Being a magazine journalist used to be the hot job of the Y2K romcom leads; these actors made any type of journalism look effortless. When I moved to New York, I knew breaking into a journalism career would run contrary to the movies. Through hard work, luck, and my time at The Observer, I landed an editorial internship at Travel + Leisure magazine, where I finally thought my life would come together and my journalistic ambitions realized. The theme for this year’s special issue is a magazine; to commemorate our love for the written word and allow us to be a bit more creative with our typical journalism.
Returning to The Observer as editor-in-chief for this 2024-2025 academic year has been a pleasure. We started this editorial board with a scrappy team and tripled the amount of talented editors and contributors. As journalists, we faced constant ethical deliberations around anonymity and sensitivity as we covered the May 2024 protests in our first issue under my and Stevie Fusco’s leadership. We scrutinized every photo, quote and administrative comment before publishing. By the fall, we increased our standards for accuracy with the creation of a fact-checking editorial role and fact-checking guide. These rules have led us through coverage of the Presidential election, climate change coverage, mayoral elections and the repercussions of this second President Trump administration.
On April 4, the Student Press Law Center (SPLC) sent out a media alert regarding the pertinent coverage of the detentions and deportations of international students by Immigration Customs Enforcement (ICE). As student journalists, it is our ethical responsibility, as advised by SPLC, to minimize harm in three ways: reviewing anonymity and takedown policies, considering providing options for pseudonyms broadening anonymity sensitivity and educating newspaper staff on coverage risks. As we close out the year with further action from Students for Justice in Palestine in solidarity with international students and interactions with President Tetlow regarding her responses to student detention and deportation — we have taken these practices into complete account.
Although this issue is unique, we have still tried to print the most significant news stories in their most accurate capacity. Additional content unfit for the long-form format of this issue will be published online accordingly.
Thank you for engaging with The Observer this year! I will miss the challenges and successes and all the in-betweens that come with publishing this bi-weekly paper.
Laura Oldfather Asst. Opinions Editor Tucker Flynn Asst. Opinions Editor
Vee Venning Asst. Opinions Editor
Vee Venning Asst. Arts & Culture Editor
EVENTS & NEWS
Mayoral Candidates Go Back to School Candidates attended a student-led panel inspired by a high school schedule
BY MACKENZIE COOPER AND MICHELLE WILSON Asst. News Editors
Democratic mayoral primary candidates faced questions on housing, education, climate change and transit at a forum hosted by a student climate advocacy group at the New York Society for Ethical Culture on Mar. 29.
In attendance were candidates Zellnor Myrie, Jessica Ramos and Whitney Tilson. Brad Lander arrived later, followed by Michael Blake and Zohran Mamdani.
The two-hour event began with a stand-up comedy routine met with tentative laughs from audience members. One attendee heckled the comedian, saying “where are the politicians?”
Upon arrival, each candidate delivered a 2-minute opening speech introducing themselves and their vision for New York City’s future.
The event was organized like a day of high school with different panels named after different classes, beginning with “English class.” Any New York City students or attendees could submit questions prior to the panel, which were read by students in the Socratic seminarstyle panel.
A moderator from TREEage, the climate group which hosted the event, asked candidates about their budget plan for the coming fiscal year should they be elected, and how it compares to current mayor Eric Adams’s plan. Mamdani said he would prioritize affordable housing and the cost of living in his opening speech.
“We stand in the wealthiest city in the wealthiest country in the history of the world, and yet one in four New Yorkers are living in poverty,” Mamdani said.
He also directly addressed how cost of living concerns affect Fordham students.
“If there is any hope for a Fordham University student to be able to afford their rent, to be able to afford their metro card, to be able to afford their ConEd bill, they need to have a mayor who’s going to fight for them each and every day, and that’s what’s on the ballot on June 24th,” Mamdani said.
Tilson shared his disagreement with opposing financial opinions throughout the forum and encouraged young people to stay in New York City despite
affordability concerns in an interview with The Observer after the forum.
“My main message would be to stay in New York. This is the most amazing city for young people. I know it’s unaffordable and I’m going to try and address that as mayor ... In terms of the dynamism, the opportunities, pick your area, tech, finance, the arts, this city’s got it all,” Tilson said.
A group of eight protesters from the Stop The Money Pipeline coalition interrupted Lander’s plan for New York City’s budget, climbing on stage and displaying a sign with the words “Black Rock Brad.” Lander walked off stage amid the protestors’ chants of “off fossil fuels Brad” and “Black Rock Brad.” Several audience members joined the heckling, shaming Lander for leaving.
BlackRock, one of the world’s largest asset management firms has recently faced criticism for leaving the Net Zero Asset Managers Initiative, an environmentalist investment group, and its investments in companies contributing to the deforestation of the Amazon and other major forests. Climate activists have urged New York City to divest from BlackRock and turn to more environmentally-friendly organizations instead.
The protestors were escorted out, and TREEage organizers convinced Lander to return.
Elliot Ismail, Fordham University student at Lincoln Center ’28, said the protest was inevitable as the event was free-entry, despite TREEage’s plans to intercept protestors.
“We expected protesters, it’s a public event, people are mad and upset, it’s about politics, you know, I’m not surprised,” Ismail said.
In “gym class,” Lander, Myrie, Ramos and Tilson answered rapid-fire yes or no questions. All four candidates answered yes to supporting funding for libraries (whose $58.3 million budget has narrowly
avoided recent cuts).
The four also said they would support Local Law 97 of 2019, a plan to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by implementing strict limits for buildings over 25,000 feet by 2030. Jessica Ramos said the support must be provided to homeowners to facilitate compliance, referencing the jobs and housing Senate bill she proposed.
“Yes and we need to help those coops and other small building owners be able to comply with the law so that they’re not just paying the penalty for not meeting the deadline,” Ramos said.
Lander also expressed his support and said he was one of the first co-sponsors for Local Law 97.
When asked which issue they considered most pressing under the Trump administration, Lander emphasized deportation, Ramos appointing civil and criminal court attorneys and Tilson the fiscal impact on transportation, Medicare and schools.
“I think he’s shredding our Constitution,” Myrie said. “I think if we do not have the foundations for that and push back, that we are going to see a city and a country that we do not recognize.”
Blake arrived near the end of this panel, followed shortly by Mamdani.
