Mengchao Yu '03
It was "Hawks and Doves," not "Hawks, and Doves Go Bugger Off"!!
And why not have a party with a world affairs-related theme? Would that really be second-rate to "DJ, Kegs" for a party at an Ivy League school?
>Date: 29 Mar 2003 12:27:01 EST
>From: Mengchao Yu
>Reply-To: Mindy Yu
>Subject: Re: Change of Plans
>To: (Recipient list suppressed)
To the brothers of Sigma Nu:
While the original party invite for the "Hawks and Doves" was in extremely poor taste, I am more disappointed and angry over the fact that Sig Nu has not chosen to publicly apologize and acknowledge the ramifications of their original theme. Your email was sent to a significant cross section of Dartmouth students, many of whom may be directly or indirectly impacted by the war. Sigma Nu as an organization has shown itself to be a pathetic coward by sliding the issue under the rug as a "change of plans." Your organization's inability to publicly acknowledge the real issue at hand simply shows that Sig Nu caved to undoubtedly much negative reaction to the original theme but does not actually care to address the main reason behind the change of theme in an HONEST MANNER. I am appalled at how Sig Nu insists on acting as if absolutely NOTHING happened and will continue to party tonight as if nothing has happened.
Congratulations on being the epitome of the "bubble" that characterizes Dartmouth in general. Sure, people should totally go on w/ their daily lives and socialize at this time, if only to forget and get away from the reality outside of Hanover. But ONLY on this campus would serious and tragic world events be turned into a cause for drunkenness and pong. Oh yes, more American GIs and Iraqis are dead! Let's drink some more! And more importantly, only on this campus would such an egregious error be swept under the rug as a dismissive and seemingly innocuous "change of plans." That is the truly offensive act.
Mindy Yu '03
Saturday, March 29, 2003
Friday, March 28, 2003
Policy Review Paradise
The more Reviewers, the better.
In the April/May issue of Policy Review, former Review Editor Ben Wallace-Wells '00 reviews The Vanishing Voter: Public Involvement in an Age of Uncertainty by Thomas E. Patterson.
In the April/May issue of Policy Review, former Review Editor Ben Wallace-Wells '00 reviews The Vanishing Voter: Public Involvement in an Age of Uncertainty by Thomas E. Patterson.
Kareem at Columbia?
The debate about world-class research professors versus liberal arts teachers is one thing.
But world-class coaches is quite another. This is indisbutably cool.
The NBA's all-time leading scorer, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, interviewed with Columbia officials last week about the head coaching vacancy on their men's basketball team.
But world-class coaches is quite another. This is indisbutably cool.
The NBA's all-time leading scorer, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, interviewed with Columbia officials last week about the head coaching vacancy on their men's basketball team.
Wednesday, March 26, 2003
Re: DDS in the D
I rather liked the article. It's just not front-page news. Even college dailies are very magazine-ish these days.
Ghandi and Thomas Mann can't be wrong
Is there a Vigil for Freedom going on elsewhere?
Also, note the word "untruth" in the Ghandi quote. Untruth??????
>Date: 26 Mar 2003 12:06:15 EST
>From: Why War
>Subject: Vigil for Peace
>To: Recipient List NOT Suppressed, notes Talcott
A VIGIL FOR PEACE will be taking place tomorrow, Wednesday the 26th, @ 7 PM on the Green.
A COMMUNITY FORUM will follow the Vigil and will begin @ 7:30 in 105 Dartmouth Hall. Students and faculty will be speaking out for peace.
Come join us in expressing sorrow for the deaths of soldiers and civilians in Iraq. Let us unite in solidarity in our desire for peace.
"Permanent good can never be the outcome of untruth and violence." - Ghandi
"War is only a cowardly escape from the problems of peace." - Thomas Mann
~~Why War
Also, note the word "untruth" in the Ghandi quote. Untruth??????
>Date: 26 Mar 2003 12:06:15 EST
>From: Why War
>Subject: Vigil for Peace
>To: Recipient List NOT Suppressed, notes Talcott
A VIGIL FOR PEACE will be taking place tomorrow, Wednesday the 26th, @ 7 PM on the Green.
A COMMUNITY FORUM will follow the Vigil and will begin @ 7:30 in 105 Dartmouth Hall. Students and faculty will be speaking out for peace.
Come join us in expressing sorrow for the deaths of soldiers and civilians in Iraq. Let us unite in solidarity in our desire for peace.
"Permanent good can never be the outcome of untruth and violence." - Ghandi
"War is only a cowardly escape from the problems of peace." - Thomas Mann
~~Why War
The Daily Dartmouth: Adventures in Navel-Gazing
I understand why The D feels the need to make the news relevant to Dartmouth -- but aren't these lines from the news page just a little inane?
"Civilians rise up in Basra -- [Professor] Edsforth warns against hopes of a warm welcome for troops"
"Come nature or terror, DDS stands prepared"
"After two terms of debate, teach-ins, rallies and protests by Dartmouth students, the Bush administration issued its final ultimatum and began its military campaign in Iraq while Hanover was vacant and students were at home sleeping off their Winter term exhaustion."
Harvard's H2O
H2O is a unique type of discussion software created at Harvard and recently opened to the public. Group conversations are organized around something called the Rotisserie, described thusly:
The site is set up now to allow anyone to create and join a discussion (called a 'project'). Projects may be setup by their creators to be open or invitation-only. Any profs who've been driven away by the CS-feel of other discussion software may wish to give H2O a try.
The Rotisserie implements an innovative approach to online discussion that encourages measured, thoughtful discourse in a way that that traditional threaded messaging systems do not. The basic concept of the threaded messaging board is to enable broadcast-to-broadcast communication among a group of people, meaning that every participant in the conversation receives every post from every other participant. This mode of discussion inevitably leads to the domination of the discussion by a few very verbal participants and silence by the lurking majority. The Rotisserie breaks this mode by assigning every post within the conversation to another, specific participant for response. The resulting conversation guarantees that every post will be responded to by at least one other participant and that every participant must respond directly to the post of another participant.Unsurprisingly, this structure seems especially well-geared to class discussions (more so than, say, any of Blackboard's interactive features) and group projects.
The site is set up now to allow anyone to create and join a discussion (called a 'project'). Projects may be setup by their creators to be open or invitation-only. Any profs who've been driven away by the CS-feel of other discussion software may wish to give H2O a try.
Tuesday, March 25, 2003
Rather funny
>Date: Tue, 25 Mar 2003 20:26:53 -0500
>From: "Oh Shit!"
>Reply-To: oh.shit@dartmouth.edu
>To: oh.shit@dartmouth.edu
>Subject: Resolution 1441
Oh Shit!
******************
The deadline to comply with U.N. Resolution 1441 has passed. Any
Dartmouth students who happen to be dictators of
applicable Third World countries should be advised that their country
will be plunged into a roiling vortex of aerial bombing,
land war, and occupation, but that all that will also be accompanied by
a soft, palate-cleansing sorbet of humanitarian aid.
A coalition of the world's foremost military powers -- including the
United States, United Kingdom, Australia, Spain, Poland,
Bulgaria, Latvia, Iceland and Eritrea -- will be removing dictators from
power by force or, if necessary, by even more force.
In other news:
**Residents of French Hall are advised that their dormitory has been
renamed Freedom Hall.
**A prolonged international search fueled by the bloodlust of millions
has failed to bring a renowned international fugitive to
justice. Analysis of tapes recently released to the international media
have led experts to conclude that Salman Rushdie is still
alive, and indeed recording new Audiobook editions of his Satanic
Verses.
**With the Afghanistan reconstruction budget dwarfed by the Iraq war in
the latest Congressional budget proposal, angry
members of the infant Afghan government have placed their financially
shafted country on eBay.
**UPDATE: Residents of Freedom Hall are advised that their dormitory has
been renamed You'd All Be Licking Nazi
Boots If It Weren't For Us, You Commercially-Invested-In-Iraq,
Anti-Semitic Effete Bastards Hall.
**In recognition of the international turmoil, ORL has cancelled room
draw and dealt with room assignments for next year by
simply placing everybody on the waitlist. Dean Martin Redman reminds
students bewildered by this decision that Dartmouth
studetns are still young children, and when they grow up, they'll
understand how big important adults make decisions.
**The world is a scary, terrifying place.
******************
The Oh Shit! is a service brought to you by the Dartmouth
Jack-O-Lantern. Anybody who wishes to be remove from this blitz
list should take care of that, I guess, although we're not going to do
it for you, you lazy slob.
>From: "Oh Shit!"
>Reply-To: oh.shit@dartmouth.edu
>To: oh.shit@dartmouth.edu
>Subject: Resolution 1441
Oh Shit!
******************
The deadline to comply with U.N. Resolution 1441 has passed. Any
Dartmouth students who happen to be dictators of
applicable Third World countries should be advised that their country
will be plunged into a roiling vortex of aerial bombing,
land war, and occupation, but that all that will also be accompanied by
a soft, palate-cleansing sorbet of humanitarian aid.
A coalition of the world's foremost military powers -- including the
United States, United Kingdom, Australia, Spain, Poland,
Bulgaria, Latvia, Iceland and Eritrea -- will be removing dictators from
power by force or, if necessary, by even more force.
In other news:
**Residents of French Hall are advised that their dormitory has been
renamed Freedom Hall.
**A prolonged international search fueled by the bloodlust of millions
has failed to bring a renowned international fugitive to
justice. Analysis of tapes recently released to the international media
have led experts to conclude that Salman Rushdie is still
alive, and indeed recording new Audiobook editions of his Satanic
Verses.
**With the Afghanistan reconstruction budget dwarfed by the Iraq war in
the latest Congressional budget proposal, angry
members of the infant Afghan government have placed their financially
shafted country on eBay.
**UPDATE: Residents of Freedom Hall are advised that their dormitory has
been renamed You'd All Be Licking Nazi
Boots If It Weren't For Us, You Commercially-Invested-In-Iraq,
Anti-Semitic Effete Bastards Hall.
**In recognition of the international turmoil, ORL has cancelled room
draw and dealt with room assignments for next year by
simply placing everybody on the waitlist. Dean Martin Redman reminds
students bewildered by this decision that Dartmouth
studetns are still young children, and when they grow up, they'll
understand how big important adults make decisions.
**The world is a scary, terrifying place.
******************
The Oh Shit! is a service brought to you by the Dartmouth
Jack-O-Lantern. Anybody who wishes to be remove from this blitz
list should take care of that, I guess, although we're not going to do
it for you, you lazy slob.
An anniversary
Dartlog.net celebrates its one-year anniversary today! Dartlog was, so far as I know, the first Dartmouth-centric weblog on the 'Net.
Thanks to everyone who has contributed, and keep it up. Things have been a bit light for the past couple weeks (with the exception of Mr. Flickenger, who's on the ball, sports-wise), but there is, after all, a war on.
This is also the one-year anniversary, give or take a week, of the new Dartmouth Review website. The plan, a year ago, was to automate the whole site, which we did, and then to replace its design with something less ugly, which we did not do. Until now. Dartreview.com gets a new look today, based on the style that's been in use on Dartlog since the new year. It loads a lot faster (75% faster, by my measurements, for the home page), looks a lot better in standards-compliant browsers, and should be a bit less buggy. For those who care (probably no one), the new site is completely valid XHTML 1.0 styled with CSS2.
For those who care (probably no one), this is the kind of thing that gets done only when one is procrastinating from writing a paper due at 10 the next morning (on public sector cash management)...
Ne cede malis!
Thanks to everyone who has contributed, and keep it up. Things have been a bit light for the past couple weeks (with the exception of Mr. Flickenger, who's on the ball, sports-wise), but there is, after all, a war on.
This is also the one-year anniversary, give or take a week, of the new Dartmouth Review website. The plan, a year ago, was to automate the whole site, which we did, and then to replace its design with something less ugly, which we did not do. Until now. Dartreview.com gets a new look today, based on the style that's been in use on Dartlog since the new year. It loads a lot faster (75% faster, by my measurements, for the home page), looks a lot better in standards-compliant browsers, and should be a bit less buggy. For those who care (probably no one), the new site is completely valid XHTML 1.0 styled with CSS2.
For those who care (probably no one), this is the kind of thing that gets done only when one is procrastinating from writing a paper due at 10 the next morning (on public sector cash management)...
Ne cede malis!
