mqking the band - The Georgetown Voice

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VOICE
the georgetown
0
GU ANNOUNCES
CAPITAL CAMPAIGN
PAGE 4
WOMEN’S SOCCER
INTO BIG EAST SEMIS
PAGE 6
CRUMBS, CRUMBS,
YUMZ
PAGE 11
Georgetown University’s Weekly Newsmagazine Since 1969 w November 3, 2011 w Volume 45, Issue 11 w georgetownvoice.com
mqking the band
2 the georgetown voice
november 3, 2011
Voice Crossword “Looks Can Be Deceiving” by Tyler Pierce
Across
1. Internet sensation Black
8. Writer of “In Cold Blood”
14. High energy type of exercise
15. Spill one’s guts
16. Perform a business operation
18. Harangue
19. Sounds from an a capella
background
21. Strike down from heaven
22. Bi, di, or in follower
25. The Amish, for example
27. Eye part
28. One of a dueling pair from
“Deliverance”
30. They are supposed to be out
of Iraq by the end of the year
32. Pop the top off of
33. Super continent
36. ___ and Gabbana
37. Madam’s partner
38. Option at Chipotle
40. Sensory preceptors
42. Take advantage of, as
privileges
43. A young girl in Spanish class?
45. More sneaky
46. Length x width
49. Apple product
50. Aristotle’s “H”
51. Units of electrical potential
53. They may be split or loose
55. Stays up for
57. “Most ___ Bachelor”
63. Start a trip
64. Prophet whose name means
“God will strengthen”
65. Hip
66. Like some scenes
Down
1. Snitch
2. Always, to Shakespeare
answers at georgetownvoice.com
3. It’s there for support
4. Time piece?
5. NCIS network
6. “Ta-Ta!”
7. Synonym for 18- Across
8. It’s corny
9. “Planet of the ___”
10. “If there is no God, everything is ___,” quote from a Dostoevsky work
11. Live
12. Together, on a score
13. Pointless weapon?
17. Theme of this Crossword
20. Grimace
22. List of official Bible books
23. Remus or Sam, for example
24. Sudden outburst
26. Rocky precipice
28. Type of brewski
29. Wagner work
31. Fritas preceder
34. Indigenous Canadian
35. On a boat
37. Pick off
39. “Star Spangled Banner”
contraction
41. Clandestine maritime org.
44. Bewildered
46. Pirate’s attention getter
47. Coxswain addressee
48. Cheer up
52. Two-by-four, sometimes
54. It doesn’t matter
56. Pigs digs
58. Do goo
59. Liked in the 50’s
60. An anxious person might be
chomping at it
61. Comic pioneer Stan
62. Antiquity, in antiquity
classifieds
Looking for a caring nanny,
someone very kind who loves children.
I will pay $710 per week and get you one car
The boy is friendly and playful with anyone
Contact: [email protected]
editorial
georgetownvoice.com
VOICE
the georgetown
Volume 45.11
November 3, 2011
Editor-in-Chief: Tim Shine
Managing Editor: Sean Quigley
Blog Editor: Leigh Finnegan
News Editor: Holly Tao
Sports Editor: Daniel Kellner
Feature Editor: Kara Brandeisky
Cover Editor: Iris Kim
Leisure Editor: John Sapunor
Voices Editor: Kate Imel
Photo Editor: Max Blodgett
Design Editors: Catherine Johnson,
Kathleen Soriano-Taylor
Projects Editor: Rob Sapunor
Crossword Editor: Scott Fligor
Assistant Blog Editor: Ryan Bellmore
Assistant News Editor: Neha Ghanshamdas
Assistant Sports Editors: Abby Sherburne, Kevin Joseph
Assistant Leisure Editors: Mary Borowiec,
Heather Regen
Assistant Photo Editors: Julianne Deno,
Matthew Funk
Contributing Editor: Nico Dodd
Staff Writers:
Nick Berti, Geoffrey Bible, Rachel Calvert, Mary Cass, Patricia
Cipollitti, Jane Conroy, Emma Forster, Julia Lloyd-George, Kirill Makarenko, Morgan Manger, Kelsey McCullough, Vanya Mehta, Sadaf
Qureshi, Adam Rosenfeld, Jake Schindler, Melissa Sullivan
Staff Photographers:
Sam Brothers, Richard De La Paz, Abby Greene, Lucia He, Kirill
Makarenko, Tim Markatos, Jackson Perry
Staff Designer:
Julia Kwon
Copy Chief: Aodhan Beirne
Copy Editors:
Connor Jones, Claire McDaniel, Jordan Moenly, Neil Saad, Kim
Tay, Chris Yamada
Editorial Board Chair: Jackson Perry
Editorial Board:
Gavin Bade, Tiffany Brown, Rachel Calvert, Ethan Chess, Julia
Jester, Sean Quigley, Julia Tanaka, J. Galen Weber
Head of Business: Keaton Hoffman
The Georgetown Voice
The Georgetown Voice is published every Thursday.
the georgetown voice 3
FOR GENERATIONS TO COME
Sky is the limit for the capital campaign
Last Friday, the University launched
“The Campaign for Georgetown: For Generations to Come,” a $1.5 billion fundraising initiative aimed at comprehensively
improving life on the Hilltop. The campaign
is a necessary response to the needs of our
community and a notable exception to the
perceived inattention of the administration
to improving the undergraduate experience
in recent years.
If all is accomplished as planned, the
cash generated by the campaign promises
to cement Georgetown’s place as a first-rate
university. The campaign will not only improve the quality of undergraduate life, but
it also holds the potential to increase our
standing in comparative rankings with our
peer institutions. Most laudably, the campaign takes a large step toward guaranteeing every well-qualified student who applies to Georgetown the education he or she
deserves regardless of socioeconomic status.
The initiative aims to assist in improving four foundational aspects of the Georgetown undergraduate experience. It allots
$500 million to fund new scholarships, $500
million for investment in faculty expansion
and endowment, $200 million for expansion
and renovation of student activity centers,
and $300 million for future transformational
projects, similar to the creation of SFS-Qatar.
Georgetown also deserves praise for its
confident promotion of the largest financial campaign in the University’s history.
Because our endowment is currently just
above $1 billion, remaining competitive
with peer institutions through persistent expansion and renovation requires a massive
fundraising campaign.
The campaign has also enabled current
students to interact with a wide range of famous alumni and other guests. Notable visitors within the last week range from former
President Bill Clinton (SFS ’68) to his class-
mate Saudi Prince Turki al-Faisal (SFS ’68) to
former NFL Commissioner Paul Tagliabue
(COL ’62). This diverse group of distinguished and popular speakers stands as a
reminder of the distinct academic culture
and intellectual spirit Georgetown is asking
investors to sustain with their donations.
Georgetown’s alumni and supporters
are stepping up. The campaign has already
accrued $775 million of its $1.5 billion goal
since the beginning of its “quiet phase” in
2006. If and when the campaign reaches its
goal, the funds generated promise not only
to sustain the Georgetown legacy, but also
to touch our community in ways that cannot be done without the help of generous
donors.
In the last several years, the administration has often faced withering criticism
for its actions and inactions on the Hilltop.
The Campaign for Georgetown is a mission,
however, that we can all rally around.
DECKCHAIRS ON THE TITANIC
SAC reforms are just more of the same
This week, the Student Activities
Commission launched its latest club funding structure, called the Comprehensive
Budget System. Though SAC Chair Andrew Koenig (COL ’12) called it a “fundamental departure from the ‘programming
arc’ system of financial allocation, as well
as a significant change in the way SAC
approves organization events and operations,” the new system is neither a departure from the previous, flawed system nor
a significant change in SAC’s labyrinthine
bureaucracy.
Although it is laudable that SAC recognized that its initial programming arc
structure required scrapping, student
groups will find that little has changed
from the old, widely disliked system.
There is a difference between correcting
an obvious flaw in the previous system
and fundamentally changing the overall
funding process.
This reform is a recipe for continued
discontent with SAC as an institution,
and it will not be surprising if a Commission chair a year or two down the road
will be hailing a new system as a fundamental departure from the Comprehensive Budget System. Until the Commission gets serious about creating a truly
new system, complaints will continue.
The most meaningful change is still a
minor one: a shift from yearly programming arc submissions to semesterly budget allocations for all SAC groups. For an
entire weekend each semester, every SAC
group will present their plans for the next
semester in front of the Commission at a
“Budget Summit.” Although this shift
will give groups greater flexibility in
event planning, it will also force student
leaders to sacrifice two weekends every
year to defending their budgets in front
of students that will be just as exhausted
from midterms as they are.
The few minor improvements in the
new system, such as reforms to travel
funding and a shift to electronic approval
of routine events, don’t address the underlying issue: a massive bureaucracy
that drowns club leaders in paperwork
and arbitrary rules. Ultimately, the welcome changes don’t affect the overall
relationship between SAC and its organizations.
The idea of SAC reform is an excellent
one, but somehow reforms are never as
transformative as their lofty names or the
fanfare that accompanies them may make
it appear. Efforts to improve SAC must
focus squarely on the causes of bureaucratic overload and better integrate student complaints into the Commission’s
routine. For the sake of the clubs who are
its constituents, the Commission must not
think its era of reform is over.
TO CATCH A PARASITE
This newspaper was made possible with the support of Campus
Progress, a project of the Center for American Progress, online
at CampusProgress.org. Campus Progress works to help young
people — advocates, activists, journalists, artists — make their
voices heard on issues that matter. Learn more at CampusProgress.org.
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On this week’s cover: Battle of the Band
Illustration: Iris Kim
Anti-piracy effort crushes Internet freedom
Last Wednesday, the Chairman of the
Judiciary Committee of the House of Representatives, Lamar Smith (R-Texas), introduced the E-PARASITE Act, a measure that
will shackle innovation and freedom on the
Internet in an attempt to stop piracy.
The proposed legislation, which features
even more aggressive policies than those
contained in the Senate’s already controversial Protect IP Act, has caused widespread
outrage in online communities. The measure
seeks to give the federal government excessive legal power on the Internet, allowing it
to shut down websites almost as it pleases
based on ambiguous anti-piracy clauses.
Certainly, a productive economic system
must protect intellectual property, which is
necessary to incentivize continued innovation by companies and entrepreneurs. However, this bill’s blatant shift of authority from
the courts to the Justice Department is suggestive of the legislation’s corporate backing.
It is disappointing yet unsurprising that the
bipartisan group behind the bill is attempting to enact all of the entertainment industry’s legal fantasies into law.
Though the act claims to protect users
from “notorious infringers,” it functionally
empowers corporations to pressure the government to unilaterally block any content by
websites that purportedly violate intellectual
property rights. Any foreign website that
the Attorney General deems as infringing of
intellectual property rights can instantly be
blocked by the federal government without
any hearing. Bypassing the courts, the legislation would empower a political appointee to
be the entertainment industry’s hatchet man,
cutting down whatever nascent websites or
technologies that those industries consider
threatening. With this act, corporate capture
of government proceeds even further.