When asked which other candidate they believe should be mayor, Mamdani, Myrie and Ramos supported Blake due to his emphasis on lowering the cost of living.
“I’m running very simply because we need to help New Yorkers make and keep more money in their pockets,” Blake said. “We have an absolute clown in Donald Trump that is attacking us in every single way by going after Medicaid, by going after immigration.”
Myrie took the opportunity to express his disdain for mayor Eric Adams and Andrew Cuomo, whose political careers have been derailed by indictment and sexual misconduct scandals, respectively.
“I think anyone on this stage would be a better mayor than Eric Adams or Andrew Cuomo,” Myrie said.
Each of the candidates filled out a detailed questionnaire prior to the event with more information on their visions for New York City’s future, which will be published on the TREEage website on April 11.
Tetlow Addresses Student Visa Revocation
The president of the university sat down with student press to answer questions
BY STEVIE FUSCO Managing Editor
University President Tania Tetlow addressed serious issues plaguing Fordham University and higher education in America at a meeting with the student press on April 8.
Tetlow fielded questions on the student visa revocation of two Fordham students, the 4.65% tuition increase, and why Fordham students should practice civic engagement.
On Friday, April 4, Tetlow sent a university-wide email that announced an international undergraduate Fordham student’s visa was revoked by the Department of Homeland Security. During the press conference Tetlow revealed that a second student’s visa was revoked.
This interview has been lightly edited and condensed for clarity.
“I think everything within our control at Fordham is going stunningly well and I’m excited about that.”
Tania Tetlow University President
The Observer: You said in your email that you wish that it was in your power to offer more reassurance. Is it painful to be in a position where you understand that something is frightening, but you don’t know what you can do about it?
Tetlow : Yes. My job is to provide hope and that is getting harder and I am, frankly, pretty angry about what’s going on right now.
The Ram: We heard that the DHS did not contact the University, and I know that the Columbia Spectator just published an article about how Columbia University does routine daily checks on this service SEVIS (Student Exchange and Visa Program) to check to see if students’ visas are going well. Does Fordham do the same thing? Is that how they figured it out?
Tetlow : Yes, and you didn’t used to have to do that because there was no need to psychically intuit the government had changed its mind about a visa. So yes, we have been checking every morning, and that’s how we found out.
Ram : And then did the university alert the student?
Tetlow : Yes.
Ram : So, the student wasn’t contacted by DHS either?
Tetlow: No.
Ram: Since, has the DHS been in contact or provided a reason for the revocation?
Tetlow: Not that we know of, no. Not to us and I don’t believe to the student, although I don’t know the last one we talked to him.
Ram: And are you guys in contact with this current student at all?
Tetlow: Yes. We’re trying to provide as much support as we can because it is an unimaginable situation, and we are so upset on his behalf.
Observer: As of now, is there only one student who has had their visa revoked?
Tetlow: No, this morning we found another. But I don’t know that we’ve reached that student yet, so I can’t talk about it with specificity because, as you can imagine, the international students have privacy rights that we leave up to them. So, we’re not trying to share too specific details about them, that would be their choice.
Observer: Looking forward to next year, are you afraid that this uncertainty about the status of international students will decrease the amount of students who choose to enroll in Fordham from outside the United States?
Tetlow: I can imagine it will decrease the number of international students who enroll in institutions across the country. So, it won’t be specific to Fordham, but I do worry about that.
Observer: What do you feel Fordham will lose in that eventuality?
Tetlow: American higher education has been one of the great exports of this country. The quality and prestige of our institutions has been something that has brought so many, I won’t say best and brightest minds because they are everywhere around the world, but the quality of our institutions has brought so many brilliant students and scholars to this country, some of whom stay. It has been a source of American influence around the world that so many people who become leaders of their countries were educated at universities here. I cannot fathom why anyone would damage that work.
Ram: I’m curious to know the reasoning behind sending out the email about the student. Why did you think that the Fordham community needed to know?
Tetlow: I want as many people as possible to know that this is happening and to spread the word through our community, through our board. All the stories that you are seeing about this happening nationally, it matters to know it is hitting home.
Observer: What would you say you want the Fordham community to do with that information?
Tetlow: We always walk a line of not wanting to create anxiety for students when they will feel powerless to do anything about the situation, which is a very real issue here, but also needing you to know what’s going on in the world that is affecting your classmates. I think for students to understand that their colleagues and friends who are here on student visas
Durga Desai // The Observer University President Tania Tetlow sits down with Fordham student press to discuss issue plaguing the university.
FEATURES & PROFILES
Is Everything a Recession Indicator? Tarriffs put the economy on the precipice, fashion
BY LEEYA AZEMOUN Head Copy Editor
The term “recession indicator” has surged in popularity online, but it’s not just another internet buzzword thrown around without meaning. Recession indicators are diagnosed by observing shifts in trends compared to past behaviors and spending habits. But they have far more to do with the public affect the economy causes than with economic shifts themselves.
Since the threat of a recession creates widespread despondency, resulting indicators reflect the two ends of a reactionary spectrum: embracing the somber mood through conservative trends, or chasing ebullience through temporary joys.
Vincenzo Domecq, Fordham College at Lincoln Center (FCLC) ’28, shared a sentiment many have expressed online: absolutely everything seems like a recession indicator when “prices for everything are going up — especially what our government’s putting tariffs on.”
Kennedy Riggins, FCLC ’28, said she often sees the term pop up on her feed.
“There’s different things that go on that basically show that a recession is coming … like, people are buying more lip glosses, and that is an indicator. Stupid stuff like that,” Riggins said. The term is somewhat satirized on the internet, with many users sarcastically referring to every post they see as recession indicators in response to the phrase’s rapid increase in frequency. As people have gained motivation to learn about the economy in the wake of online fame, our cultural ability to expand the definition and understanding of a term has been put on display.
Domecq and Riggins are not wrong to agree with these social media users. Everything — down to the “stupid stuff” — can indicate a recession because of its recently overwhelming imminence. James Ng, a senior financial advisor with Wells Fargo, said that “nothing is doing well” following Trump administration-sanctioned tariffs.
These economic realities can be observed in popular fashion choices. Some choose to take a modest route. One recession prediction theory is the “hemline index,” coined by economist George Taylor in 1926. It refers to the notion that the more severe an economic downturn, the longer the hemline of skirts and pants will be Although the correlation may not be so accurate, the innate desire to cover up — as in the case
of baggy clothing — for added comfort is a psychologically-backed phenomenon — a subconscious complement to a melancholy mood — according to InStyle.
