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ubgeneration.com
GENERATION MAGAZINE
MISSION ACCOMPLISHED -
Late Night Low -Down Pussy Willow Party Drone On
Table of Contents
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5 EIC Letter Guilty Pleasure 7 Agenda, Hit/BS Relay For Life 8 UB Twitters #HashTag 9 Trolling Grammar Police 10 Drones Unanswered Questions 11 UB Meals Dining Dos and Don’ts 15 He Said/She Said Childhood Memories 16 Pax More than a convention 18 Dyngus Day A True Buffalonian Tradition 19 Late Night Fun Buffalo After Dark 20 Book Movies An Original Thought 21. Submissions Studies in Discourse 22 Parting Shots The Cyprus Question Standing up for the BTQ
Cover designed by Melissa Osterweil and Emily Butler, Photo taken by Dinorah Santos. Photo source from all credits goes to respective photographer. www.ivillage.com (9), geekalabama.com (3), thepolitic.org (3), http://www. natomasbuzz.com/2012/04/eye-on-natomas-relay-for-life-12 (7), http://musicconnection.com/remastered-jurassic-park-soundtrack-includes-4-unreleased-john-williams-tracks/ (7) Generation Magazine is owned by Sub-Board I, Inc., the student service corporation at the State University of New York at Buffalo. The Sub-Board I, Inc. Board of Directors grants editorial autonomy to the editorial board of Generation. Sub-Board I, Inc. (the publisher) provides funding through mandatory student activity fees and is in no way responsible for the editorial content, editorial structure or editorial policy of the magazine. Editorial and business offices for Generation are located in Suite 315 in the Student Union on North Campus. The telephoane numbers are (716) 645-6131 or (716) 645-2674 (FAX). Address mail c/o Room 315 Student Union University at Buffalo, Amherst, NY 14260. Submissions to Generation Magazine should be e-mailed to ubgeneration@gmail.com by 1p.m. Tuesday, a week before each issue’s publication. This publication and its contents are the property of the students of the State University of New York at Buffalo 2011 by Generation Magazine, all rights reserved. The first 10 copies of Generation Magazine are free. Each additional copy must be approved by the editor in chief. Requests for reprints should be directed to the editor in chief. Generation Magazine neither endorses nor takes responsibility for any claims made by our advertisers. Press run 5,000. ≠≠≠
Editor’s Letter
E
veryone has a guilty pleasure in life. Whether it be a particular band or certain movie, we all have at least one thing we’re semi-afraid to admit we enjoy. But more often than not, it’s our guilty pleasure that can make us smile at the end of a long day. So why should we be afraid to tell everyone what we enjoy in life? With my time here at UB dwindling rapidly, I’ve decided that the time has come to openly admit my guilty pleasure: watching WWE with my roommate.
Once upon a time, I mocked wrestling mercilessly. The fact that people would watch the WWE and try to claim that it is a sport would annoy me to no end. Then I moved in with my roommate in August and was forced to see Monday night RAW and Smackdown on our DVR every week. For those of you who aren’t up to date on your wrestling, RAW is three hours long while Smackdown is two. This meant that I was subjected to five hours of wrestling every week if I wanted to keep Dance Moms and Glee on the record list. At first I’d sit there mocking my roommate for his obsession with WWE, but somewhere along the line I got sucked into the characters and their storylines. By the time midterms came around during the fall semester, I was willingly sitting down to watch RAW every week. I tried to hide my interest at first, for fear of being mocked by my other friends. After all, the fact that I know who Dolph Ziggler, AJ Lee, Team Rhodes Scholars, and The Funkasaurus are is already slightly embarrassing. But the fact that I know their entire backstories, current storylines, and wrestling styles puts me on a whole different level. I realized just how deep I had gone into the WWE universe when during RAW one night I looked at my roommate and said, “They need to do something about this Divas division. What they should do is have AJ start wrestling again, have her feud with Katelyn and then give AJ the title. Katelyn as a character sucks. AJ is absolutely insane but that’ll make her fun to watch. Oh, and she wears better outfits.” I scared myself so much with my comment that I had to go to bed right after. The next day, as I was being mocked for the previous night’s commentary, I realized that no matter how hard I tried to fight it, I was officially a wrestling fan. Despite the realization, I was determined to keep the information to myself for fear of being mocked.
bunch of college-aged females, so the looks I received ranged from “very nice,” to “you would,” to “wow, freak.” The awkwardness lasted for all of a minute before I decided just to own up to my guilty pleasure and embrace it. So what if I’m the only college female I know that will sit down twice a week to watch Alberto del Rio fight Big Show? I find it entertaining and that’s good enough for me. What makes me laugh about my interest in WWE is how it caused my roommate to give Glee a chance. The more interested I became in wrestling, the more open-minded he became about a bunch of singing highschoolers invading our living room once a week. Then one day I came home from work to find him watching the newest episode, alone, in the middle of the day. I casually asked him what he was doing and he responded with, “Well, Kurt and Blaine are fighting because Blaine cheated. I think they’re going to break up.” Needless to say, my jaw dropped in that moment. My six-foot-two, black, male roommate had just expressed genuine concern over the fictional relationship between two flamboyantly gay men on Glee. For the record, yes, he is still living that down. Since embracing the fact that WWE is my guilty pleasure, I’ve found myself enjoying it more. When my roommate and I went to RAW in March I flat out told people I was going and even posted a couple pictures on Facebook. My birthday party this year was a Wrestlemania-birthday party not just out of convenience, but because I had said that’s what I wanted. I’ve come to the realization that guilty pleasures don’t need to make us feel guilty. If you enjoy something (legal), you should be able to do so without being looked down upon. We’re in college, now is the time to make fools of ourselves and have a little fun. So what if someone somewhere thinks you’re strange? There is no such thing as “normal.” Trust me. Feed. Me. More.
Ally Balcerzak Eventually I let it slip at work one day that I actually enjoy watching wrestling. Mind you, I work with a
Generation Staff 2013 Editor in Chief Ally Balcerzak
Managing Editor Keighley Farrell Creative Director Melissa Osterweil Assistant Creative Director Emily Butler Photo Editor Dinorah Santos Web Editor Gabrielle Gosset Copy Editor Lee Auslander Associate Editors Laura Borschel Carlton Brock Paul Stephan Circulation Director Carlton Brock Business Manager Brian Kalish Ad Manager Jessica Bornes Contributing Staff Matt Benevento Angelina Bruno Eric Carlson
AGENDA
HIT T I H S L L U B OR
Bioshock Infinite- Finally!