Monday, March 24, 2003
Hockey seasons come to an end in Albany; Duluth
Both hockey teams finished their seasons this past weekend, and ended up with their best finishes in recent years. The women's team made it to the Women's NCAA Frozen Four, where they fell to eventual champions Minnesota-Duluth 5-2 before winning the 3rd place game against Minnesota 4-2. Harvard was the fourth team in the tournament and finished 2nd, losing 4-3 to UMD in double overtime in the final.
The men's team wound up its season in Albany, NY, where they headed into the ECAC semifinals needing to win it all to advance to the NCAA tournament. Unfortunatly they started slow and couldn't recover in time. They fell behind 2-0 to Harvard after one period of play, and it looked to be out of control as they went into the 2nd break down 4-1 and with starting goaltender Nick Boucher pulled in favor of sophomore Dan Yacey. Dartmouth staged a furious comeback late in the game, however, when Hugh Jessiman knocked in a rebound with a little over seven minutes remaining to make it 4-2 and then senior Mike Murray was pulled down on a breakaway and awarded a penalty shot by referee Scott Hansen only three minutes later. Murray deked Harvard netminder Dov Grumet-Morris and scored on a backhand shot to make it 4-3, but that was as close as Dartmouth would make it. Harvard added an empty netter with five seconds remaining to make it a 5-3 final. The other highlight of the night was when the 6' 5" Jessiman checked a Harvard player through the glass, knocking the pane into the camera man and providing some classic replays for the crowd to enjoy.
In the sparsely attended consolation game, Dartmouth took out Brown 4-2 in a game that was actually very well played considering how little everyone cared about it. Dan Yacey got the start and earned his first career win. Senior captain Kent Gillings got two goals, including the eventual game winner on a beautiful slap shot from the right point that snuck in just under the crossbar. Senior Pete Summerfelt also notched his 28th assist of the season, tying the team record for most assists in a season by a defenseman.
The win gave Dartmouth a final record of 20-13-1, the first time since the 1947-48 season that Dartmouth reached the 20 wins plateau. By finishing third in the ECAC in both the regular season and tournament, it also marked the best finish by a Dartmouth team since 1980, when the team last made it to the NCAA tournament. This was also the first time since 1974 the team has finished with three winning seasons in a row.
BTW, if any of you get a chance to go to this event in the coming years, I highly encourage it. A fun time was had by all, even given the loss to Hahvahd.
------------------
2003 NCAA Women's Frozen Four:
#4 Dartmouth vs #1 UMD (Semifinal): Recap : Box Score
#4 Dartmouth vs #3 Minnesota (Consolation): Recap : Box Score
2003 Men's ECAC Championship:
#3 Dartmouth vs #2 Harvard (Semifinal): Recap : Box Score
#3 Dartmouth vs. #5 Brown (Consolation): Recap : Box Score
ECAC Tournament Central
The New Digs A change of venue benefits the ECAC.
Hugh-ge Freshmen Dartmouth's cupboard isn't bare.
The men's team wound up its season in Albany, NY, where they headed into the ECAC semifinals needing to win it all to advance to the NCAA tournament. Unfortunatly they started slow and couldn't recover in time. They fell behind 2-0 to Harvard after one period of play, and it looked to be out of control as they went into the 2nd break down 4-1 and with starting goaltender Nick Boucher pulled in favor of sophomore Dan Yacey. Dartmouth staged a furious comeback late in the game, however, when Hugh Jessiman knocked in a rebound with a little over seven minutes remaining to make it 4-2 and then senior Mike Murray was pulled down on a breakaway and awarded a penalty shot by referee Scott Hansen only three minutes later. Murray deked Harvard netminder Dov Grumet-Morris and scored on a backhand shot to make it 4-3, but that was as close as Dartmouth would make it. Harvard added an empty netter with five seconds remaining to make it a 5-3 final. The other highlight of the night was when the 6' 5" Jessiman checked a Harvard player through the glass, knocking the pane into the camera man and providing some classic replays for the crowd to enjoy.
In the sparsely attended consolation game, Dartmouth took out Brown 4-2 in a game that was actually very well played considering how little everyone cared about it. Dan Yacey got the start and earned his first career win. Senior captain Kent Gillings got two goals, including the eventual game winner on a beautiful slap shot from the right point that snuck in just under the crossbar. Senior Pete Summerfelt also notched his 28th assist of the season, tying the team record for most assists in a season by a defenseman.
The win gave Dartmouth a final record of 20-13-1, the first time since the 1947-48 season that Dartmouth reached the 20 wins plateau. By finishing third in the ECAC in both the regular season and tournament, it also marked the best finish by a Dartmouth team since 1980, when the team last made it to the NCAA tournament. This was also the first time since 1974 the team has finished with three winning seasons in a row.
BTW, if any of you get a chance to go to this event in the coming years, I highly encourage it. A fun time was had by all, even given the loss to Hahvahd.
------------------
2003 NCAA Women's Frozen Four:
#4 Dartmouth vs #1 UMD (Semifinal): Recap : Box Score
#4 Dartmouth vs #3 Minnesota (Consolation): Recap : Box Score
2003 Men's ECAC Championship:
#3 Dartmouth vs #2 Harvard (Semifinal): Recap : Box Score
#3 Dartmouth vs. #5 Brown (Consolation): Recap : Box Score
ECAC Tournament Central
The New Digs A change of venue benefits the ECAC.
Hugh-ge Freshmen Dartmouth's cupboard isn't bare.
Friday, March 21, 2003
Amazing Hypocrisy
The University of Houston has an extraordinarily miserly approach to free speech (scroll down the page to find the part on this university). Administrators there had refused to allow Cougars Pro-Life, a student group, to erect a pro-life display on the campus's central plaza because it was outside of the "free speech zone" (i.e., the censorship zone). Cougars Pro-Life have fought, with success, in the courts, but the University is fighting back. (One administrator even testified that he would deny permission to a person holding a small sign saying, "the world is a beautiful place.")
Well, it seems that, at the University of Houston, they believe in the principle of "free speech for me, but not for thee." The University okayed a gay rights rally outside of the "approved" areas. Their justification? The rally was a "university-sponsored event," whereas the Cougars Pro-Life display was a "student-sponsored event."
Can you believe it?
Well, it seems that, at the University of Houston, they believe in the principle of "free speech for me, but not for thee." The University okayed a gay rights rally outside of the "approved" areas. Their justification? The rally was a "university-sponsored event," whereas the Cougars Pro-Life display was a "student-sponsored event."
Can you believe it?
Sunday, March 16, 2003
Women win ECAC tourney, Men advance to Semis
The #4 ranked Dartmouth women's hockey team got revenge for two previous losses this season to top-ranked Harvard by blowing them out 7-2 to win the ECAC Tournament and advance to the Women's Frozen Four in Duluth, Minnesota.
Meanwhile, the men fell behind 2-1 after only two minutes of play, but Nick Boucher would shut down Colgate the rest of the way and Dartmouth would tack on 4 more goals to win the game 5-2 and the quarterfinal series two games to one. Dartmouth advances to the ECAC semifinals in Albany, NY next Friday, where they will take on 2nd seeded Harvard. In the other semifinal, top-seeded and #2 Cornell will face 5th seeded Brown, who upset Yale two games to one in New Haven. This will be the first time in ECAC history all four semi-finalists are Ivies.
After relying solely on the top line for all the scoring during the first two games of the series, it was a balanced attack tonight that worked for the Green. Each line tallied a goal before Lee Stempniak got an empty netter for his 4th goal and 8th point (4-4-8) on the weekend.
---------
Women's:
ECAC Championship
#4 Dartmouth 7 vs #1 Harvard 2 @ Providence, RI.
Box Score
Men's:
ECAC Quarterfinal Game Three
Colgate 2 @ Dartmouth 5 (Thompson Arena, Hanover, NH)
Box Score
ECAC Tournament Central
Meanwhile, the men fell behind 2-1 after only two minutes of play, but Nick Boucher would shut down Colgate the rest of the way and Dartmouth would tack on 4 more goals to win the game 5-2 and the quarterfinal series two games to one. Dartmouth advances to the ECAC semifinals in Albany, NY next Friday, where they will take on 2nd seeded Harvard. In the other semifinal, top-seeded and #2 Cornell will face 5th seeded Brown, who upset Yale two games to one in New Haven. This will be the first time in ECAC history all four semi-finalists are Ivies.
After relying solely on the top line for all the scoring during the first two games of the series, it was a balanced attack tonight that worked for the Green. Each line tallied a goal before Lee Stempniak got an empty netter for his 4th goal and 8th point (4-4-8) on the weekend.
---------
Women's:
ECAC Championship
#4 Dartmouth 7 vs #1 Harvard 2 @ Providence, RI.
Box Score
Men's:
ECAC Quarterfinal Game Three
Colgate 2 @ Dartmouth 5 (Thompson Arena, Hanover, NH)
Box Score
ECAC Tournament Central
Saturday, March 15, 2003
Dartmouth takes game 2 behind Stempniak's hat trick
Staring the end of their season squarely in the face after losing in quadruple overtime last night, Dartmouth came back to defeat the (formerly Red) Raiders 3-1 tonight behind the heroics of Lee Stempniak. Stempniak netted all three goals for Dartmouth, including two in the deciding third period to lift the Green to victory and force game 3 tomorrow night. If Dartmouth wins, they will advance to Albany to face the 2nd seeded Crimson from Harvard in the ECAC semifinals. A loss will end their season.
Dartmouth outshot Colgate 34-10 through two periods, but were only able to capitalize on one of them, and headed into the third period tied at one. They outshot Colgate 44-20 for the game. Pete Summerfelt assisted on all three goals, and Mike Ouellette added a pair of assists as well.
Dartmouth's top line of Stempniak, Ouellette, and Hugh Jessiman has taken part in every goal this series. Stempniak has 3 goals and 3 assists, Jessiman has 2 goals, and Ouellette has 4 assists. Top D-Men Trevor Byrne and Summerfelt have the only other points, as Byrne got the other goal and Summerfelt added his 3 assists tonight. Nick Boucher had 19 stops in net to earn the victory, a night after setting the Dartmouth record for most saves in one game with 66 (on 70 shots).
-------------
Game 1 - Colgate 4 @ Dartmouth 3 (4OT) (Thompson Arena - Hanover, NH):
Box Score
Longest NCAA Games
Game 2 - Colgate 1 @ Dartmouth 3 (Thompson Arena - Hanover, NH)
Box Score
Dartmouth outshot Colgate 34-10 through two periods, but were only able to capitalize on one of them, and headed into the third period tied at one. They outshot Colgate 44-20 for the game. Pete Summerfelt assisted on all three goals, and Mike Ouellette added a pair of assists as well.
Dartmouth's top line of Stempniak, Ouellette, and Hugh Jessiman has taken part in every goal this series. Stempniak has 3 goals and 3 assists, Jessiman has 2 goals, and Ouellette has 4 assists. Top D-Men Trevor Byrne and Summerfelt have the only other points, as Byrne got the other goal and Summerfelt added his 3 assists tonight. Nick Boucher had 19 stops in net to earn the victory, a night after setting the Dartmouth record for most saves in one game with 66 (on 70 shots).
-------------
Game 1 - Colgate 4 @ Dartmouth 3 (4OT) (Thompson Arena - Hanover, NH):
Box Score
Longest NCAA Games
Game 2 - Colgate 1 @ Dartmouth 3 (Thompson Arena - Hanover, NH)
Box Score
Friday, March 14, 2003
Dartmouth loses 4-3 in 4OT to Colgate
In a game neither team deserved to lose, Dartmouth gave up a goal 1:05 into the 4th overtime to fall to Colgate 4-3 in the best-of-3 series. Total time of the game was 121:05, the third longest in NCAA history, and easily eclipsing last year's 2OT game vs. Colgate as the longest in Dartmouth history.
Dartmouth held one-goal leads thrice, and let Colgate come back to tie each time. Hugh Jessiman got two goals, Lee Stempniak had three assists, and Mike Ouellette had two assists but it wasn't enough.
Game two is tomorrow night at 7 PM at Thompson. Dartmouth needs to win to keep its season alive. Game 3 will be Sunday at 7 if necessary.
Dartmouth held one-goal leads thrice, and let Colgate come back to tie each time. Hugh Jessiman got two goals, Lee Stempniak had three assists, and Mike Ouellette had two assists but it wasn't enough.
