Title: A Look Into the Grim Realities of Sorority Culture in 'BAMA RUSH'

Allison Stewart: This is All Of It on WNYC. I'm Alison Stewart. Our next three segments are all dealing with college life. Right now, there are thousands of young women preparing for an event that for many, will be life-changing. Every August at the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa, the focus turns to rushing sororities at the state's oldest public university. Greek life is vibrant at UA, and the process of applying is a culture all its own.

One that became a national fixation when potential new members, known as PNMs, began posting their rush week outfits of the day. You can see these right now if you go on TikTok. Take this example of two young women.

Video: Hey, it's the first day of recruitment, open house convocation, and we're gonna give y'all a little OOTD of what we're wearing. So my dress and my bag are from Free People, and then I'm wearing my Bejos today. And my jewelry is from [unintelligible 00:01:07] And my necklaces are from my mom. Hey, guys, I'm Katie, and my top is Lululemon, gold hinge, Hocus. My bag is from Poeta. Dior. Kendra Scott. Kendra Scott. [unintelligible 00:01:21] And my rings. And, yes, we're so excited. We're so excited. Rush, day one.

Allison: The phenomenon led documentary filmmaker Rachel Fleet to think about some issues around this hardcore pursuit of Greek life. Feminism, belonging, beauty, standards, and acceptance. Touchpoints in her own life as a woman with alopecia. I spoke with Rachel Fleet when Bama Rush started streaming on Max. You'll hear callers in this segment, but this is an encore, so we can't take your calls. I began the conversation by asking Rachel about her experience with the Greek system before she made the film.

Rachel Fleit: So I wasn't in a sorority. I went to Ithaca College and was a theater major. I had no idea about the Greek system at all. But for years and years, I just was fascinated by it, and I always thought it would make a great documentary. So when it went viral on TikTok in August of 2021, I knew that the University of Alabama would be the place to sort of go down and take a magnifying glass to it.

Allison: As you started researching Greek life and the Greek system, what seemed unique about the University of Alabama's Greek system?

Rachel: Well, the stakes are just different in the south. In filmmaking, we often think about the stakes. And at the University of Alabama, quick into my research, I realized that there's such a long tradition of the sorority system there. There's what we call legacies. So that means you're grandmother could've been in it, your mother was in it, and now you had the pressure to get into this certain sorority.

It's really a very long-held tradition. And so young women are working very hard to get into the top tier sororities at the school. I don't think it's the same in the northeast or on the coasts.

Allison: How did you approach these young women?

Rachel: So we approach them in all different kinds of ways. We would meet them on campus once we were down there. We found them through social media. Now it's very popular, once you get into your school, to join the Bama 26 or Bama 25 social media accounts, and we would just say like, "Hey, we're making this documentary. It's going to be a 360-degree view of the experience of sorority life at the University of Alabama."

But really, what I wanted to get across to the young women that we were contacting is that this was a movie about what it means to be a young woman right now. And I really wanted to use the sorority system at the University of Alabama to further explore that.

Allison: What were some of the questions that you wanted answered? What did you ask the young women?

Rachel: I wanted to know if the pressure of being a young woman was the same as it was when I went to college 20 years ago. I had a sneaking suspicion that some of the same issues that I faced two decades ago were still prevalent. And then add the pressure of social media to that. That was really what I was going for down there.

Allison: And why did the young women tell you they wanted to be a part of this? To have cameras follow them around during what is really an important time to them. You really get that sense of how much this means to these young women.

Rachel: Yes. So we contacted over 500 young women in trying to develop our character for this film, and we got so much resistance. There were so many young women who just said, "I'm so sorry, I'm not allowed to talk to you." And I would say like, "No, no. I'm a thoughtful, compassionate filmmaker. I want to talk about what it means to be a young woman right now."

And they'd say, "I'm so sorry, we're not allowed to speak with the media." But there were many young women who listened to me and trusted my vision. And I think ultimately they wanted to be seen, they wanted to be heard, and they went on the journey with us, and it was incredible.

Allison: Let's talk to Ariel. Calling in from Manhattan. Hi, Ariel. Thank you for calling All Of It. You're on the air.

Ariel: Hi. I just wanted to share my positive experience with greek life. I went to Arizona State, and I got my first job from networking through my sorority. So super grateful. And now I'm able to work in Manhattan from that experience.

Allison: Why did you join in the very first place?