The latest incarnation of Bioshock is here on the Xbox 360 and PS3. This game boasts a greatly fleshed out story, a new control scheme, and Elizabeth, one of the most impressive AI characters in videogame history. A definite must buy for any gamer.
Jurassic Park 3D: Opened April 5th. Dinosaurs; in glorious 3D. Count us in.
HIT Sick Honeybees - A mysterious disease is killing honeybees.
Fewer bees mean fewer stings, so that’s good, right? Wrong! Fewer bees means that we have less pollination of plants, ultimately meaning less food. And since there is no known solution to world hunger we need to save honeybees.
BULLSHIT
Warmer Weather
It seems Mother Nature has begun to take pity on Buffalo and is finally letting us warm up a bit. Now, we don’t really trust her to keep it that way for long, but here at Generation we like to be optimistic.
HIT
Relay for Life, April 12, 6pm-6am
Come join your classmates in Alumni Arena and help them raise money for the American Cancer Society. All proceeds go toward cancer research as well as programs to help patients and their families.
Geese
The only good thing about winter is the lack of geese. And yes, we’re aware we spend a lot of time complaining about them, but seriously, they deserve it. Why must they invade the campus every stinking year?!
BULLSHIT
Preponderance of UB ____ Pages
Thanks to people on the internet who have too much time on their hands, we now have Facebook and Twitter pages such as UB Compliments, UB Secrets, UB Crushes, UB Insults, UB Sleep Doe, and many more. We here at the Generation love the idea of being able to send anonymous messages to fellow students.
Senior Thesis: April 27, 2013: 6pm Hi-Temp Fabrication: 79 Perrty Street Buffalo, NY
Come support the undergraduate Visual Studies Seniors in their final show of the year!
Monsanto Protection Act
HIT
Attached as a rider on a recent bill, the so-called “Monsanto Protection Act” protects genetically modified crop companies from any litigation and was signed into law by President Obama. This feels shockingly similar to the “Halliburton Loophole” passed under the Bush administration, that exempts fracking from federal clean water regulations.
BULLSHIT
Life With Lee
Important lessons brought to you by our favorite Long Island Jew
L
ast year, one of my friends decided that I seriously needed a Twitter. I was completely against it, but I humored her and allowed her to make me an account. It was solely used so that our other friends, who promptly followed me, could tag me. Every couple of months I’d get an email informing me that someone tweeted and tagged me. That would be the only reminder that I had a Twitter. I forgot my username and password. Twitter looked stupid to me so I didn’t bother using it… until last week. I decided to start using my account when everyone kept bugging me to and when I had a fit of rage during one Monday night when I saw some freshman girls being incredibly obnoxious and felt that a tweet about it would be a lovely way to blow off some steam. I had to search through my email to figure out my username and the tweet didn’t help my temper but I found myself tweeting all day and exploring different pages that I could follow. My Twitter-obsessed friends had started talking about various pages that had either gross, interesting, or funny tweets about UB. They were laughing about it and I decided to take a look. UB Crushes, UB Problems, and UB Confessions were my first stops. UB Crushes has become a fixation for some people. One of my friends says that she searches it every couple of days in the hope that she will be featured on it. While she hasn’t yet, it is entertaining when you know the person being tweeted about. I have a friend who had a very vulgar ‘compliment’ tweeted about them. Yes, it was probably flattering to him that someone thinks he is hot and hopes that he is gay so that the writer could pursue him. But the writer of the UB Crushes tweet pretty much said he would love to have extremely violent sex my friend, who swears that he will lock his door more often. Sometimes, it’s just flattering when a tweet says something about how someone is beautiful or nice. If you really like someone, tell them; don’t just post it on Twitter. It may be nice to let out your feelings on the Internet, thus making UB Crushes is your friend.
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#UB
Just like UB Crushes, UB Confessions has become another obsession because it is so entertaining. Some of the confessions spark a smile because you know you’ve done it, such as tweets about playing pranks on your roommates or getting too drunk on Main Street. But others make you uncomfortable. There was a post on the page where someone confessed to randomly spitting in sandwiches when they are at work at a certain CDS location when they are in a bad mood. Now I’m not sure I want to rush to that place to get food since I don’t like my turkey sandwiches with a side order of spit. There are many posts that are so vile that I find it hard to believe that they are true, because if they are, there are some really messed up people on this campus. UB Problems really does showcase common UB problems, albeit with some humor. One of the tweets was: “The anonymity of @UBcrushes has got me wondering what vulgar things people have been thinking all along.” And while I did mention that the two previous pages can be disgusting or vile, it gives you some insight into what people are thinking. Or what they want you to think they are thinking. Most of UB Problems isn’t as bad, but if you scroll through it you’ll find that it is just as funny. There are numerous other pages for you to check out, including UB Rumors and UB Secrets. This is some entertaining procrastination, so
Article By: Lee Auslander enjoy yourself as you ignore the fact that you have a test tomorrow. I defiantly am. If Twitter isn’t your thing, or if you prefer a ‘nicer’ page, then I recommend everyone friend UB Compliments on Facebook. You send compliments about your friends anonymously to the page and they post it, tagging them. You never know if you are going to make someone feel better or simply make their day. I’m a sucker for that sort of thing, so I’ve sent a few compliments in. Spread the love! If you’d like to be part of UB’s lovely confessional online community, join Twitter, or you can just read the posts. If you find one that mentions you or your friends, make sure to save it. And if it is like the one my friend got, don’t worry, he isn’t hiding in his locked room anymore. At least, I don’t think he is.
Trolls and Tools
Article By: Matt Benevento
Through the anonymity of the internet people have experienced freedom that was previously impossible. Posters consciously and subconsciously develop alter egos and e-personas that can be found in every facet of the web. Unfortunately, most of these counterparts are extremely irritating.
The Grammar Nazi
The Keyboard Warrior
This species of poster can be found just about anywhere on the web. Did you forget to add an apostrophe in a comment you made on Grumpy Cat? Well, you can always count on the grammar police to notify you of this and the many other egregious mistakes in your post. Just be sure to clarify if you are posting from your phone so the Grammar Nazi can give you a pass (just this once).
The Multi-quoter
These are often found on internet forums, especially ones that attract heated nerd debates like sports and video game sites. This type of poster screams with delight at the sight of text walls and heavily debated threads. It’s never enough to just quote one person in a response. If you truly want everyone on the site to know how smart you are and how wrong they are make sure to quote as many people as possible in your reply. Follow up these quotes with detailed instructions rectifying their misconceptions in order to educate them with your infinite wisdom.
