It is Friday night, and you are fed up with your boring professors and want to forget about the pile of homework that is due next Monday. You decide to go out and have a good time with your friends to get your mind off the stress. You text your girls, slip on your favorite dress and party all night long. Although, somewhere between the dancing and the fun, that guy comes along. Him. The one that your fellow females warned you about. The annoying, drunk frat guy.
Of course, there are stereotypes for every group of college students. Not every single fraternity member spends the majority of his time drinking and trying to hook up with girls. Nonetheless, some guys do fall into that solo cup of clichés. They can be an easy target for satire.
Take Jimmy Tatro, for example. He is a college student from California who administers his own Youtube channel called “LifeAccordingToJimmy.” The majority of his videos are fictionalized representations that mock frat guys and their actions. Out of his 14 fan favorite videos in his channel, at least half make some reference to frat life.
In his video “THAT Drunk Guy,” Tatro acts as the typical frat guy who thinks he is the life of the party, when, in all actuality, everyone else thinks he is annoying and a wannabe. He portrays the kind of guy who tries too hard that no one wants to be around.
In other videos, such as in “The Little Bro,” “Sh-t Frat Guys Say,” “West Coast Report: Fraternity Rush” and “How to Start a Bro Fight,” Tatro acts out how stereotypical frat bros act during recruitment and at parties.
“I think the videos are hilarious, but they stereotype fraternities 100 percent. It makes it seem like fraternities are all about partying when there is really a lot more to it than that,” said sophomore biology major Joey Pawlan, who is the founder of UT’s Zeta Beta Tau chapter.
In some of his videos, Tatro plays an arrogant upperclassmen fraternity member that belittles pledges and degrades women. Some could argue that Tatro’s videos are fairly close to reality, but others could argue that they are exaggerated representations of what frat life is really like. The stereotype of a frat guy can also vary between different universities and fraternities.
“They work off stereotypes, which almost all of them seem to hold true. This causes them to be satirical,” said sophomore marketing major Jake Loken, who is a member of UT’s Sigma Phi Epsilon chapter.
Xelmarie Medina can be reached at xelmymedina@gmail.com