Game two is tomorrow night at 7 PM at Thompson. Dartmouth needs to win to keep its season alive. Game 3 will be Sunday at 7 if necessary.
FIRE on O'Reilly
This is just a quick announcement to let you know that FIRE's Thor L. Halvorssen will be a guest on The O'Reilly Factor this evening. The show airs at 8pm EST and again at 11pm EST. Thor will be discussing FIRE's recent -- and widely publicized -- victory at Citrus College, where (among other outrages) a professor forced her students to write anti-war letters to President Bush. Tune in!
Thursday, March 13, 2003
Re: Nader Thief...
In re: your question ("Anyway, Emmett, how did FIRE managed [sic] to drop the ball on this one"), please see Clark's post, immediately below this one.
Re: Nader Thief...
The funny thing (or not so funny) is that this isn't news! Read the article; they've been doing it for years. One Canadian I know (who's a socialist mind; great guy for a beer if any of you pass through Yemen) said that those fees are mandatory at some Canadian universities. I haven't been able to check. Anyway, Emmett, how did FIRE managed to drop the ball on this one?
Emmett
The Review covered the PIRG issue a couple years back. The plantiff in the case mentioned in the article eventually lost at the Supreme Court.
Ralph Nader Is a Thief
Ralph Nader's PIRGs have been siphoning off a portion of student fees from college students. This is as though part of your funds were to go to the ACLU or the RNC. Amazing!
Plus, there's a surprise plug for FIRE's Guides to Student Rights on Campus. So that makes me happy.
Plus, there's a surprise plug for FIRE's Guides to Student Rights on Campus. So that makes me happy.
Wednesday, March 12, 2003
New Guides to Liberty
Yesterday, at a press conference in DC, FIRE celebrated the launch of the FIRE Guides to Student Rights on Campus. In attendance were luminaries from our Board of Advisors for the Guides series, ranging from former Attorney General Ed Meese to ACLU President Nadine Strossen. The five Guides -- three of which have already been published -- will instruct students on their rights, so they can stand up and defend them. As our president, Alan Charles Kors, is fond of saying, "a nation that does not educate in liberty will not long survive in liberty -- and will not even know when it has lost it."
The Guides are:
FIRE's Guide to Religious Liberty on Campus
FIRE's Guide to Student Fees, Funding, and Legal Equality on Campus
FIRE's Guide to Due Process and Fair Procedure on Campus
FIRE's Guide to Free Speech on Campus [forthcoming]
FIRE's Guide to First-Year Orientation and Thought Reform on Campus [forthcoming]
Students can download the Guides, in pdf format, at www.thefireguides.org.
The Guides are:
Students can download the Guides, in pdf format, at www.thefireguides.org.
Same question...
...was asked by me a few weeks ago with no response. I'll offer it again with Emmett.
Trustee Election
So does anyone have any info on these people? I just got the candidate package in the mail. I'm leaning towards this John Donahoe fellow, but Elyse Benson Allan plays up the whole "liberal arts college" thing. That's encouraging. Any thoughts, anyone?
Tuesday, March 11, 2003
Monday, March 10, 2003
Making Dartmouth Proud
Robert Reich '68: Rhodes Scholar, Labor Secretary, Candidate for Democratic nomination for Governor of Massachusetts, nude model
Our own Steven Menashi
He has the Hoover Institution policy brief thing in the March 24 National Review.
It's on--what else--academic freedom.
Check it out.
Also, the Review gets several mentions in yet another piece on D'Souza's Letters to a Young Conservative later in the issue.
It's on--what else--academic freedom.
Check it out.
Also, the Review gets several mentions in yet another piece on D'Souza's Letters to a Young Conservative later in the issue.
"[I]f I didn't know..."
But we'd agree that part of the problem is that faculty won't admit that they really don't know how students spend their time outside of the classroom.
Those faculty resolutions to end the Greek system are so very dishonest.
And students don't feel like being honest because with all the performance reports and action plans, students are tired. Reports are what we do for class, not for administrators interested in our social lives. Playing a pick-up game of basketball with friends should be playing a pick-up game of basketball of friends, not a "non-alcoholic programming event" or "informal engagement."
Those faculty resolutions to end the Greek system are so very dishonest.
And students don't feel like being honest because with all the performance reports and action plans, students are tired. Reports are what we do for class, not for administrators interested in our social lives. Playing a pick-up game of basketball with friends should be playing a pick-up game of basketball of friends, not a "non-alcoholic programming event" or "informal engagement."
Sunday, March 09, 2003
Re: This is long...
After reading that, if I didn't know that frats are much different now (even from Chris Miller's account from 1989), I'd think twice about defending frats as stenuously as I do.
This is long...
but somehow, I'd never seen this until today.
_______________________________________
Chris Miller's Animal House
Copyright 1989 Information Access Company, a Thomson Corporation Company
Copyright 1989 Playboy
Playboy October, 1989
SECTION: Vol. 36 ; No. 10 ; Pg. 104; ISSN: 0032-1478
HEADLINE: Return to Animal House; writer of film revisits his old fraternity
house
BYLINE: Miller, Chris
BODY: The man who wrote the movie revisits the scene of the crime-and finds he
can still boot with the best of them.
Playboy, October, 1989
IT's MAGIC MONDAY at the Alpha Delta house and the brothers have been drinking
since SiX A.M. They have worked their
way through Sunrise-Service Hour (tequila sunrises), Cartoon Hour (Kool-Aid
punch) and Lonely-Guy Hour (Thunderbird and
Mad Dog, straight from the bottle). Now it's ten o'clock, and that means it's .
. . Naked-inthe-Tube-Room Hour!
Seventy naked guys cram into the TV room, which is about as large as a small
one-car garage. Beers are distributed by dick
size-those with big ones get king cans of Bud; those with small cocks drink
from shot glasses. The worst, most repellent,
vile and disgusting porno tape available is popped into the VCR. The brother
keep checking one another out-anyone who gets a
hard-on faces rigorous punishment. No one's quite sure what !he punishment
might be, since in the history of Magic Monday,
no one has yet gotten a hard-on during Naked-inthe-Tube-Room Hour, but they
keep checking anyway, just in case.
There's a knock on the door. It's the delivery guy from the pizza place-he
steps inside and freezes. Good Lord, what has he
walked in on here-a bunch of preverts or something? Oddly enough, despite the
large number of guys present, no one has the
money to pay for the pizza-because no one has any pockets. On the screen, the
cast is urinating on one another, sodomizing
dead animals, all sorts of neat stuff. "If you could wait till the end of this
sequence," says the guy who made the order, "I'll
run upstairs and get some money"
The pizza guy looks around, swallows and says, "Never mind. This one's a
freebie." He makes the quickest getaway ever
seen from a Dartmouth fraternity house.
Magic Monday is a tradition going back at least two decades at the AD house, or
Adelphian Lodge, as its members
affectionately call it. The hourly themes proliferate over the year:
Volleyball-inthe-Living-Room Hour, with Beach Boys
music and pina coladas; Ex-Athlete Hour, with Schlitz beer (because that's what
washed-up old athletes drink); Blues Hour,
when they listen to Elmore James and drink bourbon; Christmas Hour, when they
chop down a tree, plant it in the living
room, decorate it with condoms and panties and drink eggnog; and, finally New
Year's Hour, when they cut the tree up and
burn it, drink champagne and sing Aued Lang Syne. It's a good time and an
important annual event.
The common belief is that the first Magic Monday occurred the day John E
Kennedy was shot. After all, is a not carved on
the pillar by the tap system in the basement, NOVEMBER 22, 1963-J.F.K.
DEAD-EIGHT KEGS? I could tell them different. You
see, I was there on November 22, 1963. First, it was a Friday, not a Monday,
and, second, what happened was less a
celebration of surreality than a wake; though, actually, it was a pretty good
time. No, the first Magic Monday occurred a
few years later, when a brother named Don chanced to stay up drinking one
Sunday night, and in the morning, the brothers
were so impressed that they blew off classes for the day and joined him. But
why muddy the underpinnings of a cherished
Adelphian tradition? Myths are more fun than facts.
Let me tell you another AD tradition: the Night of the Seven Fires. This is the
Hell Night that, in one form or another, has
marked the transition of more than a half century's worth of AD pledges into
brothers. The early Sixties version: You had
to hike out to the snowy woods in the middle of the night and find, with the
aid of a mimeographed map, the Seven Sacred
Watch Fires. At each of these would be a complement of brothers waiting to
demand demented acts of you. You had to drop
trou and sit in the snow, consume impossible quantities of beer and wine and
vomit repeatedly, sometimes on one another.
It was one of the greatest nights of my life.
This is difficult for some people to understand. Fraternity high-jinks are a
most particular form of behavior and are
regarded with neither sympathy nor affection by much of the world, especially
mothers, police officers, campus
administrators and other societal voices of moderation and control. It's hard
to explain to those who have missed the
fraternity experience how richly satisfying mooning or booting (thats Dart-talk
for recreational vomiting) or eating your
underwear can be. People just don't get it.
Which is why about ten years after graduating, I decided to write a book about
fraternity life in which I would present
America with the straight skinny-the reverse value systems, the fascination
with the repugnant, the cheerful flouting of
authority The book never found a publisher, but portions of it, converted to
short stories, appeared in National Lampoon,
where their popularity prompted editor Doug Kenney to propose that he, Harold
Ramis and I write a movie based on them.
The movie was Animal House.
Now, I'm aware that a lot of people thought that Delta Tau Chi in Animal House
was somehow based on their fraternity
Sorry guys-now it can be told-the house that launched the legend was AD at
Dartmouth. And although, to the best of my
recollection, no one at Dartmouth ever put Fizzies in the swimming pool or
offed a horse in the dean's office, someone did
once boot on the dean (and his wife), and there was, in a house today known as
the Tabard, a mermaid with goldfish-bowl
breasts, and, in the AD house, there were guys named Otter, Mounder and Pinto,
and a 'Sex Room," and numerous black
R&B bands that played Shout and Louie, Louie. There was also a guy named
Turnip, who placed a phone call to a dead
Smithie, identifying himself as her boyfriend. Unlike Otter in the movie, he
didn't get himself and his fellow road-trippers
dates with her roommate and friends. In fact, that idea had never occurred to
Turnip-he'd made the call out of sheer joy of
sickness.
"Sickness Is Health, Blackness Is Truth, Drinking Is Strength." That was the
house creed, and we tried to live up to it.
Pledges were taught power booting. if you drank enough beer and jumped up and
down a few times, it was no big deal to boot
your height-the trick was in keeping a tight stream and hitting the target, a
photo of Connie Francis, say, tacked to the
basement wall. There was a fellow who used to snooze atop the bar, naked but
for a beer cup over his dong. When a lady
would enter the basement, he would tip his cup. We built lewd snow statues, got
laid in a hearse parked out back, pledged a
dead raccoon and once mooned the governor of New Hampshire. We had fun.
But how much fun, I wondered, were they having up at Dartmouth today? After
all, it was the Eighties now, the era of
AIDS, religious fundamentalism and the conservative backlash against the
indulgent Sixties and Seventies. What was more,
to those of us alumni who followed the news out of Dartmouth, it often seemed
as if the college had declared war on its
fraternity system.
The opening gun was firects in 1978. An English professor, James A. Epperson,
circulated a petition among the faculty to
have fraternities abolished for "interfering with college life and the health
and well-being of students." The real stunner
came when the faculty voted 67-16 in favor of the proposal. Obviously, there
was serious resentment harbored against the
fraternities at Dartmouth.
To a degree, fraternities were under serious scrutiny nationwide. College
faculties had always tended to view them as
elitist, sexist, racist, anti-intellectual and overly involved with alcohol.
Now, in the Eighties, with their ranks swelled with
veterans of the Sixties-who by arid large hated &aternities-they were on the
attack. At many schools, especially the
smaller, private ones in the Northeast, boards of trustees formed study
committees. In 1983, Amherst and Colby abolished
fraternities outright. Gettysburg came close to doing the same, and at
Middlebury, there's a continuing controversy over
the fate of their fratemity system. Indeed, aspects of Greek fife have been
under some form of study at approximately a
third of the 650 colleges where fraternities exist.
