Talk to me about Princeton eating clubs

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I actually don’t think the bicker clubs should be abolished in that they are sort of the cultural heart and soul of the school. But they are a reason someone may not want to go there. A silver lining of being unable to get into Princeton is not having to deal with this crap.

This is the position that my child is currently in.

Can a student truly feel included and welcome at Princeton? Or will that student be ostracized if they refuse to conform? Someone informed me that some eating clubs reject students base on socio-economic status, race, culture, religion, etc. Is this type of discrimination accepted at Princeton?

I want to know can a student have a healthy and great social life at Princeton without joining an eating club? Or do eating clubs dominate the social scene at Princeton?

So half or more than half the kids are in clubs where there is no bicker system. They are randomly assigned. The kids in those clubs often really enjoy the experience. They are not the socially competitive kids. The socially competitive kids gravitate to the bicker system. I would say your kid would be fine if he or she is not the type to care about being part of the cool kid scene. This would be the same at a university that had a strong frat scene.

I wouldn’t not go to Princeton because of this.

As far as the bicker clubs being racist etc, they probably still skew more white than the overall student population but even 25-30 years ago they were somewhat diverse. Obviously 70-100 years ago they were unfriendly to Jews and so forth. Check out Gate Crashers

One caveat - I believe the sign-in clubs allow groups up to a certain size to join together. So if you have a group of friends, you can sign up to join a club together and then there could be a lottery depending on the available number of spaces at different clubs. Either way you don’t have to put on a big show to impress the members you “belong” like you would at a club like Ivy or Cap.

[Anonymous]

Go to Harvard instead.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You should also be aware that if you send your DD to Princeton and she wants to be part of the bicker scene, she will spending much of her freshman and first semester sophomore year getting drunk and hooking up with the boys in the club she’s targeting. It’s kind of gross in retrospect

My ex was in the one with a lot of jocks, I forget the name. She's a lesbian, so definitely not hooking up with dudes to get into a club, but it just sounded really gross. Hazing, forced drinking, sexual harassment, along with the run of the mill douchey guys.

Cap and Gown

Tiger was lacrosse and football
Cloister was swimmers and rowers

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You should also be aware that if you send your DD to Princeton and she wants to be part of the bicker scene, she will spending much of her freshman and first semester sophomore year getting drunk and hooking up with the boys in the club she’s targeting. It’s kind of gross in retrospect

My ex was in the one with a lot of jocks, I forget the name. She's a lesbian, so definitely not hooking up with dudes to get into a club, but it just sounded really gross. Hazing, forced drinking, sexual harassment, along with the run of the mill douchey guys.

Cap and Gown

Tiger was lacrosse and football
Cloister was swimmers and rowers

Tiger was douchy.
Cloister was more thoughtful but still really driven people

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You should also be aware that if you send your DD to Princeton and she wants to be part of the bicker scene, she will spending much of her freshman and first semester sophomore year getting drunk and hooking up with the boys in the club she’s targeting. It’s kind of gross in retrospect

My DD is a current sophomore and um that has not been her experience...

Like she would tell her mom about all the ****s she *****ed.

Just think about it. You’ve got a bunch of guys who will decide which girls get into their club. Hmm, how will they pick winners and losers?

Go away troll

I’m just telling you what happened. Because I witnessed it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You should also be aware that if you send your DD to Princeton and she wants to be part of the bicker scene, she will spending much of her freshman and first semester sophomore year getting drunk and hooking up with the boys in the club she’s targeting. It’s kind of gross in retrospect

My ex was in the one with a lot of jocks, I forget the name. She's a lesbian, so definitely not hooking up with dudes to get into a club, but it just sounded really gross. Hazing, forced drinking, sexual harassment, along with the run of the mill douchey guys.

Cap and Gown

Tiger was lacrosse and football
Cloister was swimmers and rowers

Tiger was douchy.
Cloister was more thoughtful but still really driven people

Cloister has been a sign-in club ever since it reopened in the late 70s. At some point groups of swimmers and rowers started joining together, but they didn't have to Bicker to get in.

Fun fact - Cloister is the former eating club from the early 80s of Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You should also be aware that if you send your DD to Princeton and she wants to be part of the bicker scene, she will spending much of her freshman and first semester sophomore year getting drunk and hooking up with the boys in the club she’s targeting. It’s kind of gross in retrospect

My ex was in the one with a lot of jocks, I forget the name. She's a lesbian, so definitely not hooking up with dudes to get into a club, but it just sounded really gross. Hazing, forced drinking, sexual harassment, along with the run of the mill douchey guys.

