If you didn't catch the last two episodes, go listen and start the story
from the beginning. We left off last time with me fully immersed in Greek
life. I was now officially initiated into sorority world, and if you're lucky,
you learn the rules and norms of sorority world without getting hurt. Snapped
Yeah. Summer twenty seventeen, end of July, my best friend and I
went to Sardinia, which is an island off of Italy, for vacation with
my family and almost vacation, as one does. I took some beech picks
from the bathroom sitting on the toilet looking through my pictures. You know how
it is. I'm scrolling through. I'm scrolling through. Oh shit, I
see a pick that I like. I mean, I think I look good.
I think my friend looks good. To give you an idea of this
picture, it is a picture that my mom took where my friend and I
are laying on the beach. I'll post it on Snapped the podcast on Instagram
if you want to see for yourself. My friend is laying on her back.
I'm laying on my side. I'm wearing a red with some flower print
bikini bottoms and my butt is peeking from the bikini bottoms because I got a
fat ass. I'm not even gonna lie to you. So I see the
picture. I think I look good. I think my friend looks good.
And so what do you do when you see a picture that you think you
look good in at least what a lot of people do? You post it
on Instagram. But that's exactly what I did that night. My friend and
I are going out on the town and we don't have service. But turns
out that while we're out, the notifications on my phone we're piling up.
So I get home back to my Grandpa Aren's house, which is where we're
staying, and I turned my WiFi on and I have an overwhelming amount of
notifications. The first thing I see is a text from my pledge mom saying,
hi, snap isn't an option, and then that upside down smiley face,
and so I'm like, fuck, they snapped my picture, which means
take it down. In sobrity world, and to a listener, you might
be like, okay, like what's the big deal, But in sorority world,
this is a big deal because that means that you're not representing the chapter
how you should and as you guys know, that's the number one thing that
you need to do as a good sorority girl. So I go to Instagram
and I see the notifications. One of them is from my pledge mom saying
snap. Two older girls liked the comment, and then there was another comment
from another older girl saying snap, and girls liked that comment as well.
I also had a few new follow requests from older girls and the sorority who
hadn't been following me before. Immediately, my heart is so tense, and
I mean, I know that they're slut shaming me, and I know this
is not right, but this is sorority world, and I kind of have
to play the game, and my gut instinct is to take it down.
And I replied to the pledge mom d of playing the game, wanting her
to admit why she's making me take the picture down, and I say,
I'm just wondering why was that bad? I deleted it, but I'm just
wondering so I know for next time when you snap me. It's clear other
girls liked it to prove a point, but that is gaging me up and
not very sister like when we were told what not to post. Bikini picks
were never included, and what's going on right now is slut shaming. I
feel attacked for loving my body and being proud of myself. Tears are already
flowing from my eyes. I show my best friend, who I'm with,
what's happening, and she's telling me how fucked up it is. And I'm
talking about how fucked up it is. And look at my texts, my
other texts, and I see a text from a friend in the sorority saying
I love you, don't let them bring you down. And then something about
an email, and I'm thinking, like, what did they fucking send an
email out about me? And so I check my email and I see an
email with the subject social media and this is what it said. Hi.
Hi. With the start of the semester just a one month away, yay
pnms, which are potential new members are beginning to check us out to get
an idea of what our sorority is really like. That being said, now
is a time where it is really important to be keeping our image up and
constantly sharing posts that are an appropriate portrayal of our chapter. Everyone needs to
be mindful of the photos they are posting on social media, and remember that
your pictures are not only representing you as an individual, but the chapter as
a whole. Love the beach picks, but let's try to keep the booties
tucked away from here on out, smiley face. With this in mind,
remember the part of being in blah blah blah the sorority name is holding each
other accountable. So remember to use snap if you think you see something that
might not be the best image of our chapter. And of course, if
you are ever unsure about a host or photo, don't hesitate to reach out
and get a second opinion. Xoxo. My heart is pounding, I am
ugly crying, and I'm thinking, what the fuck? How is this allowed?
