“RUSH AEπ.”
An Alpha Epsilon Pi pledge had been challenged to convince a girl to paint his fraternity’s letters on her chest for a photo. Hannah and her four freshman friends agreed to help.
Hannah had never heard of “Rush Boobs” before, but it sounded fun and harmless. With yellow acrylic paint, Hannah drew a Star of David on her friend’s butt cheek — a fitting detail for the traditionally Jewish fraternity.
She wasn’t comfortable being photographed at first, she said. But when she saw that her friends would be anonymous, she joined in.
Why not? She thought. It would never come back to her.
Because Hannah’s chest was smaller than her friends’, she decided to have her butt cheeks painted. The girls lined up in the Wright dorm room, alternating every other — three with their chests painted, two with their butt cheeks painted.
A sixth friend took the photo,
which was cropped to exclude faces, and texted back to the AEPi pledge.
The pledge never specified how the photo would be used, and the girls never asked. The photo was soon forgotten. But later, the girls wondered:
Who saw our Rush Boobs?
***
The fraternity tradition of Rush Boobs often happens during pledgeship — the time between accepting a bid and getting initiated into a chapter. In order to impress brothers, pledges are asked by individual members of their chapter to find women willing to show their bare chests.
All of the women interviewed who participated said it was their choice to take the photos. Those who agreed often wanted to help out a friend and were not drunk or pressured into doing so.
Other women declined and found the request for Rush Boobs offensive and objectifying.
The University knows this trend exists online and at other colleges but not among IU students, said Melissa Kish, associate director of Student Life and Learning, which oversees greek life.
“We have no reports to indicate this is happening or an issue at IU,” Kish said in an email.
Despite this, the Indiana Daily Student found a number of IU fraternities accepting and distributing Rush Boobs photos. They have been used as tasks for pledges, currency between brothers and advertising for potential new members, according to online photo galleries and interviews with students.
Interfraternity Council President Sam Snemis said he has seen photos online from other schools, but IFC has not received any complaints related to Rush Boobs at IU.
“I haven’t seen it prevalently used on this campus,” Snemis said.
Snemis said the tradition undermines the sexual assault prevention reform the IFC is promoting. Depending on the circumstances, Rush Boobs could be considered both hazing and sexual harassment, but this would be decided and handled by the Office of Student Ethics, Snemis said.
Both greek and non-greek women are asked to do Rush Boobs. If sorority members were to participate, they would be violating Panhellenic code of conduct, Panhellenic Association President Margaret Hensley said in an email.
“This activity not only serves to objectify and degrade both the women participating in it and sorority women in general but involves women in the fraternity recruitment process, which we do not allow,” Hensley said.
Rush Boobs has branched out from being a national chapter secret to a national phenomenon through the website TotalFratMove.com, which claims to have “the definitive collection of Rush Boobs.” Schools from every region of the country, including IU, are represented in these photos.
In the last year, photos were submitted with symbols representing IU chapters for Theta Chi, Delta Upsilon and Alpha Tau Omega. Each of these IU fraternities were identified based on chapter names or the IU logo. They were the only clearly identifiable IU chapters on TFM, as most photos do not include specific chapter or school names.
After learning about Rush Boobs on IU’s campus from the IDS, the IFC addressed the issue at a meeting with fraternity presidents, Snemis said.
“Images of these nature create an expectation for women — or from the guy’s standpoint — that women would do this kind of thing,” Snemis said.
Delta Upsilon President Quin Carroll said his chapter does not condone any use of DU letters in an inappropriate fashion, including the photo posted on TFM.
“While we cannot control what is posted on the Internet, under no circumstances have we ever encouraged or accepted these behaviors,” Carroll said in an email.
Theta Chi President Charlie Peters said his chapter does not condone the use of Rush Boobs either.
Women also reported being asked by members in Delta Kappa Epsilon, Pi Kappa Alpha and Alpha Epsilon Pi. Presidents from DKE, Pike, AEPi and ATO did not comment on the matter.
All photos are cropped and edited to exclude faces. For this reason, the women and men who have participated and spoke to the IDS asked to be identified only by their first names and without any affiliation with their greek chapters.
Women are agreeing to take these photos at IU and across the nation, but it is unclear if they have consented to their photos being online or if they have any idea their photos have gone further than a text message.
Sharing Rush Boobs online is a new trend, but the thought behind it is not, according to gender studies experts at IU. It reflects the cultural norm of using women’s bodies for the viewing pleasure of men.
It also demonstrates how men are often pressured to relate to one another through their access to women, gender studies Ph.D. candidate Jocelyne Scott said.
This phenomenon raises questions about college culture: Why are college women agreeing to strip down for fraternity brothers? Why are fraternity men being asked to get women naked to impress their brothers? What does that say about our expectations of men and of women?