At the same time, though, fraternities have never been more popular. On the
rebound from their Vietnam-era doldrums,
undergraduate fraternities grew in membership from 230,000 in 1980 to more than
400,000 in 1986. This was widely
regarded as a reflection of the return to establishment values and conservatism
on campus, though it may have had more to
do with the resurgent desire of college men to raise hell and have fun with
their buddies, which, after all, is what
&aternities are all about. In any case, it seems unlikely that larger schools,
such as USC or the University of Illinois, will
ever do away with them-they're simply too popular among both students and
alumni.
Meanwhile, back at Dartmouth, the proposal to abolish the houses was ultimately
voted down by the board of trustees, but
there did ensue a period of crackdown that resulted in many houses, being put
on probation and given shapeup-or-ship-out
ultimatums. Then, in' 1983, came the instituting of "minimum standards" for
fraternities and sororities. Since this program
called for, among other things, expensive renovations to the deteriorating
houses, most of which had been built in the
Twenties, .it was widely perceived as an attempt to do away with the
fraternities by breaking them financially
Then, in 1987, the board of trustees released a Residential Life Statement
calling for a reduction in the fraternity system's
dominance of social life on campus, and shortly after that, the Hanover police
conducted their notorious undercover sting
operation, deputizing an 18-year-old girl and sending her, with an out-of-town
policeman posing as her boyfriend, on a
round of fraternities during the big spring party weekend known as Green Key.
Naturally, she was served beer, and eight
fraternities and two sororities faced the possibility of criminal charges for
serving alcohol to a minor The college got them
off the hook, but it made it dear that next time, the houses would be on their
own. This had a chilling effect on the admission
of nonmember guests to parties.
Finally, in 1988, the administration announced that starting with the class of
1993, rush would be delayed until sophomore
year. Since this would decrease fraternity membership-and their already pinched
treasuries-by 25 percent, there was
bitter resistance to the measure, all the more so because it was a dictate from
on high that ignored heavy student
opposition.
After all this, you had to wonder if fraternity life at Dartmouth was any fun
at all any more. Specifically, I was curious to
see how the boys were doing at the house that had inspired Animal House. I
decided to find out.
I enter the lodge with trepidation. What am I going to find, 25 years and all
those regulatory institutions later? A skeleton
crew of intimidated weenies, sipping oolong and discussing Proust?
But no. The first thing that hits me is the smell. It's the same smell; it
hasn't changed in two and a half decades! Mainly
beer, with certain miscellaneous nuances. The place looks pretty much the same,
too. A bit more wre cked-up, maybe, but
it's the same tube room, the same tap system and, running the perimeter of the
basement, the same beloved AD gutter
(today known as "the gorf"). In the erstwhile basement bathroom-converted to a
broom closet a few years back after a
brother tore out the toilet to mix a punch in it-I can still make out the
carved names of brothers from my era: Y BAGS,
LAPES, SNOT, MAG F PIE, HYDRANT, DUMP TRUCK. . . .
Having recently concluded a very successful rush, the house has nearly 100
members, and it looks as though most of them
are here tonight. They seem a little cool; I wonder if I'm welcome. Or maybe
ies just a generational style-they don't make a
big deal of things. There are so many of them, though, more than twice the
number we had ! The living room is like a subway
car! And, God, how'd they get to be so young?
I have brought with me, ,on video cassette, an assemblage of eight-millimeter
movies taken back in my era. As I show the
old flicks-glimpses of forgotten snow statues, of the brothers cavorting on the
lawn, of parties and our great perennial R&B
band Lonnie Youngblood and the Redcoats-pledges are periodically sent to "run a
rack." They return with lengths of plank
covered with brimming beer cups, so that the brothers may indulge their taste
for malt beverage. As the tape proceeds, the
crowd especially appreciates the sequence in which several old ADs eat the
shirt of Bert Rowley, '61, off his back. When
the show concludes, they signify their appreciation with a round of snaps and
sing a friendly (albeit obscene) song to me.
Then one of them hands me a full 12-ounce beer cup, and I see all these faces
looking at me with expectation.
Good God, I think, can I still chug one of these things? Well, it takes a
little longer than it used to, but, yes, I can! All
rightstill got my chops! The ADs cheer, the ice is broken. We repair to the
basement, where fine music is played,
multifarious brews are demolished and laughter fills the room. Sometimes, it
occurs to me, despite the passage of much
time, the essence of things remains the same.
I stay at Dartmouth for ten days. I check out the sororities, the coed houses
and, in addition to Alpha Delta, several
"mainstream" houses. I go to parties, drink off kegs, hang out in small groups
in &aternity rooms, doing a little herb and
getting philosophical. I find out two things.
First, fraternity life at Dartmouth is a lot more complicated than it used to
be. Parties must be registered; you have to fill
out a form at the campus police station before five P.M. on weekdays and noon
on weekends. Since a party is defined as any
time you go on tap, that means that you can no longer drink a keg without
registering with the police. Furthermore, since
the sting operation, the houses have had to post guards at all entrances to
their tap rooms during parties to check I.D.s and
make sure no underage nonmembers slip in. In addition, house presidents and
social chairmen, aware that they risk $
25,000 fines and even jail sentences if persons drunk on their beer crack up a
car, say, take great care to prevent such
drunks from departing, at least with their car keys. Meanwhile, there's the
ongoing paranoia that Dean Wormer-like
authority figures are out to get them, that any time now, fraternity life as
they know it will be banished forever, the way
the samurai were abolished in Japan in the 1870s.
That's a pretty tough row to hoe, compared with the relatively laissez-faire
early Sixties. But the second thing I notice is
that, despite the many modern complications, the peculiar Dartmouth genius for
having fun is undiminished. And although
much is different at the Big Green, what's more interesting is how much has
stayed the same.
Take the AD house. We had nicknames, they have nicknames; the house currently
contains the likes of Goon, Chubber, Turd,
Hedgehog, Cowpie, Merkin, Mule, Gator and, in a nice link with the past, a new
Snot. We had a house lexicon; they have a
house lexicon, In 1962, we invested much of our neologistical energy on
descriptives for throwing up-there was "power
booting," "spray booting," "nose booting," "sick booting" and the "Technicolor
yawn," the last of these resulting from the
preboot consumption of food colorings. We also spoke of "wind tunnels" (when
your date breaks wind while your head's up
her skirt), "reltneys" (hard-ons so big they stretch your skin until your head
flips backward) and "hooded hogs"
(uncircumcised penises). The current ADs have two great terms for an
uncircumcised penis"turtleneck" and "covered
wagon." Also from today's vocabulary: Dorky people are known as "lunch meats."
Drinking is "hooking." "Sweet!" is an
expression of approval. ("Hey, we just went on tap." "Sweet!") Smoking a bong
is "pulling a tube." Doing mushroom is
"'Shrooming." A "chode" is a dick that's wider than it is long. "Piling" and
"strapping" are fucking. And a "spank sock" is the
thing you keep by your bed to beat off into.
We did weird things to our pledges; they do weird things to their pledges. In
my day, as a sort of nod to AD's past (it
started life in 1843 as a literary society), the pledges had to compose and
present papers to the brothers with titles such
as "My Sensations at Birth" and "How to Use Afterbirth in a Garden Salad."
After one fellow-Seal-left a notebook containing
his pledge paper ("The Last Time I Sucked My Father's Cock") at Smith, ere it
into the hands of the dean, we got in a bit of
trouble and the practice was discontinued. And then, of course, there was boot
training and the Night of the Seven Fires.
These days, the pledge period is shorter than it used to be but correspondingly
more intense. The threatened punishment for
pledging infractions is the "Rack of Gnarl"-as many as a dozen 12-ounce cups
containing a mixture of catsup, soy sauce, dog
food, mouthwash and whatever other unappetizing liquid or semiliquid substances
happen to be on hand. You're supposed to
drink every cup and, sorry, it's bad form to boot too soon.
One thing you must know for this next pledging story-the ADs have always been
big on dogs. It's still true today In the
current Alpha Delta composite, there are pictures of no fewer than four of
them, including one that's deceased. So, OK; one
of the current pledging practices is that if the pledges can take over the
house and prevent a single brother from coming
inside for 24 hours, they don't have to go through Hell Night. Well, a few
years ago, the pledges managed to take over the
house, throw out the brothers and actually held the place for 12 hours. The
brothers were getting worried. No pledge class
had ever pulled off what that one seemed on the way to pulling off; how would
the brothers ever live it down? Then one of
them had an idea. They grabbed one of the house dogs, taped him up, wrapped him
in a rug and hurled him through a
living-room window. That was it-the takeover was ended, the pledges had to go
through an even worse Hell Night than usual
to compensate for the inconvenience they'd caused everyone. For, you see, in
AD, the dogs are considered brothers.
There are some interesting hazing stunts at other houses, too. One &aternity
drops its pledges a few miles out of town,
naked, with an ax. The point is to get back to campus. Ever try hitchhiking
naked with an ax? The pledges of another
fraternity must participate in an event called Boot-on-Your-Brother Night. The
kicker is, you can't change your clothes for
24 hours afterward; you have to wear them to bed, to class, to meals. . . .
A last pledging story: Some brothers in one house drove a pledge to New York
City divested him of his clothes and money
and left him there to make his way back to Hanover The pledge found a dime in
the street and called the Dartmouth Club,
where he made contact with a sympathetic alum who'd been through some of the
same shit himself The guy set the pledge up
with fine new clothes and plenty of bucks, the pledge flew back to Dartmouth,
and when the exhausted brothers finally made
their return to the fraternity, they found the pledge, resplendent in his new
duds, waiting on the front porch with a glass of
champagne for each of them.
Of course, one thing about Dartmouth that is different today is that between
then and now, the Sixties happened. And so
now, in addition to the standard types from my day-stoic jock, cool stud,
conservative zealot-you have introspective
hippies, crazed psychedelic pranksters and firebreathing radicals. You tend to
find these folks, when they join a Greek
society at all, in a couple of the coed houses, where they believe that, rather
than changing members to fit the house, you
change the house to fit the members. You also dispense with a lot of the hazing
and hierarchy-things are more communal.
You are also, by definition, nonsexist. But what I love about these folks is
that although they're Sixties, they're Dartmouth,
too. Each year, one of these houses holds something called a Decadent
Decathlon, which includes 12 events: Keg Throwing
for Distance, the Tap Suck, and so forth. One of the events perfectly
symbolizes the Dartmouth-Sixties fusion-the Bong
Chug. In this event, you must take a full hit from a bong, chug a beer, and
only then do you get to exhale.
There are other differences. Although there are three fraternities and two
sororities that are predominantly black, the
mainstream houses seem genuinely unconcerned about their racial or ethnic
composition, which is a nice change from my
day. The AD house has black brothers, Hispanic brothers, Jewish brothers, even
a Moslem brother It's not a big deal.
Also not a big deal is sex. I mean, they like it and everything, but it's more
or less taken for granted. There were stories
about getting laid on a pool table, and in the 1902 Room at Baker Library and
even in bed, but, as I say, these were no big
deal. In the early Sixties, of course, sex was a very big deal. But that was
before coeducation and the sexual revolution.
With greater availability comes a blast attitude, I suppose. But it's odd how
things turn around-in 1962, as far as the deans
were concerned, drinking was no big deal, but if you and your date were caught
with your pants down, you were in deep
shit. Today, they couldn't care less what you do sexually, as long as it's
consensual and you're being careful about AIDS-but
drinking infractions can get you in serious trouble.
One thing that definitely has not changed is the high quality of partying at
Dartmouth fraternities. In the early Sixties,
parties were mainly free-form, though I do remember Phi Gamma's Fiji Islands
Parties and a real good End-of-theWorld
Party during the Cuban Missile Crisis. Strange alcoholic concoctions with names
such as fogcutters, or gin and juice, or
purple Jesus punch were served, and people got even more blown out than usual.
The AD house, it was generally conceded, threw the best parties. We introduced
R&B music to campus with such luminaries
as the Flamingos, the Five Royales, Red Prysock, joey Dee and the Starliters,
the Crystals, and Little Anthony and the
Imperials. And the brothers put on behavior displays that foresaw performance
art by two decades. The moment in Animal
House when John Belushi pours mustard on himself was inspired by Seal-the
fellow whose pledge paper so amused the dean
of Smith-who at one party covered himself with yellow mustard and crawled about
on hands and knees on the dance floor,
biting dates' asses and shouting, "I'm the Mustard Man, I'm the goddamned
Mustard Man." Another time, Doberman or Dump
Truck or Troll or someone skied down the stairs naked, just as the band went
into Shout.
