If you Google searched "hazing" this week you'd come across the news from Bradley that 10 BBCHS students were recently disciplined for allegedly meting out "birthday licks" on one of their teammates. But you'd also see that 21 football players in Southern California were suspended that same week for an unspecified hazing incident while on a visit in Utah for a game.
And you'd also find a story about an estimated 35,000 undergraduate students across eight colleges that have committed to an awareness program aimed at stemming college rape and hazing.
This is very much a part of our collective consciousness.
Many of you no doubt are applauding any efforts to combat ritualized drinking games, beatings and humiliation. Some of you, judging from the conversation on social media following the BBCHS story, feel that the reaction had gone too far and is indicative of society going soft.
But hazing carries a larger definition than most would expect. And it affects more students than you think.
<strong>What is hazing?</strong>
Advocacy groups define hazing as any activity that humiliates, abuses or degrades someone in a group regardless of that person's willingness to participate. This type of abuse can take on different forms, such as drinking games, singing or chanting in public, forcing someone to associate only with specific people, sleep deprivation and physical abuse. Most of the data used by StopHazing.org comes from a 2008 study of 11,482 post-secondary students on 53 college campuses in the U.S.
<strong>How frequently does it occur?</strong>
An estimated 47 percent of students are hazed before they graduate high school and 3 in 5 college students are hazed.
<strong>Why isn't it reported more often?</strong>
Ninety-five percent of those who said they were hazed said they didn't report it. Of those, 37 percent said they didn't want to get their team or friends in trouble, 20 percent feared further consequences from the group and 14 percent said they didn't want to be ostracized by their peers.
<strong>What can you do to protect your child from it?</strong>
In many incidents of hazing, the alleged victims said they believed adults and authority figures were aware of the hazing. Students in 1 in 4 hazing incidents said coaches were aware of the activities. In 25 percent of hazing incidents, students said alumni were present. A vast majority of alleged victims of hazing, or 9 out of 10, said they didn't consider their experiences hazing.
That makes taking action difficult.
Some suggest educating students, parents and school officials is the first step. Ask your student's school, or prospective school, what the anti-hazing policy is, if there is one.
You also should consider organizing other team-building exercises, such as volunteer work.