The Defender
Fear not if you are receiving some severe e-harassment, because the Defender is on his way to calm the situation and make sure everyone knows “it’s just the Internet.” Frequently found in the YouTube comments section, web forums, and online games, these posters know how to diffuse a heated debate. Just be sure not to directly engage these posters as another Defender will be swiftly on the way causing a never ending cycle of posters defending each other.
The Poet
When it’s not enough to simply write a normal response, it’s time for this poster to make their entrance. Often found on sports discussion forums (especially Liverpool FC fan forums) these posters love to complicate simple threads with heart felt, emotional essays and poems. Is your favorite player or manager getting some undeserved flak? Create a detailed fan fiction scenario while quoting the appropriate Greek epics to let your fellow posters know you really care.
The Attention Seeker
These posters were spawned and thrive through the anonymity of the web. Don’t dare threaten this strain of poster as they are tough and beat people up in real life. Keyboard Warriors never back down and constantly need to prove how badass they are by arguing with other posters. Cross them and you will be hypothetically beaten up if they lived near you.
The Eternal Pessimist
Nothing gets this poster down (except everything). Prepare for every last shred of enjoyment to be sucked out of the discussion when they arrive. No matter what the situation, abandon all hope. Excited about a new video game that’s coming out? Well, it’s going to suck because it’s too watered down or it’s too hardcore. Your favorite team is doing well? It’s just a fluke so be ready for disappointment when the team is inevitably crushed in their next game.
The Elitist
Easily one of the most annoying people that exist on the web, these posters can (unfortunately) be found anywhere and everywhere. The Elitist has no hesitation demoralizing and debasing everyone around them. No matter what the circumstances are it’s obvious that “this forum was so much better a few years ago” and “the quality of posters has really declined here.” Don’t bother debating with this breed of poster as you will be promptly notified of your insignificance and irrelevance.
The Semantic
Be extremely careful about what you write with this type of poster around. No matter how minute your mistake is these posters will point out every flaw in your argument. The Semantic can often be found derailing threads on web forums or posting obscure facts in IMDB discussions.
The Lurker
Hidden in the shadows of the web the Lurker lingers; silently observing your posts, like the All-Seeing Eye. Why bother contributing when you can just sit back and let everyone else do the work? Lurkers can often be found on Facebook covertly stalking photo albums or following celebrity Twitter accounts.
These posters can be found just about anywhere on the web. Whether it’s posting NFSW pictures on a cooking forum or writing something racist in a YouTube comment this brand of poster exhibits no shame. Avoid getting into arguments with this type of poster and add them to your ignore list unless you enjoy hitting your head against a wall.
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PULSE
Drone Strikes
Warfare, Law Enforcement, and Many Unanswered Questions
A
few weeks ago, Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky held a 13-hour filibuster of John Brennan’s appointment as CIA director. He was protesting the United States’ use of drones; unmanned aircraft that kill suspected militants overseas. It was the longest filibuster in 11 years, and the Washington crowd got very excited about the whole affair. Some of Paul’s concerns were, to be frank, a little nutty. He was worried that the United States would start targeting its own citizens on its own soil without due process, which isn’t in the cards. But behind the paranoia is a real and very contentious policy issue over this new type of warfare. To give some background: Drones are unmanned aircraft. The United States has been using them for targeted killing of suspected terrorists, mostly in Pakistan. While drone strikes began under President Bush, they have been seriously increased under Obama. They are carried out both by the CIA and the Department of Defense, and President Obama has been known to personally approve targets. The debate over drone warfare is in many ways an extension of the debate over the War on Terror in general. After 9/11, the consensus was that Islamic terrorism was a matter of war, not a matter of law enforcement, and that’s an extremely important distinction. In law enforcement suspects must be proven guilty in a court, and they must receive a number of legal protections. While war is not a free-for-all, those fighting in a war are subject to very little protection, and can generally be killed on sight.
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If we’re in a war, then drone strikes seem quite
justifiable. As far as warfare goes, drone attacks are possibly the most precise and surgical form that we’ve ever developed. They don’t require large standing armies, invading forces, or heavy machinery. They minimize civilian casualties and keep American troops out of harm’s way. That being said, drone strikes may have serious side effects. Innocent civilians are often killed, usually because they happen to be nearby when the strike occurs. These aircraft hover over areas for days, causing incredible fear for the people living in communities under their shadow. It’s hard to imagine a more terrifying form of warfare than a looming aircraft flying above your neighborhood, striking at some unknown time, at someone you may or may not know and who may or may not be guilty of anything. Drones are largely the reason Pakistan hates us possibly more than any other nation on earth. I worry that this resentment of drone killings are creating new terrorists just as quickly as we’re killing old ones. Many officials believe drones, imperfect as they are, are the best option. Part of the problem is that we find ourselves in a war where easy answers are hard to come by. Our old answer was counterinsurgency, where we tried to set up stable democracies in the Middle East so that terrorism wouldn’t have a breeding ground there. That strategy in Afghanistan and Iraq has had less than ideal results. In place of any large-scale systemic solution like counterinsurgency, we’ve mostly just shot up bad guys – ringleaders, incendiary mullahs, anyone that we think might be helping the terrorists. But the problem with that strategy is
Article By: Paul Stephan
that it doesn’t have a clear beginning and end point, like a regular war does, and it starts to look an awful lot like law enforcement. If we’re going to have endless target killings (which is what we seem to be on track to do), there certainly needs to be tramore transparency. Obama didn’t even officially acknowledge that a drone program existed until last year. Administration officials have released almost nothing about the program’s legal justification or about what criteria it uses to select targets. In official numbers, only the targets, not civilians, are included in death counts. Right now, we know that President Obama personally confirms drone strike targets, and that’s an incredible amount of decision-making power to give one person. Senator Diane Feinstein has proposed establishing a drone court that would function similarly to a military tribunal. This would provide some judicial oversight for the strikes and at least give a semblance of due process of law. Members of the Defense community, including former Defense Secretary Robert Gates, back up the Feinstein proposal and it’s a smart idea. If we are going to commit to drone strikes, they should be carried out in an orderly and legal way. Americans don’t have the appetite for a ground war, and so it seems at this point that drones may be our only real option. That being said, the system begs for more transparency. Americans have a reason to be skeptical of what’s going on, and the Obama administration owes more information to citizens.
