HBO’s Bama Rush documentary, which began streaming on Max today, wouldn’t have been possible without TikTok. It was TikTok users, after all, that first got swept up in the drama of sorority recruitment at the University of Alabama in August 2021.
It became such a viral sensation that it caught the attention of VICE Studios and HBO. But while TikTok users treated the young girls like reality TV stars, director Rachel Fleit finds their humanity. By the time Bama Rush has finished documenting the entire UA sorority ecosystem, you’ll see how these girls are, in many ways, victims of ruthless, exploitative system.
But there are still a few wild twists and turns to make Bama Rush an entertaining watch. Perhaps the most compelling is the section on “The Machine,” which is guaranteed to have viewers shouting “WTF” at their screens. What exactly is The Machine from HBO’s Bama Rush? Read on to find out more.
Also known as Theta Nu Epsilon, The Machine is a secret society at Alabama University dating back to the 1800s which, supposedly, has some level of control over the frats, sororities, and elections at the college.
When director Rachel Fleit asks her subjects about The Machine, they give her a secret smile and claim they either don’t know anything about it, or can’t talk about it. But she finds one student willing to speak: Garrett, a Student Government Associate Justice member, who says, “[The Machine] control everything on this campus. If there’s an election, The Machine’s rigging it. If there’s a homecoming queen, it’s The Machine candidate. You’re going to look at awards, and jobs, and it’s the Machine kids getting it. Even the most trivial things, like football seats, it’s going to the Machine kids.”
Garrett goes on to explain that every frat and sorority has a representative from The Machine, who meets regularly in fraternity basements, and receive guidance from The Machine on which way to vote re: new members.
A former member of The Machine, Alex Smith, speaks about why she left. “At the end of the day, something felt really dark and ugly about it.” She describes her first meeting with The Machine in a “dingy, smelly fraternity basement.” She says she didn’t realize that she was “going to be a figurehead, that was going to do what my Machine rep told me to do. Everything I did something that she wanted me to do, I always received positive feedback,” she said, adding, “I think it’s ridiculous that sororities want you to send them a screenshot of your voting receipt. Others want the email of your voting receipt. And if you don’t send that in, some sororities fine you.” When she spoke out against the society in article, the sororities snubbed her in punishment. “The Machine is the Greek system,” she concluded.
The University shut down the Student Government Association (SGA) from 1993 to 1996, because The Machine allegedly physically attacked a student with a knife. And, apparently, the FBI even investigated the secret society when a rare, non-Machine SGA president found his phone was being tapped.
John Archibold, journalist and UA alum who reported on The Machine and won a Pulitzer Prize, sums it up nicely when he says, “The Machine systemically made sure that a minority group on the campus of elite people—who got special treatment, who lived in special homes, who came from the most affluent and powerful families—got an advantage over everyone else.”