The Delta Gamma house on Knox Road.
A leaked email from a sorority’s student leader has gone viral, the second time this year an email within this university’s Greek life community has done so.
At about 1 p.m. yesterday, a profanity-laced email from an executive member of this university’s Delta Gamma sorority chapter appeared on news blog Gawker.com and sports blog Deadspin.com, among other blogs. The email was forwarded to Gawker by an anonymous source, and it has since gone viral — Gawker’s post had more than 1.3 million hits and 144,000 Facebook likes as of 12:20 a.m. Friday.
The abusive tirade, which contained about 50 instances of profanity and was allegedly sent to the entire chapter last week, criticized the sorority members for a lackluster performance at this week’s Greek Week events.
The university’s Delta Gamma chapter president Rachel Norris declined to comment on the situation, though she did send an email to Gawker, calling the leaked email “unsavory” and asking the website to either remove the post or redact the organization names. As of printing, the post remains on Gawker’s website in its original state, with Norris’ message added as an update.
“I’ve been getting texts on texts about people LITERALLY being so f—ing AWKWARD and so f—ing BORING,” the leaked email reads.
Within two hours of the Gawker and Deadspin posts, the executive board section of the sorority chapter’s website was removed and all social media accounts deleted. The Delta Gamma website was also hacked last night, with the home page featuring a GIF image of a chicken spinning in a disco with a caption that reads, “I regret nothing.” Later, the site played Icona Pop’s “I Love It” and linked to pages on Kim Jong-Un and Mike Tyson.
During Greek Week each year, sororities are paired with fraternities to compete in a week of competitions. Delta Gamma was paired with Sigma Nu, and “Julia,” as Gawker renamed the author, was not happy with how the girls were performing.
But members from Sigma Nu said the email did not reflect how they felt about their week paired with Delta Gamma.
“When we first saw the email, we were completely shocked. No one around the house had been complaining about anything regarding DG and your sisters’ behavior,” the Sigma Nu chapter wrote in an email to the Delta Gamma chapter, which was sent to The Diamondback. “Everyone that I had talked to only had good things to say about DG and your sisters. We are just as surprised as you guys that this email is getting so out of hand, and we all feel terrible.”
The national Delta Gamma Fraternity organization is working with the chapter and “investigating the legitimacy of this letter, the alleged author and will take appropriate actions as necessary,” according to a statement on its website and Facebook page. Communications director Mary Ellen Hardies declined to offer any additional details.
“Obviously we were surprised and shocked by the email that came out; that someone in the community has those views,” said Molly Alsobrook, president of the Panhellenic Council. “Those are not the values our community values. We want to stress that that was just one woman’s opinions and the rest of our community is kind of upset about it and we’re looking forward to finishing Greek Week with a great ending.”
Michael Sikorski, the Interfraternity Council’s external relations vice president, said the email came from an individual member whose opinions “may or may not reflect the organization.”
“We’ve reached out to our IFC chapters and stressed that it’s time to support their matchups, get into the Greek spirit and, to the leadership, to be responsible,” Sikorski said. “This is a chapter issue that organizations should handle internally and I’m sure Delta Gamma is doing that.”
According to the author, the Delta Gamma girls spend too much time talking to each other instead of the Sigma Nu members, who do “not give a flying f—, about how much you f—ing love to talk to your sisters.”
“Are you people f—ing retarded? That’s not a rhetorical question, I LITERALLY want you to email me back telling me if you’re mentally slow,” the author wrote.
The Panhellenic Council’s adviser in the Department of Fraternity and Sorority Life, Liz Brown, said she had no comment on the situation and is still gathering information.
The email also chastises Delta Gamma members for openly talking about socializing with other fraternities in front of Sigma Nu members and cheering for other teams during Greek Week games.
“Are you just so f—ing dense about what it means to make people like you that you think being a good little supporter of the greek community is going to make our matchup happy?” it reads. “NO ONE F—ING LIKES THAT, ESPECIALLY OUR F—ING MATCHUP.”
The author also threatened violence against members she said continually do not meet her expectations, writing that she will “assault” them, punch them and other more colorful threats not publishable in The Diamondback.
“I think it will frighten away a lot of prospective Greek life freshman,” said Collin Baker, a senior English and theatre major.
It’s the second time in less than two weeks a less-than-complimentary email allegedly from university Greek life’s student leaders went viral.
On April 8, several college blogs, including BroBible.com and BarStoolU.com, posted a message allegedly from a fraternity member at this university to his chapter.
The email also focused on Greek Week, and was intended to provide the non-Jewish fraternity members a crash course in talking to girls in their partner sorority, which had a reputation for attracting Jewish women.
The email focused on what the members should talk about, what they should wear and how they should act in order to present themselves as Jewish to the women. The sorority in question responded with its own similar email that gave sorority members tips on how to act less Jewish and attract non-Jewish men. The fraternity and sorority names were left out of the postings.
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