For two weeks, flyers have been turning heads in McElroy Commons with an invitation to join "Boston's only gay fraternity." Members of that fraternity, Delta Lambda Phi (DLP), canvassed the building to promote spring rush, which failed to attract any Boston College students.
A group of elderly men founded DLP in Washington, DC, in 1986. They hoped to establish an accepting social organization that hadn't during their own college years.
The nation's first official gay fraternity, DLP, now boasts 19 chapters nationwide, including one in Boston founded in 2000. In the past four years, national enrollment in DLP has doubled to 1,500 members.
The Boston chapter does not affiliate itself with one school, preferring to act as an all-university, community-based organization. According to David O'Grady, president of DLP's Boston Chapter, the frat has a mainstay of support at the Fenway schools, like Boston University, Emerson, and Massachusetts Institute of Art.
The McElroy flyers are part of a new effort to reach out to schools on the outskirts of Boston, such as BC, Harvard, and Tufts.
Like most fraternities, DLP stresses the importance of camaraderie, service, and support. Each new pledge class is required to take up a community service project.
"We provide an environment where you can be with other guys without any pressure. So many LGBT groups are support-based, or activist-based. But we also offer a friendship that can be really hard to find," said David O'Grady, president of DLP's Boston Chapter.
O'Grady said common suspicions about the group can sometimes hamper its ability to attract new members. O'Grady denied that DLP fraternities has any ulterior motives for assembling students based on their sexuality, or that it acts a dating service for its members.
"[That image] is completely understandable. It's a stigma that's going to follow us around until there is that societal change, which isn't going to happen anytime soon," he said. "We have policies in place to keep this from becoming a sex group. We don't promote that."
Spring Break