Ariel: It looked super fun. All the girls, they were all dressing up in the same outfits every day, and they all had the same backpacks, and it looked super fun, and very everyone had a friend group, so that's kind of the initial reason.

Allison: Ariel, thanks for calling in. Rachel, what was a common theme among these young women of why they wanted to rush at the University of Alabama?

Rachel: The common theme really was all about belonging. Every single young woman I spoke to said, "I just want to make best friends. I just want to find a place where I can feel at home." And that just became such the emotional engine of the film was this idea of belonging and what we do to find community really. And at University of Alabama, it's the sorority system.

Allison: To give people a sense of context, how many women are involved in the rush process? I mean, it's a lot.

Rachel: It's a lot. I think the numbers were hovering around 2500 during 2022. So quite a few.

Allison: And what's expected of them in that week? What is supposed to happen?

Rachel: So it's a series of parties, but they're not parties with alcohol. They're really like tea parties, I think, but there's no tea served, just tiny water bottles, which you'll hear about in our film. They are to dress up in lovely dresses and high heels and have their hair done and their makeup done and their jewelry on. And they are to have small talk, really, but at the same time, they have to be charming and they have to stand out, but nothing stand out too much. So you have to fit in, but you need to have a sparkling personality.

Allison: Sounds like a job interview a little bit.

Rachel: Exactly. Exactly.

Allison: Did you get a sense there was any hazing or that there was any danger?

Rachel: No. There's a lot of misconception around hazing and rush for sororities. The sorority rush is really all about this getting to know you. Any sort of hazing does not happen during the rush period, so our film didn't focus on that.

Allison: It does seem expensive, all of the clothing and the makeup and the hair. What are they spending money on? Did you get a sense of how much money they're spending and how much it costs to be part of one of these sororities?

Rachel: So we have a figure in our film. The average cost for new members to join a sorority per year is $8,300 at the University of Alabama. That's the middle cost, right? That's the average. There's higher sorority dues and there's lower sorority dues. So that's just to participate in year one. With that being said, you do get three meals a day, just to be clear. But, the outfits, some of these outfits that these young women are buying are $300 each. I know that there's more affordable options, but it's expensive to look the part to get into the sorority.

Allison: My guest is director Rachel Fleit. The name of her film is Bama Rush. It is streaming on Max now. So you made some interesting choices as a filmmaker. It's not just cinema verite. You're not only following these young women around. Instead, you also bring in some experts to provide context and historical context. When did you know you wanted to have these other voices in the film?

Rachel: It was pretty soon that we decided we wanted to have experts and other voices just because sorority culture is so limited in the mainstream media, we just don't know a lot. And I think, for me, what really struck me was early on in my own research realizing that sororities started at the beginning of co-education. So young women who first joined sororities were the first women to actually go to college, which was such a huge deal. And so the boys were having these fraternal organizations, and the young women were like, "We want that, too. We're here at college."

So the origins of sororities were actually these radical feminists. And I really wanted everyone to see that. Of course, as time went on, it went from academia and feminism to, in the second generation of sororities, being much more focused on the parties and socializing and being the best representation of womanhood. And so it changed. And I don't doubt that these sisterhoods still have some strong feminist values, but there's definitely other things at play.

Allison: Let's listen to a clip from Bama Rush. This features someone you interviewed, Elizabeth Boyd, PhD, author of Southern Beauty: Race, Ritual, and Memory in the Modern South. This is from Bama Rush.

Elizabeth Boyd: I visited the University of Alabama, observing the sorority rush parties. I probably saw five or six houses. Rush is a social stratification ritual, bar none. Stratification in the sense of organizing people and groups of people into tiers of power, of status, of prestige.

Allison: What was something you heard in those interviews that really helped you shape the film or maybe even change the direction of the film?

Rachel: Social stratification ritual is something that just rings in my mind as a pivotal moment in sort of the direction. When we realized that there was a tier system, there's top tier, mid-tier, and lower tier, I started to see that there was something underneath all of this, which I like to think of as, honestly, the patriarchy and white supremacy. There's a fight to get to the top-tier sorority, and as one of my participants mentioned, the top tier sorority are the hottest girls.

So the competition between women to get into that top tier sorority because the top tier sorority would be paired with the top tier fraternity. And by paired, it means socially paired, they would be partners in parties and other sorts of events, and you would get to mingle with these top-tier fraternity men. So, to me, it really started to feel like this competition between women and also sort of a race and class power struggle.

