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5. Epsilon | Denouncing the D9 Pt. 2
48 Plays6 months ago
As it turns out, it is a trend--people denouncing Divine 9 fraternities and sororities. As it turns out, however, there are many whose faith walks have been strengthened by their D9 memberships. This episode features some of those reflections and thoughts about how to learn and lead through this trend.
Ethocast is a "For Our Edification" limited series and is supported by Edify Ventures, LLC.
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Transcript
Introduction to Ethocast
00:00:00
Speaker
Thank you so much for joining me on this episode of etho cast. It is episode Epsilon as it were. I met a Francis and you know, a couple of weeks ago I did an episode of etho cash. I talked about, um, denouncing the divine nine.
Purpose of Ethocast
00:00:18
Speaker
Now at the time when I talked about this, my take on it was that I wasn't too sure if it was much of a trend. Guess what?
00:00:29
Speaker
I think it's
00:00:50
Speaker
effective leaders. On Ethocast, I'll share lessons learned from my college days, my career journey, and leadership research. Ethocast is a four hour edification limited series and presented by Edify Adventures. This is Ethocast, leadership to the letter. It's
Understanding Divine Nine Denouncements
00:01:08
Speaker
been a few weeks and the announcements just keep on coming. They keep on coming. They keep on coming. But I have some different thoughts this time.
00:01:36
Speaker
So when I talked about denouncing the D nine on episode gamma, I wasn't necessarily sure if we were looking at a trend and looking at this continue these denouncements. I think it's safe to say that there is a trend going on.
00:01:46
Speaker
Let's talk about it in a minute.
Personal Identity and Divine Nine's Response
00:01:52
Speaker
So what is this thing happening? What is this trend? I have to admit it is something that makes you go.
00:01:58
Speaker
Hmm, but I don't want to spend again just like the last time I didn't want to spend a whole lot of time on it But I do want to bring something up that I brought up before and that is we are talking about folks for whatever reason They are changing their minds there. There's something in their identity that didn't match what we were doing However, I will say this
00:02:22
Speaker
I will say that for the Divine Nine, we have to figure out what it is that we want.
Career Epiphany and Purpose
00:02:28
Speaker
A few years back, I was having a conversation with my wife, Halima, who is a community conscious action oriented member of Zeta Phi Beta Sorority Incorporated. And I was complaining about things that weren't happening in my career. I was talking about all these frustrations that I had going on.
00:02:48
Speaker
I was talking about how I didn't like this thing happening and I didn't like that thing happening. After we had a little bit of conversation, she goes, OK, I know what you like. I know what's bothering you. Now, I also kind of have a sense of what it is that you don't want. So what do you want? What's the end game of all of these things that you're doing? What's it going to be?
Art Studio Reflection on Leadership Purpose
00:03:13
Speaker
And that gave me a lot of pause. I pondered on it.
00:03:17
Speaker
A few weeks later, we were visiting an art studio, one of our favorites here in New Orleans, Studio B. And you might have heard of this artist, Be Mike. And so as we're walking through Studio B, I saw this sign and I couldn't believe this sign. And so Halima was behind me like in the next room. She came out of the room where I was and into the room where I was.
00:03:44
Speaker
And I looked at her with this look like you just won't believe this. And I pointed to the wall and on the wall was a sign. And the sign said, we know what you were fighting against, but what are you fighting for?
00:04:01
Speaker
And so my brothers and sisters of the divine nine, I'm going to ask you the same question as we have these denouncements going on. And these denouncements are unequivocally stating that there is something wrong with us and wrong with what we're doing.
Advocacy and Core Values of Divine Nine
00:04:18
Speaker
I know that there are so many folks who have already responded to this. There are folks who have done their commentaries on this, but a lot of these commentaries have been geared toward what
00:04:31
Speaker
either they don't like about the denouncements or they have been geared toward the people who are doing the announcements. But I have to ask you, what are we fighting for in this thing? Now listen, our existence is not limited to this moment when people are denouncing our fraternities and sororities. But again, we cannot deny that there is a trend of it. And there are people who are calling attention
00:04:59
Speaker
to what it is that they're doing, whether we like the way that we're, that they're doing it or not, whether we like that, they're doing it or not. People are doing it. And so instead of responding to what it is that they're doing, let's talk about what it is that we fight for with our fraternities and sororities.
Personal Testimony of Alpha Phi Alpha Values
00:05:19
Speaker
So I'm going to speak for myself. I've been an alpha for more than 35 years now. And in that time,
00:05:27
Speaker
I have fought for the things that Alpha stands for, manly deeds, scholarship, love for all mankind. I have fought for our mission. I have fought for the people that we serve, but I've also fought for my fraternity brothers. We're not all perfect.
