A silence rippled across Omicron Pi Sigma house late Friday night as the fraternity’s leaders gathered to discuss changes to the pledge process for the upcoming fall 2021 semester. Vice President Brad Tomlinson was at the epicenter of the silence as he suggested something so novel, the Sigmas were taken aback.

“’What if we don’t assault the pledges?’  That’s all Brad said,” Social Chair of Omicron Pi Sigma Mike Dorsey recalls. “And we were just, like ‘Whoa,’” he relinquished.

This is not the first scandal to plague the OPS house. Several Sigma fraternity members are currently on academic probation for violating the University’s COVID-19 restrictions in the spring 2020 semester.

Tomlinson’s statements sparked subsequent outrage from the majority of the fraternity members. One unnamed frat member rationalized like so:

“It’s just not fair. Everyone else had to go through the pledge process. I had to chug a glass of Everclear, buck-naked, while the Sigmas beat me and the other pledges with socks full of nickels. It’s not fair if other pledges get in without going through what I went through. It’s tradition.”

Brad Tomlinson defended his recommendation at the meeting by asking them to remember the dearly departed Zach Cameron, who 14 months ago, died of alcohol poisoning attempting to rush another campus fraternity, Kappa Epsilon Gamma.

“We must do everything in our power to prevent another Zach from dying because of a fraternity’s wrongdoing,” Tomlinson argued.

After two hours of spirited debate at the Omicron Pi Sigma house, the leadership held a vote to enact Tomlinson’s proposal.

The highly anticipated roll call vote concluded seven to one against the proposal. Standards and Practices Chair Justin Crane explained the unanimous rejection in favor of the status quo:

“Zach died — what — a whole 14 months ago? And that was at Gamma’s rush event. They need to get their act together. The Sigma frat is completely different.”

We now know the answer to the time-old question: Similar to a tree falling in the forest, if someone asks “What if we don’t assault the pledges?” and everyone pretends not to hear the question, did it even make a sound? The answer, according to this campus fraternity, is a resounding “No.”

This story is still developing.

*Campus Scout writes opinion-based, satirical stories and uses fictional sourcing.*

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