I mean, not only are they slut shaming me, but they're encouraging
other girls to snap me. And my fight or flight mode told me to
fight. I had to stand up for myself. I couldn't be treated like
this. At this point, the pledge mom had responded to me and said
also to note that these texts are slightly condensed for the purposes of the podcast,
but all salient details are present and no words were changed around, just
sentences that repeated itself were taken away for the sake of time, So the
pledge mom said, I in no way had the intention of ganging up on
you, And to be honest, I'm not sure what you're referring to on
that. I know other girls snapped you or liked my post, most likely
for the same reason I did. When you post something, you represent the
entire chapter. And to be quite honest, you're absolutely allowed to have a
bikini picture up, no problem, but you're representing one hundred sixteen girls,
and when your bathing suit doesn't cover much the photo itself wasn't really appropriate and
really doesn't reflect well. You're obviously more than welcome to wear that. I
just think pictures like those are similar to the ones we spoke to you about
around mid day, same vibes. Rule of thumb I usually follow is if
you wouldn't want an employer seeing it, safer not to post again. This
isn't meant to be an attack. Everyone has been snapped. It was created
as a safeguard and as a way to hold each other accountable. No personal
attack, I promise. Hope you're having fun on your trip. Creating the
snap system was for the exact reason to be sisterly to each other. I
would much rather have someone tell me the harsh truth than have people who I
call my sisters let me do something that isn't in my best interest. I
am livid at this text. Who do you think you are telling me what
I am allowed to wear? Like? Oh, like you're more You're more
than welcome to wear it, but don't like who is? What is this?
Is this fucking handmaid's tail? I'm confused. And although I want to
reply being in all caps, there's still this power dynamic between us where I'm
the younger girl and she's an older girl and my pledge mom and I need
to watch out what I say. But I was still going to stand up
for myself, so I said overall, I don't understand why my body concerns
anyone but myself. It is truly disheartening to be shamed by my sisters and
when I should just be cheered on. I was not disrespectful to anyone in
the photo. No one was offended, and my body isn't going to stop
one of my sisters from having a job. If a hater sends my beach
picture to an employer and they don't want to hire me because of that,
then I don't want to be hired. The picture is still deleted. I'm
following the rules, but I find them to be extremely old fashioned, and
like a lot of old rules, they should be changed. And when a
whole email is sent out obviously about my picture, it's so sad and could
easily make me feel insecure. That is an attack, and even if it's
coated in other words, it is not nice. We're all different individuals who
believe different things, and we should start embracing those differences instead of snapping each
other's bodies. Right now, I feel very targeted. I'm legit crying right
now because I don't feel happy being a part of something like that, and
being targeted by the whole chapter is seriously so upsetting, and it's happened so
much. This is not right. I got no response from my pledge momb
part of me truly thought if I stood up for myself and backed up what
I was saying that I would be heard and validated, but instead I felt
shut down and silenced. I mean I literally told her I was crying.
It was a cry for help, and not getting a response felt like a
really big fuck you. I was ugly crying for about two hours, and
then just felt shaky and unstable because I felt like everyone was against me.
And I talked to my friends about it in the sorority, and they would
empathize with me and say like, oh, yeah, that's fucked up,
But no one stood up for me. And sometimes it even felt like they
passively took their side, I guess because that was the side with the power,
or maybe they really did believe that it was a bad I don't know,
but I just felt really alone. And so the next day I reached
out to the president of the sorority to express my feelings, and I said,
I've heard the words slut and slutty used a countless amount of times throughout
our chapter, including a chapter meetings. This is a word and a concept
that should not be used at all, especially within a group of women.
Apparently, my bikini picture is sending people the wrong message about what our sorority
is. What message is my bikini picture sending that I'm a slut and that
the sorority we're all sluts. My picture doesn't send any message except the fact
that I'm confident in my body, and that message doesn't harm anyone. I
wasn't drinking alcohol, just so many people post pictures of I wasn't doing drugs.
I wasn't sending any mean, slash rude messages. If anything, I
was sending a positive message encouraging other people to love their bodies and or curves.
We should be learning to be confident in who we are and not care
about what others think. I understand we're part of something more than just ourselves
now, but the lack of diversity and acceptance for differences is truly lacking,
and it upsets me so much. Seeing a group of girls write in power
and comments on my photo would be far more inspiring than seeing girls gang up
on me writing snap and subbing me in an email. There is nothing wrong
with my photo and no one should have a say in what I do with
my body except me, and out of all people, my sisters should not
be over sexualizing it. I'm very upset that I had to be the victim
in this situation and targeted in front of this chapter, but I think a
good thing could come out of this. I used to be part of stop
slut shaming in my high school, and I think I could educate and help
my sisters on what's okay and not okay to say when it comes to slut
shaming. I took the picture down even though there was nothing wrong with it,
out of respect to the chapter. But I hope I can have the
same respect about what I'm saying. And I hope you understand what I mean.
