A handful of you may have heard of it, especially if you’re in Greek life. OneGreek: the newest social media platform exclusively for Greek life.
On paper, oneGreek is a unique experience. It allows Greeks across the country to connect with other chapters, promote their philanthropies, celebrate their chapter pride, and overall share their Greek story with others.
However, there are a lot of problems with this app. It’s not so much in the actual software as it is in the concept. Yes, oneGreek is “an exclusive experience for Greeks,” but it seems that they’re going about it in all the wrong ways.
As a former oneGreek representative, I’ve been involved with them from the beginning. Yeah, it seemed like a unique concept, but as I learned more about the app’s policies and image it wanted to promote, the more disappointed and frustrated I was with it.
Here’s why you should be too.
1. It’s exclusive…to a fault.
This is actually one of the main points of the app: an exclusive experience for those in Greek life. You can only get on the app if you’re in Greek life on your campus. And even then, you have to be invited by another member who is already on the app. At first, this seemed like no big deal. However, I pretty quickly started hearing problems from friends. My friend at a sorority across the country said she was interested in joining, but once she was invited, she was disappointed to find out that the app didn’t list her school. Apparently, her school didn’t have a strong enough Greek presence to be relevant on the app. Furthermore, during one strategy discussion, a fellow rep asked about the possibility of inviting his friend in an MCGC sorority to join the app. The creators immediately swooped down and crushed this idea, and were backed by almost every member of the rep team. They claimed that MCGC and NPHC chapters were not “real representations of Greek life,” and were therefore irrelevant. For an app that had barely been established on the market, they were turning their exclusivity into elitism.
2. It’s hidden from your Standards.
Though this may not be the case for all chapters, most of the time, the content posted on the app isn’t checked by Standards boards…but it should be. The fact that the app seems to be “immune” from Standards violations is taken advantage of by almost every member of the app. Greeks post pictures of themselves drinking or drunk and playing drinking games. Often times, women will post pictures of themselves in bikinis throwing their letters or holding their flags…but instead of innocent beach pictures, they often post the most scandalous shots they have, simply because they believe there will be no reprimand. During the app’s launch week, even the reps, who were supposed to be representing the best of Greek life, were encouraged to post racy photos that their Standards otherwise might not approve of. One rep even posted a bikini pic of her eating a Popsicle…need I explain further? Ultimately, the app is advertised in such a way that it seems like a place that Greeks can disregard their values if they chose to.
3. The Advertising...
The advertising of the app was originally meant to play to the exclusivity of Greek life, but instead seems to perpetuate its “douche” stereotype. For example, when choosing a slogan for the app to put on t-shirts and merchandise, there was a big debate among the reps between two suggestions: “Eight letters, hundreds of chapters, oneGreek,” or simply “Who do you know here?” In my opinion, though the first one was admittedly more bland, it had no chance of turning anyone off to the app or excluding anyone with questions, and maybe even invited a few non-Greeks to start asking questions about Greek life. Instead, the second option was chosen. There was concern that the slogan just reiterated the negative stereotypes that Greek life has gotten and seemed to promote a party image. Frankly, it seemed like most people just wanted the app to sound edgy and fun versus advertising it with integrity.
4. It promotes competition between chapters.
There's an almost unhealthy sense of competition that every chapter has to be “the best.” When searching a certain chapter on the app, most don’t even show up unless you’re a “top three” house on your campus, meaning that your page has the most views or likes. It was also decided that to be a top house, likes would only really matter if they were from the opposite gender. Basically, a sorority could only be a top house if enough frat boys liked it and vice versa. Essentially the app promotes the elitism of “houses,” which is a problem on a lot of campuses.
5. It's just not as unique as advertised.
Yeah, the format is cute at first. The little bow tie icon is eye-catching, and the layout certainly appealed to this sorority girl at first, but after working for them for a while and seeing picture after picture of the same things over and over again, I finally realized that it’s just a glorified Instagram about booze, parties, and girls in bikinis. And that’s NOT what a Greek community should be about.
***DISCLAIMER: This is just one former employee’s personal opinion! Feel free to share your own in the comments!
