Sororities are renowned for their stereotypes: sorority girls are vapid, love to slut-shame each other, and constantly talk mean about each other when they aren’t around. When these sorority girl stereotypes started being mentioned in my life I knew sorority life was my calling.

When I got into college, I decided to rush my very first semester. It was a process I expected. Lots of games were played, lots of girls were talked to. I figured the niceness was all a façade because otherwise how would they get girls who don’t want to tear each other down to join them?

As the pledge process went on the kindness did not fade. The girls continued to be sweet to me, and some even bought me coffee! At this point I figured it was because I hadn’t been formally initiated yet. Once initiation came and went and months as an official sister increased, the benevolence of my new sorority sisters did not end. In fact, I think they actually became friendlier as time went on.

It was by the second semester of my sisterhood status that I needed to confront the reality of what was happening. And I was, in all meaning of the phrase, shook. This wasn’t what I signed up for! I expected at this point I’d have at least half of the sisterhood excluding me and telling me that I need to be more pure! Instead, all I got was motivational talks and advice about classes and actual friends.

There was even a time when I had an in-depth talk with many of my sisters about the problems with slut-shaming and the actual sexist implications exist inherently when you tell adult women that they shouldn’t be “sleeping around”. What kind of bologna is this?

It doesn’t stop there either!

Throughout the entire process, from start to finish, there is a general acceptance of all identities of women. There is a structure of sisterly empowerment, too! These women are actually proud to be women and only want to build other women up! To this day, I can’t believe it.

I’ve decided not to drop letters even though my negative expectations were only met with positivity and love. Though, I have ultimately decided that sororities are pointless and unless you actually want to have a positive support system, you probably shouldn’t join one.