Nowadays, theme parties are the rage. One house has something called the Party
Without a Cause; everyone dresses as
James Dean and Natalie Wood. Theta Delta Chi throws a Louie Lobster Party,
wherein the guys wear lobster costumes, and
there's a live lobster crawling around in the punch. Gods and Goddesses,
another Theta Dolt party, involves everyone
dressing as Zeus or Aphrodite-it's basically a toga party SAE is known for its
annual Saigon Party (recently renamed
Welcome to the jungle), in which the house is filled with trees and live
monkeys. And Alpha Chi Alpha throws Beach Parties,
for which vast quantities of sand are trucked in and dumped all over the house.
The Medieval Banquet, a joint party thrown most years by the Alpha Chis and
Kappa Kappa Gamma sorority started life as a
Fifties Party, but one year the guys showed up dressed in the fashion of 1050,
and it stayed that way; the celebrants go as
wenches, serfs, knights, and so forth, sit around big tables and eat with their
hands. King Arthur and Guinevere order
people to chug and the party always turns inw a huge food fight, with tankards
of ale poured on people's heads, roast
turkeys flying through the air and everyone soaked and ripped to the gills by
9:30.
Now, at the AD house, they're not too big on theme parties. The more usual
thing is get a deejay, invite a bunch of people
over, order a lot of kegs and see what happens. But each spring, during Green
Key Weekend. . . .
Saturday, my last day; tomorrow it's back to the freeways and smog and
mortgages and the diaper changings of real life.
Turns out the ADs have their major annual party this afternoon on the front
lawn. They have this terrific funk band on the
porch, wailing away, and the yard is packed with partyers. But I'm not
dancing-I'm feeling grumpy about having to go home
tomorrow and, hell, a little burned out from trying to keep up with these
20-year-olds all week.
Thanks to last nights killer rain, much of the yard is a mud puddle today.
After a while, predictably enough, the brothers
decide to do a little mud diving. In fact, half the guys in the house quickly
join in, as do many of the dates and friends and
onlookers, and suddenly, it looks like Retum of the Mud Monsters out there. And
then-uh-oh-I spot seven or eight beslimed
pledges headed straight for me with crazed, demented smiles.
Well, I don't feel like going in any mud, that's for sure. Later for that,
jack. I put on my most persuasive smile. "Come on,
you guys, let's just forget it, OK?" They blithely ignore me; I barely have
time to toss my wallet and shades to my amused
wife (who has been egging them on), and then I'm being carried across the yard
by all these guys-Donk and Oddjob and Mulch
and Scurvy and Snot II and Toast and Remus and Spock-and they find a
particularly juicy mudhole . . . and plop me into it!
And-whaddaya know? -it's great! Suddenly, I'm not tired and I'm not grumpy-it's
as if I've just had a burst of adrenaline.
And, man, I'm dancing my ass off, exchanging high fives and whooping like a
maniac, and it all comes back, that total party
feeling, where time is suspended and you're in an eternal, fun-filled now. This
is it-the thing people join fraternities for-one
of those peak bacchanalian moments that know no equal. My sense of closeness
and connection with these boogieing mud
maniacs could not be greater, and I feel more in touch with the me I like most
than I have in months.
Ah, fraternities. Sweet.
_______________________________________
Chris Miller's Animal House
Copyright 1989 Information Access Company, a Thomson Corporation Company
Copyright 1989 Playboy
Playboy October, 1989
SECTION: Vol. 36 ; No. 10 ; Pg. 104; ISSN: 0032-1478
HEADLINE: Return to Animal House; writer of film revisits his old fraternity
house
BYLINE: Miller, Chris
BODY: The man who wrote the movie revisits the scene of the crime-and finds he
can still boot with the best of them.
Playboy, October, 1989
IT's MAGIC MONDAY at the Alpha Delta house and the brothers have been drinking
since SiX A.M. They have worked their
way through Sunrise-Service Hour (tequila sunrises), Cartoon Hour (Kool-Aid
punch) and Lonely-Guy Hour (Thunderbird and
Mad Dog, straight from the bottle). Now it's ten o'clock, and that means it's .
. . Naked-inthe-Tube-Room Hour!
Seventy naked guys cram into the TV room, which is about as large as a small
one-car garage. Beers are distributed by dick
size-those with big ones get king cans of Bud; those with small cocks drink
from shot glasses. The worst, most repellent,
vile and disgusting porno tape available is popped into the VCR. The brother
keep checking one another out-anyone who gets a
hard-on faces rigorous punishment. No one's quite sure what !he punishment
might be, since in the history of Magic Monday,
no one has yet gotten a hard-on during Naked-inthe-Tube-Room Hour, but they
keep checking anyway, just in case.
There's a knock on the door. It's the delivery guy from the pizza place-he
steps inside and freezes. Good Lord, what has he
walked in on here-a bunch of preverts or something? Oddly enough, despite the
large number of guys present, no one has the
money to pay for the pizza-because no one has any pockets. On the screen, the
cast is urinating on one another, sodomizing
dead animals, all sorts of neat stuff. "If you could wait till the end of this
sequence," says the guy who made the order, "I'll
run upstairs and get some money"
The pizza guy looks around, swallows and says, "Never mind. This one's a
freebie." He makes the quickest getaway ever
seen from a Dartmouth fraternity house.
Magic Monday is a tradition going back at least two decades at the AD house, or
Adelphian Lodge, as its members
affectionately call it. The hourly themes proliferate over the year:
Volleyball-inthe-Living-Room Hour, with Beach Boys
music and pina coladas; Ex-Athlete Hour, with Schlitz beer (because that's what
washed-up old athletes drink); Blues Hour,
when they listen to Elmore James and drink bourbon; Christmas Hour, when they
chop down a tree, plant it in the living
room, decorate it with condoms and panties and drink eggnog; and, finally New
Year's Hour, when they cut the tree up and
burn it, drink champagne and sing Aued Lang Syne. It's a good time and an
important annual event.
The common belief is that the first Magic Monday occurred the day John E
Kennedy was shot. After all, is a not carved on
the pillar by the tap system in the basement, NOVEMBER 22, 1963-J.F.K.
DEAD-EIGHT KEGS? I could tell them different. You
see, I was there on November 22, 1963. First, it was a Friday, not a Monday,
and, second, what happened was less a
celebration of surreality than a wake; though, actually, it was a pretty good
time. No, the first Magic Monday occurred a
few years later, when a brother named Don chanced to stay up drinking one
Sunday night, and in the morning, the brothers
were so impressed that they blew off classes for the day and joined him. But
why muddy the underpinnings of a cherished
Adelphian tradition? Myths are more fun than facts.
Let me tell you another AD tradition: the Night of the Seven Fires. This is the
Hell Night that, in one form or another, has
marked the transition of more than a half century's worth of AD pledges into
brothers. The early Sixties version: You had
to hike out to the snowy woods in the middle of the night and find, with the
aid of a mimeographed map, the Seven Sacred
Watch Fires. At each of these would be a complement of brothers waiting to
demand demented acts of you. You had to drop
trou and sit in the snow, consume impossible quantities of beer and wine and
vomit repeatedly, sometimes on one another.
It was one of the greatest nights of my life.
This is difficult for some people to understand. Fraternity high-jinks are a
most particular form of behavior and are
regarded with neither sympathy nor affection by much of the world, especially
mothers, police officers, campus
administrators and other societal voices of moderation and control. It's hard
to explain to those who have missed the
fraternity experience how richly satisfying mooning or booting (thats Dart-talk
for recreational vomiting) or eating your
underwear can be. People just don't get it.
Which is why about ten years after graduating, I decided to write a book about
fraternity life in which I would present
America with the straight skinny-the reverse value systems, the fascination
with the repugnant, the cheerful flouting of
authority The book never found a publisher, but portions of it, converted to
short stories, appeared in National Lampoon,
where their popularity prompted editor Doug Kenney to propose that he, Harold
Ramis and I write a movie based on them.
The movie was Animal House.
Now, I'm aware that a lot of people thought that Delta Tau Chi in Animal House
was somehow based on their fraternity
Sorry guys-now it can be told-the house that launched the legend was AD at
Dartmouth. And although, to the best of my
recollection, no one at Dartmouth ever put Fizzies in the swimming pool or
offed a horse in the dean's office, someone did
once boot on the dean (and his wife), and there was, in a house today known as
the Tabard, a mermaid with goldfish-bowl
breasts, and, in the AD house, there were guys named Otter, Mounder and Pinto,
and a 'Sex Room," and numerous black
R&B bands that played Shout and Louie, Louie. There was also a guy named
Turnip, who placed a phone call to a dead
Smithie, identifying himself as her boyfriend. Unlike Otter in the movie, he
didn't get himself and his fellow road-trippers
dates with her roommate and friends. In fact, that idea had never occurred to
Turnip-he'd made the call out of sheer joy of
sickness.
"Sickness Is Health, Blackness Is Truth, Drinking Is Strength." That was the
house creed, and we tried to live up to it.
Pledges were taught power booting. if you drank enough beer and jumped up and
down a few times, it was no big deal to boot
your height-the trick was in keeping a tight stream and hitting the target, a
photo of Connie Francis, say, tacked to the
basement wall. There was a fellow who used to snooze atop the bar, naked but
for a beer cup over his dong. When a lady
would enter the basement, he would tip his cup. We built lewd snow statues, got
laid in a hearse parked out back, pledged a
dead raccoon and once mooned the governor of New Hampshire. We had fun.
But how much fun, I wondered, were they having up at Dartmouth today? After
all, it was the Eighties now, the era of
AIDS, religious fundamentalism and the conservative backlash against the
indulgent Sixties and Seventies. What was more,
to those of us alumni who followed the news out of Dartmouth, it often seemed
as if the college had declared war on its
fraternity system.
The opening gun was firects in 1978. An English professor, James A. Epperson,
circulated a petition among the faculty to
have fraternities abolished for "interfering with college life and the health
and well-being of students." The real stunner
came when the faculty voted 67-16 in favor of the proposal. Obviously, there
was serious resentment harbored against the
fraternities at Dartmouth.
To a degree, fraternities were under serious scrutiny nationwide. College
faculties had always tended to view them as
elitist, sexist, racist, anti-intellectual and overly involved with alcohol.
Now, in the Eighties, with their ranks swelled with
veterans of the Sixties-who by arid large hated &aternities-they were on the
attack. At many schools, especially the
smaller, private ones in the Northeast, boards of trustees formed study
committees. In 1983, Amherst and Colby abolished
fraternities outright. Gettysburg came close to doing the same, and at
Middlebury, there's a continuing controversy over
the fate of their fratemity system. Indeed, aspects of Greek fife have been
under some form of study at approximately a
third of the 650 colleges where fraternities exist.
At the same time, though, fraternities have never been more popular. On the
rebound from their Vietnam-era doldrums,
undergraduate fraternities grew in membership from 230,000 in 1980 to more than
400,000 in 1986. This was widely
regarded as a reflection of the return to establishment values and conservatism
on campus, though it may have had more to
do with the resurgent desire of college men to raise hell and have fun with
their buddies, which, after all, is what
&aternities are all about. In any case, it seems unlikely that larger schools,
such as USC or the University of Illinois, will
ever do away with them-they're simply too popular among both students and
alumni.
Meanwhile, back at Dartmouth, the proposal to abolish the houses was ultimately
voted down by the board of trustees, but
there did ensue a period of crackdown that resulted in many houses, being put
on probation and given shapeup-or-ship-out
ultimatums. Then, in' 1983, came the instituting of "minimum standards" for
fraternities and sororities. Since this program
called for, among other things, expensive renovations to the deteriorating
houses, most of which had been built in the
Twenties, .it was widely perceived as an attempt to do away with the
fraternities by breaking them financially
Then, in 1987, the board of trustees released a Residential Life Statement
calling for a reduction in the fraternity system's
dominance of social life on campus, and shortly after that, the Hanover police
conducted their notorious undercover sting
operation, deputizing an 18-year-old girl and sending her, with an out-of-town
policeman posing as her boyfriend, on a
round of fraternities during the big spring party weekend known as Green Key.
Naturally, she was served beer, and eight
fraternities and two sororities faced the possibility of criminal charges for
serving alcohol to a minor The college got them
off the hook, but it made it dear that next time, the houses would be on their
own. This had a chilling effect on the admission
of nonmember guests to parties.