However, corporations are not the only
ones that come out ahead in this battle. The
bill gives the government and its lawyers
the indiscriminate authority of identifying
and analyzing “notorious foreign infringers.” The same bureaucrats can then also
directly intervene and shut down the same
domains based on their own interpretations
of the new law. Censorship that ought to
remain an open legal process would take
place in a matter of seconds and with just
a few signatures from Justice Department
officials.
As we have seen, the Internet has been
a powerful force for good in recent times—
especially in major democratic revolts in the
Arab world—and there is no reason to believe its importance will decrease. The web
is a great equalizer, offering an unparalleled
venue for people from all over the world
to communicate, share ideas and organize.
Building a firewall around America does
injustice to our democratic ideals. Congress
must scrap the E-PARASITE Act.
news
november 3, 2011
Capital campaign launches transformative programs
by Morgan Manger
Out of the $1.5 billion the
University looks to raise by
2016 as part of the Campaign
for Georgetown, $300 million
will go to the ambiguously titled
“transformative opportunities.”
Over the weekend, the University shed some light on what
this category is meant to entail,
releasing details for some of the
projects it could fund.
“A transformative opportunity first builds upon [the University’s] existing strength. Second, [it] allows us to advance
our mission,” R. Bartley Moore,
the Vice-President of the Office of Advancement, said. “The
max blodgett
Donors pledged $21 million last weekend during the campaign’s public launch.
third … is that eminence in the
area in question will enhance the
university’s ability to contribute
to the understanding and response to the most important issues that we confront as a global
community.” Before the quiet phase of the
campaign began in 2006, Georgetown departments were asked to
identify big ambitions that would
lead to transformative opportunities. Leaders of the campaign
chose a select few to support.
One such transformative opportunity program is the Berkley Center for Religion, Peace,
and World Affairs, led by Tom
Banchoff. The center was recently endowed with a $10 million
gift from campaign chair William Doyle as part of the Doyle
Engaging Difference Initiative,
established in 2009.
“The center supports teaching and student-led research
that engages issues of difference at the heart of the human
community—religious, cultural,
economic, ethnic, or other,” Banchoff wrote in an email.
According to Banchoff, the
center hopes to utilize this gift by
infusing themes of diversity into
many different classes already on
campus, as well as creating four
credit seminars that would include a research project. Another opportunity focuses
on environmental studies. According to Moore, it would build
upon the science core that the
University already possesses,
but would go beyond what most
other universities in the United
States are doing.
“Our assessments suggest
that no place has been really
good at promoting the multidisciplinary or integrated study of
the environment,” said Moore.
“We think that’s an opportunity
that if we were to seize and realize, would accomplish something here that no place else is
fully doing yet.”
Other areas that could receive funding include public
policy, global health, personalized cancer treatment, and
a transactional law clinic. An
anonymous donor recently gave
$5 million towards these transformative opportunities.
According to Moore, $778
million of the total $1.5 billion
had already been raised before
the public launch kick-off last
weekend. During the weekend,
the campaign received an additional $21 million in verbal
commitments, which will not
become official until the donor
signs a gift agreement.
The initiative was designed
to ensure that students had
the opportunity to be involved
in the campaign. All students
were welcome to the Afternoon of Ideas on Friday as
well as the reception Friday
evening. A small group of students also attended at a gala at
the National Portrait Gallery
on Saturday.
Mike Meaney (SFS ’12), the
president of the Georgetown
University Student Association,
gave a toast at the Friday reception and attended the gala.
“It represents a inflection
point in the trajectory of Georgetown,” Meaney said. “The financial footing that [this campaign]
will put us on will allow us to
continue to do all the extraordinary work we currently do
along with expanding upon that
work.”
Colton Malkerson (COL
‘13), a member of the GUSA
FinApp Committee who was
involved in choosing the solar panel project, said that
Georgetown Energy submitted
“a very thorough proposal.
[There were] no financial or
other concerns with the proposal.”
According to Peter Nulsen,
the panels will have paid for
themselves in 11 years.
“Solar energy is projected
to generate enough to cover
30 percent of the house’s electric bills,” he said. “The energy savings are then directed right back to the student
body, through a fund operated by students, for students.
At our current estimates, students will earn a minimum of
$1,000 in the first month and
each month thereafter for 20
years.”
By year 2020, the group
projects that the solar panels
will have earned the University
$234,000, all of which will be
put into the GUSA fund to be
used on more projects to benefit
students.
The project leaders see this as
more than just an opportunity to
make Georgetown greener. They
also believe that it will be something that can be utilized in many
different disciplines that students study. For example, science
students can learn the mechanics behind the panels, or School
of Foreign Studies students can
make comparisons to application
of solar energy in China.
“I think how we use energy,
and how we use our natural resources will be one of the largest challenges our generation
will face,” Peter Nulsen said.
“Solar panels on University
townhouses is one tangible step
into our energy future.”
GU townhouse solar panel project to move forward
by Morgan Manger
The student group Georgetown Energy is currently working on an effort to place solar
panels on a selection of University townhouses, a project
which would be the largest student-funded solar project in the
world if it is completed the way
it was envisioned, the group’s
cofounder and CEO David
Nulsen (SFS ‘12) said.
The leaders of Georgetown
Energy are meeting with members of the Georgetown administration today to discuss final
details of the project, including
whether to put panels on all
townhouses at once or to start
with a pilot program. They believe that the administration
will approve the program, although they will not know for
sure until after the meeting.
The group is “nearing the
completion of the working
group and contract negotiations with a chosen solar vendor before a referendum in
early December.” Nulsen wrote
in a follow-up email. “The referendum will give students the
opportunity to formally release
the money to the solar project.”
In order for the student referendum to pass, at least 2,000
students must vote in favor of
the project.
“When [co-founder] Anthony [Conyers] and I walked
by the ICC, we asked, ‘What’s
the deal with those panels?’
We found out the 25-year-old
panels operated at less than
33 percent productivity,” Peter
Nulsen (SFS ‘12) said. “We saw
the energy IQ of our classmates
as a huge area for growth. So we
decided let’s do some research
and find a way we can help
Georgetown morph into a green
university.”
When the group learned
of the $3.4 million of Student
Activities Fee Endowment
available for student projects
they decided to pursue a portion of the money in order to
fund their initiative. They proposed building solar panels on
43 townhouse roofs at a cost
of $163,399. Last March, the
group learned that they had
been selected as one of two finalists to receive funding.
Julian De La Paz
Georgetown Energy leads the biggest student-funded solar project in the world.
news
georgetownvoice.com
Grieg against Evans for ANC chair, supported by GU students
by Rachel Calvert
Fiona Grieg, a Democratic candidate for the Ward 2 City Council seat
challenging incumbent Jack Evans,
recently established the non-partisan
Students for Fiona working group.
Composed of Georgetown students,
the group aims to increase student
voter registration this semester, in anticipation of next April’s election.
“In the spring, [the Students for
Fiona group] will be focused on creating action plans for everyone involved, making sure people know
where to vote, when to vote, how to
vote, and then the reasons why to
vote,” the group’s co-captain Craig
Cassey (COL ‘15) said.
By the numbers, mobilizing student voters can potentially have a
very tangible impact at the polls, cocaptain Ash Das (COL ‘15) said. In
2005, Evans defeated his opponent,
Carrie Sullivan, by 1500 votes.
Although students may register in
the District for the April City Council
elections and transfer their registration
for the 2012 federal elections, Cassey
recommends that students register
permanently in the District.
“Although we can appreciate someone’s interest in their own local elections
and the problems at hand there, we feel
that this is more important to the Georgetown community,” he said.
With the 2012 presidential and
congressional elections on the horizon, Cassey and Das acknowledge
the potential difficulties of convincing
students to register in the District.
“I think knowing what is at stake
in this current election in Ward 2 for
Fiona and for students here [will increase motivation],” Cassey said.
To Cassey, one of the more salient of
these issues is the neighborhood debate
surrounding the 2010 campus plan.
Every 10 years, all District universities must file a campus plan with
D.C.’s Zoning Commission detailing
their plans for growth and development. The University’s 2010 campus
plan has heightened debate between
the University and its neighbors over
issues like off-campus housing.
In May, D.C.’s Office of Planning released a report recommending the University house 90 percent
of its students on campus by 2015,
and all of them by 2016. The report
also suggested that the University
should accept a legal limit on enrollment.
Evans, who has served on the
Council since 1991, is a consistent
critic of the University’s campus
plan. Like the Burleith Citizens Association and the Citizens Association of
Georgetown, Evans feels the University should move to house 100 percent
of students on campus.
“Even if students who live offcampus in our neighborhood are well
behaved, it is too much of a strain on
residents,” Evans wrote in his Jan. 26
column in The Georgetowner. Unlike
her opponent, Grieg said it would be
infeasible for the University to house
all of its students.
“I do believe students should be
able to live off campus. It’s unsustain-
A campaign for all students
Images of the doors of Georgetown’s iconic buildings have become omnipresent on campus
in the past few weeks due to the
kickoff of the University’s capital
campaign, “For Generations to
Come: The Campaign for Georgetown.” They have supplanted the
blue “Spirit of Georgetown” banners typically bound to the light
poles and mounted on the face
of the Intercultural Center building. It’s hard to walk anywhere
on campus without seeing something about it.
The 10-year campaign has an
ambitious, but achievable, goal of
raising $1.5 billion by 2016. Since
it began with its quiet phase in
July 2006, the initiative hit its
halfway point prior to the festivities of the formal kickoff this past
weekend.
With a capital campaign
comes the inevitable task of asking everyone—including current
students and parents—to contribute to the campaign in addition
to paying for tuition. Undoubtedly students and parents will
dread this. No one wants to be
asked for more money on top of
the already high cost of tuition to
attend Georgetown.
But is this campaign worth it?
Absolutely.
The University—like many
other Catholic colleges and
universities across the nation—
only began major fundraising in
the 1970s. This, among several
other factors, has put Georgetown behind its peers in terms
of our endowment, which hovers around $1 billion. The Campaign for Georgetown will help
able for a growing institution to be
required to house all its students on
campus,” she said. “Students should
have a choice.”
Cassey said the neighborhood’s
demands would diminish the quality
of on-campus student life.
“That means the funds currently
devoted to future athletic centers and
religious centers to be built will have
to be reallocated,” he said.
Grieg said the University plays a
valuable role in the District, as a job
creator and a cultural center. “I don’t
think we should be penalizing it for
its desire or ability to grow,” she said.
According to Grieg, the University should make more substantial
efforts to diminish the tension caused
by off-campus parties.
“The University does need to
play a much more active role in creating more spaces for students to
socialize on campus,” she said. “A
restaurant-slash-bar, a community
hangout on campus, would go a long
way towards that.”
She also recommended that the
University more closely monitor offcampus parties. “You should have to
register these parties, and the same
rules should apply to on-campus and
off-campus parties,” she said.
She said this mechanism would
allow the University to follow up
more effectively on noise complaints, as well as tracking partyto-complaint ratios from month to
month. “Much more proactive oversight of activity off-campus would
help the University track its own
to increase the University’s
paltry endowment, an essential
factor for continuing to have a
quality institution. Having an
endowment is a key way for a
university to ensure its continued financial stability.
