After police footage revealed to the world the moment officers discovered 56 blindfolded young men in a frat house basement, the true scope of hazing statistics in the United States have been released.
When police entered the Alpha Delta Phi frat house, at the University of Iowa, on November 15, 2024, they were supposed to find something entirely different.
Having been called about a fire on the premises, authorities scoped out the building, and when they found nothing in the upper levels, decided to check the basement.
The scene before them was completely different than what they’d been called out for – 56 young men, blindfolded, shirtless, and covered in unidentifiable substances.
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Police footage shows the young men refusing to follow orders of clearing out the room and cleaning up the mess, which one officer noted seemed like they were taking their situation ‘seriously’.
But what was their situation, exactly? Hazing.
You might know this as being called initiations here in the UK, with frat boys being tasked with humiliating and dangerous rituals to pass certain tests of loyalty so that they can be adopted into the fold.
In this situation, Joseph Gaya, 22, was later questioned by police and later charged in connection with the incident as hazing is illegal under Iowa law.
However, it’s not just the US state that has banned the practice.
Hazing, per Cornell Health, 'can take many forms, but typically involves some degree of physical risk or mental distress that can be disruptive, demeaning, or dangerous'.
The university states: "Hazing can occur in any club, organization, team, or other group. Hazing is not group bonding. Whereas group bonding promotes dignity and respect and creates real collaboration, hazing humiliates and degrades group members and breeds shame and division.
"Hazing is an abuse of power and often involves alcohol and secrecy."
According to NC State University’s hazing statistics, more than half of students are involved in some form of campus hazing, but in 95 percent of hazing cases, students who were aware they were hazed did not report it.
Perhaps the most harrowing of all the stats is that there has been at least one hazing-related death on a college campus each year since 1970.
44 states have anti-hazing laws to protect students from hazing rituals inflicted upon them.
For example, Louisiana forbids ‘any person’ from committing any act of hazing. However, Michigan's hazing law applies only to an individual ‘who attends, is employed by, or is a volunteer of an educational institution.’
As for Kentucky, it is unlawful to haze a ‘minor or student for the purpose of recruitment, initiation into, affiliation with, or enhancing or maintaining membership or status within any organization'.
The sentences for being caught carrying out hazing vary depending on the nature of the harm inflicted upon the person, but at a federal level, there is a document in the US labeled Considerations for a Federal Criminal Prohibition on Hazing which suggests ‘no more than 15 year’ imprisonment, or a $10,000 (£7423.80) fine to those hazing.
As for laws in other parts of the world:
- The Philippines, which implemented its Anti-Hazing Act of 2018 after the death of a student
- France, which has banned the practice since 1998
- Sri Lanka, which also passed its ‘ragging’ act in 1998
- Spain, which considers it to be bullying
- Thailand
- Post-Soviet States like Russia, Ukraine, and Belarus
- Canada, which simply charges the offense under assault
- The UK also charges hazing under things like forced alcohol consumption, assault and sexual assault
Britt Jones