11 20 14

VOICEBOW the georgetown

B A E K TA

GEORGETOWN’S THEATER GROUPS

BY CHRIS CASTANO, STEVEN CRISS, LARA FISHBANE, DAYANA MORALES GOMEZ Georgetown University’s Weekly Newsmagazine Since 1969 w November 20, 2014 w Volume 47, Issue 14 w georgetownvoice.com

the

Voice

Nov. 20, 2014 This week: Editorial ... Residential Living owes RAs more, pg. 3 News ... GU Farmer’s Market closes successful season, pg. 4 Sports ... Women’s soccer advances in NCAA tourney, pg. 6 Feature ... The Voice profiles campus theater groups, pg. 8 Leisure ... The Corp tosses our salads, pg. 10 Page 13 ... Portrait of a Basic Hoya, pg. 13 Voices ... Passion should drive leadership, pg. 14

Take a bow

The Voice explores the diversity of student theater on campus.

Last week’s key:

–Leila Lebreton

This Week’s Horoscope

– Ambika Ahuja & Tim Annick

The Sagittarius embodies the call of the wild: they are fiery lovers, they have feisty tempers, and they are ferociously loyal. If you’re boring, the Sagittarius has no problem telling you that you can’t sit with them, even if it’s Wednesday and you are wearing pink. Let’s face it: you like the Sagittarius so much, you want to put a ring on it. Born with their foot in their mouths, they’d always rather buy you that new BMW than write you a love letter.

BLOG

Editor: Ryan Greene

Assistant Editors: Grace Brennan, Marisa Hawley, Kenneth Lee

HALFTIME

Leisure Editor: Daniel Varghese Assistant Leisure Editors: Micaela Beltran, Erika Bullock, Simone Wahnschafft

Sports Editor: Kevin Huggard Assistant Sports Editors: Alex Boyd, Robbie Ponce

VOICES

Editor: Chris Almeida

NEWS

Steven Criss

Assistant Editors: Shalina Chatlani, James Constant, Lara Fishbane

Dayana Morales Gomez

Editor: Julia Jester

PHOTO

Editor: Ambika Ahuja

Assistant Editors: Sabrina Kayser, Gavin Myers, Joshua Raftis

EDITORIAL BOARD Chair: Ian Philbrick

Board: Chris Almeida, Shalina Chatlani, Steven Criss, Lara Fishbane, Ryan Greene, Julia Jester, Caitriona Pagni, Kenneth Lee, Daniel Varghese, James Constant

Editor in Chief

Managing Editor

Mary-Bailey Frank General Manager

Noah Buyon

Technical Director

Tim Annick

Managing Director of Accounting and Sales

Allison Manning

Managing Director of Finance

SPORTS

Editor: Chris Castano Assistant Editors: Joe Pollicino, Max Roberts

LEISURE

Editor: Josh Ward

COVER

Editor: Christina Libre

FEATURE

Editor: Caitriona Pagni

DESIGN

Assistant Editors: Elizabeth Baker, Sam Kleinman, Manuela Tobias

Editors: Pam Shu, Sophia Super

COPY

Staff: Caitlin Garrabrant, Johnny Jung, Erin McClellan, Eleanor Sugrue

Editors: Rachel Greene, Ryan Miller, Dana Suekoff, Lauren Chung, Maddi Kaigh, Andrew Frank, Jupiter El-Asmar, Bianca Clark, Michael Mischke

Editor: Dylan Cutler

Chief: Eleanor Fanto

Assistant Editor: Leila Lebreton

PAGE 13

editorial

georgetownvoice.com

The georgetown voice | 3

employees discounted

Res Life, administration must address RA sexual assault concerns

An op-ed written by Thomas Lloyd (SFS ‘15) in The Hoya last week about the mishandling of the Milzman ricin incident raised the issue of the unacceptable treatment of Resident Assistants by Georgetown’s Office of Residential Living. In response to Lloyd’s revelations, this Editorial Board called upon university administration to clarify the roles and responsibilities of RAs, particularly in situations involving the law.

Since then, however, the issue has become even more pressing. Last Thursday, the Voice released an exclusively online feature article chronicling serious allegations by past and current RAs of improper treatment by Res Life. These cases range from general lack of accommodation to unsupportive responses to RAs sexual assaulted by residents, and amount to serious mismanagement by the university.

These latest outrages echo a thematic trend that is fast becoming the new normal in this university’s interaction with its students. From campus construction and the proposed third-year meal plan requirement to the idea of combining student support centers, Georgetown has increasingly disregarded

students’ needs, wants, and rights. While the GUSA Senate’s passage on Monday of a resolution calling upon Res Life to clarify the boundaries of the RA position and address concerns in their work environment is judicious, it will not restore faith in a bankrupt dialogue between administration and students.

The victimization of RAs serves as a final, unacceptable straw. With allegations as serious as those publicized by this paper, the university and Res Life have a renewed ethical obligation to acknowledge and respond to student criticism—even if only to ensure that their policies accord with the law.

Perhaps most disappointingly, these latest allegations cast aspersions on Georgetown’s otherwise sterling record of treating sexual assault as a serious infraction. In the past, this Editorial Board has praised the university for its proactivity and strong victimcentric support system. However, threats of job termination against RAs for reporting cases of sexual assault or even for attempting to talk to media outlets—a First Amendment right—shows that the university’s policies remain retrogressive with respect

to its own employees. RAs—many of whom need their position to afford tuition—are some of this campus’ most vital resources, contributing to the Hilltop community by creating a safe and inclusive environment for other students. They deserve more.

