Commentary: Descent into Teer
(04/07/04 4:00am)
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Friends, I've been on a bit of a serious kick lately. My last four pieces have been a disquisition on religion, a meta-column about the editorial page, a lame attempt at surrealism and an impassioned defense of MLK Day. In short, I've been terribly pretentious, and I apologize. As penance, here is a column about jerking off.
There is no salvation for those outside the [Catholic] Church. I believe it.
You know what I just did? I just went into The Chronicle archives and read, in two sittings, every single column printed this year. No joke. It took me six hours.
So how's your day? Balancing a Great Hall tray in one hand and replacing my DukeCard in my wallet with the other, I sit down at one of the long tables.
You were being watched last weekend. Duke was offering a full 28 events in honor of Martin Luther King, and they were checking attendance at each one. We'd been warned: if we did not show proper "reflection on King's life," Duke was going to take away the holiday for good.
What's good for America is good for George W. Bush.
The following article appeared in the Inverness (Scotland) Daily Record on Aug. 17th:
Alanis Morisette? But she completely fails to grasp the concept of irony!'
Jigglypuff domination! Eat it! David Arthur, rising Duke senior, has been playing Super Smash Brothers on his Nintendo GameCube for five hours. And now, as he nears the end of a climactic battle, Mr. Arthur delivers a decisive uppercut that sends three nasty opponents spiraling off the screen, sealing his victory ('Jigglypuff" is his character of choice, on which more below). "Raaaaaaaa!" bellows Mr. Arthur.
"To become president in this era, you have to go to a bar or a bowling alley or a diner and have people feel you belong there. The question is, can you hang out with them?"
In the usual field of also-rans and status-quo monkeys, one candidate for Duke Student Government president stands out. That man is Matt Gillum: Trinity sophomore, founder of the Duke Miscegenation Club and the only man with the vision to save DSG from the swamp of irrelevance. I sat down with Matt and asked him some tough questions.
Dear Mom,
It all started last Friday night. I was lying in bed with a lady friend; it had been a good night, but there was an insecurity still nagging at me. And so I rolled over, and said, "Where is this relationship going?" She screamed and jumped out of bed. I froze--the next thing I knew, I had a face full of clothes. "Put them on and get out! Who says that? What kind of man are you?"
The Duke campus is an education in the power of place. The grandeur of the Chapel, the tranquility of the gardens, the energy of Cameron Indoor Stadium--places like these seem to be physical manifestations of our most heartfelt emotions. After we've left, I don't think anything will stick with us longer than Duke's geography; even now, I bet most of us have our own special place on campus, some place that symbolizes for each of us what we value highest. For me, that place is the bathroom.
I spoke this week with one Duke student who thinks the key to racial harmony lies in our loins.
It is with increasing interest and anxiety that I have been following the national debate on a war in Iraq. Interest, because the actions we take in the coming months--especially as regards the Bush Doctrine of preemption--will set a course for our foreign policy for decades. Anxiety, because among all the arguments and criticism, an obvious solution is being neglected.
I wonder why we've placed our ultimate value on not giving offense.
By my count, I have been instructed to "Celebrate Diversity!" about 27 times so far at Duke, and by now the phrase is enough to induce a visceral shudder of pain. Not that diversity's a bad thing--it isn't. It's just that it comes it two kinds: the real kind, and the official kind.
If you haven't noticed yet, we have an inferiority complex here at Duke. It's subtle, but you start to see it soon enough. It manifests itself on the highest levels, as in the administration's ongoing social engineering projects (e.g., shackles on the fraternities, a more restrictive curriculum, etc.) to turn us into Harvard. And it's there on the lowest levels, too, in the sheepish giggling of the tour guides when they tell Duke's creation myth about how our university was founded by tobacco barons who first tried to buy Yale and rename it before endowing Trinity College.