Finally, in 1988, the administration announced that starting with the class of
1993, rush would be delayed until sophomore
year. Since this would decrease fraternity membership-and their already pinched
treasuries-by 25 percent, there was
bitter resistance to the measure, all the more so because it was a dictate from
on high that ignored heavy student
opposition.
After all this, you had to wonder if fraternity life at Dartmouth was any fun
at all any more. Specifically, I was curious to
see how the boys were doing at the house that had inspired Animal House. I
decided to find out.
I enter the lodge with trepidation. What am I going to find, 25 years and all
those regulatory institutions later? A skeleton
crew of intimidated weenies, sipping oolong and discussing Proust?
But no. The first thing that hits me is the smell. It's the same smell; it
hasn't changed in two and a half decades! Mainly
beer, with certain miscellaneous nuances. The place looks pretty much the same,
too. A bit more wre cked-up, maybe, but
it's the same tube room, the same tap system and, running the perimeter of the
basement, the same beloved AD gutter
(today known as "the gorf"). In the erstwhile basement bathroom-converted to a
broom closet a few years back after a
brother tore out the toilet to mix a punch in it-I can still make out the
carved names of brothers from my era: Y BAGS,
LAPES, SNOT, MAG F PIE, HYDRANT, DUMP TRUCK. . . .
Having recently concluded a very successful rush, the house has nearly 100
members, and it looks as though most of them
are here tonight. They seem a little cool; I wonder if I'm welcome. Or maybe
ies just a generational style-they don't make a
big deal of things. There are so many of them, though, more than twice the
number we had ! The living room is like a subway
car! And, God, how'd they get to be so young?
I have brought with me, ,on video cassette, an assemblage of eight-millimeter
movies taken back in my era. As I show the
old flicks-glimpses of forgotten snow statues, of the brothers cavorting on the
lawn, of parties and our great perennial R&B
band Lonnie Youngblood and the Redcoats-pledges are periodically sent to "run a
rack." They return with lengths of plank
covered with brimming beer cups, so that the brothers may indulge their taste
for malt beverage. As the tape proceeds, the
crowd especially appreciates the sequence in which several old ADs eat the
shirt of Bert Rowley, '61, off his back. When
the show concludes, they signify their appreciation with a round of snaps and
sing a friendly (albeit obscene) song to me.
Then one of them hands me a full 12-ounce beer cup, and I see all these faces
looking at me with expectation.
Good God, I think, can I still chug one of these things? Well, it takes a
little longer than it used to, but, yes, I can! All
rightstill got my chops! The ADs cheer, the ice is broken. We repair to the
basement, where fine music is played,
multifarious brews are demolished and laughter fills the room. Sometimes, it
occurs to me, despite the passage of much
time, the essence of things remains the same.
I stay at Dartmouth for ten days. I check out the sororities, the coed houses
and, in addition to Alpha Delta, several
"mainstream" houses. I go to parties, drink off kegs, hang out in small groups
in &aternity rooms, doing a little herb and
getting philosophical. I find out two things.
First, fraternity life at Dartmouth is a lot more complicated than it used to
be. Parties must be registered; you have to fill
out a form at the campus police station before five P.M. on weekdays and noon
on weekends. Since a party is defined as any
time you go on tap, that means that you can no longer drink a keg without
registering with the police. Furthermore, since
the sting operation, the houses have had to post guards at all entrances to
their tap rooms during parties to check I.D.s and
make sure no underage nonmembers slip in. In addition, house presidents and
social chairmen, aware that they risk $
25,000 fines and even jail sentences if persons drunk on their beer crack up a
car, say, take great care to prevent such
drunks from departing, at least with their car keys. Meanwhile, there's the
ongoing paranoia that Dean Wormer-like
authority figures are out to get them, that any time now, fraternity life as
they know it will be banished forever, the way
the samurai were abolished in Japan in the 1870s.
That's a pretty tough row to hoe, compared with the relatively laissez-faire
early Sixties. But the second thing I notice is
that, despite the many modern complications, the peculiar Dartmouth genius for
having fun is undiminished. And although
much is different at the Big Green, what's more interesting is how much has
stayed the same.
Take the AD house. We had nicknames, they have nicknames; the house currently
contains the likes of Goon, Chubber, Turd,
Hedgehog, Cowpie, Merkin, Mule, Gator and, in a nice link with the past, a new
Snot. We had a house lexicon; they have a
house lexicon, In 1962, we invested much of our neologistical energy on
descriptives for throwing up-there was "power
booting," "spray booting," "nose booting," "sick booting" and the "Technicolor
yawn," the last of these resulting from the
preboot consumption of food colorings. We also spoke of "wind tunnels" (when
your date breaks wind while your head's up
her skirt), "reltneys" (hard-ons so big they stretch your skin until your head
flips backward) and "hooded hogs"
(uncircumcised penises). The current ADs have two great terms for an
uncircumcised penis"turtleneck" and "covered
wagon." Also from today's vocabulary: Dorky people are known as "lunch meats."
Drinking is "hooking." "Sweet!" is an
expression of approval. ("Hey, we just went on tap." "Sweet!") Smoking a bong
is "pulling a tube." Doing mushroom is
"'Shrooming." A "chode" is a dick that's wider than it is long. "Piling" and
"strapping" are fucking. And a "spank sock" is the
thing you keep by your bed to beat off into.
We did weird things to our pledges; they do weird things to their pledges. In
my day, as a sort of nod to AD's past (it
started life in 1843 as a literary society), the pledges had to compose and
present papers to the brothers with titles such
as "My Sensations at Birth" and "How to Use Afterbirth in a Garden Salad."
After one fellow-Seal-left a notebook containing
his pledge paper ("The Last Time I Sucked My Father's Cock") at Smith, ere it
into the hands of the dean, we got in a bit of
trouble and the practice was discontinued. And then, of course, there was boot
training and the Night of the Seven Fires.
These days, the pledge period is shorter than it used to be but correspondingly
more intense. The threatened punishment for
pledging infractions is the "Rack of Gnarl"-as many as a dozen 12-ounce cups
containing a mixture of catsup, soy sauce, dog
food, mouthwash and whatever other unappetizing liquid or semiliquid substances
happen to be on hand. You're supposed to
drink every cup and, sorry, it's bad form to boot too soon.
One thing you must know for this next pledging story-the ADs have always been
big on dogs. It's still true today In the
current Alpha Delta composite, there are pictures of no fewer than four of
them, including one that's deceased. So, OK; one
of the current pledging practices is that if the pledges can take over the
house and prevent a single brother from coming
inside for 24 hours, they don't have to go through Hell Night. Well, a few
years ago, the pledges managed to take over the
house, throw out the brothers and actually held the place for 12 hours. The
brothers were getting worried. No pledge class
had ever pulled off what that one seemed on the way to pulling off; how would
the brothers ever live it down? Then one of
them had an idea. They grabbed one of the house dogs, taped him up, wrapped him
in a rug and hurled him through a
living-room window. That was it-the takeover was ended, the pledges had to go
through an even worse Hell Night than usual
to compensate for the inconvenience they'd caused everyone. For, you see, in
AD, the dogs are considered brothers.
There are some interesting hazing stunts at other houses, too. One &aternity
drops its pledges a few miles out of town,
naked, with an ax. The point is to get back to campus. Ever try hitchhiking
naked with an ax? The pledges of another
fraternity must participate in an event called Boot-on-Your-Brother Night. The
kicker is, you can't change your clothes for
24 hours afterward; you have to wear them to bed, to class, to meals. . . .
A last pledging story: Some brothers in one house drove a pledge to New York
City divested him of his clothes and money
and left him there to make his way back to Hanover The pledge found a dime in
the street and called the Dartmouth Club,
where he made contact with a sympathetic alum who'd been through some of the
same shit himself The guy set the pledge up
with fine new clothes and plenty of bucks, the pledge flew back to Dartmouth,
and when the exhausted brothers finally made
their return to the fraternity, they found the pledge, resplendent in his new
duds, waiting on the front porch with a glass of
champagne for each of them.
Of course, one thing about Dartmouth that is different today is that between
then and now, the Sixties happened. And so
now, in addition to the standard types from my day-stoic jock, cool stud,
conservative zealot-you have introspective
hippies, crazed psychedelic pranksters and firebreathing radicals. You tend to
find these folks, when they join a Greek
society at all, in a couple of the coed houses, where they believe that, rather
than changing members to fit the house, you
change the house to fit the members. You also dispense with a lot of the hazing
and hierarchy-things are more communal.
You are also, by definition, nonsexist. But what I love about these folks is
that although they're Sixties, they're Dartmouth,
too. Each year, one of these houses holds something called a Decadent
Decathlon, which includes 12 events: Keg Throwing
for Distance, the Tap Suck, and so forth. One of the events perfectly
symbolizes the Dartmouth-Sixties fusion-the Bong
Chug. In this event, you must take a full hit from a bong, chug a beer, and
only then do you get to exhale.
There are other differences. Although there are three fraternities and two
sororities that are predominantly black, the
mainstream houses seem genuinely unconcerned about their racial or ethnic
composition, which is a nice change from my
day. The AD house has black brothers, Hispanic brothers, Jewish brothers, even
a Moslem brother It's not a big deal.
Also not a big deal is sex. I mean, they like it and everything, but it's more
or less taken for granted. There were stories
about getting laid on a pool table, and in the 1902 Room at Baker Library and
even in bed, but, as I say, these were no big
deal. In the early Sixties, of course, sex was a very big deal. But that was
before coeducation and the sexual revolution.
With greater availability comes a blast attitude, I suppose. But it's odd how
things turn around-in 1962, as far as the deans
were concerned, drinking was no big deal, but if you and your date were caught
with your pants down, you were in deep
shit. Today, they couldn't care less what you do sexually, as long as it's
consensual and you're being careful about AIDS-but
drinking infractions can get you in serious trouble.
One thing that definitely has not changed is the high quality of partying at
Dartmouth fraternities. In the early Sixties,
parties were mainly free-form, though I do remember Phi Gamma's Fiji Islands
Parties and a real good End-of-theWorld
Party during the Cuban Missile Crisis. Strange alcoholic concoctions with names
such as fogcutters, or gin and juice, or
purple Jesus punch were served, and people got even more blown out than usual.
The AD house, it was generally conceded, threw the best parties. We introduced
R&B music to campus with such luminaries
as the Flamingos, the Five Royales, Red Prysock, joey Dee and the Starliters,
the Crystals, and Little Anthony and the
Imperials. And the brothers put on behavior displays that foresaw performance
art by two decades. The moment in Animal
House when John Belushi pours mustard on himself was inspired by Seal-the
fellow whose pledge paper so amused the dean
of Smith-who at one party covered himself with yellow mustard and crawled about
on hands and knees on the dance floor,
biting dates' asses and shouting, "I'm the Mustard Man, I'm the goddamned
Mustard Man." Another time, Doberman or Dump
Truck or Troll or someone skied down the stairs naked, just as the band went
into Shout.
Nowadays, theme parties are the rage. One house has something called the Party
Without a Cause; everyone dresses as
James Dean and Natalie Wood. Theta Delta Chi throws a Louie Lobster Party,
wherein the guys wear lobster costumes, and
there's a live lobster crawling around in the punch. Gods and Goddesses,
another Theta Dolt party, involves everyone
dressing as Zeus or Aphrodite-it's basically a toga party SAE is known for its
annual Saigon Party (recently renamed
Welcome to the jungle), in which the house is filled with trees and live
monkeys. And Alpha Chi Alpha throws Beach Parties,
for which vast quantities of sand are trucked in and dumped all over the house.
The Medieval Banquet, a joint party thrown most years by the Alpha Chis and
Kappa Kappa Gamma sorority started life as a
Fifties Party, but one year the guys showed up dressed in the fashion of 1050,
and it stayed that way; the celebrants go as
wenches, serfs, knights, and so forth, sit around big tables and eat with their
hands. King Arthur and Guinevere order
people to chug and the party always turns inw a huge food fight, with tankards
of ale poured on people's heads, roast
turkeys flying through the air and everyone soaked and ripped to the gills by
9:30.
Now, at the AD house, they're not too big on theme parties. The more usual
thing is get a deejay, invite a bunch of people
over, order a lot of kegs and see what happens. But each spring, during Green
Key Weekend. . . .