As such, Res Life’s duty now becomes manifold: it must not only seriously reconsider the role of RAs but also involve them in a meaningful, productive, and change-oriented dialogue. RAs should not be threatened with job loss or severe punishment for reporting incidents that can jeopardize their own physical or mental health. Every student on this campus, whether or not they are employees of the university, deserves equal respect and justice—especially in matters of sexual assault.

If the administration does not take steps to engage with them, students have a right and obligation to continue voicing their criticisms. It’s time for administrators to start listening to students on all fronts. This publication stands with GUSA and RAs in demanding that the university start changing its policies to fully address student concerns.

it’s all too much greek to us

america just got served

GU should up restrictions on Greek organizations for students’ benefit

GU students must answer call to implement national service year

The death of a West Virginia University freshman at a fraternity party last Friday and the subsequent suspension of all WVU fraternity activity has reignited a public debate about the role and value of collegiate Greek organizations.

While Georgetown does not officially recognize or fund any single-sex pledge organizations, fraternities and sororities have nevertheless eked out an increasingly visible foothold on campus.

These organizations are not without their merits. They provide students with professional connections, often contain service components, and—in schools where they dominate social life—may provide students with a much-needed network of friends.

But such a view glosses over the reality that Greek organizations’ primary goals remain social and exclusive.

And, as the WVU case illustrates, they are often harmful to those both directly and indirectly involved.

With these reservations in mind, this Editorial Board argues that Georgetown should redouble its efforts to restrict Greek life on campus—restrictions that will keep fraternities a social choice for students rather than a social mandate.

Notwithstanding university policy, several Greek organizations operate at Georgetown and, under GUSA’s new partnership for unrecognized student groups, may now table in adjacent areas at Student Activities Fair. Many Greek organizations push service and academics to the forefront of their missions. These goals are outwardly noble and align well with Jesuit values.

But this arrangement accords undue legitimacy to fraternity and sorority chapters which, unlike groups like H*yas for Choice, can rely on their affiliation with national organizations for

support. Moreover, it fundamentally clashes with the widespread rejection of Greek life by Georgetown students.

Numerous extracurricular organizations on campus contain a secondary social element that provides a more productive outlet for inclusion. For these groups, a strong, specific mission comes first—social benefits are secondary.

Beyond reflecting Hoyas’ preferences, increasing restrictions on Greek organizations would also acknowledge their nationally demonstrated “dark power” (to quote a March Atlantic feature article on the issue).

Unfortunately, cases like WVU’s are not isolated. Over 60 deaths related to fraternity events have occurred over the past decade, most affiliated with Sigma Alpha Epsilon. In response, SAE cut pledging from its program in March. But these anti-hazing policies are narrow and, often, isolated. Addressing these ongoing issues will require overhauling fraternity policy nationwide and reorganizing their social, professional, and academic priorities.

Ultimately, Greek life impacts more than its members. Fraternity men are three times more likely to commit acts of sexual assault, while sorority women are 75 percent more likely to be victims thereof. As a violent incident at the University of Virginia reported yesterday by Rolling Stone illustrates, even addressing fraternity-based sexual assault can be a years-long nightmare.

Georgetown must remain vigilant about the dangers of Greek life and strengthen its policies discouraging their proliferation on campus. Hoyas’ social infrastructure is, for now, laudably elsewhere—but it falls to both students and the administration to ensure it stays that way.

Joining the armed forces is often considered the pinnacle of service to one’s country. It was therefore heartening to see retired U.S. Army General Stanley McChrystal advocate for an “appropriately voluntary but socially expected” national year of service by all American citizens aged 18-28 in the pages of the Washington Post on Friday.

National service takes many forms, from AmeriCorps participation to teaching, hospice care, and conservation work. This Editorial Board echoes McChrystal’s mandate that service become a defining issue of the 2016 election, and that citizens who serve receive a stipend, course credit, and skills for future employment. Volunteers from all socioeconomic backgrounds could alleviate many of America’s most pressing issues, from failing infrastructure and underachieving schools to declining civic solidarity and patriotism.

But McChrystal’s vision will only be realized if young people—high school graduates and college students especially—validate the legitimacy of service as a valuable endeavor. Perhaps nowhere is concern for one’s future career more evident than at Georgetown, where students crossing campus wearing suits to Capitol Hill internships or preparing for their Wall Street interviews are the norm.

Too often, however, the definition of a respectable career is limited to the lucrative or prestigious. The very narrative of success in this country is counterproductively skewed toward titles and ladder-climbing—a status quo that must be revised if national service is to be taken seriously. As students, we must acknowledge and embody the ideal of service as a necessary and desirable calling.

The positive impact of national service underscores this necessity. Wheth-

er measured by the declining dropout rate in U.S. schools or the demonstrated fiscal and social benefits of federally subsidized service programs like AmeriCorps, its effectiveness is beyond dispute.

And while Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) has repeatedly called for the removal of all funding from AmeriCorps—which has fielded over 800,000 corps members since its inception under the Clinton administration—service need not be a partisan issue. Mitt Romney, who picked Ryan as his running-mate in the 2012 presidential election, helped fund City Year, an AmeriCorps program that partners with underperforming schools, in the early 1980s, sat on its board, and defended it against Republican budget cuts alongside President Clinton in 1995.

