Cornell University has received a great deal of negative publicity and intense scrutiny following a civil lawsuit filed by a former student known as “Jane Doe.” She alleges that she was drugged and gang-raped by seven fraternity members of the Phi Chi fraternity in October of 2024.

I read an interesting article by Anthony Bradley titled, “What the Cornell Allegations Reveal About How America Raises Sons.” Chad Frick, the former president of the Alpha Sigma Phi at Clemson University, is quoted with this insightful observation. “If you know someone in a fraternity who is a terrible person, he was a terrible person before joining the fraternity, and the fraternity did not make him that way. However, there are fraternities that harbor that kind of behavior.”

Bradley says,

The horrible allegations about the fraternity men at Cornell University (“the Cornell 7”) are an opportunity to reflect on the consequences of a culture that prizes achievement over character. If the allegations are accurate, what happened at Cornell is a story about substance abuse and sexual licentiousness. What happened at Cornell is to be expected when success is defined by performance instead of moral virtue.

Fraternities don’t make young men monsters. Fraternity culture is not the cause of situations like the one we saw at Cornell. The truth is that these men arrived on campus with moral values already in place, and their fraternity provided a context for them to be the men they were raised to be. They put their already lived-out morality on display. They were the type of men who saw no problem with having a drug-induced orgy. To them, it wasn’t distasteful or immoral. Why? Because they were raised in a success-driven America that says the only personal “morality” that matters is whatever leads to personal pleasure and success.

As a society, we have purged religious formation as a framework necessary for true male success. Many view religion as “oppressive,” as something that takes away one’s freedom to do whatever one feels is right. Well, that’s exactly the point. When morally flawed human beings define morality on their own terms instead of by what is transcendently good, the Cornell 7 is what you get.

These men thought that engaging in an orgy and abusing drugs were morally good, so good, in their minds, that they invited others to join them.

Imagine instead what would have happened that night if those men had been living by sound human and theological virtues.

The tragedy of what allegedly happened at Cornell is that the consequences extend far beyond one night. If the allegations are true, lives have been deeply harmed, and the young men involved face consequences that will follow them for years. But the larger lesson is one that should concern parents, churches, schools, fraternities, and society as a whole: character cannot be an afterthought.

Academic achievement, career success, social status, and personal freedom are not enough to make a young man successful. Without a moral foundation, those very things can become tools for self-indulgence rather than instruments of human flourishing. Young men need more than opportunities to succeed; they need formation in virtue, responsibility, self-control, and a recognition that some things are wrong regardless of whether society, their peers, or their own desires tell them otherwise.

This is why I cannot help but think of one of the most significant principles in life: “Do not be deceived, God will not be mocked. Whatever a man sows this he shall also reap” (Galatians 6:7). The choices we make shape the people we become, and eventually those choices bear consequences. What are we doing to ensure that the young men we send into the world are being formed to choose what is right when no one else is there to make the choice for them?

Richard E Simmons III is the founder and Executive Director of The Center for Executive Leadership and a best-selling author.