Allison: Yes. The film goes into the male gaze. It goes into race. University of Alabama did not officially segregate their sororities, their Greek system, until 2013, just a decade ago.

Rachel: That's right.

Allison: So when you talk to the young women about race, how do they think about it? How do they talk about it?

Rachel: I have two of my main subjects, Ryan and Michaela, who are both mixed-race young women, and I really wanted them to just speak about their personal experience with being mixed race at the University of Alabama to just present the information and let my audience digest that. The young women who are not women of color really did not want to talk about race. They were happy to tell me that their sororities now had DEI representatives and that they were working to change things, but they wouldn't really dive deep into that at all.

Allison: Did you get a sense that they didn't want to dive deep into it? There's not knowing how to dive deep, and then there's not wanting to dive deep.

Rachel: I think they didn't know. The young women in the film, you see it towards the end of my film, they talk a lot about being afraid of not being liked and being canceled. And I think that the social media culture down there is so black and white and so polarizing and honestly quite mean that really they were unsure about how to talk about it.

Allison: Let's take a couple of calls. Alexis calling in for Red Bank. Hi, Alexis. Thank you for calling All Of It.

Alexis: Hi. I just want to say I love that your guest is doing this story and with such depth. I think there is so many implications, which, she was just discussing in terms of race and elitism. And so I went to school in the '80 sin New Jersey. I do think northern schools are quite different than the southern schools. They're less formal and a little more relaxed. But when I rushed as a freshman, I realized it was not for me. I am nothing a conformist, I am a nice person.

I don't ever want to make anybody feel like I'm stamping myself as like, "Okay, I'm in this group that's superior." And I knew it wasn't for me. But as chance would have it, as a junior, I wound up in an apartment with four women, all in the same sorority. That was one of the top-tier sororities. So they were saying, "Alexis, do it. Let's do it." I'm like, "Guys, I don't want to do it." Ultimately, they convinced me. Now, I shouldn't have gone against what I knew was not for me.

So I'd walk down the street or down campus. I'd cover my pins. I didn't want anybody to see them. I did happen to be a cheerleader at my school, so I already had-- There was a group of young men. They saw the pin. They're like, "Oh, my God, you're such a follower. What are you doing?" They literally put me in a garbage can.

Allison: Oh, my. Alexis, I'm going to dive in because you're bringing me to a really interesting point. Thank you so much for calling it the conformity aspect, Rachel, because these women, some of these young women hire these consultants for quite a bit of money, like college consultants, to help them shape their candidacy, sort of, I guess is the way to put it. What's some of the guidance they get?

Rachel: The guidance is really about-- First of all, there's small talk and the five B's. Those are the five things you have to stay away from.

Allison: What are the five B's? Let our audience know.

Rachel: Boys, booze, bucks, Bible, and Biden. So that's don't talk about boys, don't talk about alcohol, don't talk about religion, don't talk about money, and don't talk about politics. So those are your five B's. Then you have to dress in a certain way. There is dresses only, no jumpsuits, no shorts, no pants, bright colors. Do not wear black. You should be wearing a high heel. Your hair should be done. We went to see a hairstylist in Atlanta, Georgia. She showed the girls how to sort of tease their hair so that it was bigger.

The makeup needs to be set. The girls walk around in Tuscaloosa with these fans for their faces because the makeup will start dripping because it's so hot. I mean, it's quite an ordeal. There's a lot to do.

Allison: We got a text. "When we searched colleges, we were leaning away from schools with Greek life. However, when my daughter was expected at a small, high-tech university with 70% men in her engineering major, she found salvation in her sophomore year with a sorority. Many of her classes had no or one other girl, and making friends with other women was hard, but the sorority really changed things." Thank you so much for texting in.

So you had this thing that happens that filmmakers don't want to have happen. Two things happened. One is that there got to be a bit of a wave against your film before you even finish it. Rumors started about your intention, about what you were doing, about who was on campus, who you were engaging with. When did you first get a sense that something had gone wonky?

Rachel: I was actually in New York and I got a text message of a screenshot of a Facebook page for the parents of young women rushing at the University of Alabama. And that screenshot is actually in the film, in the third act, when the rumor starts. And they just accused us of surreptitiously recording these young women and putting microphones on young women and paying people to go through rush so we could record the whole process. And I was appalled.

I was like, "What? We're not doing that. That's crazy." And then it just exploded from there, and it was extremely stressful. But in the end, I think that rumor shows the power of the Greek system. And I don't want to give away any spoilers, but it did really impact our film and the subjects in the film.