But national service will forever fend off naysayers until a deliberate effort is made to realize it. Young people must lead this charge, both as beneficiaries of the skills and opportunities that service entails as well as to philanthropically better the country they will inherit. Service raises awareness about national issues and, more importantly, actualizes solutions. Just weeks after Millennial midterm voter turnout remained disappointingly low, galvanizing young people to become informed, engaged, civic-minded, and solutions-oriented voters is an investment in our nation’s future.

Georgetown students—many already possessing those qualities—and students nationwide should lobby their state legislatures and Congressional representatives to increase funding for national service programs. They also should lead by example, taking a year of service before enrolling or after graduating in order to truly enshrine this ideal among our national priorities governing how Americans can and must give back to benefit all.

news

4 | the georgetown voice

November 20, 2014

SAXA POLITICA: GOT A PROBLEM? HERE’S A TOWN HALL a tri-weekly column about CAMPUS news and politics

MARKET vendors enjoyed increased attendance this fall.

GEORGETOWN VOICE

GU Farmer’s Market completes fruitful season in Red Square ELIZABETH TEITZ After a move to Red Square and the addition of several new vendors, the Georgetown University Farmer’s Market concluded a successful season last week. Vendors and student leaders praised the changes, citing greater participation and student engagement.

“It’s been a big year for the Farmer’s Market, as we’re reaching full capacity,” said Lexi Cotcamp (MSB ‘15), the GUFM executive director, referring to the amount of determined available space in Red Square.

“We’ve been able to offer a variety of vendors, with everything from crepes to apples to kombucha,” she said, calling it “an incredible semester” based on vendors’ transaction numbers, which are used to loosely track performance.

Savannah Quental (MSB ‘15), GUFM’s marketing director, said that the relocation to Red Square fostered a greater sense of community around the market this season, as did increased social media presence.“ Red Square has a community feel, and it’s more visible [than Copley Lawn]” she said.

“The vendors feel like they’re in the same places every week.”

“On Instagram, I’m cognizant of reposting vendors, and a lot of them actually use it to promote what they’re selling each week,” Quental said. The market’s reach, though difficult to measure, also seemed wider to her this year. “I heard more people talking about it, saw more people in Red Square and outside of the Farmer’s Market with Farmer’s Market stuff,” she added.

Several vendors also reported an overall successful season, despite the unique customer base at Georgetown compared to other markets. First-year vendor Dave Burton, founder of

Capital Candy Jar, who also sells his products at two other D.C. markets, described his experience of adapting to his customers at Georgetown.

“Each [market has] sort of got a different personality, and because of the different personality, different things sell at each market, but it’s fun to learn what those different markets are going to be like,” he said. “Pricing is pretty consistent across all the markets, but I do change a little bit what I’m bringing.” Burton noted that the Capital Candy Jar’s top-selling item at Georgetown was its $5 custom-made s’mores.

Nathaniel Port of Grandma Vera’s Bakery, another first-year vendor, echoed Burton’s sentiment. “There’s a soup I sell at some other markets, but for some reason, students weren’t interested in,” he said. “But it’s my best market for churros. I couldn’t bring enough churros.”

According to Ashwini Persaud, founder of vegan and vegetarian made-to-order meal vendor Sexy Vegie, accommodating the Georgetown market’s timing was initially a challenge.

“We didn’t have to change our menu, but it took a little while getting used to the fact that the students were in between classes so they didn’t have much time to wait on food, versus our other market patrons that are on their lunch break with 30 to 60 minutes to grab lunch,” wrote Persaud in an email to the Voice.

The ability to adapt to Georgetown’s “different personality” as identified by Burton and Persaud is something that the farmer’s market board looks for in vendors, according to Cotcamp. “We research vendors to find those that fit Georgetown’s niche market, and make sure that they’re appealing to student needs and accommodating their products to the anatomy of students’ days,” she said.

BY LARA FISHBANE

On an almost weekly basis, the student body receives an email from Jay Gruber, Todd Olson, or Robin Morey, inviting them to take part in an upcoming event designed to “maximize engagement” with whatever issue is pertinent that week. Just about every student will casually scan the email with no real intention to act on the invitation, ultimately moving it to the trash folder.

I know this because at each of these kinds of forums I have been to, it’s the same group of students who shows up: student media reporters, outspoken activists, and a few student leaders from GUSA or other groups on campus.

Although students do an award-winning job of playing victim to the administration’s shortsighted policy making, few attend the town halls, round tables, and open houses that are supposed to give students a means through which they can effect change.

It’s not like administrators are trying to discourage student attendance—they hold these meetings on weeknights as opposed to weekends, they give students ample notification, and they often offer free snacks and beverages.

Outside of forcibly dragging students to meetings, I’m not sure what else they could do. But if students are concerned with the future of the Hilltop and administrators are making a concerted effort to host forums for student input, then there must be something else deterring students.

Even though students might care a great deal about the issues being discussed, they are also aware that these meetings, in all likelihood, will not generate any substantial change. They know all too well of the power dynam-

ics at play and how they inhibit meaningful discussion. Administrators are placed on a pedestal above students, as they are the ones who have called the event.

For instance, it was revealed in early October that Olson and other administrators were discussing the possibility of consolidating three campus cultural centers. In the following weeks, students published criticisms through student-media outlets and IdeaScale. They were not given the opportunity, however, to voice their complaints to actual administrators until last week’s town hall meeting. In the mean time, students were left in the dark, not knowing what the administration was thinking or planning. The administrators, on the other hand, were able to hear and synthesize student feedback without facing them.