“People are more conservative nowadays. There’s a really big trend of long skirts,” Riggins said.
Eloise Lebee, a wardrobe supervisor with West Street Productions, said that she’s seen similar shifts as wardrobe demands have changed.
“As soon as a recession hits, or inflation, or anything like that, there’s a lot more callback to things that are comfortable or things that are practical,” Lebee said.
But not all Americans express their recession-induced anxieties by the same means.
A longing to return to a more enjoyable time allows nostalgia to acutely permeate the culture, an approach that contrasts a somber or strictly pragmatic style. Pop music is an oft-cited recession indicator — a sign that a demand for “fun” is dire, firmly attributed to 2007-2009 recession-era artists like Kesha, T-Pain, Lady Gaga or Skrillex, all of whom are regaining popularity.
Marc Yeh, FCLC ’28, notices that people seem to be drawn to more music festivals and concerts. The bright, flamboyant visual styles of the 1980s through the 2000s are returning alongside this zeal for excitement since they act as temporary havens against harsh realities. In beauty, changes as minute as the middle part by the supposedly subversive side part are being cited as recession indicators.
“Everyone’s becoming more comfortable, kind of expressing themselves how they want to express themselves … a surge in creativity … you know, being yourself and showing that physically,” Caron said.
Lebee further discussed how a rapid turnover of fashion interests comes with this “surge of creativity,” as people try on different forms of individuality. People gravitate toward microtrends that they do not personally resonate with, instead
is adjusting
experimenting with “something that is more fleeting and momentary.”
For some, however, this period of experimentation serves as a time of discovery and deepened values. As recession fashion grows in topicality, the political messaging that clothing sends — whether intentional or not — is entering the public sphere.
For instance, Lebee called attention to a notable shift from subdued, drab hues to bright, in-your-face colors in the mid-2010s, a change attributed both chronologically and politically to the 2016 presidential election, when women’s finances were particularly vulnerable. At the time, President Donald Trump threatened the Fair Pay order that protected equal pay for all genders — a violation of individual rights that served as the impetus for more brash individuality. Lebee said the departure from “seft” pastels coincided with a departure from “feminine” gender roles in response to threats against women’s rights.
Hampton Ramos, FCLC ’28, enumerated some other shifts toward eye-catching styles: “low rise, big sunglasses, all of that stuff … bows on everything.” She continued, “people used to dress more casual, now I feel like I’ve seen a lot more people dressing up every day.”
The “fleeting and momentary” phenomenon that Lebee highlighted extends far beyond fashion. Much like the lip gloss trend Riggins mentioned, a Raymond James article defines the “lipstick index” as the purchasing of affordable, novelty items as a means of sparking joy — akin to the “trinket-collecting” trend that has gained traction for similar reasons.
According to USA Today and the National Library of Medicine, spending on drugs and alcohol, sometimes referred to as “vice spending,” is a thriving attempt to meet incessant demands for a pick-me-up during a recession. These impulse decisions feel gratifying in the moment, but of course, are ultimately detrimental.
Although they may seem trivial, staying aware of these evolutions in fashion and culture can help us maintain an awareness of the equally rapidly changing economy and political landscape. A recession is undoubtedly daunting, but there are more productive ways to deal with it than others. Panic-buying and substance abuse are dangerous outlets for economic anxieties that could be somewhat remedied by trying out a new look instead.
Joy in the Struggle
Fr. Bryan Massingale on Ignatian values and the struggle for justice
BY SAM BRACY News Editor
Bryan Massingale doesn’t love it when people write about him. In fact, he said he hates the way profiles preserve a particular account of who he is, like a fossil of an extinct specimen trapped between layers of sediment.
“I hate these kinds of profiles because even more than the label, the profile itself becomes a fossilization of who you are in a sense, and it never quite does justice to it,” Massingale said.
Labels also can reduce people to a handful of constructed identities that can other people and perpetuate harm. Massingale is wary of the way certain words are externally imposed whether marginalized people want to adopt them or not.
“These labels are socially constructed and they never capture the fullness of our reality,” Massingale said. “At the same time, those socially constructed labels have socially destructive impacts. So even if we do not like the labels gay, queer, trans, whatever, there are very powerful forces in our society that are going to use those identities that cause us great harm.”
Despite these feelings around labels, Massingale embraces the particularity of his experience as a Black gay Catholic priest and lifelong educator. He said he wants to act as a pioneer to encourage others who might continue to bring something new into the world.
“Is it a ‘both and’ reality that, am I a Black priest? Yes. Am I only a Black priest? No. But I do think it is important to be visible as a Black priest precisely because of what Blackness means in our society,” Massingale said.
On Saturday, Massingale’s book “Racial Justice and the Catholic Church” was purged from the U.S. Naval Academy’s library alongside hundreds of other books deemed to be a part of diversity, equity and inclusion policies. As President Donald Trump’s administration attacks diverse voices on federal monuments and websites — and infringes upon the civil liberties of activists and immigrants — Massingale said Americans need to reckon with deep questions about their country’s values.
“I think we need to get beyond policy debates and disagreements and say what is really at stake here,” Massingale said. “What do we stand for? Who are we? I think that is the question that the country really needs to wrestle with and is wrestling with but does not know how to wrestle with it because we have very few forums where those kinds of deep value questions can be raised, which is where I think Jesuit education comes to mind.”
On a rainy Monday in late March, Massingale met with students in a stony seminar room inside Duane Library on
the Rose Hill campus. It was the first class meeting after spring break, and the first since the Trump administration began detaining international students associated with campus activism. Massingale opened the floor to his students, asking how they felt. One student replied that she felt disillusioned to the extent that she was asking herself, “what’s the point?”
Later, Massingale said disillusionment can be positive or even necessary. Illusions, he said, prevent us from recognizing societal issues. In his class, he and his students take their disillusionment as a challenge to fight for change.
“If disillusionment leads to a sense of defeat or despair, then disillusionment is counterproductive. But disillusionment is a way of saying, ‘wait a minute, my country, my church, my institutions are not what I thought they were.’ Now can that spur me to take action to make them be what they ought to be?” Massingale said.