The endowment is not the
only aspect that the campaign
Saxa Politica
by Geoffrey Bible
A bi-weekly column on
campus news and politics
will help. The campaign also
seeks to expand the amount of
scholarships that the University
can offer. Offering more needbased scholarships allows for the
University to continue attracting
the best and brightest students
from around the country, regardless of their socioeconomic
status. Not only will this create
more diversity in our communi-
progress and defend itself against
complaints it gets from neighbors
off campus,” she said.
In addition to connecting with
students, Grieg has been in touch with
neighborhood associations about issues like the campus plan, saying
she is aware of student sentiment on
neighborhood issues and that her
platform generally aligns with student interests.
“My platform is about good, clean
government, creating a sustainable
city, and it’s about education,” Grieg
said. “Residents of all kind want to be
proud of their local government, and
right now the City Council is in its
darkest hour in terms of ethical issues.”
According to Grieg, students
can benefit from the smart growth
policies she would advocate from
her position on the City Council.
She supports extending street car
tracks across the city and establishing dedicated bus lanes on hightraffic corridors and improving the
city’s bike lanes.
“I want to see dedicated bike
lanes so that not only daredevils can
bike across town, so even my daughter can eventually bike across town,”
she said.
Grieg said her central goal in negotiating future campus plans would
be a compromise between neighbors
and the University.
“That’s the kind of leader I am,”
she said. “Someone who’s a great
listener and who seeks common
ground.”
guPRogReSSiVe.Com
Fiona Grieg believes Georgetown students should be able to live off campus.
ty, but it will also allow our University community to expand
to places where it currently has
little presence.
The campaign also plans to
allocate $500 million toward faculty and research. This is a crucial element of the plan, and any
student should be able to realize
its importance. The esteemed
faculty at Georgetown certainly
played a role in the decision to
come here for many students.
Continuing Georgetown’s tradition of having excellent professors will allow for the University
to thrive in to the future.
While it may be easy for us, as
students, to pass this off as something not for us to be concerned
with, that’s a silly attitude to have.
Even if we do not realize it, every
single student on this campus is
affected in one way or another
by the money raised by the Campaign for Georgetown, whether
it is from the $1 million given by
Board of Directors Chairman Paul
Tagliabue (COL ’62) for an LGBTQ student life initiative, the $5
million given to further support
the Berkley Center, or the countless donations to further Georgetown athletics. No student is left
unaffected by this campaign.
It may get annoying receiving countless Phonathon calls
and letters from the Office of
Advancement about the Campaign for Georgetown, but
the long-term effects of this
endeavor make the campaign
entirely worth it. Supporting
this campaign will truly allow
us to preserve and improve
our alma mater for generations to come.
Let Geoffrey know what you
think about the University’s growing endowment at [email protected]
sports
november 3, 2011
Hoyas slam Syracuse, through to Big East semis
by Abby Sherburne
Beating the same team twice
in a season isn’t easy, especially
when that team is your archrival.
But the Georgetown women’s
soccer team managed just that,
defeating Syracuse 3-1 on Sunday
to secure a spot in the Big East
Tournament semifinals.
While the Hoyas (15-5, 8-3 Big
East) are excited to be heading
to their first semifinal since 2007,
they still have a lot to work on
before facing West Virginia on Friday. However, head coach Dave
Nolan’s focus is directed more towards correcting his squad’s mistakes against the Orange rather
than scheming for a talented West
Virginia team.
“I just don’t think we played
well [in the Syracuse game],”
Nolan said. “To be honest, probably the worst thing that could
have happened to us was scoring
so early.”
A mere 52 seconds into the
game, freshman Daphne Corboz
scored off the rebound of a saved
shot. Georgetown scored again
in the 19th minute with a clever
crossover in front of goal from
senior forward Camille Trujillo.
Still, Nolan was especially unimpressed with the Hoyas’ overall
effort in the first half.
“I felt the first half was our
worst performance of the year,”
he said. “I know they can do
better.”
In the second half, senior Ingrid Wells was able to guarantee
the win, calmly putting in a rebound from her own saved penalty to extend the lead. While the
Orange responded with a goal
in the 76th minute, the 3-1 lead
proved insurmountable.
Despite the Syracuse goal, Nolan was happier with his team’s
second half of play, but Wells
understands Nolan’s frustration
with the Hoyas play early.
“Scoring early ... is obviously
a good thing, but I think our mentality shifted, maybe not for the
best,” she said. “[We were] a little
too confident.”
Both Nolan and Wells, although disappointed with the
team’s overall play, were satiated
with the win.
“It wasn’t a pretty game at
all, and I don’t think we played
our best but we still got the win,”
Wells said. “That’s what good
teams do.”
The physicality of the Big
East matchup combined with
the muddy conditions on North
Kehoe Field resulted in a sloppy
game. Four yellow cards were issued to the Orange, and a red card
was issued to Syracuse midfielder
Tina Romagnuolo after she cursed
at an official in the 85th minute.
An incensed Romagnuolo shoved
Georgetown defender Alexandra
Bushman as she left the field, giving the Hoyas something extra to
think about until they next play
their rival.
“I don’t even know what just
happened,” Wells said minutes
after the incident. “I’m still taken
aback a little. I’ve never played in
a game like that. I just want to let
it go.”
However, with all that was at
stake in the game, she can understand that the Orange had nothing left to lose. Nolan agreed, citing frustration as the major reason
for the unsportsmanlike penalty.
“A better team would have
beaten us today,” he said. “Find
ways to perform and the results
will take care of themselves.”
The Hoyas will look to do
just that against West Virginia on
Friday. Although defeating Syra-
TIM MARKATOS
Camille Trujillo added to her team-leading goal tally, helping the Hoyas past ‘Cuse.
cuse likely assured Georgetown’s
invitation to the NCAA Tournament, the team should have
plenty of motivation to avenge
their earlier 3-1 loss to the No. 12
Mountaineers.
Still Nolan, usually a stickler
for his “one game at a time” mantra, can’t help but look ahead.
“The next step now is to
make the Big East Championship,” he said. “We’ve never
done that, and this is what we’ve
been doing as the year goes on,
just setting new goals. So maybe
we’ll go try and win the game
Friday night and see what happens Sunday.”
Winning
the
conference
could portend big things: last
year’s champion, Notre Dame,
went on to win the national
championship. But first comes
the Hoyas’ semifinal showdown
in Morgantown, where they’ll
look to acquire a team-record
16th win.
the Sports Sermon
“Then he looked me right in the eye and said, ‘I’m going to be the Will Smith of the NBA.’”
– Shaq discussing Kobe’s prophecies in his new book
fans still only care about the implications of realignment insofar as
they impact the Hoyas’ basketball
schedule and prestige. Thus, while
previous reports of inviting TCU,
Boise State, and the service academies to join as full members offered some semblance of stability,
there was a hesitance to get excited
about adding schools that would
be almost guaranteed basketball
duds every year.
The new conference plan, however, wants to add these schools
(minus TCU, which has since
joined the Big 12), as football playing members only. Meanwhile,
Houston, SMU, and UCF will be
leaving Conference USA to join the
Big East as full members, playing
both basketball and football.
Many fans will roll their eyes,
seeing this approach as more of
the same. We don’t need another
DePaul or USF; we need to replace
Big East to the immense Dallas
market and another recruiting hotIt has been a roller coaster few
bed. Entry into a major conference
months for the Big East conferlike the Big East could change their
ence, to say the least. New reports
fortunes with former North Carolithis week, however, indicate that
na coach Matt Doherty at the helm.
the Big East may finally be addHouston, meanwhile, is pering teams rather than subtracting
haps the most interesting addithem, sending invitations to Houstion. Most will have little recolton, Southern Methodist, and Cenlection of Houston as a relevant
tral Florida, as well as football-only
basketball program, but histoinvitations to Navy, Air Force, and
rians and connoisseurs of the
Boise State. While these programs
game will be eager to point out
may not be the sexy solution Big
consecutive NCAA Tournament
East fans were hoping for, they still
Finals appearances in 1983 and
have good reason to cheer up.
1984 (including a loss to GeorgeThe announcement that Pitt
town in the championship game)
and Syracuse would leave the Big
by the famous “Phi Slamma JamEast for the ACC sent shockwaves
ma” squads. Recent years have
throughout the conference’s basbeen tough for the program, but,
ketball community. West Virginia
with a legacy of five Final Four
reaffirmed this paranoia with its
appearances and several NBA
declaration of intent to join the
Hall of Fame alumni such as ElBig 12. Many naysayers and pesvin Hayes, Clyde Drexler, and
simists felt that losing three perenHakeem Olajuwon, the Cougars
nial powers would
are potentially a
Pete Rose Central
surely cripple the
sleeping giant for
conference, changing
the Big East.
Da bettin’ line
the face of the Big East
While none of
Dookies
Margin
forever, if not comthese programs are
Hoyas
pletely undoing it.
set to enter the Big
(underdogs)
(duh!)
(favorites)
But while the basEast framework as
B=ama
ketball implications
Tiger blood title favorites in the
LSU
of these departures
seasons,
Tebow
Hail mary coming
Media
dominated the minds
they are each loaded
Cardinals
Mucho dinero with potential in
Pujols
of Georgetown fans,
the real damage was done to Big three schools that account for four their own way. More importantly,
East football. The conference still of the last seven Big East Tourna- however, the Big East will almost
maintains an ample number of ment champions.
certainly persist through the requality basketball programs, but
Though it is unlikely that the alignment apocalypse. The Big
the football-playing members now proposed basketball replacements East can afford to lose some comtotal just five, surely not enough will live up to their predecessors petition in basketball anyway. The
to warrant an automatic BCS bid, anytime soon, they are far from real danger to the Hoyas was the
which is perhaps the most signifi- being as dismal as people suggest. uncertain existence of the confercant factor keeping the conference UCF, for example, started 14-0 last ence as an entity at all. If this plan
relevant in college football.
year, beating schools like Florida goes ahead successfully, the Hoyas
Adding these football-playing and Miami, before stunningly los- will still have Big East basketball,
members revitalizes the confer- ing eight straight games in a rather and that’s what really matters.
ence, providing replacements for Georgetown-esque collapse. Their
While the conference may
the departed teams in addition to location is also a bonus, setting up never be what we grew up with
assuring other potential detectors a potential rivalry with USF and or make any geographical sense
like Cincinnati and Louisville that growing the conference’s profile in whatsoever, no one can deny that
the Big East is here to stay.
a recruit-rich state.
competitively, the conference can
However, even with the necesFew will care about SMU’s still salvage its rich basketball herisity for stability in the conference’s 1956 Final Four banner, but the tage. Somehow, the future of the
football lineup, most Georgetown school’s presence does open the Big East looking up again.
by Daniel Kellner
sports
georgetownvoice.com
Men’s soccer preps for tourney
by Melissa Sullivan
After a successful regular season, the Georgetown men’s soccer
team has qualified for the Big East
Tournament and will begin with
a tough test at St. John’s tonight.
The Hoyas were given the sixth
seed in the tournament after a
posting a 10-4-4 record and going
5-3-1 in the Big East.