00:05:43
Speaker
But there are the ones, as I pointed out in Epsilon Gamma, there are the ones who do what they're supposed to do to meet the vision, the goal and fulfill the mission and to really, really uphold the values of the fraternity. And I fight for them as much as I possibly can. And it's not just
00:06:02
Speaker
in being with the chapter. It is in as many things as I do that I can think of, whether it's at work, whether it's with my family, whether it is in community service, whether it's in my entrepreneurial ventures, when I'm on the radio, when I am doing one of my speaking presentations, I am doing something that I believe fights for what Alpha Phi Alpha stands for.
00:06:28
Speaker
Think about this, our fraternities and sororities, our brotherhoods and our sisterhoods, our families, they are places of refuge for like-minded people, for people who need to experience some sense of community. We deliver on that time and time and time again. The reason I do the Black Greek Success Program
00:06:52
Speaker
is because over 20 years ago, I noticed this pattern of how our brothers and sisters would be able to achieve these great things in their careers.
Career Success and Fraternity Support
00:07:05
Speaker
And I had one simple question. Why is it?
00:07:09
Speaker
that black Greeks specifically members of the divine nine are able to reach success in their careers. How do we always get to the front of the line? It seems a lot of times when there are so many other people who are trying to achieve similar things that we're trying to achieve. How is it that we get to the front of the line? And for me, what it was about, it was about the fact that our fraternities and sororities,
00:07:36
Speaker
were able to find a way to bring the best out of people so that they experienced this sense of self actualization. If you think about it in terms of the hierarchy of needs. Achieving this sense of self actualization that really propelled them to meet some lofty goals in their life, to do some great things in their lives. It's no mistake that you have people out there like a Robert F. Smith, like a Colin Kaepernick.
00:08:05
Speaker
Like a Kamala Harris, it is no mistake that these people are out there and there's no mistake that their association is with divine iron fraternities and sororities. So in this moment, in this moment and in other moments where people choose to call us out and guess what is going to continue to happen.
Evaluating Fraternity/Sorority Loyalty
00:08:27
Speaker
People are going to continue to call our fraternities and sororities out. It's actually a good thing.
00:08:34
Speaker
Because whenever people do that, it gives you an opportunity to evaluate your membership and to really ask yourself, why am I so loyal to this fraternity or sorority? Why am I so puffed up with pride whenever I wear these letters? What is it about this? It's good to be curious about what value it brings to your life. It is a good thing.
00:09:01
Speaker
But I had a question, I was really curious about something. I took to Facebook because with the spiritual part of this discussion of the denouncements, I really wondered something.
Faith and Fraternity Experience
00:09:18
Speaker
I wanted to know what did people actually gain in terms of their faith walks
00:09:28
Speaker
by joining their respective fraternities or sororities. And guess what? I got almost 50 responses from folks about what it is that their fraternities or sororities did for them. Actually, J.S.Y. Robo, his comment about this was, my faith walk helped me focus on my fraternity service. Chanel, she says, it caused me to be a lot more empathetic towards others.
00:09:56
Speaker
consider servant leadership in a different way and examine my love walk. Here's another one, Rashid.
00:10:03
Speaker
I am a Quaker. Yes, this man is a black man. At the time I became an alpha, I was probably more agnostic. There are aspects of Christianity and hence alpha that don't jibe with me. But because alpha is a diverse organization, I was exposed to many men of many faith walks, most notably Muslim. Because we were from so many different backgrounds in a secular body,
00:10:26
Speaker
I was able to observe, support, and celebrate the traditions of others while I found my own way. Tim Allen, my sorority has been instrumental in deepening my faith walk by fostering an environment of service and shared values, encouraging me to reflect on how my faith aligns with my daily actions and interactions.
00:10:49
Speaker
All of my spiritual advisors, Jeff says, come from the frat. If anything, they keep me in line. We have so many pastors that I have access to and I am comfortable asking the deep questions or even when being vulnerable with them about faith and the struggle. Pascal.
00:11:07
Speaker
It is a cornerstone of my deep belief in servant leadership, not just the community service, but also in service of the individual being my sister's keeper and being kept by my sister. We hold each other up and hold each other accountable. And then finally, Bernard, I spent more time working within the church since crossing than I have since I was a kid. When I became a member of Alpha,
00:11:36
Speaker
I grew up Catholic and that's pretty much all I knew in terms of faith, Catholicism. In 1991, I entered the Fraternities Oratorical Contest and I was fortunate enough to make it to the National Oratorical Contest at the General Convention.