Cap and Gown

Tiger was lacrosse and football
Cloister was swimmers and rowers

Tiger was douchy.
Cloister was more thoughtful but still really driven people

Cloister has been a sign-in club ever since it reopened in the late 70s. At some point groups of swimmers and rowers started joining together, but they didn't have to Bicker to get in.

Fun fact - Cloister is the former eating club from the early 80s of Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan.

In the 90s it went to some kind of hybrid system

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Go to Harvard instead.

Harvard has finals clubs, same thing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Go to Harvard instead.

Harvard has finals clubs, same thing.

Quite different but okay.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You should also be aware that if you send your DD to Princeton and she wants to be part of the bicker scene, she will spending much of her freshman and first semester sophomore year getting drunk and hooking up with the boys in the club she’s targeting. It’s kind of gross in retrospect

My DD is a current sophomore and um that has not been her experience...

Like she would tell her mom about all the ****s she *****ed.

Just think about it. You’ve got a bunch of guys who will decide which girls get into their club. Hmm, how will they pick winners and losers?

Go away troll

I mean at least one club still has stripping down to your underwear as part of its initiation so...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Go to Harvard instead.

Harvard has finals clubs, same thing.

Quite different but okay.

Social club with a rush like process were members take meals and throw parties. Seems pretty similar, except some of the clubs at Harvard remain single sex.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Go to Harvard instead.

Harvard has finals clubs, same thing.

Quite different but okay.

Social club with a rush like process were members take meals and throw parties. Seems pretty similar, except some of the clubs at Harvard remain single sex.

Quite different but not getting into it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You should also be aware that if you send your DD to Princeton and she wants to be part of the bicker scene, she will spending much of her freshman and first semester sophomore year getting drunk and hooking up with the boys in the club she’s targeting. It’s kind of gross in retrospect

My DD is a current sophomore and um that has not been her experience...

Like she would tell her mom about all the ****s she *****ed.

Just think about it. You’ve got a bunch of guys who will decide which girls get into their club. Hmm, how will they pick winners and losers?

Go away troll

I mean at least one club still has stripping down to your underwear as part of its initiation so...

Oh, that is the least of it. To be fair, at least back in the day, it seemed all facets of student life at Princeton ended up in some kind of clothing removal.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Go to Harvard instead.

Harvard has finals clubs, same thing.

Quite different but okay.

Social club with a rush like process were members take meals and throw parties. Seems pretty similar, except some of the clubs at Harvard remain single sex.

Quite different but not getting into it.

DP who attended both Harvard and Princeton. I see two main differences, only one of which would favor Harvard if you were concerned about these clubs.

First, finals clubs aren't quite as big a part of the Harvard social scene as the eating clubs, so they are easier to avoid if you don't want to be part of that scene. But, second, there are no non-exclusive eating clubs. If you want to be part of that scene, that's the only game in town. And the finals clubs seemed significantly more pretentious than the eating clubs, even including the bicker clubs.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Go to Harvard instead.

Harvard has finals clubs, same thing.

Quite different but okay.

Social club with a rush like process were members take meals and throw parties. Seems pretty similar, except some of the clubs at Harvard remain single sex.

Quite different but not getting into it.

DP who attended both Harvard and Princeton. I see two main differences, only one of which would favor Harvard if you were concerned about these clubs.

First, finals clubs aren't quite as big a part of the Harvard social scene as the eating clubs, so they are easier to avoid if you don't want to be part of that scene. But, second, there are no non-exclusive eating clubs. If you want to be part of that scene, that's the only game in town. And the finals clubs seemed significantly more pretentious than the eating clubs, even including the bicker clubs.

Did you mean that there are no non-exclusive finals clubs (at Harvard)? I always thought they were smaller and more secretive than the Princeton eating clubs - like taking the membership at Ivy Club, splitting it into five smaller clubs, and then acting as if membership in each club was a closely held secret. Or maybe I’m conflating the finals clubs at Harvard with the “secret societies” at Yale. It’s hard to keep these WASPy traditions apart.

Some of the eating clubs at Princeton are open to all juniors and seniors, subject only to membership limits based on capacity. And there are other games in town - you can remain a member in your residential college or you can cook for yourself if you end up living in one of the dorms with kitchens or in an off-campus co-op.