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(03/22/19 7:04pm)
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are in possession of divided attention spans, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain predictable tendencies, that among these are excitement, arousal, and reaction– and to secure the control of these passions, the author must direct them with great purpose and careful calculation, so as to properly court the consent and readership of the content consumers– (Becker’s Declaration of Sentiments, 2019.)
(03/04/19 5:05pm)
Dear Mr. Williamson,
(02/19/19 7:44pm)
A common value defines the Duke experience. It pops up on path signs around Cameron and Wallace Wade Stadiums. Proudly and prominently, it marquees on basically every item of Duke promotional material and across Duke’s expansive web presence. In the many notifications from President Price and the occupants of the Allen building, the administration often reaffirms its commitment to this value: diversity.
(01/31/19 5:00am)
I disagreed with quite a bit of the content of my fellow columnist Lizzie Bond’s latest column, but I want to focus on one point in particular: her assertion that “Duke students who arrive [at Duke]… discover that an on-campus residential community is a luxury, not a right.” Let’s slow down and consider whether or not human beings inherently have a right to community, both because this question is important in and of itself, but also because our answer to this question has serious implications for how we ought to structure the future of housing at Duke.
(01/14/19 5:00am)
For most Duke students, Thanksgiving was a much needed break from academic demands, internship applications, and general responsibilities that define our lives on campus. But apparently there is no rest for the wicked. On November 23rd, the day after Thanksgiving, the Chronicle reported that posters from a group called “Identity Evropa” appeared on Duke’s campus. Part of the broader alt-right movement, Identity Evropa is one among many organizations who hope to apply lipstick to the pig of white nationalism. Calling themselves “identitarians,” members of the group aim to infiltrate college Republican organizations in order to inject white supremacist ideas into the mainstream. Sadly, this is not the first instance of hateful people announcing their presence at Duke. Less than a week before the Identity Evropa incident, a swastika was painted over a mural devoted to victims of the Pittsburgh Synagogue shooting. That too was but the most recent incident in a spate of anti-Semitic attacks that have repeatedly marred Duke’s campus. In response to these hateful events, various student groups, from The Chronicle's independent Editorial Board to DSG to the Graduate and Professional Student Council to the People’s State of the University, have all called on the Duke administration to implement a “robust hate and bias policy.” As someone of Jewish heritage, these acts on campus pain me and I empathize with the good intentions of those proposing the hate speech policy. But even though I understand how they feel, I still don’t think censorship is the answer.
(11/26/18 5:00am)
If you listen to some Duke students, you would think the relationship between Duke and Durham is fraught at best, outright exploitative at worst. In the pages of the Chronicle one columnist blasts Duke for cancelling its funding of the underutilized Bull City Connector bus line, an act which the columnist claimed “inherently said something about [the bus’] passengers and their worth.” Presumably, Duke thinks Durham residents are worth very little. In a column lambasting President Price and Duke’s decision to change the work shift system for its Durhamite workers, another columnist teeters toward accusing Duke of perpetuating slavery. Somehow, an administrator justifying said decision by saying it was made considering the best use of “staffing and housekeeping resources” prompted the columnist to ask “When else in the history of America have people of color been called “resources?” If the columnist is right that referring to workers as resources necessarily implies slavery, then every Human Resources department of every business in the country is now an official remnant of American slavery. The columnist is probably not right.
(10/24/18 4:00am)
She has lived in Los Angeles my entire childhood. She works for a real estate firm just a block away from Rodeo Drive. Like many Californians, she gets her raw almonds and self-satisfaction at Whole Foods. If she’s feeling indulgent, she’ll take her Audi sedan through the In-N-Out drive through. She lives like a Californian, she walks like a Californian, but she certainly doesn’t talk like a Californian. For good reason too, because Sarah Blanchard isn’t a Californian—she’s a Texan. And maybe it's that Texas spunk, but my Aunt Sarah actively defies many aspects of California culture and, especially, its politics. When together, Sarah and I love to discuss California’s “kooks, nuts and freaks.”
(09/28/18 4:00am)
Although the debate over gun control flares after each school shooting or spike in crime, it is genuinely difficult to pin down the start of this societal conflict. Some might argue that it began long before living memory, in December of 1791 when the Second Amendment was ratified by the states and added to the nation’s Constitution. Maybe the rift began in the Depression era, when public outcry at the crimes of gangsters like Al Capone and John Dillinger empowered President Franklin Roosevelt to launch a “New Deal for Crime” and to pass the National Firearms Act of 1934—the first federal gun control law in American history. Or, if you favor a more modern outlook, then the debate began with Senator Biden and President Clinton who, respectively, were the author and enacter of the 1994 assault weapons ban. While the origins of the gun control debate might be best left to the historians, I am more interested in the premises of the entire debate regardless of when it started.
(09/11/18 4:00am)
On May 16th, 1936, writer E.B. White trumpeted his love for the Ford Model T. Writing in the pages of The New Yorker magazine, White lavished the car with praise describing it as “the miracle God had wrought” and “mechanically uncanny… like nothing that had ever come to the world before.” To White, the Model T was remarkable for far more than its practical use. In White’s eyes, Henry Ford’s iconic car had moral significance-- it was “hard-working, commonplace, and heroic” and “seemed to transmit those qualities to the persons who rode in it.”
(08/28/18 4:00am)
Because of their significant resources, influential alumni and academic authority, elite universities play an outsized role in influencing public discourse. Reflecting the importance of elite colleges in our culture, the general public lavishes them with praise, attention and, occasionally, anger. Primarily, the focus is on the actions and attitudes of the young adults who attend these institutions. This preoccupation not only calls our national priorities into question, but is also absurd. What other demographic in modern America is nitpicked like college students? To date, I have not read an article about the dangerous ideas of McDonald’s employees. Obsession with higher education and its students stems from a powerful belief—a belief so powerful that it calls into question whether or not colleges are “secular” institutions.
(04/18/18 4:05pm)
This past week marks the anniversary of a seminal moment in the history of Duke University: the Silent Vigil on West Campus. On April 4, 1968, Duke students of various creeds and colors assembled in order to both commemorate the recently murdered Dr. Martin Luther King and, in honor of his legacy, to spur change at Duke. For several days, students assembled in front of Duke Chapel and silently protested. Their silence spoke volumes and their actions highlighted and helped change the discriminatory policies of the Duke administration.