For Massingale, shedding harmful illusions and spurring people to action is the work of a Jesuit education. He sees the synthesis of faith and justice in Ignatian values not just as an application of Catholic teachings, but as an essential part of the Gospel. He said that the role of Jesuit institutions and educators intertwines the interrogation of faith and justice as two practices and ideals, in order to discover their deep connection.
Massingale speaks with the passion of a preacher, the depth of a professor and the candor of a friend. He talks in structured depth, as if delivering a speech, but cracks jokes as well. He does not keep a shell around his emotions either and will be honest if a memory is painful for him to recall.
While Massingale admires Ignatian values and has spent much of his life walking alongside Jesuits, he himself is not a member of the Society of Jesus. Massingale said maybe he would have been, had the Society asked him to join.
As an undergraduate at Marquette University, Massingale was an exceptional
student with a clear path to becoming a man of the cloth.
“I was a daily mass-goer. I was a leader in campus ministry retreats, majored in theology and philosophy, had a four point average in it all. I mean, I had priestly vocations stamped on my forehead in neon lights,” Massingale said.
But he was not invited to become a Jesuit. Massingale planned to attend seminary school and work toward priesthood instead. He recalled a Jesuit telling him, “I am sure if you had what it took to be a Jesuit we would have asked you,” when he was 21 years old.
“I thought about that and I said, well, wait a minute, what am I lacking? Especially because I had, you know, white classmates who did not have all of that going on for them and they were asked. And I realized that what he meant was that it was because I was Black,” Massingale said.
Massingale realized that the institutions he looked up to, like the Catholic Church and the Society of Jesus, were also guilty of the sin of racism. This moment of disillusionment is still a painful memory for Massingale four decades later, but he said standing outside of the Society of Jesus allows him to confront obstacles to racial justice.
“There are times when even the Society of Jesus falls short and it needs to be challenged to live up to its aspirations, and I think sometimes those who are outside the Society have a freedom to raise those questions,” Massingale said.
As a professor, priest and activist, Massingale uses inquiry to challenge and reveal oppression. Massingale said that he is made afraid by the seeming impunity of the Trump administration’s targeting of activists and academics, but that his faith gives him the courage to struggle.
“Courage is doing what we believe is right despite being afraid,” Massingale said. “That’s what courage is all about, it is not letting our fear control us. It’s being motivated by something that’s deeper than fear. And that’s love.”
Sam Bracy // The Observer
Fr. Brian Massingale embraces his personal experiences in the Church.
Glass Courts Not Glass Ceilings
Sofia Arseniev made a strong impression at Fordham when she was first being recruited.
Sofia Arseniev makes Fordham athletic history by being the first female squash athlete to play on a Division I roster
BY CORA COST Sports & Health Editor
Down two games in a nationals match last season, Sofia Arseniev was hit in the face with a racket. When Arseniev came out to recover, Fordham men’s squash coach Sahel Anwar thought she would end up defaulting the match. Instead, Arseniev took a beat to ice her face. She got back on the court and ended up winning the match, 2 - 3.
“It was crazy. She was like, ‘no, I’m going to go back and play.’ And I’m like, ‘okay, yeah, it’s okay. You don’t need to go!’ And she’s like, ‘no, I want to go. I want to play, I want to play.’ And she iced herself for a little bit and she went back on court, and then, yeah, she won the third game, fourth game and ended up winning the fifth game,” Anwar said.
Arseniev, Fordham College at Lincoln Center ’25, joined the squash program her first year, becoming the first female squash athlete to play on the Division I men’s team ladder. Four years later, Arseniev closed out her Fordham squash career by playing her last match this March and becoming the first female squash player to have a career win in the program’s history.
Throughout her career, coach Anwar has seen Arseniev develop into both a technically and mentally strong squash athlete. The strength of this mentality
was on full display during her comeback in last year’s nationals match against Vassar.
“I think it’s the self-confidence in her now, when she’s out there nothing fears her, and, you know, I’m sure it’s probably happening outside of the squash court as well too,” Anwar said.
For many people, squash is a sport they have never been acquainted with. Squash is often inadequately compared to tennis or pickleball, but they share few similarities in reality.
Arseniev’s squash career started long before she became a Ram. Born into a squash-playing family, Arseniev picked up her first racket at age nine. Growing up in Russia, Arseniev’s family saw squash as a stepping stone to an acceptance to an American university.
“I got into it because my aunt played squash and she had okay grades in high school, but she got into UPenn because she got recruited for squash,” Arseniev said. “At the time I was living in Moscow, Russia when I was nine — my father’s Russian. My parents kind of thought, ‘oh this could be a ticket to university from Russia,’ like an out of Russia kind of thing, and so I started playing.”
For many people, squash is a sport they have never been acquainted with. Squash is often inadequately compared to tennis or pickleball, but they share few similarities in reality. Squash is played in a glass court where the two players hit a small rubber ball against a wall. The truly niche nature of squash is what draws Arseniev to the sport.
“I think squash is a very unique sport. You have to be very athletic for it. It’s a lot of endurance,” Arseniev said. “The ball does not bounce at all. A tennis ball is very bouncy, but the whole point about squash is you have to hit the ball hard enough that it gets warm and it gets bouncier.”
Arseniev finally moved to the United States to live in Washington D.C. with her grandparents, before highschool. The move from Russia to the U.S. was in hopes of having a better opportunity to be recruited by American universities.
In the U.S., Arseniev played on the squash team at her all girls high school, National Cathedral School. She found a lot of success on the court while in D.C., she was a two time MVP and in 2019 she was a U.S. Junior Squash All-American. With her success in high school and Junior Squash, Arseniev started the college recruitment process in the hopes of continuing her squash career. Then the unexpected hit — in 2020, Arseniev found herself at home like most of the
Courtesy of Fordham Athletics
country due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
While stuck at home, Arseniev decided to put down her racket and quit the recruitment process. So ultimately her decision to apply to Fordham had nothing to do with potential squash prospects.
“I kind of had a little bit of a rebellious streak and I quit and so I stopped. I was in the process of getting recruited but I just didn’t reply to any of the emails and just applied normally and got into Fordham,” Arseniev said.
Even though squash was not the reason Arseniev joined the Ramily, it was not long before she picked her racket back up. Fordham has a Division I men’s squash team, along with a women’s club squash team. During Arseniev’s first year, her mother encouraged her to return to the sport and try out for the women’s club team.