By the time of the meeting, administrators were able to regain the high ground by announcing what they knew students wanted to hear—that they were taking the proposal off the table.

The fact that the administrators are the ones who lead discussion in these types of forums gives them the power to decide which points will be expounded upon and which will quickly be brushed off. At the last town hall meeting, Olson spent plenty of time making it clear that the administration would be protecting the integrity of the three centers and that their funding would not be cut. He also emphasized his commitment to addressing the issues facing disabled students, but when disability rights activist Lydia Brown (COL ‘15) asked about a firm timeline for the disability working group, Ol-

son admitted he could not give her a definitive answer.

Another issue is that administrators often hold these events under the pretenses of receiving student feedback, but in practice, it is often too late to make changes. All they can really do is justify their decisions.

Earlier this semester, I went to an open house on residential construction projects. As I was looking at one of the room designs for the former Jesuit Residence, a woman who was part of the design team asked me, “What do you think?” But she wasn’t asking to hear my response. When I blandly said, “It’s different,” she agreed and then proceeded to explain to me why the design was so innovative and thoughtful. There was nothing I could have said to change the design. The facilitators were not looking for suggestions on how to improve the plans, rather they were there to assuage any worries or criticisms.

It is impossible for constructive conversations to occur when administrators stand above students—where their claims have an inherent validity and students have to earn such respect. Instead, both parties should have to work to earn the other’s respect. In order to form an environment that fosters productive discussion, administrators have to be more transparent throughout their processes instead of leaving students in the dark until a meeting is called.

At meetings, rather than having administrators stand up in front of a room of students, all participants should sit around a table as equals with administrators as mediators, rather than leaders.

Georgetown’s vendors undergo an application process similar to many of the city’s other farmer’s markets. Prospective vendors are asked to detail their products, sources, and provide proof of a general insurance liability policy. If accepted, vendors pay $250 for each season, which lasts approximately eight weeks, as well as $20 per week for on-campus parking.

Many of GUFM’s vendors also regularly attend the Capital Harvest on the Plaza farmer’s market at the Ronald Reagan Building, which charges $50 per

week for their 21-week season, and has similar requirements for sources and coverage.

According to the GUFM application, the board prioritizes offering a variety of vendors and requires that vendors “sell what they grow, raise or produce on their own farm or facility,” and that “all farmers and producers are required to be from the Chesapeake Bay watershed region.”

Luisa Santos (COL ‘14), founder of Lulu’s Ice Cream, and Burton both appreciate the opportunities for collaboration that the GUFM provides, as vendors have

created products using combinations of each other’s ingredients, such as Cervantes Coffee used in Lulu’s Ice Cream, and Capital Candy Jar’s marshmallows in Rita’s Crepes’ recipes.

Quental is looking forward to the market’s reopening in the spring, with continued growth. “Juice is the word,” she said, noting that several vendors have expressed interest in selling at the market next semester. “It’s great seeing so many students engaged in local food and responsible consumption.”

news

georgetownvoice.com

the georgetown voice | 5

October and November crime more than doubles from same period last year JAMES CONSTANT Before becoming victims of a violent mugging, Jackson Sinnenberg (COL ‘15) and Jack Schmitt (COL ‘15) weren’t particularly focused on their safety as they walked back to Burleith from a night on Capitol Hill on Nov. 7.

“I’ve walked up 34th St. many times before with friends. … I just didn’t think anything of it,” Sinnenberg said. But at 11:40 p.m. evening that night, both he and Schmitt were mugged.

“From out of nowhere, I felt a blow to my face and a very unfriendly voice in my ear telling me to ‘give me the money,’” Sinnenberg said. He and Schmitt handed over everything they had on them— their wallets, phones, and backpacks full of textbooks and electronic devices.

Georgetown University police, D.C. police, and GERMS responded promptly to the scene. While Sinnenberg lay in an ambulance headed to MedStar Georgetown University Hospital, he discovered that his jacket was soaked in blood.

An increased number of GUPD public safety alerts indicated that late October and November saw a rash of property crimes and assaults both on and off campus. During October and November of last year, the Department sent out nine public safety alerts. This year, there have been 23 since October.

Students are not the only people who have been impacted by the rise in crime. Nan Coflin, a Burleith resident who lives at the corner of 36th and R streets, was robbed between 11:30 a.m. and 2 p.m. two days after the mugging on 34th St.

ELEvator problems take accessibility issues to new heights.

ELENA PLENEFISCH

Elevator malfunctions create accessibility issues on campus COURTNIE BAEK This semester, a number of elevator malfunctions and delays throughout campus have caused students to raise concerns about university accessibility and convenience.

One of the two elevators in Darnall Hall broke down twice this past week for over 48 hours each time, and only one is currently operating.

Darnall consists of six floors, and over 200 students travel by elevators daily. The staircase next to the elevators doesn’t allow access to the basement level, where laundry machines and dryers are located.

On Nov. 10, Darnall Hall resident Sara Natour (COL ’18) found herself stuck in the malfunctioning elevator with two other students. “We were locked inside for roughly 10 minutes,” wrote Natour in an email

to the Voice. “In panic, we tried pressing the ‘help’ and ‘open door’ buttons, but the elevator was still frozen—the ‘help’ button appeared to be jammed. We desperately tried to reach the RA on duty to ask for guidance. While waiting, the elevator jerked upward toward the other floors. We found this matter to be both inconvenient and frustrating.”

