Sometimes you wish corporal punishment could be used to discipline infantile college students. Last Thursday night, as the University of the Philippines was staging a concert to commemorate the death anniversary of a victim of fraternity-related violence, members of two UP fraternities were at each other's throats inside the Diliman campus. The brawl between members of the Alpha Phi Beta and Sigma Rho fraternities ended when one of them collapsed and blood started flowing. Den Daniel Reyes, a third year engineering student, was rushed by fellow Alpha Phi Beta members to a hospital, but he bled to death from multiple stab wounds that punctured his lungs, colon and pancreas.
Three members of the Sigma Rho fraternity, including the son and namesake of former Environment Secretary Fulgencio Factoran Jr., were wounded in what they claimed was an attack initiated by the Alpha Phi Beta -- a charge the rival fraternity naturally denies. As usual, the Philippine National Police is having a hard time investigating a murder case in the UP Independent Republic, where school officials have been trying in vain for years to end fraternity-related violence. A year ago this month, 22-year-old journalism student Niño Canilao was killed when he got caught in the crossfire of warring fraternities Scintilla Juris and Sigma Rho. That concert Thursday night commemorated Canilao's death.
Just days ago, a student was killed when a grenade exploded at the Technological Institute of the Philippines in another fraternity-related violence. The young thugs in that case have been arrested. Why do fraternity members fight? A wrong look at the wrong place and wrong time? Someone has a better car, a prettier girlfriend? Do these brats lack attention? Did they get called the son of a prostitute? You can get called worse things when you grow up -- just ask government officials -- but these fraternity members still have a few more years before they enter a bigger, tougher world. You shudder to think what such violent young monsters will do when they face life's bigger problems -- assuming they will ever grow up.
UP officials are right -- fraternity violence is a social problem. It needs coordinated action among parents, school officials, religious and civic groups and the fraternities themselves. And don't leave out the cops, especially if there's a murder case. Punish the culprits, punish the fraternities. Why does this sound like a tired refrain? When will the violence end?