“Once I played with the guys and they saw that I was good as well, it was kind of a no brainer.”
Sofia Arseniev
FCLC
’25
As a student at Fordham Lincoln Center (FLC), Arseniev had to take the inter-campus transportation, the Ram Van, to club practices. The drive between the Lincoln Center and the Bronx campus would soon become a staple of Arseniev’s Fordham career.
After a couple of practices with the club team, Arseniev decided to reach out to coach Anwar. Anwar invited Arseniev to play at the squash court in the Lombardi Fieldhouse at the Rose Hill campus.
“To be honest, she was basically a walk on,” Anwar said.
From the moment that Arseniev played on the Lombardi Squash Courts, Anwar moved to put her on the program’s roster.
“Once I played with the guys and they saw that I was good as well, it was kind of a no brainer. I should play for the men’s team,” Arseniev said.
Despite being a “no brainer” for Arseniev to be a member of the Division I squash roster, the transition onto the team was anything but smooth. For one, Arseniev had never played on an allmen’s team before. Initially Arseniev was confronted with the shock of a new playing environment but once she found her footing she felt incredibly welcomed by the Fordham Squash team.
“I was 18, fresh out of high school, and I also went to an all-girls high school. So that was such a shock to be, like, at an all-girls high school and then an allmen squash team, but the guys were nice to me,” Arseniev said. “It was definitely kind of hard because I was like, oh, do I have to be kind of a cool girl? Should I be more quiet? Should I be more talkative and I guess be more myself, but the three
seniors, my three captains freshman year, were so nice. They immediately treated me really as part of the team.”
It is extremely rare that varsity athletes at Fordham are students seeking their degrees at FLC instead of the Rose Hill campus. Despite not being advised by the athletics department, as a neuroscience major, Arseniev decided to not move up to the Bronx.
“Fordham was not happy with me when I didn’t transfer to Rose Hill after starting the season,” Arseniev said.
Staying at FLC, Arseniev has had to be highly conscious of her schedule. Over her four years at Fordham, Arseniev had to balance her academic classes, 8 a.m. practices and travel between The Bronx to Manhattan. From when the team begins practices in October to when the squash season ends in March, Arseniev has had to be both an athlete at Rose Hill and a student at Lincoln Center.
“She made it work. It was all her, it
“Women’s squash has a huge potential, and I mean, I honestly enjoy watching women play squash more than men playing squash because it’s also a lot more tactful,”
Sofia Arseniev FCLC ’25
had nothing to do with me, to be honest. It was all her effort being able to get up and come in the morning and classes and whatnot and her schedules,” Anwar said.
The first two years on the team were an adjustment period for Arseniev as squash player, according to coach Anwar. Arseniev’s first year was the first time she had played competitively against male athletes.
“When you put her in a situation where now she’s competing with the men as well too, it is very difficult. I think in the beginning we kind of went through that where she had to learn to
overcome that. And then the last two years, honestly, it’s just been great, the way she’s been able to compete. It’s been a good ride with her on the team,” Anwar said.
Over her four years at Fordham, Arseniev has seen growth both in her play on the court and in her ability to articulate her needs as an athlete. Being the only female athlete on an all-male roster has been challenging, but Arseniev felt the most important thing for her was to be able to take space from the team when needed.
“There were definitely some times where I really was like, ‘this is really annoying me when you’re on the Ram Van for seven hours with all guys and they’re being very crude,’” Arseniev said. “I’m like, ‘what am I doing right now?’
But I think it was just key for me to articulate that with my coach because it got to a point where I realized that no, I can’t be like one of the guys, so I just have to take my time when I need it and when I feel like it,” Arseniev said.
From walking on to the team her first year to graduating as a Division I squash athlete, Fordham Squash has shaped Arseniev’s Fordham career and her future.
“I’m definitely very glad that I played, and I will definitely be in contact with some of the guys — probably for the rest of my life,” Arseniev said.
As her career as a Fordham athlete has come to an end, Arseniev hopes that the opportunity she has had to be a female squash athlete at Fordham does not end with her. She said that there are so many talented female squash athletes who are waiting for the opportunity to get on the court at the collegiate level.
“Women’s squash has a huge potential, and I mean, I honestly enjoy watching women play squash more than men playing squash because it’s also a lot more tactful,” Arseniev said. “There’s a bunch of girls who are very good but don’t get recruited because there’s just not enough teams, and I think Fordham would have a great women’s squad.”
Courtesy of Sofia Arnesiev
Sofia Arseniev started playing squash when she was nine years old living in Moscow, Russia.
THE ARTS
Animation’s Capacity for Complexity
While often misconceived as childish, this medium is a diverse mode of creation
BY VEE VENNING
Asst. Opinions Editor
Animation has undergone tremendous developments in the past century, and as the medium evolves, its popularity continues to soar. In 2023, North America’s animation market was valued as the largest in the globe, with a revenue of $23.22 billion and an expected annual growth rate of 5%.
In spite of its indisputable presence in the entertainment industry, animation is regularly written off as childish. Although a significant portion of animated media admittedly caters to younger audiences, it is crucial to remember that animation is a medium, not a genre. It is a unique mode of creation with the capacity to transport audiences to worlds that transcend reality, and this potential manifests in mature and adolescent content alike.
While artists like J. Stuart Blackton and Winsor McCay made notable animated pieces in the early 20th century, their characters and stories created a foundation upon which Walt Disney quickly capitalized.
Disney solidified itself as a dominant force in the industry with the advent of Mickey Mouse and synchronized sound featured in its 1928 animated short film “Steamboat Willie.” The company’s subsequent release of “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs,” one of the earliest animated feature films, marked another significant shift in the commercialization of the medium and Disney’s claim on it.
Considering the correlation between the rise of Disney’s success and animated media, it’s no surprise that animation has developed a reputation as a childish medium. However, to write it off as such is to belittle its value as an art form and a means of storytelling.
Disney has since morphed into a mega-conglomerate, encompassing notable studios such as Marvel and Pixar in 2009 and 2006, respectively. Disney then went on to win the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature Film 13 times since its conception in 2002. This considerable critical acclaim further established the studio as a leading force in animation, simultaneously strengthening the medium’s connection to Disney and, subsequently,
childhood.
However, Disney and its seemingly endless stream of releases should not define our perception of animation. In fact, plenty of other studios are more than worthy of our acclaim.