Georgetown faced stiff competition in the Big East regular
season, matching up against
nationally renowned programs
such as No. 4 Connecticut and
No. 18 Notre Dame. While they
struggled to win consistently at
home, they were defeated just
once in nine away appearances. Their resilience on the road
might come in handy, as the team
will be away from North Kehoe
Field from here on.
“It’s been a really good group
to work with,” head coach Brian
Weise said. “I think they are very
close and have an intangible quality to them. We’ve had a lot of interesting games.”
The Hoyas closed out their
regular season with an unexpected defeat to Providence. While
they battled hard against their
conference rival, they could not
overcome the Friars through difficult conditions of rain, snow,
and sleet.
Junior captain Tommy Muller,
however, has not lost faith in his
team’s potential in the postseason, despite their disappointing
defeat.
“We faced a lot of hardships
as far as conditions,” he said. “But
we feel confident in our ability
to win games and do well in the
postseason.”
Last season, Providence ended the Hoyas’ Big East run in the
quarterfinals after a frustrating
encounter. This year, the team
hopes for better progress leading
into the NCAA Tournament.
“We are going to attack it like
we usually do,” Muller said. “We
are going to go in confident that
we have the ability to win.”
Wiese is also optimistic and
believes the Big East is a much
TIM MARKATOS
Ian Christianson is optimistic about the Hoyas chances to make a postseason run.
The Passion of the Tebow
This past Sunday witnessed
one of the more lopsided encounters of the NFL season so far, as
the Detroit Lions battered quarterback Tim Tebow and the Denver
Broncos up and down the field all
afternoon. Not only did the Lions
win 45-10, they made Tebow look
simply atrocious.
“We knew all week that if we
brought any kind of defensive
pressure, he couldn’t do anything,” one Lions defender told
Yahoo! Sports. “In the second half
it got boring out there. We were
like, ‘Come on – that’s your quarterback? Seriously?’”
Such a sentiment was echoed
across ESPN, as analyst after analyst said Tebow would never be
successful. Merrill Hoge went as far
as to say Tebow was the worst quarterback he’d ever seen.
While it may seem that the entire sporting world has lost faith in
the polarizing quarterback, it is still
far too early to deem the Tebow
experiment a complete failure.
Though his style—light on throwing mechanics, heavy on God-given
grit and determination—is unconventional, he has not been given a
truly fair chance to succeed.
Tebow’s unfortunate descent
from college football immortality to
pro football futility began on draft
night, when the Broncos traded-up
to select him with the 25th overall
pick, generating unreasonable expectations.
Tebow became the immediate
hope of a franchise and city. But
tighter conference than records or
seeding would suggest.
“We have as good of a chance
of winning the league as anyone
else,” he said. “The distance between the top seed and the sixth
seed is almost nothing … I think
this team is a group that has an
innate self-confidence and that we
have a good chance of winning
[the tournament].”
While the Hoyas are excited
to start their league tournament,
they understand what this game
means to the future of the team.
St. John’s is a strong opponent,
earning a No. 3 seed. Georgetown
last played the Red Storm in 2009,
losing 2-0 away in New York.
This time around the game
will be crucial for the Hoyas’ extended postseason hopes as they
seek an invitation to the NCAA
Tournament.
“I think our next game is
a must win looking at getting
into the NCAA Tournament,”
said Muller. “We feel it is a
game we are intended and expected to win.”
Beyond reaching the Big East
semifinals at Red Bull Arena, the
Hoyas are set on progress in the
NCAAs, where they have unfinished business from last season.
Junior captain Ian Christianson is
looking to quench the bitter taste
lingering from last season’s unfortunate end, where they found
themselves losing on penalties
kicks in the second round to perennial powerhouse UNC after a
well-fought contest.
“We went out on a heartbreaker last year,” he said. “Looking at the bigger picture with the
NCAAs, we’d love to make a bigger run … It’d be great to build on
last year.”
With a win tonight, the Hoyas
will help secure that chance.
he was never going to be the next
John Elway, even if every break fell
his way.
Still, Tebow did have a fair
measure of success during his
rookie year, winning rookie-ofthe-week honors twice. Former
Broncos head coach Josh McDaniels used Tebow wisely, inserting him at the goal line and
Double Teamed
by Adam Rosenfeld
a rotating column on sports
in end of game situations that allowed the quarterback to get his
feet wet.
Unfortunately for Tebow, the
Broncos set a franchise record for
losses and McDaniels, Tebow’s
main supporter, was fired before
the season ended. The offseason
Football sets up title clash
by Kevin Joseph
In the midst of last weekend’s snow, the Georgetown
football team (7-2, 3-1 Patriot
League) defeated Holy Cross
for the second straight season
with a 19-6 victory. The Hoyas
won playing smash-mouth
football, rushing for 220 yards
and recovering five fumbles
on the afternoon.
Defensive end Andrew
Schaetzke led the charge with
two sacks and three tackles for
a loss and was named Patriot
League Defensive Player of
the Week. Head coach Kevin
Kelly continued his praise of
the senior, whom he often calls
the best defensive player in the
Patriot League.
“He’s a guy that people
have to scheme for,” Kelly
said. “We just try to get him
in the best possible position
to make plays and that’s
what he does.”
But for Schaetzke, the Patriot League leader in sacks
(9.5) and tackles for loss
(17.5), taking one step closer
to a Patriot League crown
was the real highlight of the
afternoon.
“The win is the most important thing,” he said. “We
played for a chance to play for
a Patriot League title and, despite the conditions, we played
a hard-nosed football game
and got it done. It just felt great
to be a part of this win.”
With two straight Patriot
League victories, the team
has set themselves up for a
chance to guarantee at least a
share of the Patriot League title with a win against Lehigh
on Nov. 12.
brought new management and an
uncertain future.
The new regime, unintentionally or perhaps intentionally, has not
put Tebow in a position to succeed.
New coach John Fox and team
president Elway made the correct
decision in placing Tebow third
on the depth chart out of training
camp despite strong public support
for Tebow from fans. However, after the team’s horrific 1-4 start, Fox
gave the fans what they wanted by
naming Tebow the starter during
the Broncos’ bye week.
During the Lions game, the
Denver coaching staff called plays
as if Tebow was Peyton Manning.
They consistently called for slowdeveloping passing plays—a recipe
for disaster against a stout defensive
line like the Lions’. It was as if the
coaching staff was trying to show
the fans why they didn’t start him.
Before that happens,
though, the Hoyas could be
facing a trap game against
the Fordham Rams on Senior
Day this Saturday at MultiSport Field. This year ’s
graduating class oversaw
the revival of the football
program from a winless 2009
season to a surprising 7-2
record this year. Kelly, has
a number of goals with this
weekend’s game.
“It’s our fourth home game
and we want to be undefeated
at home this year,” Kelly said.
“We want to have the seniors
go out a winner at home and
for me, the more you win the
more you have the momentum in your favor.”
Fordham comes into
the game with a 1-7 record,
though none of their Patriot
League contests count for the
league title, because the rams
offer athletic scholarships.
The Rams’ poor record may
be misleading, however, as
they scheduled several FBS
programs this season. Fordham will certainly be looking
to salvage some pride after
relinquishing 514 rushing
yards against Army in their
last game.
“Fordham will not be an
easy task,” Kelly said. “They
are a much better team than
their record would indicate.
They have had some injuries,
but they have as much talent
as anyone in this league, so
we know we will have our
hands full.”
Georgetown looks to double their win total from last
season with number eight on
Saturday. Kickoff is set for 1
p.m. at Multi-Sport Field.
Sure, Tebow was inaccurate
and indecisive, but such is to be
expected with a non-traditional
quarterback in only his fifth career start on a team with a serious
lack of talent. Tebow needs time
to develop and a system that caters to his unique skill set, taking
advantage of his mobility and
running power while masking
his inability to unleash the ball
downfield.
The Tebow experiment might
be close to over in Denver before
it was given a legitimate chance. It
seems everyone is focused on what
he is not, instead of what he is. He’s
certainly no Brady or Manning, but
he could be a legitimate threat in
some capacity in the NFL. He just
needs a fair chance.
Practice Tebowing with Adam at
[email protected]
feature
november 3, 2011
feature
georgetownvoice.com
A Band of Brothers:
Music at Georgetown
by John Sapunor
In Georgetown, even daytime house concerts attract police attention. Though a D.C.
noise ordinance gives officers
the right to arrest perpetrators
creating noise that is “likely to
annoy” anyone after 10 p.m.,
when student band Text Message played a daytime house
show, they still had multiple
run-ins with the Metropolitan
Police Department. Although
the police were unable to take
lawful action before 10 p.m.,
neighbors repeatedly called the
cops anyway. The band tried to
take it in stride.
“The police disturbances split
the show into three 20-minute
sets,” Mike Jaroski (COL ’14) said.
Georgetown isn’t a school
known for its music scene. Aside
from venues outside the Georgetown neighborhood, there are
only a handful of opportunities
for bands to play on campus every year. WGTB hosts an open
mic night once a semester, and the
Guild of Bands has a performance
every semester, but the lack of regular on-campus performance areas
in combination with the dearth of
house shows, forces bands to look
beyond the front gates.
Despite these obstacles, Text
Message is one student band
that has been able to thrive
with the help of University resources. A self-described “low-fi
indie rock band,” Text Message
formed last spring when Jaroski
joined forces with brothers John
(COL ‘14) and Joe Romano (COL
‘12). The group began to write
material, and in the last two
weeks of the semester, Text Message recorded a 10-song album
in an on-campus studio.
Having a pair of brothers
who both happen to be musicians turned out to be a very
Brotherly love: Mike Jaroski joined Joe and John Romano to form the band Text Message.
IRIS KIM
convenient aspect of forming
the band. And as Joe and Jaroski
had already been playing together before John started at
Georgetown, the trio fit together
naturally. “We all had an idea
of what we were going to play,”
John said.
With the help of the Guild of
Bands, Text Message was able to
overcome a major obstacle: access to practice space. The Guild
of Bands is a one-credit class
that gives musicians access to
Studio D in New North, tucked
away from hostile neighbors. To
practice, the band simply puts
their name on a schedule. Since
a large batch of Guild members
has recently graduated, Text
Message has space to practice
three times a week.
Professor Joe McCarthy, who
has led the Guild of Bands for
the past three years, said that
the program was created to put
students together in an environment that fostered both songwriting creativity and musical
skill development. McCarthy
meets with bands at least once
a week, giving them advice on
technique and performance. At
the end of the semester, all the
bands get together for a concert
on Georgetown’s campus.
The Guild of Bands has also
given Jaroski and John the tools
to learn drums. With the help of
McCarthy, who is also the drummer for the Grammy Awardwinning Afro Bop Alliance,
Jaroski and John have reached a
comfortable level in their drumming. “He’s given good advice,
and it’s also been a blast to learn
drums,” John said.
The Guild of Bands has been
so helpful to the band that John
said, “I would find it very unlikely that there would be a band
around that isn’t in the guild.”
But Geordie Kieffer (COL
’12) has taken a decidedly different route from Text Message.
