Let's start over but also this is probably my last post on the subject since I don't feel like having a drawn out argument about fraternities of all things.

Regardless of what OP posted, who OP is, what country they're from, where their allegiances lie, etc etc. I am arguing that Europe (France, Germany, Spain, UK) has scholastic organizations (ie organizations centered around school life) that center on networking, brotherhood, community service, and possibly spirituality or religion. That's their public face. In their private face, they have a lot of partying, drinking, drug use, sex, hazing, and general anti-social behaviors. What these orgs are actually called in their specific regional dialects I don't know. What percentage of the populations of each country is a member, I also don't know. I'm not the person who brought up the 70% figure but I agree that the vibe is "a lot." These European student orgs are comparable to American fraternities. The similarities begin and end with them all being student social organizations dedicated to networking, partying, and being a social terror wherever they are located.

American frats do not center on student housing a specific major goal. It's a perk of some frats to have a dedicated house on or off campus known as a "frat house." It's not a requirement that frats provide housing, free or otherwise. Students who stay at frat houses may still be required to pay for it or the rent may be covered by alumni. All students are generally required by universities to live on campus their first year or two, in dormitories provided by the school. Students pay rent for the dorms. I don't know if European schools work this way but regardless it doesn't radically change the other similarities between Europe and the US frats.

Frat is short for fraternity or fraternal order. There are non-scholastic fraternal orders in the US and Europe. I am not talking about those. I am specifically talking about university-aged people at a school. I do not believe in my heart of hearts that European teenagers at uni are less drunken daterapist dudebros than American teens. The attitude that, as a European, it's "their drunken dudebros" vs "our urbane students", is exactly the problem.

[–] Salah@hexbear.net 2 points 7 hours ago

Just to add to this: in my city it is only possible to get housing in your first year as a student if you are either super rich, super lucky or you join a fraternity. These frats are very dudebro and there are countless examples of daterapes and other disgusting behaviour of these people. In frat houses you have to ‘earn’ a door to your bedroom by having sex in. Which means you first have to have sex in your room without a door (so your roommates can see and hear clearly) before you can assemble a door to your room.

My city is not unique, in fact, the frats here are not as ‘prestigious’ as in other cities. The political class in my country mostly originates from 2 frats in other cities. France has a slightly different system that I can’t really speak for, Germany is weird because student associations are associated too much with nazism so many people don’t want to associate with them (but they still hold significant political power). AFAIK UK, Netherlands, Denmark, Belgium and UK are as I described or similar, and I assume Switzerland, Austria, Sweden and Norway are similar as well.