Considering the correlation between the rise of Disney’s success and animated media, it’s no surprise that animation has developed a reputation as a childish medium.
Cartoon Saloon, located in Kilkenny, Ireland, is one of many smaller studios making waves in the animation industry. With releases like “The Breadwinner,” a 2017 PG-13 film based on a young adult novel, Cartoon Saloon proves to audiences that animation can capture relevant themes in a beautiful and imaginative fashion. The movie delves into discussions of misogyny, political unrest and more as it depicts the story of Parvana (Saara Chaudry), a young girl living under the Taliban regime.
While some may categorize this film as
Illustrations by Ikma Inusah // The Observer
Abjecting Innocence: Post-9/11
Artistic Production
Disruptive contemporary aesthetics track the destabilization of childhood’s structure
BY GRACE MISKOVSKY
Contributing Writer
“JonBenet Ramsey and the Culture of Child Abuse; Can We Clone Humans?” “Who Speaks for Kids? As growing up in America grows more perilous, the battle heats up over how best to help our children.” “Kids without a Conscience? Rape, murder, a baby dead at a prom: A look at young lives that seem to have gone very, very wrong.” “Too Fat? Too Thin? How media images of celebrities teach kids to hate their bodies.”
Curator Jean Crutchfield cited these headlines in her introduction to “Presumed Innocence,” a 1998 exhibition examining changing structures of childhood and adolescence in the late twentieth century in relation to television’s exposure to war, violence and cultural anxieties. The longstanding, mistaken presumption of childhood innocence is undermined by a group of conceptual artists such as Mike Kelley, Lisa Yuskavage and Inez van Lamsweerde. Within the exhibition, they acknowledge the agency, frustration and potential violence of children — deconstructing stuffed toys, re-appropriating the supposed naivete of cartoons and cyberizing childlike forms. Childhood, according to “Presumed Innocence,” is endangered by perilous social and cultural conditions.
In a feedback loop of exposure and self-reproduction, when do children stop being innocent and instead start being complicit in childhood’s demise?
In the 1990s, various artists explored how childhood’s supposed innocence is further destabilized by access to knowledge through television, media and digital structures that children are not cognitively able to process. Notable examples include “Kylie” (1997) by Dinos & Jake Chapman, “Glock” (1994) by Daniel Oates and “Pinocchio Pipenose Household Dilemma” (1994) by Paul McCarthy. Technologies are not innocent in exploiting the image of the prepubescent child in selling youth culture, or even in contributing to a 41% increase in violence on television between 1992 and 1994, as noted by Hillary Clinton in her book “It Takes a Village: And Other Lessons Children Teach Us.”
The mirror, a foundational object for children’s construction of the self, is replaced by the television; children mimic the chaos inside, seeing their reflection overlay a diet pill advertisement or live war
footage from Afghanistan. In a feedback loop of exposure and self-reproduction, when do children stop being innocent and instead start being complicit in childhood’s demise?
“Ah, youth! Third graders smoke pot. Teenagers are covered with tattoos and piercings and brandings and body cuttings. Girls starve themselves to look sexy. Gangs recruit eight-year-olds to run drugs … Children are born into a world full of crack babies, drive-by shootings, AIDS, horrible pollution, congestion, fierce competition, no jobs, no hope, no guarantees, no future,” wrote Kathryn Hixson in her 1998 essay “Youthful Hysteria and Wild-eyed Delirium: Youth Culture Fights Back,” included in the exhibition’s publication. Margaret Mead noted in her 1970 “Culture and Commitment: A Study of the Generation Gap” that “there are now no elders who know more than the young themselves about what the young are experiencing.” Philosopher Theodor Adorno’s theory of “well-informed superiority” applies well here, in which seemingly informed people underestimate the powers they are up against. At the time of its inauguration 27 years ago, “Presumed Innocence” examined the dire nature of social death, its impact on children who adopt and perpetuate it and a thinning generational gap in which parents and children alike become ill-equipped to process a fragmented culture.
self that one finds particularly disturbing. Much of contemporary art since 2000 has dealt with abjection: the dispelling of horror manifested in childhood via trauma, digital indoctrination or exposure to violence which one cannot truly separate from itself.
Bernadette Corporation’s “Get Rid of Yourself” from 2003 examines the “aesthetics of rebellion” in a post-9/11, anti-art, anarchic landscape. The hour-long “antidocumentary” tracks the experiences of rioters from the 2001 G8 summit in Genoa, Italy, converging with digitally distorted footage of 9/11, pointing to the disturbance of civil life due to the pressures of capitalism and the subordination of the poor. In evidencing the leering presence of local and transnational empires and colonization, “Get Rid of Yourself” presents a strata of naturalized violence exacerbated by 9/11 which seeps into daily life and coming of age.
Since then, post-9/11 and contemporary art production has similarly dealt with the disturbing abyss of the digital age, now manifested in brain-rotted virtual realities, 4Chan and deep-web manospheres. The iPhone has replaced the television as a mirror, pressed up against the faces of young teens hidden under their bedsheets late into the night. Anxiety is revealed by contemporary art in the deconstruction of a hypersexualized, exploitative and pornographic self-image.
The landscape of violence in contemporary art is also different, set against the cultural backdrop of Columbine, the murder of Tamir Rice and Trump’s rise to power. Abjection, coined by Julia Kristeva in her book “Powers of Horror,” refers to the rejection of parts of the
Children, victims of exposure to trauma detailed in “Get Rid of Yourself,” at some point become capable of enacting such violence. As perpetrators, children act out fantasies of social disintegration
Courtesy of Dario Lasgani Here, Lee titillates sexual euphemisms by cornering the exaggerated, bulging eyes of Tom.
Anne de Vries courtesy of Schinkel Pavillon Uddenberg examines babyhood and agency alongside the liminal deconstruction of self-image.
manifested through their screens. In Bunny Rogers’ “Mandy’s Piano Solo in Columbine Cafeteria” (2016), digital snow flecks accumulate on the floor of a virtual rendering of the Columbine High School’s cafeteria, where in 1999 students Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold massacred fifteen students and then themselves. Mandy, Rogers’ recurring digital character, melancholically sips red wine on the bench of a grand piano as her spindly, triangular fingers brush up and down the keys.
Much of contemporary art since 2000 has dealt with abjection: the dispelling of horror manifested in childhood via trauma, digital indoctrination or exposure to violence which one cannot truly separate from itself.