Four days later, Kyle Ashby (COL ‘18), another Darnall resident, said her roommate got stuck in the malfunctioning Darnall elevator, and two hours later, so did Ashby.

“I was riding up to the sixth floor with one other person, and when it got to the sixth floor, the elevator started shaking a little bit and then nothing happened,” said Ashby.

“We were in there for about 20 minutes. The lights were on, but all of the buttons didn’t work except for the emergency button.”

“They broke the glass on my back door and took my desktop computer, two iPads, and whatever change they could find,” Coflin said.

GUPD Chief Jay Gruber sent an email to the campus community on Nov. 9 acknowledging the increase in neighborhood crime and urging students and staff to adjust their behavior and take advantage of safety resources at their disposal, such as SafeRides and the LiveSafe app.

“The Georgetown University Police Department is working closely with the Metropolitan Police Department to both investigate these robberies and monitor this crime trend in areas around the University,” Gruber wrote.

In an email to the Voice, Gruber discussed the efforts GUPD has made to combat the spate of crimes.

The emergency button dialed the GUPD office, from which the campus police came to open the elevator doors. “I think it’s an inconvenience to us as well as the GUPD because within the two hour time span, they had to come to Darnall twice to do the same thing,” said Ashby. “He made a comment about not getting back in the elevator, because he didn’t want to come back and have to go through the whole situation again that night.”

The issue of elevator malfunctions extends throughout dormitories on campus. In Harbin, which consists of nine floors, one of the two elevators is also currently out of operation. On Nov. 4, residents of Village C East, another nine-floor residence hall, received an email from the Office of Residential Living informing tenants that an elevator outage in their building will not be repaired until after Thanksgiving.

“As you have probably realized, an elevator in Village C East is out.

An inspection revealed a deficiency that must be rectified before the elevator can become operational,” the Office of Residential Living wrote in the email. “Unfortunately the part that must be replaced will take a fair amount of time to procure, and Facilities anticipates that the repairs won’t be complete until after Thanksgiving break.”

In the New South Residence Hall, one of the elevators was stopped for an inspection on Nov. 13, preventing students from using it. While the two existent ele-

GUPD is unsure of what is driving the increase in crime.

MEGAN HOWELL

“We are working closely with the MPD Second District, especially with PSA 206. MPD has put additional resources in the area to help deal with this current crime trend,” he wrote. “GUPD officers have also had an increased presence in areas outside of the main campus.”

Sinnenberg expressed satisfaction with GUPD’s re-

sponse to his mugging, despite the fact that the assailants have not been apprehended.

“GUPD showed up fairly quickly, GERMS was contacted fairly quickly,” he said. “It seems like the guys who did this, it wasn’t their first rodeo, so they probably had a plan… aside from like, armed battalions patrolling the streets, [GUPD] did everything it could.”

vators are currently in operation, one of the hall’s residents, Jonathan Marrow (COL ’18), shared that they are not without flaws.

“New South elevators have been under maintenance more than three times. Just the other day, one elevator was out of commission for over 24 hours,” wrote Marrow in an email to the Voice.

“More than once the elevator has just froze on a certain floor, and I’ve waited inside for a minute without the doors closing.

Getting scared that it will shut down, I’ve taken the stairs. It hasn’t been an uncommon experience to see GUPD [or] facilities staff in front of the elevator.”

GUSA Secretary for Disability Affairs Lydia Brown (COL ’15) addressed the effect of elevator malfunctions on the disabled community. “As mentioned in the Voice [editorial] last week, back in September, both of the elevators in Copley broke down at the same time.

This was particularly egregious because every student with a physical disability who lives on campus is housed in Copley Hall,” she said.

“All the disabled students in Copley had to be moved to New South for that night—that’s unacceptable.”

Brown also recalled an instance earlier this month in which the elevator in Walsh broke for a week, citing it as another example of “the pervasive issues with construction and facilities on campus.” Academic buildings, such as Walsh, consist of fewer floors compared

to residence halls, however, faculty members, students, and other university-affiliated persons use the elevators to travel everyday.

“In Walsh, Lau, and Leavey, the elevators are not even leveled with the floor when you get in and out.

Depending on the specific kind of mobility aid that you use, you might not be able to get in or out of the elevator,” said Brown. “I have had multiple experiences repeatedly with the Office of Planning Facilities where they say they will make note of the issue. I call again a couple days later to find the same response.”

In New North, a paper sign in the elevator says, “This elevator tends to get stuck. Until the university fixes the elevator, please take care to press the CENTER of the button (some of the buttons will not light up). Pressing the SIDE of the button can cause the elevator to malfunction.”

GUSA Secretary of Student Space Connor Maytnier (COL ‘17) responded to the complaints of elevator outage on campus. “I am aware that a general sentiment of dissatisfaction with campus elevators exists among students,” wrote Maytnier in an email to the Voice.

“Replacing elevators is certainly a costly project. However, a rapid and effective response for elevator maintenance is a reasonable expectation for us as students to have.

It is important to remember that many of our fellow Hoyas rely on elevators and that for some, using stairs is not a possible option.”

sports

6 | the georgetown voice

NOVEMBER 20, 2014

Women’s soccer climbs by Mountaineers on penalties MAX BOROWITZ

The Georgetown women’s soccer team (11-4-6) shocked the No. 3 ranked West Virginia Mountaineers (16-24) in the first round of the NCAA Tournament this past weekend with a victory. After a 0-0 draw in regulation that had proved largely indecisive, the game was thrust into penalty kicks. Thanks to short moments of brilliance and grit, adjoined with some luck, the Hoyas sent the Mountaineers crashing out of the competition.

