little_tippler

I was chatting with friends a while ago and we were talking about situations that happened to us as teenagers. Specifically, we were recalling some of the weird things boys would do to each other to prove they were 'men's men'. To this day I remember being horrified by some of them.

One particular activity involved groups of guys ganging up on one other guy and carrying him in their arms (while the guy yelled and squirmed in terror) to a tree, where they would proceed to ram him, and his junk, against the tree, repeatedly. This was called, 'ir ao poste' (going to the pole). They would do it to each other in plain view of everyone at school (minus teachers), and us girls were horrified and would wince. It must have been painful. One friend told me he knew a guy who became sterile from this stupid prank. No kidding. They just went for it too hard and the guy had to go to hospital. I can't imagine how he must have felt after.

Another friend told me that another thing his friends did was, one guy would take very deep breaths until he felt faint and then another would come and punch him hard, square in the chest, and the first guy would pass out. This is pretty nasty!

I know between girls there are also some things done like this, though luckily I have never experienced it. Except for the occasional slighting or bullying, I never had any of this.

I think hazing is horrible. It seems to be a part of growing up to some degree. It scares me to think about my kids having to experience that.

Have you ever experienced this kind of situation? How did you deal with it? Did you ever haze someone else? What do you think about this kind of 'ritual' practice?

I think it must be really hard for men, having to cope with this probably on a much higher scale than women.

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Redjake

It all starts with one person who thinks it's a good idea, and then everyone else is too scared to admit they don't agree with it and before you know it you have farmers with pitchforks going to burn the town witch at the stake (or haze someone). It's all centered around peer pressure.

We never had anything that extreme in high school, but college fraternities certainly get that bad. One time we were in the cafeteria and about 5 guys were carrying another guy up above their heads yelling QUACK QUACK QUACK over and over and they were going to throw the guy in our campus' duck pond (hence the "quack"). They looked like douches yelling "quack" but either way they got to the pond and threw the guy in and it was frozen solid because it was during the winter. He landed on the ice with a thud and they picked him up and tried to throw him in again and he just slid.

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thespian86

It's archaic but unavoidable I think. Men are predisposed to stupidity and competition.

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Charlatan

I avoided situations that could lead to this sort of thing. It's one of the reasons I don't much socialize with men.

The closest I can get to hazing was getting drunk at Scout camp. Beyond that, I just stayed away from it all.

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silent_jay

Back when I played hockey it was called initiation and was all in good fun. Was it for everyone to see? Hell no. Was it disturbing and a bit fucked up? It sure was. Was it all in good fun? Yep

Yes I've experienced an initiation and yes I've partaken in the rookie initiation as well.

What did we do, well lets just say one of them involved a marshmallow being picked up in ones ass crack and passing it down the aisle of the bus to the other rooks from ass crack to ass crack, but you don't want to be the one to drop it during the pass, or be ready to eat some assmallow haha good times.

There's always the classic who can pick up the biggest pig at the bar and fuck her, but I don't consider that an initiation, more out of lack of creativity, good times.

There are some other more disturbing ones, but I'll see if I feel like posting them later, some here may not see the humour in them.

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Halx

Sounds like me.

I have "guy" friends now and I'm wary of passing out drunk around them.

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silent_jay

I was at a buddies place one night smoking some weed, and laid down on the floor to watch a movie, some annoying guy I had just met thought I was sleeping and figured he'd see if my friends were up for drawing on my face with some markers, little did he know I wasn't sleeping and promptly told him if he feels the need to try it I'll American History X his black ass on the curb outside. I'm not racist, I would have smilied a white guy as well for trying the same thing, but this guy just set my hatred flowing, haven't seen that chap again.

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Xerxys

You guys do not hang around the same women I do. I had a friend get lotioned all over because he passed out drunk-stupid. This I do not consider Hazing and I wouldn't be too angry to wake up looking like a chicken or having been drawn on after heavy binge drinking. I think it's funny. It's not inconsiderate and you can wash it right off.

The assmallow jay here speaks of is just sick.

silent_jay

That one was pretty tame too, what do you reckon we did with a bucket, some pucks, a length of rope, and those water pipes near the ceiling of a dressing room?

Had I been drinking maybe funny, had the person who wanted to initiate the drawing on me not just met me that night and upon meeting me immediately proceeded to annoy me, I probably wouldn't have threatened him American History X style, he probably would of just got a fuck off. Also the fact I was in my late 20's at the time and was a wee bit passed the drawing on passed out people stage set me over the edge.