Johanna Fateman refers to the Columbine shooting in her review of Rogers’ work in Artforum as a “fin-demillennium media event that produced shocking new icons of alienated masculinity and remapped the American high school as a site of spectacular violence.” “Mandy’s Piano Solo in Columbine Cafeteria” also contributes to new icons in the post-9/11 era of artistic production in its ominous liminality. The cafeteria, a space designated for children, becomes the uncanny animated detritus of societal collapse as digital pixels converge to reflect an early 2000s tech aesthetic.
Ben Davis typifies this post-9/11 aesthetic in his essay “Culture Has No Name for this Cursed Vibe. It’s Everywhere,” and writes that the ill-defined movement, which has extended until the present, displays “the sense of a digital reality-collapse that is now accelerating faster and faster … (present in) the dark feeling I get from the story of the young man who tragically took his own life because his A.I. clone of ‘Danaerys’ from “Game of Thrones” told him to ‘come home.’ ... It’s the influencers literally eating themselves to death on camera.” This brings to mind the 2014 stabbing in Waukesha, Wisconsin, in which two teens, after
spiraling into the Creepypasta web page, stabbed their friend in the woods to appease the fictional video game character Slender Man.
The agency of the child is then questioned. As adults “fear the children we would protect,” their power as perpetrators of violence is realized. Conversely, Hong Kong’s “Chalk Girl,” a fifteen-year-old arrested in 2014 for drawing flowers in chalk on a government building, became an icon of the Umbrella Movement and children’s political rebellion. Children like “Chalk Girl,” symbols of childhood purity, double as undisciplined resistors.
Anna Uddenberg’s “Closing” (2022) examines babyhood and agency as much as it discusses the liminal deconstruction of self-image. A man dressed in a diaper and crocs suggestively crouches, backside to the sky, within a sterilized bassinet doubling as a suitcase. Constrained and molded within a sickly sweet blue and gray contraption, complete with leather frills on its hinges, the man-as-baby is subject to the space around him. Suggesting a subliminal desire to reconnect with intrauterine existence as detailed by Paul Federn’s “Womb Fantasy,” the man is received by a womb-like machine, thereby giving up his own agency. The work engineers his posturing, referencing a pornographic self-image, and alludes to the sexual development of children we would rather not talk about, which Freud did, extensively. Once more returning to Kristeva’s theory of abjection and Lacan’s theory of a child’s “mirror stage,” Robert Hobbs writes in his essay “Youth’s Purgatory” that “Kristeva’s … insidious oedipal narrative characterizes a recurrent … pattern in which one rejects aspects of oneself … in order to come to terms with the symbolic name-of-thefather.” Uddenberg’s sculpture welcomes and disgusts the man which it encapsulates because it reveals his internal desire to reject the self and become one again with the parent and womb.
Gowoon Lee explores the underpinnings of violence and sexuality in Mickey Mouse, Looney Tunes and other early children’s cartoons that subsume modern relevance. In “Asphyxia,” (2022) Lee titillates sexual euphemisms by cornering the exaggerated, bulging eyes of Tom from Tom and Jerry. Intensely furrowed eyebrows constrict bulbous forms, referencing adult anatomy. Upon a searing red backdrop, Tom grotesquely transforms into a veiny, aggressive icon while Lee maintains a familiar cartoon-ish painterly
aesthetic. As Lee imbues aggression and suggested sexuality into antiquated children’s imagery, the gap between the dawn of television and the weird, web-ish fissures children and teenagers subscribe to is illuminated.
On the back of the AIDS crisis and early 90s retro technology, “Presumed Innocence” reflected systems of childhood withering throughout the twentieth century.
Works like Leila Hekmat’s 2022 play “CROCOPAZZO!” explore sexually charged family dysfunction, while Stanya Kahn’s “Stand in the Stream,” produced from 2011-2017, documents interactions with strangers on Omegle. Colin Montgomery’s “Emergency Doors (Smithsonian American History Museum)” from 2006 implies violence towards school group tours, imposing the conditional usage of emergency doors. Tobias Bradford’s “Hundis” comes to mind as reflective of the post-9/11 aesthetic, as a nightmarish presentation of an animatronic dog-man who appeared in the artist’s dreams as a child.
On the back of the AIDS crisis and early 90s retro technology, “Presumed Innocence” reflected systems of childhood withering throughout the twentieth century. In post9/11 artistic production, the idyllicism of childhood is further deconstructed. Out of red-pilled male supremacy, right-wing extremism, QAnon, Slender Man and Elon Musk’s DOGE coin, the art of abjection is produced — grotesque, self (and society) repellant and liminal. It is a result of the horrifying realization that kids kill each other, police brutality footage is streamed on YouTube and the Nazi party is being reimagined before our eyes. The worst part is, that we all belong to a culture which allows it. Therefore, the post-9/11 and contemporary aesthetic negates the innocence of children and adults alike, repelling manifestations of societal evil upon art objects. We watch, stare and shiver at how much these art objects look just like us.
Courtesy of Henrik Schedin “Hundis” serves as a notable example of the post9/11 aesthetic.
Courtesy of Bunny Rogers Rogers contributes to icons in the post-9/11 era of artistic production in its ominous liminality.
Visions of the Heart in Lipani Gallery
Two photographers’ senior theses meditate on kinship and belonging
BY NORA KINNEY Asst. Arts & Culture Editor
On March 28, a crowd gathered in Lipani Gallery to celebrate Lucy Duckett and Kenzie Roberts, two Fordham seniors presenting their thesis projects for the visual arts program from March 25 to April 8.
Duckett (FCLC ’25) and Roberts (FCLC ’25) completed their theses independently, and their work involved different narratives. However, when exhibited in the same space, a visual synergy suffused the room. Photos taken by both artists felt like memories — flashes of a never-ending summer, and of sheltering within it.
In one of Roberts’ images, a young woman lays in a shallow pool of water while waves crash further down the beach. Duckett showcased a similarly composed photo – a person half submerged in the reedy waters off an embankment, their head tilted to the sky.
I spoke to Duckett first about her thesis, “En Gallop,” named after the Joanna Newsom song, which she called “a connecting force … ongoing, unending, like this project.” Duckett’s photos reflect the time she spent at independently-run “transgender healing farms” in the rural midwest, where she lived and bonded with the people who operate them. The first town she visited had a population of 973.