Despite the Mountaineers keeping possession for most of the match, they failed to parlay their advantage in quality into any goals. They outshot Georgetown 30-12 and had more shots on goal, as well as more corner kicks, but still failed to find the back of the net.

“I thought in the second half we definitely had better chances and created better opportunities,” said West Virginia Head Coach Nikki Izzo Brown. “Though both teams played pretty tight to the end—you could tell both teams wanted the game.

Against a good team like Georgetown, you have to finish those chances, and unfortunately we didn’t tonight.”

Brown’s concerns had merit. West Virginia had excellent chances to take the lead multiple times, notably in the first few minutes, when consecutive shots slammed off the crossbar or were parried away by senior goalkeeper Emma Newins.

Despite remaining in good spirits, Georgetown Head Coach Dave Nolan was acute-

ly aware that his team was playing second-best most of the game.

“I thought there was a 15-minute patch where we couldn’t really get out of our own half. It was probably in the middle of the first half.

I thought after that, it was pretty even. Ultimately, we had the best chance to win the game with about four minutes to go, and credit to their goalkeeper for making a stop,” Nolan said. “I think our kid’s eyes just got very big. We’re happy, but we know the ball bounced our way a little bit in the penalty kick shootout tonight.”

During the penalty shootout, freshman midfielder Rachel Corboz scored the Hoyas’ first penalty kick to make it 1-0, while senior forward Jessie Clinton put the Hoyas up 2-1. Another West Virginia miss gave the Hoyas a chance to go up further, which freshman defender Taylor Pak converted to put Georgetown up 3-1.

After a miss with the next penalty, senior midfielder Daphne Corboz converted the winning penalty to give Georgetown the victory.

Of particular regret for West Virginia was the decision to bring Kate Schwindel directly off the bench to miss her subsequent penalty.

“Prior to the game she went out and hit a couple, and she never misses. She wanted to take it, and I take full responsibility—I made the decision to let Kate Schwindel take that penalty kick. When you have someone like Kate who is just hammering it away, it was hard for me not to make that decision. Looking back now,

Women’s Soccer will play virginia tech in the Second Round This Friday.

Jennifer Costa

maybe I would definitely not put someone in that position,” Brown said.

For Nolan, the penalty shootout was a perfect opportunity for him to outfox his counterpart. West Virginia had prepared for the possibility of penalty kicks against Georgetown, and Nolan wanted his team to be as unpredictable as possible.

“You change the order.

You change maybe some of

the kids who kick, and you ask some kids maybe to try and find possibly another spot they’re comfortable hitting, too. And then at the end of the day, it just comes down to nerves. It comes down to who can strike the ball cleanly, and who can deal with the situation,” Nolan said.

Nolan’s plan worked to great effect, but he was a graceful winner who clearly understood that with the eu-

phoria of victory on penalties comes alongside the devastation of defeat.

“It’s a horrible way to lose a game, and it’s a fantastic way to win a game,” Nolan said. “We feel fortunate that we were on the good end of it tonight.”

The Hoyas are back in NCAA Tournament action this Friday at 4:30 p.m. as they take on Virginia Tech (15-0-5) at University Park, Pa.

Chris tano’s SPORTS SERMON--Cas “Grind!!!”-Swaggy P aka Los Angeles Lakers guard Nick Young As I sit in my apartment, trying to make it through the last week before this semester’s first major holiday break, there’s only one thing on my mind: snow.

Specifically, snow-related sports. Like any good Vermonter, I grew up learning how to ski and skate before I was even potty trained. My parents signed me up for rental skis before I had even completed kindergarten, and I was on the slopes most weekends, practicing how to pizza (stop) and parallel (go fast). Eventually, during my teenage years, I defected to snowboarding and never looked back, causing segments of my friend group to label me a heathen, while others were happy to have me join their ranks. I’ve been on boths sides of the great divide.

That last sentence may seem like a joke, but for any of you southerners with minimal winter experience out there, the rivalry between these two groups is no laughing matter (alright... it’s kind of a laughing matter). The rivalry may be even worse where I’m from, given Vermont’s connection to Burton Snowboards. Needless to say, I’m a bit of an expert in the points both sides like to make.

Keep in mind that these are caricatures.

Personally, I have ridden behind incredibly obnoxious members of both factions, and let me tell you, everyone is capable of making you want to run straight into them at the bottom of the hill. Everyone carves all over the trail at some point in their career on the mountain. Everyone stands too

close to the chairlift. Everybody’s equal.

Or are they? There are still a handful of resorts in the U.S. that ban snowboarders from practicing their pastime. One of them is actually very close to where I live. Mad River Glen is hailed in Vermont as one of the state’s premier skiing attractions. They won’t let you forget this accolade. The Glen operates on private land, much to the dismay of knuckle draggers everywhere, and doesn’t look to be opening its doors to riders anytime soon.

The same can’t be said for one of its exclusive counterparts. Alta Resort in Utah was sued earlier this year for only allowing skiers on the basis that the resort sits on federal land. The four men who filed the lawsuit claimed that since Alta is built on publicly owned land, any move to bar people from the resort based on the sport they practice is ludicrous. I’m bound to agree with them.

I have yet to read an oped piece on the subject that doesn’t include some classic, seemingly logical arguments against allowing snowboarders. For one, many skiers seem to be very concerned about a so-called “blind spot” that plagues snowboarders. Since riders stand perpendicular on the board, and don’t stand straight forward, they can’t see half the trail and therefore run the risk of careening into anyone behind their back.