Coming off the success of New
Vo Riche, an EMI-signed band
that he formed with his brother and their friend, Kieffer is
starting a new project with a
few other seniors he started
playing with in his freshman
year. Kieffer ’s project decided
to work outside the Guild of
Bands, citing the sense of “feeling locked in there” as the main
concern with the class. Unlike
Text Message, this unnamed
project has been able to practice two to three times a week
in a basement.
Though not part of the
Guild of the Bands, Kieffer has
still tried to pursue music on
his own.
“Here at Georgetown, there’s
not much of a music program,
but there are a lot of kids that
play music that are kind of hidden and tucked away,” Kieffer
said. “You have to find yourself
around that scene.”
When it came time to record the 10-track album, Text
Message used Georgetown resources again. The band needed a friend taking an advanced
recording class to give them
access to the New North recording studio—not to be confused with the Guild of Bands
practice room—but after seven
or eight sessions in the last
two weeks of spring semester,
RICHARD DE LA PAZ
The Guild of Bands offers student musicians a place to practice.
Text Message had a finished
product.
After uploading the tracks
onto
their
bandcamp.com
page this September, Text Message was ready to move on to
shows—an arduous step that
would present the band’s biggest challenges to date. Text
Message began sending out
emails to 10 venues around
D.C., of which only two have
proved fruitful. This September, they performed a 40-minute set at the Velvet Lounge
with four other bands.
However, getting booked
at a small venue like the Vel-
bers which bands they have
come to see at the door, and
then pays the bands accordingly, has been implemented
at clubs such as DC9.
“They’re more concerned
about making money off the
bar, so it doesn’t matter if you’re
a new band that’s either good
or not good. It just matters how
many people you can bring,”
Jaroski said. “We took a cab to
bring equipment, and we barely
broke even with the cab drive.”
Sasha Lord, the booking
agent at Comet Ping Pong on
Connecticut Ave., where Text
Message is performing on No-
lem for Text Message. If promoters are measuring success
by crowd size, they need to
bring an audience over from
Georgetown. But with the closing of the bar Saloun, the last
small venue for bands on M
Street, there are no places to
perform in the proximity of
Georgetown, so packing a concert with University students
becomes a daunting task.
The only viable solution has
been to befriend other bands in
the hope of opening for them in
the future. “One of the only things
you can do is open for a band that
has had experience playing at
these places,” John said.
The band just linked up
with Mercies, a band composed
of Georgetown alumni, at the
Velvet Lounge show. But befriending bands outside of the
Georgetown circle may take a
little more time.
“There’s a bunch of places
to play [in D.C.], but not necessarily local bands and a local
scene doing their own stuff,”
John said. He has found the
ratio of touring bands to local
bands in D.C. as a source of the
difficulty in booking shows.
After working at the Black
Cat—a medium sized gig—
for ten years, Lord has found
a strong local presence with
her booking experience. She
admitted that there has been
a shortage of college bands
looking to perform, either
from Georgetown or other local universities.
“College bands should have
more opportunities here, but
perhaps they’re new in booking, or new in town, so they
still have to figure what the
venues are and who the contacts are,” Lord said. “It takes
a while to move to a town and
meet the right people.”
Lord has also seen a rising
number of independent promoters who book gigs at restaurants or other less conventional locations. In established
McCarthy, who has lived
in D.C. for 18 years, has found
both ups and downs with
D.C.’s music venues. “With
the amount of different clubs
around town, there are many
different opportunities and lots
of festivals,” McCarthy said.
Yet, at least in the Georgetown music scene, he has seen
better days in terms of venues
available for college bands.
“Obviously, maybe 10 or 12
years ago, there was more
work in terms of money,” McCarthy said. “But I don’t think
that has affected the artistic
end of things. I think people
who are serious about their
craft are going to move forward whether or not there’s
money to be made.”
However, the lack of outlets for college bands in D.C.
has left the band with dreams
beyond D.C. altogether. As Joe
and Jaroski approach graduation, the band has made a
tentative outline for its future.
They hope to record new songs
on Long Island with Mike
Fiore, a good friend of Joe’s
who attends the University of
Southern California. They said
Fiore has had a drastically different experience as a musician
in L.A., a city full of clubs and
bars that cater to smaller bands.
Over the summer, Text
Message plans to tour New
York City, Chicago, and other
Northeastern cities where they
can count on friends to help
them book shows. “It’ll be a
graduation road trip,” Jaroski
said. When summer ends, Joe
and Jaroski will have to move
back up to D.C. if they want to
keep the band as a single unit,
but John is already eyeing
Text Message’s future after his
graduation in 2014. He hopes
to go to Los Angeles with Fiore’s band.
The band members are eager to look beyond Georgetown, which doesn’t seem to
have as vibrant of a music
scene as other schools.
“One of my buddies at Emerson has a couple groups he’s
playing with, and it seems to
me, it’s easier to get shows together, and there’s a lot more
bands. … Georgetown could be
the antithesis of all that,” John
said. “It’s a very small group of
people here that’s interested in
music itself.”
At the same time, they’re
grateful to the Guild of Bands
for providing them the resources to practice and record
an album.
“There’s a way to practice,
there a place to play songs with
your band, write songs, and
get better,” Jaroski said. “All
the opportunities are there, but
they’re not utilized that well.”
“Here at Georgetown, there’s not much
of a music program, but there are a lot of
kids that play music that are kind of hidden
and tucked away. You have to find yourself
around that scene.”
vet Lounge is not the same as
getting paid. Since all proceeds
came from the door, they only
earned around ten dollars each.
With profits based on proceeds at the door, venues
expect bands to bring the
crowds. Door-polling, a system that asks audience mem-
vember 12, is against this recent trend.
“Touring bands get paid
higher percentages because
they have higher expenses, but
we divide payment equally
with local bands,” Lord said.
The door-polling payment
system has presented a prob-
night life scenes like U Street
and in areas like H Street where
bars and eateries are sprouting
up, local start-up bands may
have a better shot at booking
consistently than if they were
to aim for medium-sized bars
that favor touring bands that
draw more crowds.
RICHARD DE LA PAZ
Professor Joe McCarthy gave John Romano the tools to learn to play drums.
leisure
november 3, 2011
Make sure to track down the Hunter
by Nico Dodd
A Child Shall Lead Them: Making The Night of The Hunter is a
play that makes you feel like
you’ve just watched a movie.
The play is based on the
production of the 1955 film The
Night of the Hunter, directed by
Charles Laughton, a commercial failure that is now considered a piece of classic cinema.
In the film, a preacher and a
condemned thief share a prison
cell. After the priest is released
from prison, he returns to his
cellmate’s family to find some
hidden money, which the thief’s
children were sworn to hide.
Off-screen (and on stage)
Laughton is having his own
problems with a druggy actor
and a behind schedule and overbudget production. His producer is doubting the marketability
of the film as it moves in a progressive direction
The play is a coproduction
organized by Georgetown’s De-
partment of Performing Arts
and the University of MarylandCollege Park School of Theatre,
Dance, and Performance Studies. Students, staff, and faculty
are from both universities, commuting 10 miles to rehearsal
during rush hour. The play ambitiously juggles its two separate
plotlines along with envelopepushing film projections.
The whole play takes
place on a movie set, and during scenes where the movie is
filmed, the production is projected in real time on the back of
the stage. The acknowledgement
of the setting makes the idea of
“sets“ in the film segments of the
story more believable.
The projections, a key aspect of the play, were designed
by Jared Mezzochi. who also
worked on The Glass Menagerie,
a production for Tennessee Williams Centennial Festival last
March. Director and writer Derek Goldman trasnforms Mezzochi’s projections from an interesting novelty into a central part
of the production.
The play opens with Laughton, played by Dan Hrebenak
tim markatos
“Why am I so unhappy? I had a happy childhood, I have a family, yet getting out of bed everyday is a struggle.”
(SFS ’12), entering the stage and
addressing the audience. Soon,
period Laughton footage is projected over all the set. As the
monologue continues, live footage of the actor’s face is superimposed over Laughton’s, until
it’s only Hrebenak’s.
Through the rest of the play,
scenes from the film, along with
actors performing the scenes
live, are projected onto anything
that can be turned into a screen,
such as held up blankets and
the sliding warehouse walls.
The projections lit up the Gonda
Theater like a dynamic movie
theater.
A Child Shall Lead Them is
an innovative production that
blurs the line between the making of a film and performance,
and it features stellar showings
by Hrebenak, Justin McCarthy
(COL ’12), and UMD’s Robert
Mitchum. The play runs through
November 6 at the Gonda Theater, and will run at College Park
from November 12-19.
Got me feeling Like Crazy in love
by Julia Lloyd-George
In Romeo and Juliet, the titular
lovers are threatened by a deep animosity between rival families. In
Like Crazy, lovers Jacob and Anna’s
relationship is threatened by immigration officers, as rising stars
Anton Yelchin and Felicity Jones
play a young couple struggling
with the strife of a long-distance
relationship.
Drawing on themes of angstridden separation and the bureaucratic red-tape of immigration
policy, Anna and Jacob are split
up when Anna, unable to renew
her visa, is forced back to London.
By documenting the growing tension between the two with a shaky
hand-held camera, Like Crazy explores a conflict that becomes progressively less believable as the
plot develops, and the result is a
poor display of the passion and
pain of love.
Beginning with Jacob and
Anna as college students in Los
Angeles, the film opens with a
typical classroom scene. Meaningful looks are exchanged. The next
thing we know, the two are sharing
coffee and getting along famously,
bonding over their shared appreciation for Paul Simon’s Graceland.
In a montage of sweetly realized
scenes devoid of dialogue, their
relationship inevitably deepens.
Here, the film shows its strength
with cinematographic flourishes
like focusing on meaningful details in a scene—when the couple
sit on Santa Monica Beach, for
example, the camera closes in on
their sandy feet.
It is artistic touches like these
that wordlessly yet successfully
convey the intimate, emotional
atmosphere in any given scene.
On the opposite side of the spectrum, many scenes are shot in a
voyeuristic style—the viewer
sees the couple around a door
frame or lamppost—that effectively make up the second half
of what director Drake Doremus
calls “the balance between intimacy and voyeurism.”
The first hint of trouble in
this blissful time comes when
Jacob asks, “What are we going to do after we graduate?”
Choosing to avoid reality rather
than face it, Anna naively advises
not to ponder this question. When
the dreaded time actually arrives,
Anna chooses to stay in L.A. with
Jacob and “spend the whole summer in bed” (a rapid-fire montage
of the couple sleeping proves, she
really wasn’t kidding). She finally
has to leave for the U.K., but tragedy strikes when she tries to return to the States. That monster of
bureaucracy, the customs officer,
refuses to let her in.
What follows is the development of an increasing separation—both physically and emotionally—as Jacob and Anna are
divided by half a world of pesky
geography. Jacob starts a furniture company (he has a particular
fondness for chairs) and begins
a half-hearted yet convenient relationship with a woman played
by Jennifer Lawrence. Meanwhile, Anna begins to blog for
a London-based magazine. The
couple’s relationship becomes
defined by phone calls that are
increasingly few and reserved.