“I feel like being transgender in the middle of nowhere, in a town of less than a thousand people — and it’s like ‘Trumpland,’ like ‘MAGA-land’ — that’s terrifying,” she said. “I think that’s what drew me in.”
Duckett found a directory of LGBTQ+ farming projects last summer and started cold-pitching her thesis. After numerous dead-ends, she finally heard from a few farmsteaders who were open to hosting her. Fordham awarded Duckett an undergraduate research grant to cover her expenses, and she set out for middle America.
In Hesperia, Michigan, Duckett camped on the land and met folks there who aim to create a community for transgender and queer people. In Viroqua, Wisconsin, she befriended a flower farmer named Rufus, whose portrait, “Rufus Buzzes Hair,” is a highlight of the collection. The photo shows Rufus standing shirtless in their front yard, shaving their head with an electric razor. Light glances off a hand mirror and onto their scarred chest.
Duckett stressed the importance of gaining her subjects’ trust in order to portray them intimately.
“You can’t just go to those kinds of places and start photographing immediately. You have to form a connection,” she said. “I didn’t want them to think that I was taking advantage of them. I wanted them to know that I cared about them, and that I cared about what they were doing.”
“En Gallop” feels like the first sign of spring; the miracle of beginning anew. The sparse pastoral backdrop gives the series a dreamy quality. While traveling, Duckett, the
outsider, noted that “the hills seem to go on forever … I can’t tell the difference between anything here.” Her subjects seem habituated to their natural surroundings; they traverse it as if they have always been there.
Yet impermanence pervades the collection. One image shows a tiny church in disrepair, the remainder of a faithful community that no longer exists. I was curious about a collage that featured a dead moth — Duckett said the insect was from Rufus’ home. She taped it to the back of a note and framed it with a photo she had taken of a dead cat.
The morbid implications add a layer of complexity to Duckett’s photos. I contemplated the significance of rural havens for a group of people who face increasing threats to their access to medical care, the perversion of their identity in mainstream media and overt erasure by the governmwent. Is it exile? Is it paradise?
For Duckett, it is a community persisting in unexpected places. Her time on the farms opened her eyes to a way of purposeful living that defied her own judgement.
“I always thought that I needed to be in a city (to be) settled down,” she said. “Life is not what you expect it to be. These people did not expect to be what they’re doing … Community is everywhere, it really is.”
Similarly poignant but differing in subject matter, “Fibers” by Kenzie Roberts centers on female kinship and the preservation of youth. The frameless images range in size, from polaroids to large prints, and are displayed on the gallery walls in neat clusters.
Roberts created several prominent pieces of fiber art to accompany her photographs. Two are large-scale monochrome crochet portraits, feats of craftsmanship that Roberts takes great pride in. She made the first over the course of three weeks, and the second one in just three restless days. Woven in the likeness of her loved ones, the portraits evoke the artist’s unbreakable bond with the subjects.
Highlighting the people in her life is not out of the ordinary for Roberts. Before her thesis, she regularly photographed her friends and family, and her instincts lent to particularly alluring images. When a
professor pushed her to develop a cohesive narrative for them, the undertaking felt like a natural extension of her artistic gaze. She took more photos in Hawaii, South Carolina and her home in Seattle, among other places.
“My sister is in a couple of them, my best friends from home are in them, my best friends from here are in them,” Roberts said. “It’s just a culmination, it’s all very personal.”
The photos that comprise “Fibers” brim with tenderness and light. Between snapshots of sun-drenched flower beds, interior scenes and ephemera, there are girls. They lounge by open windows and on sofa beds, entangled in each other’s limbs. They romp in various states of undress and tumble onto the grass. There is freedom in the way they wield their bodies and bare their skin. The girls look directly into the camera lens, inscrutable and utterly captivating.
Those images are the ones Roberts likes most, because the eye contact creates an interaction with the viewer. She designed her exhibition with those intimate moments of connection in mind — which is why she included smaller photo sizes that require close-up viewing.
Getting the right shot was intuitive for Roberts, but it helped to put her subjects at ease first. She often captured them in familiar environments like their bedrooms.
“I didn’t want to put someone in a room and have it be inauthentic and weird. I wanted them to be comfortable in the setting and just do what they wanted,” she said. “I didn’t want it to feel foreign, like a performance.”
Roberts’ process reflects her greater objective for “Fibers,” which she said is to memorialize this time in her life through art. Looking at her photos depicting female friendship, I felt a sense of displaced nostalgia, like I was attaching my own memories to someone else’s. I wondered aloud what it will be like to look back on the project decades in the future, as if it were a universal scrapbook.
Through Roberts’ eyes, girlhood is not a batch of tropes, but rather a projection of uninhibited joy and companionship that will hold true forever.
Kei Sugae // The Observer
Kenzie Roberts poses infront of her work in Lipani.
Observer-Feed Quiz: Which Fordham Dining Option are You?
Our Lincoln Center campus has a variety of fine dining options for Rams to enjoy, each one with its own unique flavor and personality. Which one are you most like?
Jot down how many times you selected each letter and flip to the back page to see your results!
On a Friday night, you are most likely to be …
a. At a Broadway show
b. Wherever, as long as I’m with friends
c. Out on the town
d. Studying
What’s your comfort show?
a. “Community”
b. “Modern Family”
c. “The Suite Life of Zack & Cody”
d. “Gilmore Girls”
Your roommate’s candle tipped over and set the dorm on fire … QUICK!
Pick something to save:
a. Your laptop
b. Your favorite outfit
c. Your digital camera
d. Your favorite stuffed animal
Pick your favorite place to study on campus:
a. Law Library
b. The Plaza
c. I’d rather be off-campus
d. Quinn Library
Which of the following best describes your mornings?
a. I like a substantial breakfast to start my day
b. I usually like to eat a quick snack before class
c. I always roll out of bed and get straight to class
d. I cannot operate without my morning bev
Which Hogwarts house do you most associate with?
a. Hufflepuff
b. Gryffindor
c. Slytherin
d. Ravenclaw
What is your go-to midnight snack?
a. I’m not a big snacker
b. Midnight is usually when I eat dinner
c. Chips
d. Something sweet
Where is your dream vacation destination?
a. Italy
b. Mexico
c. Japan
d. France
Which section of The Observer (besides Fun & Games, of course!) do you most look forward to?