Let me make this clear: snowboarders don’t peel off and nail people they can’t see. Idiots peel off and nail people they can’t see. You’re just as likely to get walloped by some geezer on two

planks as you are by some young upstart on one.

But skiers paid for the lifts at Alta and have supported the resort all these years. Why should they have to open their doors to the undesirables? I’m not going to touch that logic with a 10-foot pole. All I’ll say is that this sort of reasoning is what has kept a lot of people on the wrong side of history. The stakes are certainly lower here rather than some other cases, but it’s a terrible reason nonetheless.

In the same line of reasoning, some are even prone to telling snowboarders they’re welcome to ride the terrain that Alta’s built on seeing as it’s federal land, so long as they do not freeload and use the chairlifts or any of the other equipment.

Well, of course they want to use the lift. Who in their right mind wants to spend the majority of their time hiking when they could be riding? It’s the exact logic that caused human beings to build the damn lifts in the first place! You can’t seriously fault people for wanting to be afforded the same convenience.

These places don’t have to let snowboarders through their doors. They have the right (so far) to say who can and cannot ride. However, in continuing this practice, all they are really doing is contributing to stereotypes of both winter sports. Snowboarders are still painted as hooligans and skiers still think they’re a few steps ahead of the game. In reality, they are only holding each other back.

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the georgetown voice | 7

Football rammed by Fordham MAX ROBERTS

The Georgetown University football team (2-9, 0-5 Patriot League) dropped their sixth straight contest on Saturday as they lost 52-7 to Fordham University (10-1, 6-0 PL) in their penultimate game of the season.

The Hoyas were overpowered in nearly every facet of the game, surrendering just shy of 500 yards of offense to the Rams, while only mustering 251 yards of offense themselves. Despite coming off a bye week, the Blue and Gray struggled early, falling 24 points behind in the first half.

“I don’t think the bye week helped us,” Georgetown Head Coach Rob Sgarlata said. “I think we came out slow to be quite honest with you.”

On their opening drive, the Rams methodically marched 71 yards down the field in 10 plays to open the scoring with a touchdown. Georgetown was unable to respond as they were forced to punt quickly on their first two possessions. At the end of the first quarter, Fordham once again controlled the pace of the game as they went on a

16-play drive that stretched into the second quarter. Fortunately, the Hoyas managed to hold the Rams to a short field goal, raising the deficit to a manageable 10 points.

However, the Hoya offense couldn’t seem to put anything together. A quick three-andout handed the ball back to the red-hot Fordham offense with a short field. The Rams quickly capitalized on the excellent field position and the tired Blue and Gray defense by scoring another touchdown to put them ahead 17-0.

Following a great kickoff return from senior running back Daniel Wright, the Georgetown offense began to string together successful plays. Unfortunately, the Hoyas took a gamble on fourth down, which didn’t pay off. Junior quarterback Kyle Nolan’s pass fell incomplete, ending the drive.

The Rams and Hoyas traded possessions before Fordham was able to add another touchdown to make it 24-0. Georgetown refused to quit, however, and they showed signs of life by blocking a Fordham field goal attempt as time expired in the half.

“I’ve been in football for 36 years. I haven’t been around a group like this where they love playing together,” Sgarlata said.

Fordham continued to dominate the game after halftime, adding three more touchdowns in the third quarter to make the score 45-0. Nevertheless, Georgetown showed resilience and finally broke through for a touchdown pass from Nolan to junior wide receiver Jake DeCicco at the beginning of the fourth quarter.

The Rams would proceed to add another touchdown later in the quarter to account for the final score of 52-7.

As the team approaches its final game, Sgarlata took a moment to compliment the seniors who will be graduating in 2015.

“If you look through top to bottom, these kids have been through a lot together. They’ve had some successful seasons, they’ve had some winning years, and their dedication hasn’t wavered at all,” he said.

Georgetown will look to finish their year on a high note when they face Holy Cross (4-7, 2-3 PL) this Saturday at 12 p.m. at home on Multi-Sport Field.

Men’s basketball downs A&M JOE POLLICINO

The Georgetown University men’s basketball team (2-0, 0-0 Big East) was propelled to victory by its seniors on Tuesday as the Hoyas defeated Texas A&M-Corpus Christi (1-1, 0-0 Southland) 78-62 at Verizon Center. Senior forward Aaron Bowen and senior center Joshua Smith scored a combined 33 points, proving to be the decisive factors in a contest that was uneasily close in the first half.

With the scored tied at 34-34 entering halftime, the Hoyas opened play with a 2111 run in the first eight minutes of the frame to put the game out of reach. Bowen’s offensive and defensive contribution stemmed the first half momentum built up by the Islanders. The Jacksonville native brought an intensity to the Hoyas that they lacked in the opening minutes of the contest. This energy lifted the Hoyas in the second half, as the Blue and Gray offense shot 55 percent from the field in the frame, while forcing 11 Islander turnovers on defense.

noah buyon

Senior Center JoshuA SMith powered the Hoyas past Texas A&m-Corpus Christi.

“I am just doing my job,” said Bowen. “[Head Coach John Thompson III] tells me that every time I touch the court just to play with energy and I feel that that’s what I did.”

