want to give money to Cornell if it changes into something that is not the Cornell they loved

Also, the students still must live somewhere and they will find a place to party and consume substances. I think it's a shame the kids can't go to bars and just be in public.; 10/15/26, 12:57 PM
boatbuilder said...: If there is a record at Cornell of ongoing and repeated offenses by most or all fraternities, and the university did little or nothing about them, then Ms. Craig's attorneys are going to have lots of ammo with which to pursue their legal claims against Cornell. If not, what justifies banning all frat parties?

You are either closing the barn door after the cows are out, or unfairly curtailing the frats' freedom of association rights.

Did you know that service to or consumption of liquor by persons under the age of 21 is illegal on every college campus in the U.S.? I'm guessing that Cornell's record of enforcement is a bit spotty in that regard.; 10/15/26, 1:06 PM
n.n said...: Minority report.; 10/15/26, 1:07 PM
baghdadbob said...: Prof Althouse said:
"I think it's a shame the kids can't go to bars and just be in public."

When I was in College, the drinking age was 18, so >95% of the student body was legal. We had a pub right on campus, and kegs would roll through on hand-trucks. Now with the drinking age set at 21, most students must party in the shadows, where shadowy things happen.; 10/15/26, 1:09 PM
Dr Weevil said...: boatbuilder:
Learn to read. I had plenty of male Latin majors, but none of them were fraternity members. Many, but not all, of the female Latin majors were sorority members, and I couldn't help noticing the contrast.; 10/15/26, 1:09 PM
bagoh20 said...: "Women have the same rights as men to be horny sex animals."

Here! Here! Just don't look at them, when the dress like it.; 10/15/26, 1:10 PM
Caroline said...: I hear they’re also going to add yet another layer of bureaucrats for “safety.” Note well it hasn’t occurred to them discontinue “ sex week” and all the attendant programs and speakers who promote depravity as a mark of liberation.; 10/15/26, 1:13 PM
Dr Weevil said...: By the way, a French professor was once surprised that my Latin classes always had roughly equal numbers of men and women. Apparently French classes were more than 2-1 female, Spanish more than 2-1 male, and he had somehow assumed that Latin would be like French.; 10/15/26, 1:15 PM
Peachy+2 said...: Bagoh - Afterwards - those same horny leftist females might choose to ruin your life. Rolling Stone in on the phone.; 10/15/26, 1:17 PM
Oh Yea said...: baghdadbob said...
I'm so glad I enjoyed my fraternity experience in the late 70s, during peak Animal House. Toga!

Same - When I watched Animal House the first time, I could assign names of my fraternity brothers and other acquaintances to nearly every character in the movie.

And I agree with boatbuilder, that worst fraternity and sorority incidents took place at off-campus unsanctioned activities.; 10/15/26, 1:21 PM
Peachy+2 said...: Blue State Hell.

Well at least we know where DD has been hanging out.; 10/15/26, 1:30 PM
Two-eyed Jack said...: My solution is to lower the drinking age and reverse grade inflation. That might bring back the Cornell I loved. Safetyism will not do the trick.; 10/15/26, 1:36 PM
Smilin' Jack said...: “Also, the students still must live somewhere and they will find a place to party and consume substances. I think it's a shame the kids can't go to bars and just be in public.”

Bars don’t have bedrooms. Frats offer all-in-one convenience.

Not that I have any experience with that. I went to college during the time when frats were considered very uncool, and no hot liberated hippie chick would be caught dead with a frat guy.; 10/15/26, 1:41 PM
Mary Beth said...: They will, of course, also ban sororities? The infamous evening began with the young woman going to a couple of bars with her sisters and getting 5/10 drunk even though she was underage.; 10/15/26, 1:42 PM
Two-eyed Jack said...: By coincidence, I happened to be writing a letter to Dr. Kotlikoff just now. What do you think?

Dear President Kotlikoff,

I am sure this is a difficult time for you and that you are beset on all sides by people, both inside and outside the Cornell community, eager to let you know just how far short you have fallen, in their estimation, in your handling of the Jane Doe case.

I am, nonetheless, writing to let you know how far short you have fallen, in my estimation, in your handling of the Jane Doe case.