Events take a briefly positive
turn when Jacob visits Anna in
London, but the reunion quickly
turns sour when it becomes evident that the distance between
them was more than physical. Jacob’s visit ends, and the couple’s
lives continue without each other.
The game changes when Anna
reaches her breaking point and
convinces Jacob to get married in
order to resolve visa issues. Married life is no fairytale ending,
however. Another six months of
forced separation leaves the couple resorting to infidelity. When
they are finally reunited, there is
palpable tension as they adapt to
their new lives together.
After much brouhaha, the ban
on Anna’s visa is finally lifted
and she goes back to L.A. with
Jacob, but their relationship has
clearly lost the supposed passion
that it began with. In a frustrating
lack of closure, the ending does
little more than imply continued
tension. What is clear is that the
naïve craziness of love has faded
in a film that fails to portray the
ardor it advertises.
The dialogue between Jacob
and Anna is a particularly weak
point, as it allows for excessive
improvisation from young actors
without the skills to pull it off.
Though their relationship is in no
way defined by communication,
their dialogue (when it does happen) is so bland that it fails to convey the supposed complexity of
their love. Though Doremus does
his best to explore the “grey areas”
of modern love in these nuanced
exchanges, the passion gets lost in
the shuffle. In the end, the convoluted plot is just, for lack of a better
word, a little too crazy to create the
visceral moments it strives for.
imdb
“I don’t understand, why don’t you just lean over and pick up that soap?”
georgetownvoice.com
“God help you if you use voice-over in your work.” —adaptation
Thumbs up for Crumbs
by Alex Rice
There’s no denying the fact that
the “cupcake culture “ has hit the
D.C. area in full throttle. We’ve all
rolled our eyes at the seemingly
endless line that extends outside
of Georgetown Cupcake’s doors.
We’ve listened to our friends get
into heated debates about whether
the treats at Sprinkles or Baked
and Wired are superior. What is
it exactly that makes people do
such crazy things in the name of a
muffin-shaped cake doused in buttercream frosting? Beats me. But for
all you loyal cupcake fans, I have
good news: yet another cupcakery
has just opened up. And it’s worth
getting excited about.
With over 40 locations stretching from Los Angeles to New York,
Crumbs Bake Shop has made a
statement across the country. The
most recent addition to the popular chain opened two weeks ago in
Farragut Square, selling a variety of
sinful desserts, from freshly baked
scones to a variety of gooey brownies. However, what Crumbs is most
known for is its wide selection of
rich, oversized cupcakes. This bakery has a cupcake for everyone, offering flavors that range from the
classic “Vanilla Sprinkle” to the
more exotic “S’mores” or “Grasshopper” cupcakes.
As a fan of cupcakes, I couldn’t
wait to try out the tasty treats at
Crumbs. Upon walking into the bakery, I noticed the words painted above
the doorway: “Welcome to Happiness.” A bold claim, I thought, but one
I was willing to test out. In order to get
a feel for Crumbs’ range of flavors, I
ordered a classic “Vanilla/Vanilla”
and a more unconventional “White
Hot Chocolate.”
The vanilla cupcake was solid,
but its buttery cake and smooth buttercream frosting were practically
identical to the many vanilla cupcakes
of my past. But it was the “White
Hot Chocolate” that really sold me.
This white chocolate mousse-filled
cake smothered in delectable cream
cheese frosting was topped off with
mini white chocolate chips and baby
marshmallows.
One bite, and I resolved that the
sign above the door was right—this
bakeshop was indeed a place of happiness. Two bites, and I was in heaven.
Three bites, and I realized that I would
have to slow down unless I wanted
to finish off my day with a stomach
ache. As scrumptious as these cupcakes are, they are so rich that it would
take an iron stomach to down one in a
single sitting. But this isn’t necessarily
bad news—it just means more to take
home for later!
Can’t make up your mind on
which of the many delicious fla-
You are not the father
Think about something
someone could tell you that
would make you really, really
excited. You’d whoop, scream,
get out of your chair, and do a
victory dance while a crowd of
people cheered you on. But the
information you were just told
wasn’t that you’ve just won the
lottery, or you’ve become an
overnight international celebrity. It’s even better—in the case
of this 14-month-old baby, you
are not the father.
This situation surely sounds
familiar, and no, I’m not accusing my beloved Voice readers
of having been involved in paternity scandals of their own
(although if you have, no judgment). I am, however accusing
you of having—maybe because
you were stuck at home sick, or
you were in a waiting room at a
doctor’s office—found yourself
deeply, personally engrossed in
an episode of Maury. Which, as
far as morality goes, really isn’t
much better.
Maury, like its more violent,
more obscene, and markedly
less entertaining counterpart
The Jerry Springer Show, represents the rare breed of television trash that has withstood
the test of time. Sure, we always have our rotating series
of bad reality shows and sitcoms, but even such mainstays
as The Real World can’t boast
the breadth of viewership and
consistency that these shows
have. Maury spans ages and
demographics, and proves that
if there’s one thing this country
can bond over, it’s spending a
few hours in the middle of the
day watching shameless specimens of humanity air out their
very personal problems.
And boy, are they personal.
Jerry and Maury have spawned
vors to choose? No problem.
Crumbs also sells “taste packs,”
which feature a dozen bite-sized
cupcakes in an assortment of flavors. And with the overwhelming richness of many of the flavors, a bite-sized cake is often all
you’ll need to satisfy that postdinner sweet tooth craving.
If you have a major sweet
tooth and enjoy generous portions of rich desserts, then
Crumbs is the place for you.
The bakery offers larger cupcakes than those of its equivalently priced competitors, not
to mention a much shorter line!
Sorry Georgetown Cupcake, but
I’m going to have to side with
Crumbs on this one.
CONCERT CALENDAR
Saturday 11/5
Wild Fruit
with Sleeping in Avry and
Paperhaus
Velvet Lounge, 9 p.m., $8
The Sounds
with Natalia Kills, The
Limousines, Kids At The Bar
Black Cat, 8 p.m., $20
Stephen Kellogg and the
Sixers
with Deep River
9:30 Club, 7 p.m., $20
Sunday 11/6
The Drums
with Patrick Cleandenim
MetroStage, 8 p.m., $14
Monday 11/7
Cold War Kids
9:30 Club, 7 p.m., $25
Thursday 11/10
The Sea and Cake
with Brokeback
Friday 11/11
moe.
9:30 Club, 8 p.m., $25
aLEX riCE
Gotta hand it to these cupcakes.
such broadcast TV classics as
the woman with a phobia of
pickles and the 15-year-old
who’s had sex over 300 times,
in addition to daddy-guessing
sagas like that poor white guy
whose white wife gave birth to
an obviously biracial child, and
the one couple that—try not to
gag—found out after having
their first kid that they’re half-
idiot box
by Leigh Finnegan
a bi-weekly column about television
siblings. And for every episode,
viewers turn out in unbelievable numbers to entertain their
ultimate guilty pleasure, where
there is no pretense of plot, no
superfluous competition, nobody trying to heighten modeling or acting careers—just
pure, up-front, no-frills trash.
Of equal importance to the
trash is the man moderating
it. An even-tempered, turtle-
Wednesday 11/16
Phantogram
necked senior citizen, Maury
Povich seems to be the least
likely person to serve as liaison
between a promiscuous woman
and her child’s eleventh potential father. Jerry Springer,
by contrast, is pretty carefully
branded as a troublemaker,
and his crowd’s teleprompted
chants of “Jerry! Jerry!” cost the
show part of its voyeuristic appeal (“Look, honey, a real and
unsolicited fight broke out on
TV!”).
Maury’s guests don’t get
into as many explosive physical
fights as Jerry’s, and as such he
has earned, if you can believe
it, a classier reputation. Get
caught watching Jerry Springer and you’ll immediately be
judged for contributing to the
success of such an exploitative,
entirely fake television show.
But if someone walks in on you
watching Maury, he may not
verbally ask you to bring him
up to speed, but I can almost
Owl City
9:30 Club, 5:30 p.m., $20
Peter Murphy and She Wants
Revenge
with Hussle Club
9:30 Club, 10 p.m., $25
Thursday 11/17
Mike Doughty and His
Band Fantastic
with Moon Hooch
9:30 Club, 7 p.m., $25
Fu Manchu
with Honky, The Shrine
Friday 11/18
Trampled by Turtles
with Jonny Corndawg
9:30 Club, 10 p.m., $18
The Shakedowns
with The Alphabet Bombers,
Nervous Impulse, The Do
Likes
Sunday 11/20
The Kooks
9:30 Club, 7 p.m., $26
Tuesday 11/22
The Radio Dept
guarantee you that he’ll want
to.
But although he seems a
little incongruous to his surroundings, Maury’s attempts
at foraying into other genres
of television have failed miserably. He tried to host a game
show in 2000 and co-hosted a
news program with his wife
in 2006, both of which were
cancelled shortly after their
debuts. Apparently, America
doesn’t want to see Maury unless he’s talking to people looking to cure their crippling globophobia (fear of balloons—it
exists, and he did a show about
it). No, Americans need exactly
what Maury has always given
them—a zoo-like window into
the lives of the most ridiculous,
pitiable, offensive, miserable
people our country has to offer.
Email Leigh if you think she
is the mother of your child at
lfi[email protected]
leisure
november 3, 2011
C r i t i c a l V o i ces
genre confusion. Both songs are
impossibly slow and manage to
sound simultaneously flat and
twangy. The lyrics don’t make up
for the lackluster melodies. For
example, “Davy” repeatedly references “screws and spades” and
“weepin’ weeds” in a poor attempt to convey the raw emotion
of the Wild West.
One song, however, manages
to produce a new indie-country
sound while avoiding manufactured twang. Album opener “E.
Watson” tells of another western
tragedy, but this time the sound
and lyrics are grittier, making the
song more interesting, if not more
authentic.
The greatest success of the
album moves in another direction entirely, harkening back
to the band’s old work. “I 4 U
& U 4 Me,” with its cheery lyrics, upbeat rhythm, and hopeful
melody, gives listeners a muchneeded respite from dreary western themes. “Sonnet” is another
love song that closes the EP on a
slower, happier note.
The Decemberists are evidently moving in new direction, crossing continents and genres to reach
the American West. Long Live the
King offers a disconcerting mix
of the band’s usual folksy indie
style and a new, at times awkward, country sound. In the end,
Decemberists fans listening to the
EP are likely to have some respect
for a band experimenting with a
different genre. This respect, however, is likely to be drowned out
by an overwhelming nostalgia for
the band’s old cheerful and folksy
work, produced before their apparent identity crisis.
Clocks and robbers
to have been coordinated by
student pranksters suggests
that it required a bit more than
a key and physical fitness.
In 1976, according to a
Hoya article, nine freshmen
living on the fifth floor of Copley began mapping out all
the possible entrances to the
The Decemberists, Long Live the
King, Capitol
After 2009’s prog-influenced
rock opera The Hazards of Love
added a sludgy, blues-metal lower end to the Decemberists’ literary indie-folk, the band seems to
have settled into a country motif
over their last two releases, The
King is Dead and the recently released Long Live the King EP. But
where the western influences on
The King is Dead felt like a natural extension of the Decemberists’
already folky style, Long Live the
King seems to be built from awkward outtakes from the album,
many of them failing to materialize into fully convincing songs.