Saturday, my last day; tomorrow it's back to the freeways and smog and
mortgages and the diaper changings of real life.
Turns out the ADs have their major annual party this afternoon on the front
lawn. They have this terrific funk band on the
porch, wailing away, and the yard is packed with partyers. But I'm not
dancing-I'm feeling grumpy about having to go home
tomorrow and, hell, a little burned out from trying to keep up with these
20-year-olds all week.
Thanks to last nights killer rain, much of the yard is a mud puddle today.
After a while, predictably enough, the brothers
decide to do a little mud diving. In fact, half the guys in the house quickly
join in, as do many of the dates and friends and
onlookers, and suddenly, it looks like Retum of the Mud Monsters out there. And
then-uh-oh-I spot seven or eight beslimed
pledges headed straight for me with crazed, demented smiles.
Well, I don't feel like going in any mud, that's for sure. Later for that,
jack. I put on my most persuasive smile. "Come on,
you guys, let's just forget it, OK?" They blithely ignore me; I barely have
time to toss my wallet and shades to my amused
wife (who has been egging them on), and then I'm being carried across the yard
by all these guys-Donk and Oddjob and Mulch
and Scurvy and Snot II and Toast and Remus and Spock-and they find a
particularly juicy mudhole . . . and plop me into it!
And-whaddaya know? -it's great! Suddenly, I'm not tired and I'm not grumpy-it's
as if I've just had a burst of adrenaline.
And, man, I'm dancing my ass off, exchanging high fives and whooping like a
maniac, and it all comes back, that total party
feeling, where time is suspended and you're in an eternal, fun-filled now. This
is it-the thing people join fraternities for-one
of those peak bacchanalian moments that know no equal. My sense of closeness
and connection with these boogieing mud
maniacs could not be greater, and I feel more in touch with the me I like most
than I have in months.
Ah, fraternities. Sweet.
Saturday, March 08, 2003
Google Fight!
And the winner is...
This one isn't so hot, though... But the site does seem to have some kind of a French connection, so I wouldn't trust it if I were you.
This one isn't so hot, though... But the site does seem to have some kind of a French connection, so I wouldn't trust it if I were you.
Friday, March 07, 2003
Hockey awards season starts with All-Ivy Teams....
Dartmouth got the shaft bigtime as the hockey team placed only one person on the all-Ivy squads this year, as voted by the 6 coaches of the Ivy League teams, despite finishing 3rd in the ECAC and tied for 2nd in the Ivy League standings. Trevor Byrne was picked to the 2nd team All-Ivy squad, and sophomore Lee Stempniak garnered an honorable mention.
Hugh Jessiman was a unanimous choice for Ivy League Freshman of the Year.
Cornell was the big winner with 3 players on the first team, another on the second, and a 5th getting an honorable mention. Cornell netminder David LeNeveu also was voted Ivy League Player of the Year.
Dartmouth should fare better in the All-ECAC teams. Look for Byrne and Stempniak to get spots again, with Pete Summerfelt and/or Jessiman possibly joining them. As well, Dartmouth should garner two if not three spots on the ECAC All-Freshman team. Jessiman is a lock and will easily get ECAC Freshman of the Year award as well, while Mike Ouellette and/or Sean Offers should join him on the All-Freshman squad.
Press Release
Hugh Jessiman was a unanimous choice for Ivy League Freshman of the Year.
Cornell was the big winner with 3 players on the first team, another on the second, and a 5th getting an honorable mention. Cornell netminder David LeNeveu also was voted Ivy League Player of the Year.
Dartmouth should fare better in the All-ECAC teams. Look for Byrne and Stempniak to get spots again, with Pete Summerfelt and/or Jessiman possibly joining them. As well, Dartmouth should garner two if not three spots on the ECAC All-Freshman team. Jessiman is a lock and will easily get ECAC Freshman of the Year award as well, while Mike Ouellette and/or Sean Offers should join him on the All-Freshman squad.
Press Release
Wednesday, March 05, 2003
Hunger Banquet
"The class of Human Biology 4 (The Biology and Politics of Starvation) this term invite you to participate in A Hunger Banquet, to be held in Collis Commonground today, Wednesday, March 5, 5-7 PM.
Dartmouth's Human Biology Program will donate $5 for each Dartmouth student who attends to an international food relief agency that the class will choose at its closing Student World Food Congress on March 6. We also ask that all attendees bring non-perishable food items that we will donate to The Haven, a Upper Valley food pantry.
The class has focused on issues of food security and famine throughout the world and would like to share its insights with other Dartmouth students. The Banquet will feature several menus including those representative of the USA (both food excess and unavailability), Ireland of 1846-1850, Ethiopia in the 1970s, 80s and 90s, Zimbabwe in 2003, the 'artificial famines' of Urkraine of the 1930's and China of the 1950s and regions of South/Central America. Class students in each of these groups will engage in small group discussions and we will have an audiovisual presentation as well."
Dartmouth's Human Biology Program will donate $5 for each Dartmouth student who attends to an international food relief agency that the class will choose at its closing Student World Food Congress on March 6. We also ask that all attendees bring non-perishable food items that we will donate to The Haven, a Upper Valley food pantry.
The class has focused on issues of food security and famine throughout the world and would like to share its insights with other Dartmouth students. The Banquet will feature several menus including those representative of the USA (both food excess and unavailability), Ireland of 1846-1850, Ethiopia in the 1970s, 80s and 90s, Zimbabwe in 2003, the 'artificial famines' of Urkraine of the 1930's and China of the 1950s and regions of South/Central America. Class students in each of these groups will engage in small group discussions and we will have an audiovisual presentation as well."
Terrorism Panel Tonight
Filene Auditorium
7:30 PM
Featuring:
-Col. Robert Leicht - Former Army Special Forces Colonel, liason to CIA
-Daniel Byman - Military Analyst, Staff Member w/ the Joint 9/11 Intelligence
Committee
-Richard Ned Lebow - Professor of Government at Dartmouth College.
-Ronald Green -Chair of Dartmouth Religion Department, Director of Dartmouth's
Ethics Institute
7:30 PM
Featuring:
-Col. Robert Leicht - Former Army Special Forces Colonel, liason to CIA
-Daniel Byman - Military Analyst, Staff Member w/ the Joint 9/11 Intelligence
Committee
-Richard Ned Lebow - Professor of Government at Dartmouth College.
-Ronald Green -Chair of Dartmouth Religion Department, Director of Dartmouth's
Ethics Institute
Funny story
Courtesy of an '03:
"NEVER EAT IN NOVACK AGAIN.
Im here right now studying for my exam at 845 and a mouse is crawling around with a mouse trap attached to it and the woman who opened up Novack this morning refuses to touch it. She opened the door and it scurried out of novack. So it is crawling around on the floor with a mouse trap on its tail. Everyone here is just staring. She's yelling "Oh god" and chasing it into the computer rooms where the people are beginning to also yell "Oh God." This is ridiculous, funny, and gross all at the same time.
Now some other old lady is saying, 'Take him outside. He'll freeze.'"
"NEVER EAT IN NOVACK AGAIN.
Im here right now studying for my exam at 845 and a mouse is crawling around with a mouse trap attached to it and the woman who opened up Novack this morning refuses to touch it. She opened the door and it scurried out of novack. So it is crawling around on the floor with a mouse trap on its tail. Everyone here is just staring. She's yelling "Oh god" and chasing it into the computer rooms where the people are beginning to also yell "Oh God." This is ridiculous, funny, and gross all at the same time.
Now some other old lady is saying, 'Take him outside. He'll freeze.'"
Tuesday, March 04, 2003
Trustee Voting
Since Alex Wilson '01 is not on the official ballot, who seems to be the best candidate? I'm leaning towards Donahue, but Lewis seems solid as well...
Or should I continue my policy of abstention?
Thoughts?
Or should I continue my policy of abstention?
Thoughts?
$$$ The Princeton Tory $$$
THE PRINCETON TORY
P.O. Box 1499
Princeton, NJ 08542
tory@princeton.edu
PRESS RELEASE
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
When Ira Leeds, Princeton freshman and Financial Manager of the student publication The Princeton Tory, checked his magazine's bank account, he was surprised to find a ledger balance of $9,900,693.61--or, nearly $10 million more than he expected.
Leeds immediately called PNCBank of Princeton to report the error, only to be told that there was no error - the figure was correct; Princeton University's balance was quite accurate.
Leeds had recently opened an electronic 'Account Link' for The Princeton Tory, Inc. When the access was granted, though, he discovered that he had access not only to the Tory's funds, which number in the thousands, but over nine million dollars of Princeton University's money.
Leeds immediately requested that the Tory's online access be directly terminated, so the student journal would not be liable for future transactions. The bank did not immediately process his request, and he continued to be able to access the account for at least a day.
Leeds then called the Tory's Publisher, sophomore John Andrews. Agreeing that this error needed immediate rectification, Andrews expressed dismay that Princeton's administration would be so careless as to allow student groups to access the University's wealth.
"Their negligence is appalling," he said. "Nobody's donation, or tuition, or retirement savings, or research grant is safe. Who wants to have their money where strangers could easily transfer it to an offshore account? Not everybody would do the right thing in our situation," he said. "But I'm proud of Ira and the way he embodies the Tory's character and high ethical standards."
According to Andrews, preliminary findings suggest that a University official inadvertently gave The Princeton Tory incorrect tax information listing Princeton University's taxpayer identification number rather than the Tory's.
Andrews explained, "The taxpayer ID number is like a Social Security Number - it gives you control of the account. Princeton ought to have been more careful with this information. We assumed that the University knew what it was doing when it gave us our number."
This information lay dormant for years, until the Tory staff attempted to use it to access the Tory's own account, but instead gained access to fifteen University accounts, with a ledger balance of $9,900,693.61. An electronic copy of the Tory's balance statement, reflecting the acquisition of the University's ten million dollars, is available from the Tory's official website: www.princetontory.com.
Leeds and Andrews consulted the Trustees of The Princeton Tory, Inc., four of whom are attorneys. Under their Trustees'advice, the two young men then notified President Tilghman and Provost Gutman of the problem.
"We used email, because it's prudent to document your intentions," Leeds said.
University administrators are currently examining the matter.
Published at least six times per academic year, The Princeton Tory is a student-produced magazine of conservative and moderate political thought. A recent survey of students conducted by the administration found that the Tory is the most-read political publication on campus. It currently receives no funding from the University - except by accident.
For further information, contact:
Amy Gutman, Provost, Princeton University
(609) 258-3026
Shirley Tilghman, President, Princeton University
(609) 258-6100
John Andrews, Publisher, The Princeton Tory
(609) 986-8880
Ira Leeds, Financial Manager, The Princeton Tory
(609) 986-9425
Kathleen Deignan, Dean of Undergraduate Students
(609) 258-5431
P.O. Box 1499
Princeton, NJ 08542
tory@princeton.edu
PRESS RELEASE
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
When Ira Leeds, Princeton freshman and Financial Manager of the student publication The Princeton Tory, checked his magazine's bank account, he was surprised to find a ledger balance of $9,900,693.61--or, nearly $10 million more than he expected.
Leeds immediately called PNCBank of Princeton to report the error, only to be told that there was no error - the figure was correct; Princeton University's balance was quite accurate.
Leeds had recently opened an electronic 'Account Link' for The Princeton Tory, Inc. When the access was granted, though, he discovered that he had access not only to the Tory's funds, which number in the thousands, but over nine million dollars of Princeton University's money.
Leeds immediately requested that the Tory's online access be directly terminated, so the student journal would not be liable for future transactions. The bank did not immediately process his request, and he continued to be able to access the account for at least a day.
Leeds then called the Tory's Publisher, sophomore John Andrews. Agreeing that this error needed immediate rectification, Andrews expressed dismay that Princeton's administration would be so careless as to allow student groups to access the University's wealth.
"Their negligence is appalling," he said. "Nobody's donation, or tuition, or retirement savings, or research grant is safe. Who wants to have their money where strangers could easily transfer it to an offshore account? Not everybody would do the right thing in our situation," he said. "But I'm proud of Ira and the way he embodies the Tory's character and high ethical standards."
According to Andrews, preliminary findings suggest that a University official inadvertently gave The Princeton Tory incorrect tax information listing Princeton University's taxpayer identification number rather than the Tory's.
Andrews explained, "The taxpayer ID number is like a Social Security Number - it gives you control of the account. Princeton ought to have been more careful with this information. We assumed that the University knew what it was doing when it gave us our number."