PULSE
g in in D Do’s Don’ts and
Article By: Angelina Bruno
UB
students armed with student IDs and meal plans often run into one of two problems. Big eaters burn through their dining dollars in the first two weeks of the semester and have to try to survive with only 14-19 meals week to week afterward. Then there are the lighter eaters; they skip breakfast a couple times and before they know it, they find themselves racking up unusable meals at the end of each week and an excessive amount of dining dollars at the end of the semester. It would be real nice if we could get our money back from UB for unused meals during the semester. Since that will never happen here are some tips and tricks to try balancing your dining diet as we approach the end of the semester. The most important thing to do is to budget meals for the week. Think about your schedule, do you wake up in time for breakfast every day? Do you have to rush to class certain mornings and not have time to use a meal? These are all things to factor into your plan. The mealtime periods can make it difficult to eat at a convenient time for your schedule. A good way to work around the system is to use two meals during dinner: one for your actual dinner and one for items that you can eat for breakfast during the week. Options like fruit cups and hard-boiled eggs that can be refrigerated for breakfast the next morning. You can also buy small cartons of milk and cereal at most campus dining locations. Operating this way you get more value for your breakfast because you can use $8.25 during dinner as opposed to $4.50 for breakfast or $5.00 for late night.
You might not always have time to step out of your room for lunch or late night but you don’t need to. You can order everything from pizza and subs to fried dough and mozzarella sticks straight to your room using dining. Another tip for meals is not to buy a ridiculous amount of water bottles when you have meals left on a Friday. It isn’t worth it with the nice filtered water fountains being installed all over campus. Think ahead and go to Tim Horton’s and buy boxes of donuts for your friends, classes, or clubs. I know it sounds like all of these options are very unhealthy but you can also buy snacks like apples or bananas. Remember to always ask how many meals you have or how much of this and that you can get to make the most of your meal. A good way for those who run out of meals to operate is to find out when there will be free food on campus. They aren’t hard to find, especially if you like pizza. You may end up enjoying a fun event as well because many clubs try to entice students to their meetings and events with food. Another idea for both those who have too much and too little is to team up. If your friend has too much to eat, share with a friend who doesn’t have enough. That way food will not be wasted and no one will go hungry.
The amount of wasted food on this campus is pretty disgraceful, especially when you look at how much it costs to have a meal plan. The meal plan averages to about $21.00 dollars a day spent on food. That is far more than most people need. Despite these high costs, dining dollars and meals Some of the best ways to use up dining dollars and meals are places you exchanges are helpful because there is no tax. The only downside to using don’t necessarily think about. You can go to the Elli or Teddy’s convenient only dining is that it costs twice as much to go to the dining halls as it does stores to buy useful things like sugar for tea, ice cream that isn’t frozen using a meal. C3’s food is better than most dining halls but certainly is not yogurt and bison chip dip. If you have extra money when using meals, worth $13.00. For that price you can go out to eat somewhere nice or buy pick up chips to use as a snack later in your room with the dip. Vending your own good food for dinner that isn’t loaded with less than tasty spices. machines are also a good way to use dining. You can buy drinks or candy to Despite these issues, we do have the best dining in the SUNY system as snack on while studying. Ordering from the Incredibull site is also useful. long as you make smart decisions about budgeting your dining.
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s u g n y D ! y a D
Photos By: Ally Balcerzak
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Photos by: Gabrielle Gosset
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Generation Magazine is hiring for the 2013-2014 school year. Send your resume, cover letter, and writing sample or creative portfolio to ubgeneration@gmail.com.
: r o F G N I K O O L e
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Managing Editor Creative Director Assistant Creative Director Web Editor Photo Editor
Copy Editor Buffalove Editor Pulse Editor Literary Editor CIRCULATION Director
d i a S e H he Said S l
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As kids, what did you guys want to be when you grew up?
I feel like I grew up too fast. How do I reach out to my inner-child?
Is there anything you hated as a kid that you now enjoy?
HS: At different points, I wanted to be a paleontologist, a hockey player, and a CEO. So I wanted to be the CEO of the world’s first all-dinosaur hockey team. Needless to say, my dreams went bankrupt, were killed by a meteor, and pulled a hammy. SS: Inspired at six years old by the popular action drama film Rush Hour, I made the decision that I could physically become Jackie Chan. Later, I became obsessed with meat, and decided to become a butcher.
HS: Might I suggest Oregon Trail? It was a great way to let your dysentery-ridden friends die and ford rivers in badass fashion. We just can’t do that stuff now that we’re adults. It wouldn’t be socially acceptable in college to stay inside for hours, bring ourselves into an alternate state of consciousness, and not accomplish anything. SS: Become an adult baby! What more could you want? A woman taking care of your every need and also boobs.
HS: I used to think that vegetarians were dumb. Then I started reading and thinking. SS: Boys. No, just kidding. Sorry, Mom.
Who was your first classroom crush? What were your first words?
HS: Erin Miller. Ooooh yeah. Fourth grade, Mrs. Seagal’s class. Just you and me, girl. She made my heart go all a-twitter, or at least all a-Twitter. #PrepubescentRomance SS: My first crush was my second grade teacher Mrs. Remick. I don’t know exactly what it was about her, but something about the way she taught me to fingerpaint led me to believe there was so much more.
HS: “Fuck the police.” SS: According to my parents my first word was “no,” but we all know that really means “yes.”
My childhood dream was to be the first Jewish unicorn to go into space. What were your childhood dreams?
What were your favorite childhood games? HS: Kickball was the shit when I was a kid. Everyone knew how to play, except for this one weird kid named Rudolph. He was super awkward and he ran with his arms down by his calves. Needless to say, we never let poor Rudolph join in any childhood games. I know, I’m really corny this week. I apologize. SS: One game that my twin brother would “play” with me was “Let’s take useless stuff I don’t want and hide it in Laura’s room.” I would find everything from bibles to Britney Spears from 2007 to 2009.
HS: I had a dream that one day, this nation will riiiiiise up and live out the true meaning of its Creed: With arms wide open, under the sunlight, welcome to this place, I’ll show you everything. SS: I wanted to be a boy. I would pick a new name each week and my parents would call me by it. Shortly after that, I proclaimed that I was actually going to become Jackie Chan. I thought it was possible that I could physically become a short Asian man who was the better half of a Chris Tucker comedy duo.
If you could hook up with any 90’s cartoon character, who would it be and why? HS: Two words: Patti Mayonnaise. With that fluorescent yellow hair and polka dot shirt, who would not have sexual relations with that woman? I just want to clear up, though, that this is assuming we are both at the age of consent. Bitches love consent. SS: I would pick Reggie from Rocket Power. She was the butchest butch to ever butch next to Spinelli from recess. Let’s just say she was a girl, I was a girl, can I make that anymore obvious?