“Burying Davy” and “Row
Jimmy” are the most apparent victims of the Decemberists’
Halloween at Georgetown
is full of traditions: watching
The Exorcist in Gaston, exploring the underground tunnels
below campus, or taking part
in spreading old rumors about
the supposedly haunted fifth
floor of Healy Hall. But what
about the story that attributes
wails in Healy to the ghost of
a student who was crushed
to death between the clock
hands in the clock tower? This
story may originate in another
Georgetown tradition: stealing the clock hands straight off
the tower as a prank.
Though it is not clear when
or why this tradition began,
according to a 1966 article in
the Hoya, tradition dictated
that freshmen abscond with
the hands for a “short period
of time” during the beginning
of the school year. In 1966, that
short period lasted for over a
month.
According to the tradition,
successful pranksters were
supposed to mail the hands
to the Vatican, to be sent back
with a “return to sender”
stamp. There were, however,
variations on this. For example, a pamphlet found in the
University Archives stated
that in 1989 they were sent to
the White House with the request that President Reagan
personally return them. The
Secret Service sent the hands
back to University. In 1975,
students stole the hands, only
to replace them after painting
them with “festive red and
white peppermint stripes for
Christmas.”
According to the pamphlet, “entrance to the soaring heights of the Healy Clock
tower requir[ed] a ‘folding
key’ and physical stamina.”
However, the extensive plotting and planning that seems
Voice’s Choices: “I 4 U & U 4
Me,” “E. Watson”
—Jane Conroy
Lou Reed and Metallica, Lulu,
Warner Bros.
On the first of November of
the 2,011th anniversary of the alleged birth of Christ, Lou Reed
throwback Jack
by Sadaf Qureshi
a bi-weekly column about Hoya History
clock tower. They called themselves Hands of the Clock
Klub, or HOCK, and went
by nicknames and numbers
that were assigned to each
member. They came up with
four ways to access the clock:
“Hernando’s
Hideaway”—
a padlocked door with an
iron bar in Healy, a securely
locked door in Gaston Hall,
“a panel in the ceiling of the
fourth Healy,” and a “narrow window at the top of a
and Metallica, henceforth malevolently referred to as Loutallica,
released the collaborative double
album Lulu, proudly proclaiming
that, in no uncertain terms, “Rock
is dead. We killed it.” Though this
unholy union did not shout this
proclamation from the rooftops,
the 87 minutes of pure rubbish
do all the talking (literally—most
of the album is spoken word).
All puns aside, Lulu is by far the
worst album in rock history.
From the very start, Lulu is
doomed to fail. “Brandenburg
Gate” begins the album with
the frantic acoustic strumming
of a five-year-old who has just
learned his first guitar chord. As
Lou Reed begins to speak nonsense into the microphone with
his raspy voice, the listener cannot help but hold a memorial
service for the money and time
wasted on Lulu.
What Loutallica tries to pass
off as an LP does not improve
with time, and listening to the
album more than once may have
adverse health effects. “Frustration,” at the end of the first CD,
echoes any listener’s feelings on
trying to sit through even one listen. With its chaotic chords and
Lou Reed reading the listener’s
fire escape of Healy.” Anyone
who got through Hernando’s
Hideaway would also have to
pass through a second door
secured by three locks and a
burglar alarm.
Members of HOCK decided to access the tower through
a panel in the ceiling of Healy,
spending “four hours removing floorboards from the story
above the attic.” They used a
hand drill in place of a saw to
avoid making too much noise.
Once the floorboards were
removed, a door with two
padlocks was dealt with using hacksaw blades, a wrench,
and a screwdriver, and the
students were out of there
with clock hands in hand.
According to articles in
the Hoya, the University began to seal up all entrances
around 1976, but this did not
stop students from attempting
to steal the clock hands. However, it did make the endeavor
a bit more dangerous.
mind by repeating, “I want so bad
to hurt you,” this track launches
listeners into a second disc filled
with tracks that are much too long.
The album’s final song and
20-minute monolithic steaming
pile of trash, “Junior Dad,” provides the perfect definitive allegory for Loutallica’s Lulu as a
whole. Met allica’s surprisingly
soft steadily progressing guitar
lines provide hope of a decent
production until Lou Reed’s monotonous voice and painfully
uninspiring lyrics destroy any vision of the track’s quality. Unmistakable Metallica riffs occasionally punctuate the deathly horror
of the remainder of the song, attempting to resurrect the sound
that built the band until the very
last note.
This quiet, steady, 10-minutelong last note, with nearly undetectable alterations in pitch, signals the end of the track, the end
of Lulu, and the probable end of
Metallica. With apologies to T.S.
Eliot, this is how the world of
rock ‘n’ roll ends: not with a bang
but a whimper.
Voice’s Choice: “Frustration”
—Kirill Makarenko
Attempts to steal the hands
seem to have been successful
roughly every five years, with
the most recent theft occurring
in 2005. We are just about due
for another successful attempt,
but beware: the University’s
shifting responses to attempts
demand caution. In 1976, students who were caught climbing up to the tower were let
off with a $40 fine and a letter
sent home. However, in 2005,
the University took matters
more seriously. An article in
the Hoya said that students
involved in the 2005 attempt
were on academic probation
for a year and had to write an
essay on ways to engage in
more constructive traditions.
So if you’re a senior looking
for a job, you might want to
follow tradition and leave this
to the freshmen.
Send your clock hands to
Sadaf at [email protected]
page thirteen
georgetownvoice.com
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The campaign for Georgetown is supposed to open
doors for students, and yet this student is feeling
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ from all the nice events.
voices
november 3, 2011
Twuesday Tweetacular: dispatches from the hashtag front
by Leigh Finnegan
A few days ago, a friend of
mine was sitting at her computer,
her face expressing deep, hopeless concentration—writer’s block
if I’ve ever seen it. When I asked
her what was stumping her, she
sounded exasperated: “I can’t
think of anything to tweet about.”
Her answer surprised me, but
not because of the importance that
she was assigning to coming up
with a bite-sized sentiment to bestow on her dozens of followers.
Rather, I was baffled that she had
enough self-awareness not to just
type up her latest passing thought
and throw in some number signs
and words without spaces between them. From my experience,
that’s what Twitter is all about.
I am a reluctant tweeter. Back
in the day, out of the jobless boredom that was my summer after
graduating high school, I made
myself a Twitter account. It currently consists of four tweets,
the last of which was posted on
August 5, 2009. But earlier this
year, when I became editor of
Vox Populi, the Voice’s blog, I became responsible for the weekly
microblog survey known as the
“Twuesday Tweetacular.” This
quickly became my least favorite
task, as it required me to weed
through ungodly numbers of
tweets from the over 1,000 accounts that @GtownVoice follows, and try to find five—just
five!—that are suitable for those
coveted Tuesday morning spots.
You’d marvel at just how difficult
this is.
Manning this account gives
me an unusual perspective on
Twitter. I’m an outsider looking
in, reading the tweets of a massive population consisting largely of regular people I’ve never
met and know nothing about.
I’m not laughing at inside jokes,
having conversations with my
friends, or posting culturally relevant Huffington Post articles—
my job is to, as quickly as possible, judge tweets based solely
on their comic value or degree
of insight. Through this weekly
process I have come to a not-soshocking conclusion: virtually all
people lack Twitter filters, and
very, very few of them are funny.
Sure, there are exceptions—
mostly joke accounts and news
sources. But for every @PimpBillClinton there are thousands
of accounts like @guyinmyEnglishclass, who live-tweets his
thoughts like they’re some kind
of political debate.
I’m not saying that Twitter is
the first website that has made its
users think undeservingly highly
of themselves—that’s been going
on since every eighth grade girl
with a MySpace profile thought
taking mirror pictures made
her Adriana Lima. But on Twitter, we’ve reached a new level
of online self-importance. Bios
of average, relatively insignificant @hoyadudes unironically
state that “tweets are my own,
retweets are not endorsements.”
This started with celebrities and
politicians, who sometimes pay
assistants to tweet for them and
have the ability to, you know,
actually endorse things. But
now, this trend has spread to the
masses, and everybody needs to
tell their “followers”—implying
not friendship but fandom, admiration, dependence—that their
snappy comments about #singlegirlproblems were not written by
a professional.
And then there’s that number sign. With the recent boom
in Twitter use, the hashtag has
become a cultural phenomenon
that blurs the line between Twitter and other forms of communication. The hashtag was designed to allow Twitter to track
which topics users were talking
about at a particular time. But
that simple, practical idea has
since entered the extra-Twitter
lexicon, to the point where virtually everyone—including yours
truly—has been caught hashtagging texts, Facebook posts, even
regular, in-person conversations.
Besides the fact that it’s annoying, and, at least when speaking out loud, a little awkward
to say, using the hashtag makes
one crunch even communication
not barred by a 140-character
limit into impersonal little sound
bytes. A hashtag-adorned text is
little more than a targeted tweet—
probably sent to multiple people,
obviously meant to show off the
sender’s hashtagging hilarity, and
would likely be tweeted to the
masses if more people would understand it. And as funny as it can
occasionally be to hashtag normal
categorically negating the legacy
of the founders. In an editorial
special to CNN last month, Kennedy writes that blacks, in large
part, reject Herman Cain because
he esteems the founders as great
men, who “did their job … a
great job.”
Kennedy, in response to Cain,
wrote that Cain “makes no mention of … the Constitution’s
protection of slavery, or that the
initial Constitution forbade Congress from prohibiting American
participation in the international
slave trade for 20 years and indeed made that provision un-
amendable. Cain evinces no recognition of the Founding Fathers’
role in erecting a cruel pigmentocracy that continues to poison virtually every aspect of American
political, social, and cultural life.”
To begin, the notion that
blacks wouldn’t support a candidate that demonstrates respect for
the founders is ridiculous. Barack
Obama, hugely popular among
blacks at the time of his inauguration and still now, said in his
inaugural address, “Our Founding Fathers, faced with perils that
we can scarcely imagine, drafted
a charter to assure the rule of law
and the rights of man.” Blacks, of
course, didn’t repudiate Obama
over this statement. Where was
Kennedy in January 2009? Why
didn’t he remind the President
that the founding fathers owned
slaves?
The fact is that what the
founders did, while imperfect,
was tremendously significant.
The nation was never perfect, and
it still isn’t. Denying the Founding Fathers’ eminence because
they did not abolish slavery in the
new nation is not only to ignore
their role in setting up representative government, but to gloss
over the historical fact that many
founders did work, albeit quietly,
to slow the spread of slavery and
limit its prominence.
