Culture ∙ Page 4
The Knight Times ∙ January 2022
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With Jazzmin Duncan
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KYLE SANDERS Guest Writer
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Lil Nas X may be a controversial figure for several different reasons (that’s a whole other topic for another article), but if you say that he can’t dress, then you’re lying to yourself and everyone around you. He is living and breathing proof that if you wear something with confidence, it’ll look good. There is no objective barrier to what pink is and who can wear it. It has even been pegged as a “mean” color. Iconic films like Mean Girls successfully helped to define pink as hyperfeminine and synonymous with negativity. The stigma surrounding pink is mainly due to clouds of toxic masculinity and misogyny in our culture. I don’t get all the anger; it’s never that serious. At the end of the day, it’s just a pretty color.
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Pink gets too much hate. Not the brand, not the singer, but the color. A lot of the time, pink is reduced to a “girl color” or “effeminate,” but pink is much more than that. It is one of the best colors. Everyone looks good in pink: it always adds a nice splash of color, AND it symbolizes strawberry flavors in candy. Whether it be a soft, light baby pink or a blistering, abrasive hot pink, it always slays the house down. Culturally, pink is usually viewed as a “forbidden” or “taboo” color for men, and I think it should be anything but that. I mean, just look at Lil Nas X’s Grammy’s red-carpet outfit a couple years ago; he looked AMAZING, not only because he made a statement, but also because it was simply a good look.
Mensis primus nobis appellatur “Ianuarius” pro prisco bicipite deo nomine “Ianus.” Potens omnium liminum (pontum, portarum, itinerum, matutinum, motuumque planetarum) simul in proximum annum providet atque in priorem respicit. Re publica Romana duo consules magnis feriis “inaugurati sunt” kalendis Ianuariis quo sacerdotes qui “augures” appellati sunt auspicia spectaverunt ut nutum divinum civitati invenirent. Quamquam hodie hic mensis Ianuarius fastidiorum exercitarum, antiquitate Romana illae res saepius mense Februario facta sunt. Rebus certioribus factis anni novi ab demum hodiernis, constat tamen origines magni momenti Romanis fuisse. Ergo incipiamus ut poeta Horatius nobis monet: Dimidium facti, qui coepit, habet; sapere aude, incipe! The first month of the year is called “January” on behalf of an ancient Ro-
man two-headed deity by the name of Janus. With power over all thresholds (bridges, doorways, journeys, mornings, and the movements of the planets), he looks simultaneously forward to the next year while also glancing backwards at the previous one. On the first of January during the Roman Republic, the two consuls were “inaugurated” in a great festival where priests called augurs watched the sky in order to find divine approval for the election results. Although today, January belongs to diets and exercise, in Roman antiquity such things were more likely to happen in February. And while New Year’s resolutions may be a modern practice, it is nevertheless well established that beginnings were of huge importance to Romans. Therefore let us begin this year just as the poet Horace reminds us: “Once begun is half done: dare to use your brain, begin!”
Hey Knights, I’m Ava Gami, this year’s Internal Vice President of Math Club, and I hope everyone has had a great start to the new year! I’m excited to announce that our first Math Club meeting of 2022 is on February 8 in Anderson Hall, where members will be able to take the Texas Math League Contest. On January 29, some Math Club members will be competing in the University of Houston Math Contest, where they are offered different exams in Algebra 1, Geometry, Algebra 2, PreCalculus, Calculus, Statistics, Physics, Number Sense, Calculator Usage, and the Smack Down. From February 17-21, juniors and seniors will collaborate on two teams to tackle real-world problems in the M3 MathWorks Math Modeling Challenge. Math Club is excited to host the annual Pre-Pi Day celebration on Thursday,
March 10, during both lunches, so mark your calendar and keep an eye out for more announcements regarding it in the coming months! Follow us on Instagram and Twitter @ ehsmathclub, where we not only announce events and meetings but also post weekly math memes on Mondays and post interesting things about math! If you are interested in joining Math Club, it is never too late! Thank you, and go math!! I hope to see you at the next Math Club Meeting!
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Lil Nas X wears his bright pink cowboy outfit to the 2020 Grammys, defying color sterotypes. Photo by Buzzfeed.com.
The Lily Pad As 2020 wound down to an end, something big (and deadly) was just beginning to brew around Boulder, Colorado - the Marshall Fire. According to the Chicago Sun Times, as of January 10, the natural disaster had resulted in the evacuation of over 35,000 people, the destruction of at least 1,000 homes, and the search for at least three missing people. Experts have dubbed the phenomenon a “firestorm,” a classification denoting its unique ability to spread by wind and through the air, unlike traditional wildfires that spread across the ground. So, what lessons for the future, you may ask, can we take away from this tragedy? Experts analyzing the environments that allowed for this rare disaster have begun pointing to climate change as a potential contributing factor. Jennifer Balch, a fire scientist at UC Boulder, boiled down the
fires to three ingredients: a warm climate, a warm climate, and a spark or ignition source. Balch explains that the wind, or a “fourth ingredient,” was the last piece of the puzzle that sparked the disaster and, ultimately, contributed to authorities’ inability to contain it. With plenty of ignitable grass due to a wet spring followed by a dry period just before the fire, conditions couldn’t have been more ideal for it to spread, and the conditions can at least be partially attributed to changing weather patterns brought on by climate change. A professor at the University of Michigan School for Environment and Sustainability, Jonathan Overpeck, vocalized the fears of many, saying, “Ultimately, things are going to continue to get worse unless we stop climate change.” He went on to say that “it’s just a matter of time before we have whole towns burning down like
we had in California and events like this in Colorado.” As temperatures increase globally, weather patterns continue to provide
goldilocks conditions for rare weather phenomena - phenomena that pose danger to life as we know it.
The Colorado Marshall Fires spread all across the state, destroying millions of homes. Photo by Wildfiretoday.com.
A Colorado family loses everything due to the unstoppable fires. Photo by the New York Times.