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kramus

I remember coming home and finding a bunch of drunk, giggling guys all full of hilarity because my ex-BIL had passed out drunk, and they had duct taped his sorry ass and drawn all over him and stuck marshmallows and shit on him. He was moaning and twitching and generally acting like a confused drunken idiot who would wake up soon and be royally p'o'd at everyone in sight. I firmly insisted they release him (the sight and the thought of this going on in my house sickened me), but boy they got a kick out of having had him all bound up for a few hours while they partied.

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dlish

i went to an all boys school, and this was all part and parcel of being accepted.

i was 'poled' countless times, and 'poled' others countless times over 6 years in high school. all in the name of good fun. we never had girls to prove our manlihood to, just to ourselves.

was it stupid, sure it was. do i regret it? hmm not really since no one ever got hurt.

it always funny until someone gets hurt.

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LoganSnake

You kneel with your head down and take a couple of deep breaths with another guy standing at the ready behind you. Then you suddenly shoot up, resulting in a sweet head rush. The guy standing behind you wraps his arms around your chest and squeezes. You pass out.

We did that in 5th grade. Fun times. One of my friends ended up with a garbage bucket on his head. It was full. Funny at the time.

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timalkin

..

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silent_jay

We also used to get the guys who fell asleep in the aisle of the bus we were traveling on. You drop your pants and get your asshole down low enough so it's over the sleepers face, then you startle him awake and voile, his nose meets your asshole, nose full of ass....good times, good times.

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Vigilante

This thread makes me laugh. I have always been a part of hazing, on either end of the joke. I'm 33 now and still get some kicks with this kind of humor. Once you laugh at it, it's always funny after that.

I grew up in the school of hard knocks. I lived at an orphanage and we hazed and got hazed, with no real organization to it. Someone would dare, someone else would follow through, and sometimes someone else would follow through better just to prove he could. Other times it was involuntary. If you got us all locked down, then you can expect to be held down when you're going to sleep as a few others beat on you, sometimes pretty bad. We called that a blanket party, because the blanket was what was used to hold you down and/or cover your face.

The jokes never end. At my old job one guy ended up running around in the middle of a field butt naked screaming and wailing because we started pelting him with mud when he was trying to change clothes behind his truck. I nearly died laughing so hard. Even the girl on the crew, after being horribly mortified, started laughing. It was just too ridiculous. I mean, he ran all over the place and even tried to get another girl's attention as she was driving by

At another job I used to sneak up on this one girl all the time. She would freak right the fuck out and I would crack up. She finally got a mirror for her desk, which we both laughed about.

There were some school jokes of course. One time someone got the bright idea to rub his nuts, then scrub his fingers on the ground and then try to shove his fingers in an unsuspecting guy's mouth. This went on for a few days. Needless to say I had my hand over my mouth for that whole week when I was in that class.

I don't think of it as bad, it's just a part of growing up. I feel sorry for no parties involved and don't really regret the hazing I received either. I chalk it up to life experiences. Then again, I've also done much more laughing than grumbling, since I was usually one of the bigger guys where ever I went

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Plan9

Happy birthday, Airborne! Suffering builds character according to FM 6-22.5.

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Anormalguy

I've never understood why anyone, male or female, would want so badly to be accepted that they would undergo and participate in hazing. There is something seriously wrong with people who have fond memories of hazing.

Is hazing...
juvenile? Incredibly so.
stupid? See above.
funny? Not at all.

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Plan9

C19H28O2'd!

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Gebbinn

Having spent a good part of my adult life in the U.S. Army Infantry, I have been witness to, party to, and willing participant in all manner of hazing. What I think most people who have never been a part of this time honored ritual do not understand, is the purpose behind the hazing. Too many people hear the word hazing, and immediately picture a bunch of college frat boys doing all sorts of unspeakable things to some poor defenseless freshman. Although that sort of thing still occurs to this day, that is the exception in my experience rather than the norm.

