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Comment by waschl | Hacker News Reader

The protection for this kind of fencing was practically the same during the last hundred years. Depending on the city they are different, the Paukbrille is default everywhere, others like nose or ear protection are treated differently depending on the local rules.

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Why then are the scars such an uncommon sight nowadays? Is it because the medical treatment of the wounds is better or because there are less duels nowadays than 100 years ago? Or is it because in the past, students did everything to get a scar (including slicing themselves open with a razor blade) because it was seen as a sign of honor?

Self-hurting is a urban legend afaik and was always (eg putting horse hair in the wound to make it gape wider is such a legend). The number of fencing fraternities is lower today, many stopped it between 1945 and 1970, and also back then many non-frat-guys practiced fencing. Also the number of fights per person was higher back then.

I'm not sure if that is also something that has changed over time, but a friend who is in a fencing fraternity (and also recently got a scar) told me that in most duels, certain moves or move combinations with a high risk of injury have been banned. That especially applies to the initiation duels required to enter the fraternity.

For "initiation duels" (Fuchsenpartien), that was commonly the case in the past as well. However, as previously mentioned, since the number of duels ("Partien") per person is usually lower today, the total number of duels where there is a risk for a hit on the cheeks is substantially lower.

It's true that some fraternities (more specifically, groups with common fencing rules called a Waffenring) have also moved to a "Hochcomment", i.e. a set of rules where hitting the cheek is banned entirely.

The membership in Burschenschaften (fraternities) has reduced significantly and membership is more frowned upon in society because most of them are very much on the right most fringe of society (in particular the "schlagenden Verbindungen, i.e. the ones that do duels).

Fascinating. In my country, fraternities are very much on the leftmost fringe of society.

Oh, where are you from? It's (sadly) true that there is no significant movement of left-wing fraternities over here in Germany (at least none that I'm aware of). I never understood why, because it is part of a historic student culture - and leaving that culture (or any kind of culture) to the right wing seems kind of sad.

Portugal. The first fraternities were founded in the 30s. They had their boom in the 50s and 60s, when university education started to become available for the middle class in earnest. This also coincided with the peak of discontentment with the ruling authoritarian fascist regime. The fraternities were a center of anti-regime activities (the communist party was virtually the only real resistance organisation during the dictatorship). Perhaps that's why the fraternities have always been left-wing bastions. But it's interesting how that culture remained even 40 years after the end of the fascist regime.

A lot of Burschenschaften have changed their rules.

Catholic ones now prohibit self harm through Mensur.

Some now protect the face completely while fencing, and others dont make it obligatory for the scar to be apparent anymore.

And contrary to the Wikipedia article, I would say its an upper middle class thing rather than an upper class thung, even if some Burschenschaften have very high connections.

Their membership has dwindled as their reactionary values have gone out of fashion.

According to Wikipedia, German speaking fraternities have 190.000 members [0], which is around 0.19% of the population of Germany, Switzerland and Austria (EDIT: see comments below, most of them are "nichtschlagend", meaning they don't duel). Compare this to 34.000 students in the German empire in 1900, which was under 0.1% of the population. I would assume that not every student was member of a fraternity back then, so the number of active fraternity members was even lower. Now, I do not know if the 190.000 members include non-active members as well, but I don't think you can generally say that their membership dwindled significantly over the last 100 years. Also, after studying in a University town in Germany where fraternity live is still very present, I don't think you can generally say that these fraternities are reactionary and/or right-winged (although there membership is, on average, much more conservative than the general population). I only noticed one common denominator among all of them: a massive consumption of alcohol.

[0] https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Studentenverbindung

I saw the Wikipedia article. The number isn't properly sourced, but it's believable enough. The closest attribution is this journalistic article[1], which doesn't have the number. It also refers to the dwindling relevance in the past decades, which I was thinking of rather than going back a century. I'll let DeepL translate:

However, what sounds pleasing from the point of view of the student fraternities is different on the bottom line. "Despite the new admissions we have a minus of about 200 members per year", says CV managing director Weiskorn. This is due to the fact that the vast majority of members are older academics, some of whom die every year. This development is in line with the long-term trend that can be observed overall among the student fraternities: "According to information from the cross-corporate mergers CDA and CDK, the number of fraternity members declined significantly between 1997 and 2009," says political scientist Kurth. "This downward spiral is accompanied by a massive loss of importance." Less than one percent of all students are now organized in corporations.

It's worth mentioning that most fraternities don't duel. Dueling fraternities are the reactionary minority of a conservative minority.

[1] https://web.archive.org/web/20141129111313/http://www.wdr.de...

> Dueling fraternities are the reactionary minority of a conservative minority.

As someone that knows quite a few people from dueling fraternities (recent graduates), I don't think that's a fair generalization (even though that's the common trope). There has been a lot of organizational changes in the last two decades around one of the biggest associations for dueling fraternities (DB), where a lot of fraternities that didn't align with their reactionary views left and founded associations of their own. As a result of that, DB is now half of its initial size. And there are probably also a few that didn't leave where the younger generation has more progressive views, but they weren't able to convince the old inactive members (which are the bulk) to leave.

So yeah, they are generally of a conservative political mindset, but I would say that the strong political tendencies portrayed in media and hearsay only apply to maybe ~1/3 or less of dueling fraternities.

I assume by DB you mean the Deutsche Burschenschaft, which still includes the majority of fraternities not just the ones that duel. You are correct that many left, but that was not because the DB moved to the right it was more that generally society became more and more critical. The same fraternities did not have any issues for many years that several of the prominent members fraternities of DB had Neonazis in key roles. To give a taste of the views held by many fraternities. Most (90%) do not allow women members, many do not allow members from migrant backgrounds (and the ones that changed only did so in the last 10 years or so). When Germany still had military service (technically it's just "paused"), most fraternities did not allow members who had done "Zivildienst" which is the substitute where you work in hospitals, retirement homes...

My point is that what you call "the same fraternities" are not the same fraternities anymore. Younger, more progressive (compared to the status quo of the fraternities) members join, and older less progressive members leave (die).

I personally don't share the values of fraternities, and would never join one, but I've also come to see that they can be a good station for young adolescents leaving their parents homes for the first time, if done right, and would also love to see them open up to more diverse groups of people.

In the last years, community structures for teenagers/adolescents (e.g. sport clubs, scouts) are becoming less and less popular, and I'd hate for that trend to continue, as I personally wouldn't be the same without them, had they not existed. I'd rather see them reform than be shunned out of existence.

Most of those are not schlagende Verbindungen, though.

The vast majority these are "Alte Herren", i.e older, non active members. The important fact is that their importance for student live and career opportunities has all but ceased to exist.

Out of fashion _among students at elite universities_ maybe.

Unfortunately growing quite fashionable in the greater society.

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