If you could tell your 8-year-old self anything, what would it be? HS: “Listen, in a couple years, you’re going to want to cut your hair like Nick Carter from the Backstreet Boys. Don’t.” SS: You are a flaming homosexual. Also, NEVER get a job as a spray-on tattoo artist at Darien Lake. It is not as cool as it sounds. Your main clientele will be five year olds wanting tramp stamps and forty year old women who want boob tattoos, and they won’t take no for an answer.
Send your questions to ubgeneration@gmail.com! -15-
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y: Gabri Article B
PAX
East is more than a video game convention. It’s a Mecca for video game nerds of all kinds. From tabletop enthusiasts to PC gamers, there’s a booth for everyone. The Expo Hall is littered with booths promoting new games, merchandise, demos, free stuff; you name it. Most people just think about the booths and the Expo Hall when they think of PAX but there’s must more than just that. Of course, the Expo Hall is where the big stuff happens: unreleased demos, giveaways and raffles for free stuff, and betas for games in development. Most of the big players were there with new projects, information, or even playable demos. Riot Games, the makers of League of Legends, had the biggest booth on the floor, which was fitting for one of the most played games out there. There was a huge main stage where creators of the game or professional players of the game would play with community members live in front of fans. Naughty Dog had a booth for The Last of Us with a line circling the booth multiple times as people waited to play a demo of the highly anticipated game scheduled for release in mid-June where they had to limit the demo time to half an hour to try to accommodate the mass of people that wanted to get a small glimpse of the new survival, horror action game. 343 Industries also announced a new forge map, Forge Island, adding to their pool of maps where players can create their own levels to share online with other Halo players. Another big player present was Bethesda, which was there to promote Elder Scrolls Online, a relatively controversial new massive multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG). One of the most recognizable MMOs is World of Warcraft (WoW), and because of the game’s popularity, almost every other MMO is compared to it. The Elder Scrolls has thrived with its iconic open world gameplay in games like Skyrim, where players are given the option to basically do anything and go anywhere they choose in the created world, and this new MMO is definitely a step in a new direction for the franchise, one has been pretty criticized among fans to the franchise. Now, while some fans have faith in Bethesda’s ability to make a new game with the same immersive world of the Elder Scrolls universe, their booth at PAX was rather controversial. There was a long line, which was to be expected, but once you got to the end of the line, there wasn’t a wonderful, playable demo awaiting you, but rather videos. Yes, there was a line hours long where people waited to watch a video of someone playing the new MMO...although, the videos showed some pretty promising gameplay. Among the bigger players, there were also smaller developers repping the indie game community in style. One that was particularly exciting was the creators of Bastion, Supergiant Games. They had a booth with a fully playable demo of their new game Transistor, which is the new science fiction game from the indie development company. The demo was beautiful and fun, but more than that, it showed the promise of Supergiant Games. They aren’t resting on their success of the reactive narrator that changed his narration according to what you did in the game. While those creative narrative elements are still there, they didn’t just make another clone of Bastion, but went from fantasy to science fiction, with a new world, new story, and new heroine, Red, as she tries to escape her robotic pursuers with the help of a powerful weapon, Transistor.
Another newcomer to the scene was Carbine Studios with their game, Wildstar. Another MMO coming onto the scene, the playable demo along with the presentations proved that this game was also not just another WoW clone. There was personality, humor, character and charm to the game that other -16- MMOs seem to lack. The combat was more immersive and fast-paced, showing indicators for your abilities as well as enemies’ abilities, and allowing
for mobility with dives and tumbles that made the combat feel more akin to action adventure games than the typical MMO combat. There were plenty of stations for people to play the game even though it hasn’t even been released for public beta yet, but the game felt polished and ready for more people to get their hands on The Expo Hall wasn’t the only part of the convention either. In fact, it closed at 7 PM, while the convention kept on going into early morning. There were places for free play for games like Dance Central and Rock Band where people could perform in front of a real audience for fun, or during competitions that were held later in the evening. There were also free play areas for vintage game systems, going all the way back to Ataris, as well as a large PC area where people could either get together in person or go online to play popular games while enjoying benefits like bonus XP or in game currency just for being at PAX. There was also a huge tabletop section with free play, competitions, and even testing games for new game mechanics for games like Dungeons and Dragons and Shadowrun. On top of all of this, there were also panels, discussions, and presentations. Now, while this might not seem like the most exciting part of the convention, I assure you, it was. Not only was there still free stuff at most of the panels (thanks for the free Borderlands 2 expansion, Gearbox!), but there were also big announcements and discussions about video games that brought new light to the industry and how it is changing. First, some of the big announcements. As I hinted before, Gearbox, makers of the Borderlands franchise, announced another playable character as well as an increase in the level cap for the game, full of new balances to the current game, as well as enhancements to difficulty, and more importantly, a higher tier of randomly generated loot in the game, pearlescent gear. Even the CEO of Gearbox was present to talk about the new additions to the popular, blockbuster game. They also announced that the new tier of loot and the level cap increase will be free to season pass holders, proving that there are companies out there that both reward loyalty of their fans while also working hard to create new content at relatively low prices considering the amount of time and resources that went into the expansions and new vault hunter that was not even planned in the beginning stages of the game development. Nvidia also had a very intriguing announcement. Nvidia creates visual computing technology from physical aspects like processors to software like physics engines that can simulate real world physics of water mechanics, or destruction of buildings and settings in games. There were onstage demos of their new software to show how the look of games is going to improve, but another big announcement was the unveiling of Shield. Shield is a handheld gaming device that’s a mix between a controller and a mini tablet, but it’s more than just that. Shield has an HD touchscreen that can be lifted up off the controller to reveal the game controls. This system is open source and can play any Android game, but it can also stream games from your PC, for example, you can use Big Picture Mode on Steam on the handheld device. There was even an onstage demo of the CEO of Gearbox playing Borderlands 2 on the system. It has yet to be given a price or a release date, but there were demo units at the Nvidia booth on the Expo Hall floor, so it should hopefully be sooner rather than later (but let’s be honest, it’s probably not until holiday). There were also panels discussing the gaming community and the impact that video games have on society. One panel discussed free to play games that include in game transactions for more aesthetic items or extra features to a game actually make more money than other pay to play games. The game industry is realizing that the players are the ones that will shape the industry. Another panel discussed the issue of gender among video game players, particularly the stereotypes of female gamers and the reaction of male gamers to them. There were panels on player behavior and how the anonymity of the internet and online play is not what feeds bad behavior online, but rather the lack of consequences, but also how some of these so-called toxic players could actually be genuinely confused as to what is appropriate and video games may be able to give them an avenue to learn this where their environment off the internet may not be able to. One such example was given in a panel where one of the administrators for a game received an email from a player who was banned from their game for bad behavior that stated before he was banned from the game and given the reasoning, he didn’t even realize that some of the words he used were offensive. There were also panels discussing video games as a form of education and how they could be used as a legitimate learning tool as well as for entertainment, and may even help to promote learning more than other traditional methods of education. These panels showed how the video game industry is changing and how the stereotype of video games as a mindless, violent form of media that breeds criminals is becoming less and less common, and how we as a community can help to facilitate this change. The video game industry is changing and as it becomes more popular, there are more subcultures that branch out and new forms that video games can take to change the industry more and more. Not only are video games themselves changing, but the companies as well. As the target audiences change to include more women, or more countries and cultures, so must the companies change the way they make their games. As gamers choose how to spend their money, game companies must adapt to the economic shifts, and so it is the gamers themselves that are shaping the industry. From the newly released or not yet released game demos to the panels discussing the more cultural and societal impacts of video games, PAX was eye opening, interesting, and just plain fun. While the lines were long and the outlets for phone chargers were scarce, it was great to play new games and discuss real issues in this genre with professionals and other gamers alike.