In the Infantry, a mentality must exist amongst all the men of the unit; a mentality that says basically "I will do anything for my brothers, as I know they will do anything for me, wether on the field of battle or off, I trust them completely with everything up to and including my very life" There is no real way to prove to anyone that they can actually rely on you to provide that level of comraderie and brotherhood. However, through acts of hazing ranging from simple jokes "get me a chemlight battery, a box of grid squares and some BA1100Ns" to more extreme acts such as "bloodwings" (when a member of the unit recieves any major promotions or achievements, the protective covers on the pins of the insignia are removed and each member of the unit then punches the insignia, driving the pins into the soldiers pectoral muscles) the member of the squad proves his willingness to stand with his brothers and take whatever they can dish, and know that next time, they will be the one returning the act.

Though these acts may seem barbaric to most, to those soldiers of the unit, they are the glue that helps to hold the unit together. (I have never seen a soldier who was unwilling to participate in bloodwing rituals be forced to either participate or to recieve, however if they chose not to recieve, they will never be allowed to participate.) Men and women who are expected to lay thier lives on the line for thier country at a moments notice must by the very nature of thier job be more barbaric than the average person. By participating in these hazings, they prove to those who they must rely on that they themselves can be relied on as well.

There have been laws passed all throughout our government and military to outlaw acts of hazing, and there are stiff penalties for commiting acts of hazing if you get caught. In 12 years serving our country, not one single time did I have a soldier complain about hazing, or turn anyone in for it.

So, is hazing barbaric, humiliating, degrading and demeaning. Absolutely. Should it be allowed. I say yes, in certain places, among certain willing participants, absolutely. Should I ever become a part of anything like the military again, I will willingly put myself to the stocks and prove that yes, I can take anything you can dish out, and I am not going to cry to my mommy, instead, I will return the punishment right back when my time comes.

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Plan9

Funny, I always thought "bloodwings" were a great way to ruin a perfectly good brown T-shirt.

Hazing, like many things in the military, only serves to prove that there is a threshold of learning when the suck is involved.

After a certain period of time, suffering is pointless and you gain nothing from it. "Realism" and "training value" be damned.

Hazing turns into abuse when it becomes part of a daily activity or a mindset.

2 weeks of freezing / starving is 10 days of stupid unless you're doing SERE.

Just as shaving-creaming new privates in country is a waste of laundry facility time.

...

I was only in for a single tour, though.

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Zeraph

Hazing is dumb. It's a trust building technique among the emotionally retarded. No thanks.

OP: I've seen girls do very similar things; it's not specific to guys. And when the females do it it seems a lot more hateful, though usually less painful (more humiliation tactics). When I went to high school the girls would find out when one of their friends was on their period, then steal their emergency tampon and throw it into a crowd or hide it in a guy's backpack.

Gebbinn

My personal favorite was the pink belly. New privates always tend to get overly cocky and knowitall, so we would wait until they participated in some hazing type event, (by participating in an event, you are agreeing that you are also open to being the victim) the next day, we would grab them coming out of the shower, hogtie them, then each member of the unit would slap the belly of the victim once with an open hand.. the result of this activity gives the hazing its name.. hence pink belly. Then we would drag the guy, stark naked, into one of the common areas and leave. 30 minutes later, if no one had rescued them, we would come and set them free. This has a very humbling effect.. in fact we preferred this to the infamous blanket party... and before you ask, yes I have had more than one pink belly. After the first time, you knew, just relax and let it happen, fighting only makes things worse.

---------- Post added at 01:10 PM ---------- Previous post was at 01:05 PM ----------

Sounds to me you are not talking about hazing so much as extreme training. Something I learned early on in my military career is that most extreme training is designed not so much for the sake of punishing the soldier, as it is to show the soldier that what the human body and mind are capable of is usually a great deal greater than the individual thinks. Ranger school taught me just how much abuse a body can take, while IMLC taught me that I can think clearly under a great deal of stress and distraction.

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Plan9

Nope, I'm talking about E3s that can barely rig a ruck going on week long field problems in December.

But, yeah, whatever. It's good to push yourself to your limits. It helps if you're educated enough to know what to do when you reach 'em first, though.

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squeeeb

im gonna reply to this in gebbinn's new thread

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jewels

I think it's horrible too, LT. It's juvenile, often dangerous and always humiliating.

Builds trust and confidence? If I'd been initiated the way many have been, I sure as hell wouldn't trust those who humiliated me in that way. Humiliation breeds confidence?

Hazing is the ultimate manifestation of peer pressure.

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Jinn

I build trust and confidence in the people who don't haze me, or the ones who actually stand up and say NO to hazing. Saying no takes a hell of a lot more guts than letting it happen.

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