In your statement this week, it appears that you are willing to accept the woman and her lawyer's characterization of the incident without reservation or hesitation. In your statement you put forth

that Jane Doe is a survivor of sexual violence
that Cornell has fallen short in its actions thus far
that there is broad prevalence of sexual violence against women in our society
that there is a need to address the "social context" of sexual violence at Cornell
that faculty expertise in "rape culture" will help create expanded opportunities for safe and healthy social engagement
that a partisan lightning rod like Sally Yates can easily find improvements that will foster community, trust and respect

All of these seem highly debatable. Lost in this is the possibility that the incidents in question are now being incorrectly characterized and that the institutions of both the government and the university responded appropriately or might have even been overly aggressive towards male students, and that current statements might be harmful to students and to Cornell itself. Anyone watching TMZ this week or with any memory of the Duke Lacrosse case might think you are being taken for a chump.

I doubt that you are a chump, but your evident lack of concern for legal process, the rights of the accused, ordinary social interactions of Cornell students who have done nothing to warrant punishment, and your insistence on doing something because of the feelings whipped up by national media two years after the fact, don't provoke any admiration.; 10/15/26, 2:00 PM
n.n said...: Like RAATs in an Ouroboros progression. Vive la sexual revolution! #NoJudgment #NoLabels #HateLovesAbortion; 10/15/26, 2:03 PM
ForestwithouttreeS said...: Collective punishment doesn’t solve anything. I can testify to from first-hand experience that non fraternity college kids engage in “non-safe” activities all the time.; 10/15/26, 3:05 PM
Joe Bar said...: Ann Althouse said...
"I think it's a shame the kids can't go to bars and just be in public."

Raising the drinking age to 21 was a horrible decision. That said, either lower it again, or rigidly enforce the law. I understand, in some states, underage drinking is allowed if a parent or guardian is present. Perhaps that's a solution.; 10/15/26, 3:06 PM
Joe Bar said...: I met an engineer who graduated with a EE degree from MIT. He said he never would have graduated without help from his fraternity brothers. In his house, failure was not an option, and low grades would get a student kicked out, so they had long study sessions every night, and cram sessions before finals.; 10/15/26, 3:09 PM
Dr Weevil said...: Joe Bar:
Yes, a horrible decision. When I was in college (early '70s) we learned to drink like civilized grown-ups from teachers who threw wine-and-cheese parties for their classes at the end of each semester. The few who didn't were despised.; 10/15/26, 3:12 PM
Jim at said...: I wonder if any of these people running around with their hair on fire ever bothered to read the DA's report from two years ago.

Or Jane Doe's actual text messages.

Obviously not because if they did, they'd shut up about it. All of it.; 10/15/26, 3:34 PM
Prof. M. Drout said...: Since the '80s we known that there are per capita more rapes, sexual assaults, alcohol poisonings, overdoses, and violent actions in dorms than in fraternity houses, but colleges are much better as covering up what happens in the dorms, and you also can't blame an entire dorm for the actions of a single person.
Fraternities are free associations of individuals and colleges should not be subsidizing, regulating, or prohibiting them, which means that they probably should not be physically on college property. Unfortunately, in many places colleges swallowed up the private land that had surrounded them, so there aren't physical locations.
The Student Life bureaucracy hates fraternities because they "exclude" people, are self-governing, and they demonstrate that most of what Student Life does is unnecessary, because most fraternities handle communal life far better than Student Life does in dorms, at less cost.
Now keep in mind that my undergraduate was a nerd school, so those of us in fraternities were not party animals (the dining room was used for group problem-sets every night after dinner, for God's sake) but just slightly less socially inept than the average Carnegie Mellon male student, so it's possible that houses at big state schools are abusive and still haze and do other abusive things, but I kind of doubt it, since just about every negative journalists story about fraternities turns out to be made up--if things were so bad, at least one of the stories of abuse would be true.; 10/15/26, 4:19 PM
todd galle said...: In my opinion, it's the institution constantly changing rules. Our fraternity had a mandatory 'study hall' for pledges, twice a week, with brothers on hand to help within their major field of study. The college declared it 'hazing'. End of study hall. This was 1986.; 10/15/26, 5:11 PM
Jim at said...: *Our fraternity had a mandatory 'study hall' for pledges, twice a week*

Yep. Three hours on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Wednesdays were exchanges (hosting a sorority). Those were mandatory for pledges, too.; 10/15/26, 5:20 PM
Not an oldster. said...: Wait, you want them snorting K and fucking in public?