***
Gavin, a sophomore fraternity member, went through pledgeship last fall. Individual brothers assigned members of his pledge class tasks — Rush Boobs was a popular choice.
Gavin crafted a lengthy text explaining his task. He first asked his girlfriend at the time, but she hesitated, not wanting his fraternity members to see her naked. Instead, he asked another close friend, who agreed. Asking for the photo wasn’t awkward, Gavin said.
“It’s not just some random chick,” Gavin said. “It’s a girl who understood the situation and accepted it.”
He then sent the photo back to the brother who requested it. Gavin did not share the photo with other brothers and did not post it online.
“It would be really stupid to do that,” Gavin said. “At least in my fraternity, that person would be immediately removed. This is already on the fence of whether it’s appropriate or not, but that would be the most ungentlemanly thing ever.”
***
With no faces or names affiliated with Rush Boobs, participants feel detached from their photos. Anonymity makes the thrill of doing something “wild” seem safer. Women said they felt more comfortable knowing they were doing it with friends or to help a friend.
The photos also have a liberating and exciting appeal for some freshman women.
“For me, I’m a freshman, so I’m just out of the house, and I know this sounds stupid, but now I can do whatever I want,” Hannah said. “So let me do something stupid, like being naked in a picture for a frat, because I’m in college.”
In a culture of “Girls Gone Wild”, sexual freedom can be misunderstood, gender studies senior lecturer Jennifer Maher said.
“That’s what makes me the saddest,” Maher said. “There’s much more to sexual freedom than being able to flash your tits.”
Women on TFM make their Rush Boobs stand out with flattering filters, occasional stripper poles and even puppies. It is a cultural norm for women to be praised based on their physical appearance, Maher said.
“Is that what we want young women coming into IU to think about as their greatest value?” Maher said.
***
Last fall, junior Jaylee White was home recovering from appendicitis when a member of Pi Kappa Alpha asked her what she thought of Rush Boobs. Not knowing what that was, White asked him to elaborate. The brother explained the tradition of writing on women’s chests. Before he even asked her, White refused.
“I said, ‘Honestly, if you’re willing to ask anyone to do that, you are repulsive, and you should probably reconsider what you’re asking,’” White said.
The Pikes brother later apologized. Having known him since freshman year, White said she was surprised he had brought it up. It made her think differently of her friend and of campus culture as a whole.
“It’s sad that no one is saying anything about it,” White said. “Everyone’s just consenting to it. I don’t think that’s cool. Especially not with IU, because we’re so anti-sexual assault, and we have so many sex policies we’re trying to pass, and we’re so gender neutral. I don’t like it. I don’t want that on IU.”
Rush Boobs gives the wrong impression of greek life as well, sophomore sorority member Courtney said. She declined to participate when a brother in Delta Kappa Epsilon asked her last year. Courtney requested her sorority not be named.
“It would feel wrong using your body to promote one fraternity over another because when it comes down to it, greek is greek,” Courtney said. “Is your fraternity really better because you got more girls to show you their boobs?”
Courtney said she also felt taking the photo would be a poor representation of herself. The promised anonymity of Rush Boobs wasn’t enough to convince her.
“I think our generation has this thing where (we think) nothing bad can happen to us,” Courtney said. “No one will see your face, but what if someone steals your phone, or you lose your phone and someone gets on there and sees that I sent you that?”
Trusting that a Rush Boobs photo gets from point A to point B with no interception is never guaranteed.
***
For Jas, who participated in AEPi’s photo with Hannah, the only lingering question is: Who will see that photo?
“I don’t know what they did with my picture,” said Jas, who requested that she be referred to by her nickname. “That’s sort of just in the back of my mind, like they still have it, what are they going to do?”
Some photos reach a much larger audience through Total Frat Move, whether the participants and chapters know it or not.
TFM has been curating its Rush Boobs photo gallery for two years. With an average of 30 to 40 photos posted weekly, the site has already accumulated nearly 2,000 pictures. In January 2015 alone, TFM received 3.2 million views, according to website traffic estimator SimilarWeb.
Fraternity members who wish to contribute to Rush Boobs can simply sign up with their name and school. There is no screening process on TFM. Submissions are completely up to the discretion of the individual who posts them, said Kelsey Heineman, customer relations director for TFM’s parent company Grandex. Users are giving TFM consent to use their photos however the company sees fit.
Just upload, submit and become part of Internet infamy.
Among these photos are a handful of Snapchat screenshots, one of which was carefully captioned, “These go viral your dead.” This implies that not all the photos posted were intended for the public eye.
It also raises the question of whose property the photo is and what defines consent in the digital age.
For the five freshman girls, the discussion of Rush Boobs stayed within the walls of their Wright dorm room. But looking back, Jas said she still wonders where that photo went.
“I would want to know what they did with it,” Jas said, “just because those are my boobs.”
