Get off my lawn

Greetings and salutations to all of you gents. My name is Wellington Biddle Duke McClendon, but you may call me Grumpy Trustee. And grumpy I am.

Just recently, as I was travelling down to Duke with my 12th and final grandson Herbert so that he could see the school he will one day attend (his incessant crying and vomiting displeased me), I noticed that this little muckraking periodical published a piece about some sort of “house model,” and the effects it will have on the coming semester.

Although I have not been a student here in several score, I have been concerned about the University’s treatment of its students since the unfortunate incident with those pleasant chaps on that distinguished lacrosse team. It left such a bad taste in my mouth that I simply had to donate to my wife’s school for a few years until the whole thing blew over.

And it seems as though the University has yet again failed to act to protect its most vulnerable students: the distinguished brothers of the Greek community. My sources tell me that Central Campus now contains six fraternities and nine sororities. Needless to say, I whipped out my fountain pen and began writing this very column. (If you note any grammatical errors, blame my dear assistant Gertrude: She has done her best to put my words into what she calls “digital form.” Unfortunately, although she possesses the great qualities of her gender—namely fidelity, deference and eagerness—she also is afflicted with the associated inferior intellect of the very same gender.)

My grandnephew Theodore is currently a brother in such a fraternity, and he told me that he is alarmed by his new housing. I agree. Had I known that the continued deferral of Central Campus renovations I approved during my time on the Board of Visitors would affect people of repute beyond the usual rabble we charitably let in each year, I would have simply cut the Women/Homosexuality Center from the budget for Teddy and his pals’ sakes.

Oh, Teddy living on Central Campus? Perish the thought. He’ll just have to use the off-campus house we purchased so that we wouldn’t have to deal with the commoners frequenting the Washington Duke Inn every time we visited. Still, I was shocked at the gall of Mr. Moneta readjusting Duke living around his nouveau-Marxist ideology of equitable housing.

What is equitable about allowing those who donate the least to occupy the best parts of campus? As an ardent supporter of the righteous capitalist system that has put me in this position of excellence, I would like to inform Mr. Moneta that handouts such as these simply lead to nothing but idle behavior from the underclass as well as certain, ahem, demographics. Although I’ve always supported the policies of segregation, and felt that Duke is right in shielding people of different viewpoints from one another, Mr. Moneta has managed to do so in the worst possible way.

There is, of course, a greater issue in this new “vision” of Central Campus: allowing women to live in their own residences on-campus without adequate supervision. In my day, women were only permitted to leave East Campus for Convocation and graduation. I remember not seeing my sister at home during her four years at Duke, and although she may have regretted missing our parents’ funeral after the hell, I still know it was the right thing because she was shielded from the temptation of Durham.