This message is to the overall chapter. But I think you could help
me change things. I'm still extremely nervous about all of this. I mean,
I went to the beach that day with my family and I had to
leave because I was so anxious. And I'm not trying to be all,
Oh my god, woe is me? I had to leave the beach.
I'm trying to show you guys that this was really affecting me. The President
responded and said, how does this sound, meaning that she sent it to
someone else before that and forgot to take away the how does this sound?
By Lucy? I'm so sorry. I'm traveling today, so I was in
the air when you sent me your messages. Thank you for reaching out to
me and sharing how you are feeling about all of this. First off,
I am so sorry you felt singled out. I promised you that email was
not directed to you specifically at all. If there's ever concerned with an individual
or two, we would absolutely reach out specifically to you and not send a
mass email to the chapter. The message sent is something that's typically sent mid
semester or throughout the semester to remind everyone that we're reflecting the organization. I
really respect you and hope you feel supported by everyone, and you are a
hot Tamali who should feel proud and confident. However, we just have rules
and always have to reflect the organization. Well, there are rules our internationals
gives us to follow and enforce. By no means do I want you to
feel slut shamed. Our sororities should be a place where you feel empowered.
I do think when we get back we should have a talk about maybe holding
a program event. We're talking its chapter about this more often. Again,
I am so sorry and thank you for reaching out. Sorry for the first
line didn't mean that. We were just going back and forth talking about how
the email could have been misconstructed by the rest of the chapter and wanted to
come up with the best solution. This response was truly so disappointing for me.
It was saying I'm sorry you felt singled out instead, I'm sorry you
were singled out, And this is what happens today. When a woman expresses
that she was wronged in some way, we've respond with I'm so sorry you
feel that way, which immediately undermines the experience and just contributes to the sexist
stereotype that women are just emotional and shouldn't be taken seriously. I was flabbergasted,
like, how could a sorority force me to take a photo down of
me in a bikini saying I'm not representing the sorority, but then encourage its
members behind closed doors of chorus a chant about sucking cocks and fucking guys.
It seemed like they wanted us to come off as these dainty conservative virgins but
perform sexual like the sluts that they've shamed us to be. It was one
large contradiction, and as much as I wanted to call her out on all
her bullshit that she just wrote me, there was still that huge power distance,
and I felt like I couldn't argue with her because she had that position
as president and had that power, and so I sent her another long message.
I reiterate to her, like how upset I am about this and I
got no response. This was another cry for help and it got completely ignored.
It felt like that harassment and embarrassment was my punishment for posting the picture
and would ensure that I wouldn't do it again. It's like I was back
in middle school being forced to wear sweatpants that scream out. I violated the
dress code when wearing shorts that go above your knee, and since the process
of being called out is so humiliating, you just don't do it again.
After all this happened, I couldn't enjoy the vacation. I know, that's
just like a white people problem. I'm like, oh, like I'm in
Italy and like I can't enjoy my vacation. You know. I had stopped
taking my anxiety medication for that summer because I was feeling like I was in
a pretty good place in life, and after this happened, I was so
anxious that I went back on it. For the rest of the summer.
I didn't wear shirts with the sorority letters. I wouldn't even wear it to
bed because it just gave me bad vibes and folk up. I was anxious
went to bed. I was anxious. I was lashing out at my parents
because I was so miserable about the fact that I was about to move in
to the sorority house and would be living next to these people that ostracized me,
and there was no way out of it. I mean, I had
signed a contract, so of course when the end of August came around,
I was packing up my stuff to go move into the chapter house. As
much as I'd like to tell you that this story is over soon, we're
just getting started. Snapped. Thank you so much for listening to this episode.
Please rate, review, subscribe, share this episode to your Instagram story,
and send it to your sorority sisters. Snapped is an independent podcast,
so the biggest way that you can help is by spreading the word. Let's
spread this ship faster than my butt pick spread. Okay, let's send some
mass emails about this ship. For all the updates and to be part of
the conversation, please follow at Snaps the podcast on Instagram and TikTok. Thank
you again for listening, and I'll see you next episode. It's gonna be
a tough one.