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Comment by corybrown | Hacker News Reader

> Because by invoking the image of the family, the valor of doing whatever it takes naturally follows. You’re not just working long nights or skipping vacation to further the bottom line, no, no, you’re doing this for the family.

Same trick used by college fraternities to do all sorts of crap.

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I totally disagree.

College fraternities exist as a framework for social contracts between strangers alone in a college environment. Each member is incentivized to support/protect/uplift the other members (just like a family) as they will be able to expect it in return. You can somewhat make the argument for each chapter's national org, but I really don't think the incentives are really that out of line between them, Nationals just tend to be poorly run.

Companies, as the article discusses, don't.

Agree, and with all those benefits that come from a functional family, so too do dysfunctional fraternities suffer in the same way dysfunctional families do.

Isn't the point of a fraternity specifically to facilitate these kinds of "do everything for your brother" type of relationships?

I would argue yes. Most people join fraternities for these exact kinds of relationships. Most employees join a company for a paycheck/growth in career.

I would say that within the chapter it really is sort of a family. To the national organization though, all they see is a bunch of walking talking dollar signs.

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