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Dyngus Day: A Truly Buffalonian Tradition
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uffalo is known for all sorts of things such as food, weather, and notalways-great sports teams. We also happen to be home to the world’s largest Dyngus Day celebration. Dyngus Day is a Polish holiday held the Monday after Easter that has traditional ties to water and the harvest. But here in Buffalo, it has evolved into a celebration of Polish heritage. The easiest way to describe Dyngus Day would be to compare is to St. Patrick’s Day, especially given the amount of drinking for each holiday. However, the holiday focuses on bringing together the Polish community, with numerous traditions coming out in full form. There is only one requirement for the dress code: you must dress traditionally or wear red. Take a walk around Cheektowaga on Dyngus Day and you’ll find a surprising number of people dressed in traditional Polish garb while the rest opt for various Poland inspired t-shirts. Despite being a Polish Buffalo native, I had never done Dyngus Day until this year. Being a Monday, it can sometimes be difficult to justify spending the day partying, but this year a few Generation editors decided to head down and check it out. So on Easter Monday we donned our red shirts, grabbed some gloves, and headed out to Cheektowaga to experience one of the most Buffalo days of the year. This year’s festival featured Polish dancers performing at the Broadway Market before the parade, various locations where Polka bands were playing, and food galore all over Cheektowaga. Down by the end point for the parade, various food trucks set up shop, with some offering up Polish inspired options such as pierogis or Polish sausage, not that it was necessary. No matter where you went within Cheektowaga, there was no shortage of pierogis. Traditionally, they are filled with cheese, mashed potatoes or sauerkraut, with people often getting into debates over what kind is the best. (Side note: a few Generation editors tried the farm cheese and the cheesy potato ones at the Broadway Market and then proceeded to debate them for twenty minutes. Farm cheese won.) In true Buffalo fashion, open container laws were lax and plenty of people could be seen walking the streets with beer. While at Corpus Christi church I overheard a bartender telling two college students, “You can get Blue Light
BuffaLove
Article By: Ally Balcerzak
anywhere in this town. You’re having a Tyskie today, ladies.” Inside the venues the beer options were the popular Polish beers Tyskie and Zywiec, along with the standard Blue and Blue Light, showing how Americanized the holiday has become. The Euro Gypsy jazz music at the Broadway Market was a draw for many since it provided a break from the polka music at other venues. It was surprising to hear such a heavy American and international influence in the music since we were standing in the middle of a Polish festival, but everyone around us seemed to embrace it. At times it had a 1920s big band vibe along with a few Latin inspired pieces, all of which flowed together and drew the crowd in. Out in the streets, the parade floats were lined up to portray every Polish stereotype out there. The Buffalo Dyngus Day parade is the largest in the world, with dozens of floats taking part. This year a few people created floats in honor of Anderson Cooper because he recently bailed on the festival despite saying he’d attend a year ago when he mocked Dyngus Day on his show, Anderson Cooper 360. When you turn down the honor of being the first ever Pussy Willow Prince, you can expect some serious backlash. Some floats were lined with flamingos (Polacks like to put them on their lawn, go with it), while others featured people dressed in traditional clothes. One float went all out and created a dragon. We’re still not sure what Polish stereotype it represented but it was hands down the most impressive in the parade. There were also groups walking the route performing traditional dances and playing instruments. Did you know people in Poland play bagpipes? Don’t worry, we didn’t either, until we saw it and asked. After the parade numerous after-parties are hosted around Cheektowaga, with the largest one being in the Central Terminal. At the parties is where the frivolity begins and young people begin squirting and beating each other with water guns and pussy willows (think of it as the Polish form of flirting). Dyngus Day is one of those things everyone should experience while in Buffalo. It’s a festival as unique and quirky as the city. Next year’s celebration will be on Monday April 21st, so hopefully it’ll be warm. Until then, you can spend the year hunting for that perfect Polish pride t-shirt.
Buffalo After Dark
BuffaLove
Artciel By: Keighley Farrell
We all know nothing good happens until after midnight, but many major establishments seem to disagree. For the average nocturnal member of our fair school, the weekends can start to drag when you run out of frat-house basement floors to pass out on. Here we’ve compiled a small collection of some rad late-night adventures that you can use to fill the void, long after Mojo’s boots out the last sloppy freshman.
Midnight Bowling:
The bowling alley is no longer for the dorky kid’s birthday party. Now you can challenge your friends to a few rounds under the soothing glow of the black light. It’s all of the lighting and the loud music of the best nightclub, except now you have something to do other than stand by the bar and watch people have sex with their clothes on. And if you’re over 21, you can even still get your drink on while scoring some strikes. It’s a win-win all around.
Walmart Safari:
Hear me out on this one. Walmart is open 24 hours, which means that when someone needs to buy something super weird at three in the morning, that’s where they’ll be going. All you have to do is play it cool and pretend like you’re looking for batteries, and the weirdos will fall right into your lap. (Maybe even literally.) Make it into a scavenger hunt for some extra fun. (Examples: someone without enough clothing on, someone yelling, someone who is obviously intoxicated, etc. Please note that you do not count.)