Thomas Jefferson himself
saw slavery as an evil, unjust
institution, but he did not see a
way to emancipate slaves and
keep social stability. Jefferson
deeply mistrusted vagrants—to
him—people without land were
only free in name. The founders distrusted landless whites
just as they distrusted landless,
freed blacks. England had a history of landless whites creating
unrest. To Jefferson, the nation
could only remain safe so long as
slavery existed. He, like Lincoln,
never envisioned a multiracial society. He imagined if the United
States were to rid itself of slavery,
then it would need to recolonize
Africa.
There were historical reasons
why blacks remained unfree; it
wasn’t simply because the founders didn’t have the moral backbone to do it. A slave-based agrarian economy had been, by 1788,
ingrained in the United States for
about one hundred years. The
framers couldn’t simply have
broken it at the time of the Constitution. The southern states,
Georgia and South Carolina, certainly, would never have ratified
a Constitution limiting an institution they so desperately relied on.
In large part, the founders did the
best they could to limit the spread
of slavery while forming a Union.
conversation, the trend has had its
share of cultural casualties—think
about how much less attention
Charlie Sheen would’ve gotten if
#winning had confined itself to
tweeters.
And that’s my biggest qualm,
complaint, and fear about the
Twitter monster—its implications beyond its own bounds. In
less than a month, my tenure as
Vox editor will be up, the Tweetacular will be someone else’s
burden, and I can recede into
the comfortable life of the Twitterless. But as long as I still get
shortened, impersonal texts, see
movie posters advertising with
hashtags rather than slogans,
and have to listen to my friends
self-importantly talk about their
“CULP major problems,” I will
be constantly and involuntarily
living in the real-world Twittermerica, feeling like there’s
#nowayout.
Leigh Finnegan a
is a junior in the
College. Her only
followers are Not
Greg Monroe and
Beltway
Greg—
#singlegirlproblems.
Founding Fathers fought slavery in their own way
by Connor Jones
As many have noted, ”all
men are created equal” did not
hold true for the vast majority of
Americans until 1865, 1919, and
even beyond. The founders did
not create a republic for all; they
created a republic for the few, but
even this was a significant accomplishment—no other country
had affirmed and secured natural
rights in the same way that the
United States did in 1788.
In any case, this hasn’t
stopped Randall Kennedy, a
professor at Harvard Law, from
“Advertisements contain the only truths to be relied on in a newspaper.”
FLICKR
The Continental Congress
passed the Northwest Ordinance,
banning the importation of slavery
into the Northwest Territory; five
signers voted for it, one against.
The Congress of the United States
voted to enforce the measure; 16
signers voted for it, none against,
with Washington signing it.
When the Northwest Ordinance passed, it passed quietly,
without dissent. The framers attempted to limit the spread of
slavery, behind closed doors. So
while it’s fair to say that the framers didn’t—or, more properly,
couldn’t—end slavery, at least
21 of 39 acted to limit it so that it
would be contained and, in their
minds, die off.
This approach treads on moral relativism, but history is about
examining those who lived in
the past on their own terms. Yes,
slavery was just as evil then as we
know it to be now. Yet we need
thank the founders for achieving what was possible—not ending slavery outright, but perhaps
slowing its spread so that it would
be easier to end in the future.
Connor Jones is a
freshman in the College. On Saturday
nights he watches
the two-part Gettysburg film and cries
himself to sleep.
voices
georgetownvoice.com
the georgetown voice
15
Troy Davis is yet another victim of a broken system
by Udayan Tripathi
Troy Davis was convicted
and sentenced to death before
many students at Georgetown
today were born. His fate has
been sealed our entire lives. On
September 21, 2011, yet another
American man was killed for a
crime he did not commit.
Having spent most of his
adult life on death row, Davis
had to spend his last day in
an agonizing battle. First the
world heard that the President
would not intervene. Then, the
Supreme Court deliberated for
hours over a stay of execution,
which he had successfully received three times before. But
he was denied a fourth. From
his fatal injection at 10:53 p.m.
to death at 11:08 p.m., Troy Davis passed away and became a
pallid shadow cast long and low
over the United States.
This Tuesday night, in Copley Formal Lounge, Troy’s sister
Kimberly described her brother.
She described his faith, his love
for his niece and nephew, and
what he had done for her as she
soldiered through a debilitating
paralysis caused by multiple
sclerosis. She lovingly recalled
how he would calmly tell her
MAX BLODGETT
Kimberley Davis, Carolyn Forché, and Laura Moye look on as Jen Marlowe speaks.
No more stolen lunch money
To my disappointment,
the Internet recently seems
to have become more about
social change and less about
LOLcats. From the death of
Neda Agha-Soltan, broadcast
all across the world during the
2009 Iranian election protests,
to the subsequent coverage
of the Arab Spring, it became
clear how powerful viral material could be. With that in
mind, the It Gets Better Campaign was launched to end
bullying and what seems like
an increase in bullying-related
suicides. The organization targets youth by releasing videos urging the bullied masses
to keep on keeping on, and
boasts videos from the likes
of President Obama, various
members of Congress, and
professional athletes.
These videos, though inspiring, fail to address any
solution to bullying, or even
the sad possibility that bullying can never be eliminated
as a result of our Aristotelian,
power-hungry, animalistic nature. They serve as an increasingly disingenuous ointment
for psychological wounds that
probably cannot be healed by
Kim Kardashian’s two cents
on the matter.
There is a fatal disconnect
in their method. Bullied teens
may watch the videos, but
celebrities cannot provide actual help, and those who can,
teachers and parents, are less
likely to be influenced by celebrities, or even be aware of
the campaign. Even worse,
bullied youths may look to the
advice of these celebrity videos in lieu of professional help
for depression.
The organization focuses mainly on LGBT youth.
Let the Voice be your voice. We accept opinions, letters to the
editor, personal experiences, and creative writing that are exclusive
to the Voice. Submissions do not express the opinion of the board of
the Voice. The Voice reserves the right to edit submissions for accuracy, length, and clarity. To submit, email voices@georgetownvoice.
com or come to the Voice office in Leavey 424.
Opinions expressed in the Voices section do not necessarily reflect the views of the General Board of the Voice.
that “‘can’t’ is not a word in
your vocabulary.”
From her words it was sharply clear that his voice challenged
her to fight her condition. To
Troy, Kimberly could play basketball again. To Troy, Kimberly
had to walk again, and so one afternoon on the driveway he simply asked her to get up, which
she did, and pulled the wheelchair away. Terrified, she complained, but he warmly insisted
she must succeed. She did. This
small glimpse into the life of the
Davis family revealed how normal they were, how bravely they
fought life’s injustices, and how
strong they could be together.
These qualities took them on
three-hour journeys to and from
the prison. Troy would plead
with them to make the onerous
drive less frequently, but his
mother and sisters would have
none of it. His sister Martina’s
children loved seeing their
uncle, even through plexiglass
and iron mesh. His young niece
would put her hand up to the
screen and he would reach out.
Contact visits were banned three
years ago, which meant he could
no longer hug his mother. All he
had left was the sight of his famThough these kids are obviously at risk for bullying, and
in need of encouragement,
you can’t help but wonder
how perennially bullied overweight and disabled kids or
their parents feel about being
left out of the largest antibullying campaign in history.
Ironically, the movement further alienates some kids in
desperate need of help.
Carrying On
by Aodhan Beirne
A rotating column by Voice senior staffers
Despite its good intentions, the campaign is ultimately doomed because of its
popularity. Its celebrity appeal
means that it is at risk of falling by the wayside when it is
no longer trendy to offer help,
just like what happened when
the campaign to raise awareness about the Darfur genocide became more popular
than Justin Bieber. It seems
like celebrities catch on to
these trends to feign goodwill
or check off “charity” from
their bucket list. It is easier
than ever now that they only
have to record a three-minute
message pretending they can
ily and prayer. His mother said a
family that prays together stays
together, and so Troy led prayers
when they visited.
Davis’ death casts a pall over
the American criminal justice
system. It is not simply the question of whether justice is done or
not. It isn’t even about fair trials and the definition of “peer”
when selecting a jury. Here a
more intrinsic wrong was committed, one which we cannot debate with style and panache.
The issue here is about the
taking of life at all. Execution
is absurd. The possibility of
executing the wrong man isn’t
the point at hand. Innocence is
not in question because to truly
support abolition of the death
penalty one must accept commutation of all death sentences,
including those for despicable
crimes like the horrific killing
of James Byrd. That killing, ten
years after the murder Davis
was accused of, was a racist, sadistic, and macabre killing of a
man simply because of the colour of his skin. But Lawrence
Brewer, Shawn Berry, and John
William King do not deserve
death sentences either. No one
does.
relate to what is undoubtedly
excruciating pain.
That isn’t to say some of
the celebrity endorsements
are not poignant or powerful,
or that some teens are not affected for the better by the
videos, but any project involving the participation of Ke$ha
or Lindsay Lohan is bound to
lose its intended bite. What
the project is doing is noble,
and I think it would have
succeeded in being a force
for social change had celebrities not worn it like a trendy
pair of sneakers or otherwise
completely misconstrued the
depth of the issue.
Some celebrities have taken their bullying benevolence
past YouTube videos, and
have incorporated the theme
into their songs—Lady Gaga,
Pink, and Katy Perry, specifically. Katy Perry’s song “Firework” is about overcoming a
low sense of self-worth, which
I imagine is pretty easy for
Katy Perry to do, considering
how attractive she is. In the
video, fireworks stream from
her cleavage, calling attention
to the very thing for which
many girls who are uncomfortable about their bodies are
bullied.
It’s clear that Katy Perry
is not actually committed to
It isn’t appropriate for any
human to kill another. It is an
act woefully ignorant of the potential that each and every human life holds. To love like Troy
did, to take care of one’s family,
is commendable and makes his
murder by the state of Georgia
all the more sorrowful. It does
not however make one iota of
difference whether or not he
should have lived.
That is determined solely
by what Lawrence Hayes told
students on Tuesday: “The Constitution says: ‘We hold these
truths to be self-evident, that all
men are created equal, that they
are endowed by their Creator
with certain unalienable Rights,
that among these are life’—I
think I can stop there. Life.” It
is indeed an unalienable right,
and it is decreed in the first legal document of this country. If
these revolutionary words won’t
suffice in establishing the sanctity of life, what will?
Udayan Tripathi
is a senior in
the SFS. Udayan
would like to add
public urination
to his unalienable rights.
ending bullying or low selfesteem when her hypersexual
image reinforces the very insecurities she is supposedly
combatting. A similar message from Judi Dench, Danny
Devito, or Kirstie Alley might
prove more effective or authentic.
When bullied youth stop
getting mixed and diluted
messages about bullying and
self-esteem from those they
admire most, they might actually stand a chance against
their aggressors. And when
the movement to end bullying
is directed at parents, teachers,
and administrators, bullying
in schools, and the tolerance
for it, might finally be mitigated. Celebrities, unless they are
actually passionate about the
issue or otherwise personally
connected, should stick their
profession, lest the issue be
watered down and lost among
the myriad celebrity causes
that have outrun their 15 minutes. Until then, I’ll be looking
elsewhere for my LOLcats and
cheezeburgers.
Aodhan Beirne is a
senior in the College.
Katy Perry isn’t the
only one who shows
off her cleavage, you
should see Aodhan
at the pool.
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