Because they had no trouble getting into the bars underage and drinking but the party needed a place for the drugs and fucking... you cant be advocating we see that too in public?; 10/15/26, 5:30 PM
Peachy+2 said...: Jim at 3:34 - right?

The Russia Russia-MS NOW narrative is needed prior to an election.; 10/15/26, 5:58 PM
Achilles said...: mccullough said...

Cornell enrollment is 54% female. Soon it will be 60%.

Who is more willing to go 6 figures into debt for a degree in psychology or sociology?

The average IQ of college graduates has dropped over 20 points in the last several decades.

The colleges are just catering to what they have determined to be their best customers and the percentage of degrees in STEM fields just keeps falling like a rock.; 10/15/26, 6:21 PM
Bruce Hayden said...: “*Our fraternity had a mandatory 'study hall' for pledges, twice a week*”

“Yep. Three hours on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Wednesdays were exchanges (hosting a sorority). Those were mandatory for pledges, too.”

Went to a small liberal arts school, and most everyone was pretty motivated scholastically. In my class in the fraternity, there were no mandated study halls. But tutoring was always available and strongly pushed, for those needing it. Our house was always #1 or #2 in GPAs every semester out of the fraternities. And the Greek GPA was always notably highest than the GDI GPA. Always.

The bulk of my classmates ended up with graduate degrees. More MBAs - you could see that coming when we half filled a sophomore accounting class. Which was convenient for those of us bored by the subject matter. Two of us had a contest for missing the most classes (while acing the class). I lost, attending the 1st class, midterm, and final. The other guy beat me, by skipping the 1st day. One of the other Bruces was the other one together MBA/JD. The other Bruce ended up an MD. Two others. Typical year. Year before had a lot of JDs. There was a mini fraternity in town of alum attorneys. Very handy.

We also traded honors every year with the same house for most socially involved. When I was president of the chapter, we had at least one such function a month. My favorite was setting the Guiness record for continually jumping on a trampoline. We worked with a sorority, got pledges, jumped for a month, with someone bouncing 24/7, and gave the money raised to charity.

My daughter joined a sorority some 40+ years later. Very similar results. Her house had the best GPA and did more public service than the other houses. She had no interest in the tri-Delts (sorority that Jane Doe belongs to) because of their alcoholism and drug use. Or the other one that put drugs above booze. If that’s what you want, you can find it. Daughter didn’t, and instead ended up in a sorority that boats more illustrious allumna nationwide than any other. She was happy there.; 10/15/26, 6:38 PM
Hassayamper said...: *****
My daughter joined a sorority some 40+ years later. Very similar results. Her house had the best GPA and did more public service than the other houses... a sorority that boasts more illustrious alumnae nationwide than any other...
*****

Hmm. That has got to be KAΘ, although ΠBΦ may be in the running too...; 10/15/26, 9:58 PM
Bruce Hayden said...: I think that you got it in one.; 10/15/26, 10:37 PM
HoodlumDoodlum said...: Jane Doe in this particular case did most of her (underage) drinking at her own sorority house, right? Seems like they ought to be getting a lot more criticism than they have been.; 10/16/26, 9:36 AM
loudogblog said...: A lot of the same people who say that 16 year olds should be allowed to vote are now saying that adults should not be allowed to have parties at their own houses. I'm not a fan of the Greek culture at colleges and universities, but don't adults have a right to free assembly? This is an example of punishing an entire group because some of them might do things in the future that are already against the rules.

"Out of an overabundance of caution, we have decided to throw the baby out with the bath water."

It will be interesting to see if the President of Cornell eventually gets named in one of the upcoming slander/libel lawsuits. You'd think that the President of Cornell would know better than to publicly take sides in a serious legal issue like this before the basic facts have been determined legally.; 10/16/26, 12:08 PM
loudogblog said...: JK Brown said...
"But, but, how will Cornell sell the "college experience" if drunken frat parties are banned?"

As a person with a Theatre Arts degree, I can tell you that there was much heavy drinking and sexually inappropriate activity at cast parties, too.; 10/16/26, 12:14 PM