This information lay dormant for years, until the Tory staff attempted to use it to access the Tory's own account, but instead gained access to fifteen University accounts, with a ledger balance of $9,900,693.61. An electronic copy of the Tory's balance statement, reflecting the acquisition of the University's ten million dollars, is available from the Tory's official website: www.princetontory.com.
Leeds and Andrews consulted the Trustees of The Princeton Tory, Inc., four of whom are attorneys. Under their Trustees'advice, the two young men then notified President Tilghman and Provost Gutman of the problem.
"We used email, because it's prudent to document your intentions," Leeds said.
University administrators are currently examining the matter.
Published at least six times per academic year, The Princeton Tory is a student-produced magazine of conservative and moderate political thought. A recent survey of students conducted by the administration found that the Tory is the most-read political publication on campus. It currently receives no funding from the University - except by accident.
For further information, contact:
Amy Gutman, Provost, Princeton University
(609) 258-3026
Shirley Tilghman, President, Princeton University
(609) 258-6100
John Andrews, Publisher, The Princeton Tory
(609) 986-8880
Ira Leeds, Financial Manager, The Princeton Tory
(609) 986-9425
Kathleen Deignan, Dean of Undergraduate Students
(609) 258-5431
RE: STORMING Parkhurst
Mean-Spirited, Cruel and Ugly?--We are not.
One conservative figure I know has recommended staging false Leftist events. That is, putting up posters for protest marches starting on cold early mornings (say, 6:00am?) at remote locations (Hanover High far enough?) and then not showing.
One conservative figure I know has recommended staging false Leftist events. That is, putting up posters for protest marches starting on cold early mornings (say, 6:00am?) at remote locations (Hanover High far enough?) and then not showing.
Should I write back...
"Are you HOMOSEXUAL?"
>Date: 04 Mar 2003 07:32:23 EST
>From: Yovany Jerez
>Reply-To: El Martiano
>Subject: Are you WHITE ???
>To: (Recipient list suppressed)
Come and discuss "white identity" today at NOON -1pm
at the
Tucker Foundation Lounge.
FREE LUNCH will be provided.
"What Matters to me and Why?
w/ Prof. Lively
Sociology Department
>Date: 04 Mar 2003 07:32:23 EST
>From: Yovany Jerez
>Reply-To: El Martiano
>Subject: Are you WHITE ???
>To: (Recipient list suppressed)
Come and discuss "white identity" today at NOON -1pm
at the
Tucker Foundation Lounge.
FREE LUNCH will be provided.
"What Matters to me and Why?
w/ Prof. Lively
Sociology Department
Clown Car
I have long been urging folks at the Free Press to get a sense of humor. It seems their pals at Why War have beaten them to it -- but at least one Free Presser's tight lips have begun to curl into a Grinchy smile.
Clint Hendler notes with girlish delight that "someone over at Why War sent out a gem of a prank blitz with a repressed recipient list to a few select dartloggers. The blitz concerns a false occupation of Parkhurst to pressure the school to take a position against a possible war with Iraq�They ought to be wiping the egg off their faces." Chee! Now if that ain't a corker!
So, is it time to push the baby birds out of the nest? Well, yes and no. The good news is that they're loosening up a bit. The bad news is that they still don't seem to get it. Yes, the prank was an expert piece of self-parody, but it's hard to see why us 'loggers should be embarrassed for assuming it was the Real McCoy.
Never before has this Laffy Taffy riddle seemed so pertinent:
Q. Doesn't Dartlog's credulity suggest that the anti-war movement (having by now pissed every drop of its credibility into the wind) is seen as capable of pretty much any meaningless, self-aggrandizing publicity stunt?
A. Yes. Also, Clint Hendler sounds like a ninety year-old man when he gets excited.
Clint Hendler notes with girlish delight that "someone over at Why War sent out a gem of a prank blitz with a repressed recipient list to a few select dartloggers. The blitz concerns a false occupation of Parkhurst to pressure the school to take a position against a possible war with Iraq�They ought to be wiping the egg off their faces." Chee! Now if that ain't a corker!
So, is it time to push the baby birds out of the nest? Well, yes and no. The good news is that they're loosening up a bit. The bad news is that they still don't seem to get it. Yes, the prank was an expert piece of self-parody, but it's hard to see why us 'loggers should be embarrassed for assuming it was the Real McCoy.
Never before has this Laffy Taffy riddle seemed so pertinent:
Q. Doesn't Dartlog's credulity suggest that the anti-war movement (having by now pissed every drop of its credibility into the wind) is seen as capable of pretty much any meaningless, self-aggrandizing publicity stunt?
A. Yes. Also, Clint Hendler sounds like a ninety year-old man when he gets excited.
Funny kids
According to our pal Clint Hendler at Free Dartmouth, the blitz referred to below is a prank. Seems the jokers at Why War have a sense of humor after all.
Clint, brother, I'm glad you got the inside scoop this time. The last one about the Review office, well...it made you look pretty foolish.
Clint, brother, I'm glad you got the inside scoop this time. The last one about the Review office, well...it made you look pretty foolish.
Monday, March 03, 2003
Well Done Gorsche!
It seems the esteemed co-editor of our Dartmouth Review has justified the paper's fine reputation for getting news out first. We did it with the Zantop murders, and we're doing it now -- less than thirty minutes after the email was released.
It'll be a few more bong rounds before the Freepers even get around to reading about it -- on Dartlog, of course.
Wah-Hoo-Wah for Gorsche, the Review, Dartlog, and the idiot lefties who give us fodder.
It'll be a few more bong rounds before the Freepers even get around to reading about it -- on Dartlog, of course.
Wah-Hoo-Wah for Gorsche, the Review, Dartlog, and the idiot lefties who give us fodder.
STORMING PARKHURST
I know posting personal e-mails is generally Talcott's domain, but under such circumstances:
Date: 03 Mar 2003 21:45:59 EST
From: Why War
Subject: heads up
To: (Recipient list suppressed)
We have been pressuring the college and SA to take a stance against the war for some time now. It is becoming more and more clear that, despite agreeing with us, that they will not stand up for what they believe. So we are going to up the pressure a little. We need 10 volunteers to help take over Parkhurst. I know finals are coming up, but once we're barracaded in you'll have time to do your studying. We will succeed and I want to stress that this is going to be 100% peaceful. We will not fight back in any way. If you volunteer chances are you will get arrested, but you'll be out on 60-100$ bail in no time. Please respond if you are interested. If this is going to happen we need to get moving on it.
peace
Date: 03 Mar 2003 21:45:59 EST
From: Why War
Subject: heads up
To: (Recipient list suppressed)
We have been pressuring the college and SA to take a stance against the war for some time now. It is becoming more and more clear that, despite agreeing with us, that they will not stand up for what they believe. So we are going to up the pressure a little. We need 10 volunteers to help take over Parkhurst. I know finals are coming up, but once we're barracaded in you'll have time to do your studying. We will succeed and I want to stress that this is going to be 100% peaceful. We will not fight back in any way. If you volunteer chances are you will get arrested, but you'll be out on 60-100$ bail in no time. Please respond if you are interested. If this is going to happen we need to get moving on it.
peace
Donna Strange
Listed in DND as of the Forsensic Union, Donna Strange urges:
>Date: 03 Mar 2003 21:29:53 EST
>From: Donna L. Strange
>Subject: Please Vote
>To:
HELP HANOVER STUDENTS FIND THEIR VOICES
A group of passionate high school students need you to vote for warrant articles 12, 13 and 14 on Tuesday March 4th!
The Hanover High Mission statement, approved by the School board, the staff and the representatives of the student body, says that it wants to improve the minds,
hearts and voices of their students. A debate class and team was created 3
years ago and has been funded through private grants and mostly by the parents
of the students involved. These funds have dried up, parents can't afford to continue to pay for this program, and the students need support from the public so they can
spend time debating and not finding the money in order to debate. It is time
that Hanover pays its fair share to support a program that has the support of
over 60 students.
These students have spent the past year going to school board meetings, and working within the system to try to achieve their goals. THESE WARRANT ARTICLES ARE THE LAST CHANCE THESE STUDENTS HAVE TO ACHIEVE FUNDING FOR THEIR PROGRAM. Debate trains active citizens. Without your active participation, their voices could be silenced.
As residents of Hanover, you can go to the Richmond Middle School (which is connected to the high school) between 7am and 7pm and vote. All you need is a picture ID and proof that you are a Dartmouth student and you can register at the polls.
If you want more background or have any questions, please feel free to email donna.strange@dartmouth.edu. Please spread the word to anyone who you know may be able to vote in Hanover or Norwich.
>Date: 03 Mar 2003 21:29:53 EST
>From: Donna L. Strange
>Subject: Please Vote
>To:
HELP HANOVER STUDENTS FIND THEIR VOICES
A group of passionate high school students need you to vote for warrant articles 12, 13 and 14 on Tuesday March 4th!
The Hanover High Mission statement, approved by the School board, the staff and the representatives of the student body, says that it wants to improve the minds,
hearts and voices of their students. A debate class and team was created 3
years ago and has been funded through private grants and mostly by the parents
of the students involved. These funds have dried up, parents can't afford to continue to pay for this program, and the students need support from the public so they can
spend time debating and not finding the money in order to debate. It is time
that Hanover pays its fair share to support a program that has the support of
over 60 students.
These students have spent the past year going to school board meetings, and working within the system to try to achieve their goals. THESE WARRANT ARTICLES ARE THE LAST CHANCE THESE STUDENTS HAVE TO ACHIEVE FUNDING FOR THEIR PROGRAM. Debate trains active citizens. Without your active participation, their voices could be silenced.
As residents of Hanover, you can go to the Richmond Middle School (which is connected to the high school) between 7am and 7pm and vote. All you need is a picture ID and proof that you are a Dartmouth student and you can register at the polls.
If you want more background or have any questions, please feel free to email donna.strange@dartmouth.edu. Please spread the word to anyone who you know may be able to vote in Hanover or Norwich.
Sunday, March 02, 2003
Dartmouth beats Union, earns 3rd place finish
Dartmouth entered the night needing at least a tie to clinch 4th, while still holding an outside shot at third place. Everything broke Dartmoth's way, and the team ended up with its best regular season record since 1980, the last time they made the NCAA Tournament. Dartmouth (17-11-1, 13-9-0) took down Union 2-1 at Achilles Rink on Saturday, and in the process claimed 3rd place in the ECAC Standings after Cornell defeated Yale 3-0. Jarrett Sampson got Dartmouth's first goal, and Lee Stempniak got the game winner 4:14 into the 3rd period, his 40th point of the year. Dartmouth hadn't had a 40-point scorer in 10 years, and now has two of them in Stempniak and Hugh Jessiman, who leads the team with 41 points. Nick Boucher made 33 saves on 34 shots to earn the victory.
Dartmouth will be off next weekend as the ECAC playoffs get underway. They'll host a quarterfinals series the following weekend, starting March 14th at Thompson Arena. Game two will be Saturday the 15th, and game three if necessary Sunday the 16th. All games will start at 7:00 EST. And yes, it does suck because Spring Break starts on the 14th and thus there will be little to no student presence at the games.
The Conference Semis and Finals will be March 21st and 22nd at the Pepsi Arena in Albany, NY and will be televised on NESN and YES. The winner receives an automatic berth into the NCAA tournament.
Friday: Dartmouth 7 at Rensselaer 1
Box Score
Game Recap
Saturday: Dartmouth 2 at Union 1
Box Score
Game Recap
Regular Season Stats:
Final ECAC Standings
Team Statistics
Dartmouth will be off next weekend as the ECAC playoffs get underway. They'll host a quarterfinals series the following weekend, starting March 14th at Thompson Arena. Game two will be Saturday the 15th, and game three if necessary Sunday the 16th. All games will start at 7:00 EST. And yes, it does suck because Spring Break starts on the 14th and thus there will be little to no student presence at the games.
The Conference Semis and Finals will be March 21st and 22nd at the Pepsi Arena in Albany, NY and will be televised on NESN and YES. The winner receives an automatic berth into the NCAA tournament.
Friday: Dartmouth 7 at Rensselaer 1
Box Score
Game Recap
Saturday: Dartmouth 2 at Union 1
Box Score
Game Recap
Regular Season Stats:
Final ECAC Standings
Team Statistics
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