Allison: There's a discussion of a group that's somewhere between skull and bones and the Illuminati that everyone seems to feel has a great deal of power. I don't want to give so much away. But did you get a sense that this group knew about your film and had any sort of intentions of trying to thwart your film or disrupt your film?

Rachel: So, as one of my subjects, Garrett, says in the film, he says the Greek system is the machine. The machine is the Greek system. And obviously, a lot of young women knew that we were making this film because we contacted them, and they said they weren't allowed to speak to us. And so I think, absolutely the Greek system was aware that the film was being made. And if the Greek system is the machine, then in my mind, of course, the machine had something to do with this rumor really going viral.

Allison: My guest is Rachel Fleit.

Allison: She's the director of Bama Rush. Let's talk to Ginger calling in from New York. Ginger, thanks for calling in.

Ginger: Hi. Thanks, Alison, for letting me get through.

Allison: Of course.

Ginger: Oh, well, I just called because I belong to one of the historically African American sororities, and I haven't seen the film yet, though folks are talking about it. And it's just interesting that we kind of exist in different universes, even when worlds are integrated and kind of for different purposes. I belong to AKA, my daughter's an AKA, my mother was an AKA.

Allison: Vice presidents in AKA. [laughs]

Ginger: And it's kind of more of a lifetime-- Vice presidents in AKA. Tony Morrison was in AKA. It's more of a lifelong network of professional black women that came about over 100 years ago when they were excluded from so much. So it's a support network and a community service network ongoing. And I think the social pressure is just very different in terms of it being so much part of-- I mean, it's definitely part of your identity, and people choose the organization that fits best with their own personal identity.

But in terms of the social pressure and what it means in terms of making friends and making "the right friends", I think it's very different. I think we probably feel just not that level of pressure. And it's also interesting. Most folks I know had no desire to join a white sorority. I mean, I went to a predominantly white private school growing up, and people were picking out what sorority they wanted to join. And most of my black friends, we just didn't have any desire.

We had white friends. We didn't want to belong to organizations where we were going to kind of feel like the eyeball. We wanted to belong, really belong to something. So those differences I've noticed.

Allison: And you better like pink and green. I hope you do. I know you do. In terms of black sororities on campus, Rachel, you do touch on it in the film, how did you see them in relationship to the predominantly white Greek system?

Rachel: So in my research, I met with some amazing young women who are members of Divine Nine sororities at the University of Alabama, which is an incredible, vibrant community, and it was incredible to meet them. And we were very clear that this was a film about the historically white sorority system, but that we couldn't tell the story without explaining the history of the Divine Nine at the University of Alabama and the events that took place when the Alpha Kappa Alpha sisters moved to sorority row and the racist incidents that took place there.

So while we were much focused on the Panhellenic sororities, the historically white sororities, you couldn't tell the story without including the Divine Nine.

Allison: And I want to mention before I let you go, you did a very brave thing, and you included some of your own feelings and your own experience in the film as a woman with alopecia, especially since we've been talking about all of these very traditional beauty standards and what's expected of these girls, that they have to be thin and wear high heels and all the rest, the right kind of makeup. How was that for you to have to reflect on it? I mean as filmmakers or journalists, we reflect on things all the time, but then to decide that you wanted to share that.

Rachel: Yeah, it was not my intention at all to put my own story into the film, but every time I sat down with these young women at the University of Alabama and tried to connect with them, I would sort of tell them my own story of college and my own story of belonging. And at a certain point in the process, my editor said, Rachel, I'm so sorry, but I think you're going to have to be in the movie. And the reason why we decided that, and I was so resistant to it at first.

I'm like, "No, no, no. I'm a fly on the wall. That's not my style" But I realized what I was going for was the maximum amount of empathy for these young women. And I realized that if I stood shoulder to shoulder with them and said like, "You know what? Me too. I wanted to belong and this is what I did," that it might create this feeling in my audience like. "Wait a second. I'm just like these girls on some level, too. What did I do to belong?" So it was really with that intention.

It felt scary. It felt like a big creative swing. But I'm so happy I did it. I've heard from so many people, alopecia or tons of beautiful hair, that they really identified with that, and that it really helped them in the experience of watching the film to identify.

Allison: That was my conversation with filmmaker Rachel Fleit. Her film, Bama Rush is streaming on Max.

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