Food Crawl:
This one is not for the faint of stomach. Originated as a way for the DD to monitor the recovery of his intoxicated counterparts, the food crawl is the ultimate late night eatery challenge. Your goal is to patron as many open eateries as possible without barfing. Hit up the big ones like Denny’s, Zonies, and Jim’s SteakOut first, then move onto the less threatening ones later. (McDonalds, combination Tim Horton’s/ Coldstone, etc.) The last person to either surrender or vomit is the champion of the night, and will probably spend the rest of it in the bathroom. But at least you’ve killed a few hours!
Netflix Marathons:
This option is extremely versatile. You can do this alone, like many of us on staff are prone to doing, or with some buddies. And, for those of you who have a short attention span like I do, you can turn just about any TV series in to a drinking game. For Parks and Recreation, take a drink every time Ron talks about food, Chris calls someone by their full name, or Jerry does something stupid. For Breaking Bad, take a drink every time Jesse says “bitch,” Walt tells a lie, or someone smokes/ talks about/thinks about meth. For It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia, take a drink every time someone on the show takes a drink. (Caution: that last one was a joke. Don’t do that. You’ll die.)
Craigslist “Casual Encounters” Bingo:
There are some freaky, freaky people on the Internet. Craigslist has provided the common man with an anonymous way to see just how weird people are willing to get with strangers in your area. The goal here is to fill a bingo board with the most bizarre things you can possibly fathom, and then get searching! I bet everyone reading this has a shiny penny (redeemable any time in the Generation office) that the weirdest thing you can think of, someone on Craigslist is looking for, right now, and is 100% serious about it. (For additional hours of horrified fun: if you can’t find your weird and imaginary fetish, make a fake posting and just watch the creepers pour in.)
Campus Hikes:
(I am obligated to insist that this one you don’t do by yourself. Buddy system for life.) This place can be pretty hectic during the day, but during the witching hours, our campus is quite an interesting adventure. It’s very peaceful to see what kind of people are fast asleep outside of Capen, or wide awake and wandering the earth, much like yourself. And now that it’s getting warmer, nothing beats the view of the stars from the pillars at Baird Point. Let your inner-explorer guide you. Just stay away from anyone who appears to be on bath salts.
By offering you these (kind of) action-packed options, I implore you to break free from the monotony of Sizzles runs and booty calls. You won’t be young forever, so you might as well take advantage of these after-dark years while you still have the chance. You may not find any of these things to be your calling, but whatever you do, don’t sleep. You can sleep when you’re dead.
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LITERARY
An Original Thought Article By: Carlton Brock
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hen a person claims they don’t enjoy books, chances are they just they don’t like reading. It’s not that they don’t like the stories. This is especially true when they claim that they love movies. Hollywood introduced a string of blockbusters based on books in 2012 and this year looks to continue this trend. There is no longer such a thing as an original idea in mass media, but just new ways to interpret ideas. This thought has never been more obvious than when going to the movies. There has been a string of book based movies including major releases such as Hunger Games, The Hobbit, and Les Miserables as well as lower grossing releases like Warm Bodies, Cloud Atlas, and Alex Cross. The silver screen this past year was dominated by bookbased movies. These movies have had varying degrees of success and in some cases the results were very well received. A perfect example of this comes in The Perks of Being a Wallflower. Released in fall of 2012, this can be seen as a prime example of a well-done book-based movie. Stephen Chbosky, the author of the book, directed the film and he therefore closely followed the source material, adding and subtracting in places that benefitted the change in medium as a whole. Though it should be noted that Perks is an extremely popular book and has been for quite some time, it also benefitted from being the first major, non-Harry Potter role of Emma Watson’s career.
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Being a critical darling is not the only measure of a well-done book based movie. The Hunger Games, based on the novel by Suzanne Collins, proved this by being a massive financial success along with its critical successes. Hunger Games was the first movie since Avatar to maintain in first place for four consecutive weeks. A massive following like the one The Hunger Games has is not something to underestimate, while not as rabid a fan base as Harry Potter or Twilight the movie performed extremely well. Unlike Perks, the leading star did not make this movie a major standout before it hit the screen; instead, it made Jennifer Lawrence into a breakout star.
Ironically it was the influence of Jennifer Lawrence that made Silver Linings Playbook into a critically lauded film. Silver Linings Playbook was nominated for multiple awards, including eight Academy Awards. Jennifer Lawrence won for Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role. Along with Life of Pi and Les Mis, book-based movies swept the award season this year. The stars did not strongly carry other movies that were based on books. Movies like Cloud Atlas, which starred Halle Berry and Tom Hanks and Alex Cross starring Tyler Perry made a comparatively smaller impact than the films previously discussed in this article. More in the former than the latter, these were innovative takes on unoriginal ideas. With the rash of book-based movies, the lack of originality is at the forefront of a lot of Hollywood discussion. Les Miserables, for example, was previously released as a film multiple times, from 1912 to 2012. Each version of these movies has been different from the last. The Hobbit was also made into a film in the past, albeit it was animated rather than the live-action spectacle that we have seen this past year. Though it should be noted that these films were looked at as renditions of the books and not remakes of earlier films. This was not necessarily the case that the movie Total Recall, released in 2012 was given. This instead was a film that that was a remake of a film, which was based on a book. The movie though, unlike the original, was a flop. This was also true of Dredd, based on a comic book, which was the second movie to be made of the character. In addition to books, recent movies have looked to comics, television shows, songs, children’s books and even board games. The main reason behind this phenomenon is simple; movies are financial investments. It is much more financially secure to create a movie based around proven property than it is to base a movie on something completely untested.
LITERARY This weeks submissions come from Hannah McGovern. If you would like to submit poetry or short stories that are less than 800 words please send them to genliteraryeditor@gmail.com
Studies in Discourse By Hannah McGovern A Let’s say that you are on the way back to a house. The house is not yours and a storm is coming in from the south. You are in a car that you are not driving and you are marveling at the ominous clouds before you and the shining sun behind you. The rain hasn’t hit you yet. You are stuck in a limbo. You see flashing lights. Seeing is unavoidable: it is a dog. A young woman is standing several yards away, sobbing into the shoulder of another woman. The dog is dead. The officer leaves, the offender leaves, the woman leaves, and you are back at the house. The dog is still dead and the storm hits. Suppose for a minute that you are on an airplane. The passenger in front of you reaches behind her to adjust her seat and you see your mother’s hands. You glance to your left and your mother is sitting next to you. You blink. You are in a classroom. The boy sitting next to you writes your name in Arabic on a light green Post-It note. You lose the note and he is sent away to Canada for insubordination. Let’s say you are on a tightrope and there is a man beneath you. He is trying to convince you to put one foot in front of the other, but you are on a tightrope and you just want to fall. Let’s say you do.
