Well the World ain't gonna run itself... somebody's gotta do it! Posted on 08/02/2014 5:59:36 PM PDT by nickcarraway
Inside the surreal recruitment process of a legendary club—or something like it—at New York University
It all started with a Facebook message from a dead guy.
His name was Ernest Howard Crosby and his profile picture showed an old-time portrait of a man in a dapper vest sporting a bushy Civil War beard. The message came on behalf of New York University’s Eucleian Society, a literary club formed in 1832 around the same time that secret societies began sprouting up at university campuses across the country.
"The Society is interested in your potential membership and would like to invite you to learn more… Time is of the essence."
There was a link to a Facebook group that contained a long list of male undergraduates, mostly white (like me), a few Latinos and Indians, and one black guy. The list also contained the avatars of a few other dead guys, like Crosby, and the identity of the Group itself was similarly concealed beneath another guise: “Vote Arthur Watkins for Second Circuit Judge.”
The page, paired with the campaign-ready photo of an old guy holding an open book, appeared to be a 1930s-era political campaign. The comments field on the Group page was disabled, but a note in the Description section directed us to fill out a questionnaire (via Google Forms) that asked about our backgrounds, our political views, and our religious ideologies.
Before submitting to interrogation, I first searched online for any information I could uncover about the “Eucleian Society.” A Wikipedia page drew on sources from NYU’s Bobst Library and Digital Archives, as well as academic books that covered the broader topic of “secret societies in America.” The society was founded the same year instruction began at NYU, first operating out of the Main University Building, where it held oratory debates
(Excerpt) Read more at theatlantic.com ...
interesting
ixnay on the ecretsay.
There is no fight club.
Un-American.
Oops, I was supposed to post this to the encrypted secret FR.
It would be nice if FR had global https.
What...like the Journo-list-as?
Too bad this guy didn’t fork over the 600 bucks just to see how much of a scam it was or not. It would make a good story if it was a scam that was going on all across colleges for years and years.
I tried to join the order of Albino Assassin Monks, but I had too much melanin.
Freegards
My guess is, if he forked over the $600, there would be another level of gatherings, drink fests, fees until the pigeon eventually withdrew himself from the game.
As stated in the story’s comments, this could be fiction at the Atlantic or the author level. Good yarn, nonetheless.
Well the World ain't gonna run itself... somebody's gotta do it! 
Who controls the British crown?
Who keeps the metric system down?
We do, we do
Who keeps Atlantis off the maps
?
Who keeps the Martians under wraps?
We do, we do
Who holds back the elctric car?
Who makes Steve Gutenberg a star?
We do, we do
Who robs gamefish of their site?
Who rigs every Oscar night?
We do, we do
Like every secret society I join, I’m only in it for the secret decoder ring. Once I get that, to heck with the robes and juju.
Yeah, if the amenities were on the same level. But imagine walking into the room after forking out like a dummy and it’s all top shelf. “Ah, the few who had faith, welcome to the inner workings—here is your % of the annual dividends the Eucleian Society’s investments have accumulated since 1832. You will be killed if you speak of this. Now let us speak of boobies.’
Like I said, good story material.
Freegards
Link please? ;-)
I recall a made-for-tv movie called Seconds with Rock Hudson. He joins a group that will fake his death actually providing a body for the accident and give him a full make over and a new life for a fee but he misses his old life and keeps trying to go back. In the end, they have to liquidate him. His body is used to fake another’s death.
The first rule of Fight Club is nobody talks about Fight Club.
What’s the secret password?
Freegards
Cool. I was kinda thinking of Chesterton’s ‘The Man who Would be Thursday.’ But everyone involved in the society is actually a reporter of some sort, either to see if the society is legit or how far some suckers would actually go.
Freegards
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