Parents' Weekend: the second Halloween

Quick, hide the booze! Mommy and Daddy are here for the weekend. Marketplace employees, keep the grade-D meat-product in the freezer; we're bringing out the filet mignon tonight. Everyone, remember to say your pleases and your thank yous, your sirs and your ma'ams. And while you're at it, pretend that Duke is the bastion of intellectuality that the benefactors of your education believe it to be.

Parents' and Family Weekend is Duke's belated Halloween; we all dress up as a family-friendly version of what a college is supposed to be. With every campus organization putting on a show this weekend, you will be able to trick your family into believing that there is more to do on the weekend than go to the Fratio or Shooters. This Friday night alone, you and the 'rents can choose from Awaaz, the Duke Jazz Ensemble, the Classical Theatre of Harlem and 'Round Midnight at the Mary Lou Williams Center.

There will be speakers aplenty, classical music from the Duke Symphony Orchestra and the Duke Chorale, improv from DUI and, for all of you weirdos who need your a cappella music fix, the Pitchforks. This weekend's programming is like the slight of hand of a magician, concealing reality. As Malcolm X would say to your mom and dad (although I am not sure if he would want to talk to them), "Ya been took! Ya been hoodwinked! Bamboozled! Led astray! Run amok!" by the fallacy that is Parents' Weekend.

We cannot present the real Duke to Mom and Dad. Frankly, Duke would horrify most parents for one of two reasons, depending on their own college experiences. They would either be disgusted by party culture at Duke-a culture they will have to learn to deal with because it is a reality in all colleges not founded by Jerry Falwell-or they would be dismayed and saddened by Duke students' lack of cultural and political awareness.

Our parents grew up in a time where college students were on the vanguard of progressivism-no, that does not just mean that they experimented with LSD. Back in the day, college students used to represent a social movement. Today, what do we represent? I am not saying that we should imitate our parents and fight the powers that be, like Public Enemy. We do not have the same compelling reasons Mom and Dad had to protest, but that does not excuse our extreme political apathy.

Judging by voter turnout, 18- to 24-year-olds, in general, care less about politics than any other age group, and Duke students seem particularly indifferent. Perhaps it is because we are simply too smart, too beautiful and too rich to concern ourselves with such things. Perhaps it is because our campus is in the middle of a forest that is itself in the middle of the cultural wasteland that is Durham, North Carolina. Alas, I suppose our political apathy will always remain a mystery.

In addition to Duke's political (in)activity, Duke-as far as colleges go-is a cultural abyss. Well, maybe "abyss" is a little too strong of a word, but for a place that is supposed to be a cathedral built in the name of expanding the intellectual horizons of young people, we are pretty limited in our cultural pursuits. Duke built the Nasher Museum of Art to counter these limitations, but unfortunately, the University forgot to fill the building with art, both in terms of quantity and quality-not that Duke students noticed.

Even when Duke hosts an interesting speaker, often the audience is either empty-as was the case with John Amaechi-or full of faculty-as was the case with Paul Rusesabagina. No wonder Duke can only get the man that you all know as Joe the Policeman from the "What's Going Down" episode of "That's My Mama"-for those who aren't avid "Coming to America" fans, that is to say, someone utterly unworthy of delivering the commencement address at one of the United States' finest academic institutions-to speak to our graduating seniors and their families.