I think there's something very appealing about being part of an exclusive group, be it a football team or a college fraternity. It's especially true when everyone has gone through a hazing ritual together. I had that kind of experience one summer at camp. All of your peers are standing there with you, embarrassed and humiliated together. I know it sounds immature, but the adrenaline of the experience really makes you feel like you're part of something special. When you run into each other the next day or later that week and smile at each other, you realize that you have a bond with every guy that was with you that night. These things happen in many different social settings: high school, college, camp, sports teams, and clubs. It's supposed to be a rite of passage, an experience to remember, and it usually works out well. Almost always, no harm is meant, nobody is hurt and it ends with a party.

However, hazing becomes a very serious problem when it gets out of hand. At a preseason training camp last August, three varsity football players at Mepham High School in Bellmore, N.Y. sexually brutalized younger teammates with sticks, pinecones and golf balls. It's truly disgusting to imagine what it must have felt like. There was a similar incident in May, when a group of high school students in Skokie, IL. were videotaped beating younger girls and dumping urine, paint and animal entrails on them.

This isn't the hazing I was referring to; this is full-blown sexual assault and it must be considered as such. There is a debate transpiring now as to how best to adjudicate the incident in Mepham. Are the coaches responsible? The principal of the school? What about the other students who remained silent while watching? Should this incident be looked at as a typical hazing ritual that everyone goes through? Should the perpetrators, juniors and seniors in high school, be tried as minors or adults? All of these questions are filling op-ed sections in both local and national newspapers, and creating an uproar among Bellmore residents.
The best way to go about dealing with this situation, I think, is to first step back and try to picture what happened. Three young kids were sodomized with broomsticks and pinecones. The boys were then pressured into keeping silent, which ended only when one of the victims needed medical attention. I just don't understand how a hazing turned criminal, and I think that it is important for us to find out.

This incident must be looked at out of the context of high school hazing. When similar attacks were committed against Abner Louima, the Hatian immigrant sodomized by N.Y.P.D. officers, there was no debate as to whether or not this was a crime or just a "boys will be boys" incident. All of the students who watched this happening have both a legal and moral obligation to report it, just as they would if they saw someone assaulted in a park late at night.

The coaches and the principal, of course, claim that they had no idea something like this could happen. They have to say this to save their jobs and reputations. But one parent told coach Kevin McElroy and Principal John Didden that her son was threatened and this threat wasn't taken seriously. There is plenty of blame to go around, and everybody involved must be adequately punished.

On Nov. 6, Newsday reported that the three varsity players had been "charged as juveniles with multiple felonies for allegedly sodomizing three junior varsity players." District Attorney Mark Zimmer plans to ask a judge to move the cases to adult court. None of the five coaches of the football team will be returning next year when the program begins. This was announced at a town meeting on Nov. 5.

Newsday reports, "Even those who wanted the coaches removed said yesterday that they were disturbed by how the issue has divided their communities." Situations like this one have no winner, only losers. Hopefully, this incident will send shockwaves throughout the country and raise awareness about hazing and juvenile violence in general.

I offer my condolences to the victims and their families.