B Let’s say that you are in a New York hotel in a tidy room on the seventeenth floor. It is an average room with two neat beds and a desk and a television that you won’t use. You are laughing because there is a window but outside of the window is a brick wall. Suppose you are stuck between the window and the brick wall. You can’t breathe. You grow stiff and become the brick wall. The next night, another girl just like you rents the hotel room. She pushes the curtains apart and all she sees is a brick wall. She laughs, shaking her head, but doesn’t question it. She is smart. Suppose for an instant that a man stands on the edge of a pond and sees himself in the reflection of the sky. He asks himself why that is but doesn’t think for too long because the man is now in the pond and he is drowning. He wonders briefly if the fish will eat his corpse or if they are vegetarians. Years later, another man stands on the edge of the pond and tells his son that sometimes, fish eat each other. It’s just the way it is.
C Let’s say that it rained today. Suppose that it’s raining now. Maybe it has rained before, or it never has rained, or it has been raining for six thousand years. Consider your brother. Suppose you don’t have a brother. Suppose your brother is standing outside in the rain. He is getting wet. Suppose he isn’t. Suppose your brother has an umbrella and is standing out in the rain with the umbrella and under that umbrella, beside him, is a girl. Suppose that girl is you. You and your brother are walking through the rain together under an umbrella. Suppose your brother is dead. Suppose a bomb blew him to pieces overseas. You go to his funeral. Suppose you don’t, because you are dead too. Suppose you say you are sorry, but no one is listening because you are dead. Suppose everyone is listening but they don’t believe you. Suppose the rain stops. Suppose you were the bomb.
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PARTING SHOTS Standing up for the “BTQ”
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Article By: Laura Borschel
fter seeing the Human Rights Campagin’s red marriage equality profile pictures all across Facebook, I was again reminded how I personally dislike the current state of gay rights and rhetoric within America. Now don’t get me wrong I am 1) A flaming homosexual and 2) Very happy that I could have the opportunity to have a legal marriage some day, but I am disheartened over the one sided gigantic monster that is the fight for marriage equality.
found myself more concerned with worrying about in what states can I be evicted from my apartment for being gay, which states can I be fired based upon my sexual orientation, which states can I be kicked out of a restaurant because of my sexuality, and which states do not protect LGBTQ persons against hate crimes. In my mind, these concerns are much more relevant and applicable to a wider number of LGBTQ persons.
I understand the importance to some people that the right of marriage holds. It provides much needed benefits such as tax breaks, and finally acknowledges same sex couples on the same level that straight people have. It forces the government and everyone in the nation to acknowledge our existence. However, one of the main things that bother me is the fact that marriage has taken the front and center position among the LGBTQ rights movement.
So why are we exclusively putting in so much effort into one thing that doesn’t apply to the entire community?
The fight for marriage equality has overshadowed other more time sensitive and more broadly applicable needs within the LGBTQ community. Looking at my current life, I have
Sadly, I think a large portion has to do with how the LGBTQ rights movement has turned into a “gay thing” instead of a community based movement. I think it is easier for dominant society (straight people) to see the opposite end of the spectrum (gayness), rather than the grayer areas (bisexual, transgender, and queer). Likewise, I think it is easier for people to grasp onto the marriage issue because it is an overarching issue. The fact of the matter is, a lot of Americans get
Article By: Eric Carlson
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he news from Europe has been worse than usual lately. It seems every couple of months another Eurozone member is mired in a debt or banking crisis. The latest casualty is the tiny island of Cyprus. At a mere $18 billion in GDP, this resort country is a blip on the economic radar, but its unique situation threatens the cohesiveness of the entire European Union.
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Beyond being a romantic vacation spot, Cyprus is a tax haven for corporations and wealthy individuals, mostly Russians. The banks are estimated to hold up to 80 billion dollars, which is 4 times the size of the country’s economy, mostly in foreign deposits. Given banks have to make money for their shareholders, the Cypriot banks loaned out piles of money to Greek home buyers during the real estate boom years. Unfortunately, when the you-know-what hit the fan, these now toxic loans have served to sink the solvency of these banks. If these banks were allowed to default, the shock wave would ripple throughout the economically
married at one point throughout their life, so they can connect to the idea of wanting that right. On the other hand, I don’t think many people can relate to dealing with other forms of discrimination that LGBTQ persons are especially susceptible to, or the pain and defeat that can come with everyday life. Like transgender or non-gender conforming people who have to go through the struggle and decision of changing a driver’s license, the realities of what coming out at work could mean, or even having to fill out basic medical forms. All of these concerns effect LGBTQ persons daily and have to be dealt with on a regular basis, far more than the issue of marriage. I think that if we start thinking practically rather than idealistically over something that we may do one day, we will be able to stand up and really help the rest of the LGBTQ community.
The Cyprus Question integrated EU, and have negative consequences for the Euro currency. It would also send the stock market in a likely free fall. The “brilliant” plan hatched by the EU to fix this problem has been to tax the uninsured savings accounts of depositors in Cypriot banks. Any account whose value stands over 100,000 Euros is likely to lose up to 40 percent of their value. Just imagine your bank stealing your savings because of bad decisions it made. The bulk of the accounts that would be subject to this tax are wealthy Russians who use Cypriot banks as a tax haven and money laundering operation. Obviously the Russians are unhappy about these transpirations and have made many threats to Cyprus’ masters, the International Monetary Fund, the European Central Bank, and Germany to not take their money to help finance a bailout for Cyprus. In my opinion, the Russians need to suck it up and deal with it. They are upset because their tax haven has been destroyed. That
would be like Mitt Romney complaining if his Cayman accounts that allow him to pay a lower tax rate than a bus driver were to wash up. Furthermore, the Russians are claiming the tax is theft. That may be true in the abstract sense, but they are essentially complaining the money they stole or earned through illicit activities is being stolen. It’s rather ironic. No one should feel sorry for the plight of mobsters and oligarchs. The whole situation stinks, especially because the Europeans are trying to shirk free market forces, but you cannot expect there will be no pain after years of unsustainable economic practices. The Germans are indeed strong arming the Cypriots and Russians, but they are justified in doing so. The culture of bailouts for irresponsible countries needs to end. More strict austerity requirements are not unreasonable from a political or economic perspective. You cannot run from the market forces forever.