Informant EL went to the same high school as me and now currently goes to UC Berkeley. However, because he is interning in LA, he is taking classes at USC this semester to satisfy credits. While we were out eating dinner we began reminiscing about high school when I realized that our school had a lot of traditions and myths, so I asked him to tell me in his own words some of the stories of our school.

EL: “I don’t know.. does hazing count?”

Yeah it does

EL: “Okay I’ll tell you about the hazing we did in our high school basketball team then. We do a lot of small hazing things that aren’t that big of a deal but the worst one was one time when all the older people and the coaches were in on it together. We had to run basically suicides, except instead of running the long way we run the short way, from left side of the court to the right side then back. The coach told us, all the people that had just made the team, that we need to run 20 suicides in under 1 minute. If we don’t make it in time, we would have to redo it with one less suicide every time. Basically if you don’t make 20, the next time you have to hit 19, and then 18 and so on. Obviously, hitting 20 in a minute was impossible and I remember so clearly everyone was protesting ESPECIALLY the older guys. Little did I know… So then we started the run and after the first run, no one made it, but all the older guys claimed to have made it so they sit out. Meanwhile, us the people that had just made the team just kept running and running. I ended up not making it until it was 14 in under 1 minute, because by the second or third time you’re so exhausted. But yeah, after we finished the suicide running the coaches grouped us up and then told us what was going on. I’ve never been that pissed at sports in my life.”

Thoughts: I’ve never known that our basketball team had a hazing ritual considering I have been on other sport teams and have never been hazed before. I thought it was really interesting that their hazing seemed to have no reason except to torture their near teammates, because usually there is a point to hazing, such as mental toughness or team building, but I guess sometimes hazing is just pointless like that.