00:11:54
Speaker
And one of the brothers who gave me a hard time is his brother who we know very dearly here in New Orleans and honestly throughout the Southwestern region and other parts of the fraternity. His name is Joe Bird. And Brother Bird walks up to me before I compete and he says, Brother Francis, now, now you're Catholic, right? And I say, yeah. And he goes, well,
00:12:17
Speaker
Those Baptist preacher sons, they're gonna eat your lunch. You need to get some hooping lessons before you get on up there because they're gonna eat your lunch. And he was right. I got up there and the two brothers who were ahead of me, who placed ahead of me were from the Eastern region and the Southern region. Of course, Southern region.
00:12:35
Speaker
I've run the southwestern region. And so you say to yourself, well, Eddie, that's not so bad. You went third place. Yeah. Well, only four of us competed and there are five regions. And so I, I did learn a lot, but I became so curious when he said that.
00:12:53
Speaker
All of a sudden, I was really curious about going to a Baptist service. So I went to my first service that was not really a Catholic service, I'm pretty sure after I became an Alpha. And then I met brothers from other sects of Christianity. I met brothers
00:13:10
Speaker
who were Methodist. I met brothers who were Episcopalian, my brothers who were members of the AME church. And then I met brothers who were Muslim. I met brothers who were Buddhist. And so that made me very curious about faith. And so my faith walk has been enhanced because of my membership. I don't just see one thing. I don't see one part of Christianity.
00:13:32
Speaker
I see all faiths and I see all faiths for what they do for people, how they enrich people's lives. So this brings me to some final thoughts, some things I want you to consider here. And so let's look ahead.
Future Leadership Advice for Divine Nine
00:13:48
Speaker
And when I say let's look ahead, let's look ahead in terms of how we are going to continue to lead in the divine nine.
00:13:55
Speaker
Number one, I'm going to go back vaguely to something I mentioned in episode gamma. And that is when it comes down to people who want to be members of our fraternities and sororities, understand what your prospects want. What do they want?
00:14:14
Speaker
with Sigma Gamma Rho? What do they want with Omega Psi Phi? What do they want with Iota Phi Theta? What do they want with Delta Sigma Theta? What do they want with our organizations? And if you are not a member of the Divine Nine,
00:14:31
Speaker
What do they want with Groove Fire Groove? What do they want with Swing Fire Swing? What do they want? Second, use your membership as an opportunity to be an inclusive leader. It is not lost on me that it is June. It is pride month. And so how do we include
00:14:56
Speaker
the brothers and sisters who in the LGBTQ community, how do we include them in what it is that we are doing in our fraternities and sororities? How do we include our brothers and sisters who were Muslim in everything that we are doing? How cognizant are we of their presence and how they practice their faith? And how cognizant are we of our social practices with them? How cognizant are we of the brothers and sisters in our organizations who are neurodivergent?
00:15:25
Speaker
On the most recent episode of my other podcast for our edification, I spoke pretty bluntly about finding out at the age of 53 that I have ADHD. And so how do we accept these folks who were neurodivergent in our fraternities and sororities? How do we include them in things?
00:15:43
Speaker
This is probably one of the biggest things for me. Avoid absolute thinking as a leader. A zero-sum mentality. There's only one way to do it. There's only one way to go with this decision. In our fraternities and sororities, we have more diversity than we realize. We have to tap into that diversity.
00:16:06
Speaker
And when we decide that something is going to be absolute thinking, we really cut off a lot of other great thoughts. We prevent those great thoughts from bubbling to the top so that we can be the best we can be and we can honor our mission, our values, our aims, our goals.
00:16:27
Speaker
And so for a final, final thought, lean on each other, not just your frat, not just your sorrow, not on just your, your fellow divine nine member, but on anybody who wears a set of letters, regardless of their ethnicity, regardless of the nationality, regardless of the ethnic makeup of their organizations, lean on them because when we celebrate the true spirit of brotherhood, a sisterhood or very simply family, when we celebrate that,
00:16:55
Speaker
We serve as an example of the people who we said we were going to serve the people who we pledged to serve. Thank you so much for hanging out with me on this episode of either cast.
Conclusion and Listener Engagement
00:17:08
Speaker
I will see you for the next episode.
00:17:10
Speaker
Ethocast is a four-hour edification limited series. If you like what you heard, like and follow this podcast for more leadership insights for your fraternity or sorority chapter. To find out how you can bring followership to leadership or the Black Creek Success Program to your campus or a campus near you, email today, eddy at eddyfrances.com. Until next time, spread brotherly and sisterly love wherever you go.