Bowen wasn’t the only senior star of the night. After a disappointing season debut against St. Francis, pulling down only two rebounds, Smith was force to be reckoned with in the low post, converting 8-of-12 field goal attempts, as well as racking up double-digit rebounds for the first time in his Georgetown career. “[His performance] was better. His effort level was much, much better today,”

said Thompson. “If Josh plays with that intensity and effort and that energy, that should happen every time.”

Smith is considered key to the Hoyas’ success this season. However, consistency has been an issue for the Georgetown big man during his time on the Hilltop. If he can continue to put up numbers like he did against Texas A&M, he will play a major role in any success the Hoyas enjoy this season.

The Hoyas will look to build on their two-game winning streak when they face Robert Morris (0-2, 0-0 NEC) this Saturday at 12:00 p.m. at Verizon Center.

– FullcourtPress – Joe Pollicino’s TRI-weekly column about sports

LAYING THE SMACKDOWN on the MIDDLEMeN Few Americans consider professional wrestling to be one of the more forward-thinking enterprises in the world of sports and entertainment.

Ever since the often-ridiculed sport achieved some semblance of mainstream popularity within our country’s culture, the same on-show narratives have been repeatedly employed. I can already tell you three things that will happen in next week’s Monday Night Raw. Someone will be either hit with a steel chair or put through a table; the referee will be beat up almost to the point of unconsciousness, but will somehow miraculously recover to proclaim a match’s winner; and the foreign wrestlers, for some reason, will always be portrayed as villains.

Although the quality of professional wrestling certainly has subsided since the halcyon days of Stone Cold Steve Austin and The Rock, the sport’s fans, and the general public, may have a new reason to pay attention. World Wrestling Entertainment has introduced an innovation that could change the future of television, especially with regards to our other beloved professional sports.

Launched this past February, the WWE Network is a subscriptions-based service that offers access to a plethora of on-demand programming options for $9.99 a month.

Along with weekly shows and documentaries, access to the company’s video library, subscribers can watch the company’s previously overpriced monthly pay-per-view events.

Even the wrestling equivalent of the Super Bowl, WrestleMania, is available for no additional charge. This model allows WWE to cut out middlemen in regards to content distribution, whether that be the cable companies or payper-view providers, and charge a direct fee that feeds only WWE’s coffers.

For many die-hard wrestling fans, this should be a deal that’s almost too good to be true. Unfortunately for WWE, if something seems too good to be true, it probably is. Nine months into the network’s launch, the company has yet to meet the optimal number of subscribers to break even on its substantial investment. And while many might not care

about the network’s success, it would be unwise for sports fans to dismiss it as an extraneous, otherworldly project. In fact, if you’re a sports fan, you might have a vested interest in this business model, as it could be the future of sports media.

As the advent of Internet-based services, such as Netflix and Amazon Prime, continues, fewer people are watching their favorite TV shows live, opting instead for the convenience of on-demand options. So far, the only facet of television that has been immune to this has been sporting events, due to their live programming. And as anyone who’s ever recorded a game will tell you, trying to avoid the score before you watch is a nightmare. Many people, like myself, probably watch only a quarter of the channels in their respective cable packages. Essentially, I only need my respective sports channels, such as ESPN, TNT, TBS, and Fox Sports, to name a few.

But what if the NBA were to forego its deal with cable networks, who reap enormous advertising revenue off of televising professional basketball games, and create its own online subscription service with a monthly fee? A service where fans can access original programming, as well as the NBA’s video library, with every NBA game ever played? Throw in access to NBA League Pass, which gives fans the ability to watch every NBA game, for no extra charge and you’ve got yourself one of the sweetest deals in sports history.

Implementing this sort of package for fans of any and all professional teams would be a win-win for all except broadcast companies, as fans wouldn’t have to pay for channels they don’t want and the leagues could reap the benefits of the direct subscription fees as well as the potential advertising bonanza that would ensue. How many sports fans wouldn’t be willing to pay a fee within the range of $5-15 a month to enjoy access to these privileges?

The future of television is unfolding in WWE. The question is, to paraphrase one of the Rock’s many noteworthy catchphrases, can other professional sports smell what WWE is cooking?

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8 | the georgetown voice

Curtain Call The diversity of Georgetown’s theater community No one comes to Georgetown for the theater scene. Until recently, the university did not even have a theater major or administrative structures to support acting or set design. In spite of this, Georgetown boasts four active, student-run theater groups. With their unique quirks and history, each campus theater group occupies a unique niche in the theater community.

MASK AND BAUBLE by Lara Fishbane In February of 1853, The Dramatic Association of Georgetown College performed its first play, Pizarro, which depicted the conquering of the Incas.

During its earlier years, the group only held daytime performances, relying on natural light to illuminate their stages in Healey, Old North, and other locations around campus.

“We continued staging plays each year until World War I, when the entire university was drafted into the armed forces reserve,” Technical Administrator Will Redmond (COL ‘15) said. “When we resumed, we adopted the name we currently have, The Mask and Bauble Dramatic Society.”

Now in its 163rd season, Mask and Bauble is the oldest continuously-running student theater troupe in the country. Throughout its tenure, Mask and Bauble has built up an impressively long list of alumni, which includes the notorious John Wilkes Booth.

Each year, the group performs at least four plays in Poulton Hall’s Stage III. These works include a classic work and a student-written work in the fall, a modern classic in late winter, and a musical to close the season in the spring. “Because we were founded so many years ago, our group definitely has more of a draw toward older, more traditional plays,” Associate Producer Katie Rosenberg (COL ‘15) said.

For its first show of the semester, Mask and Bauble performed Inherit the Wind, which originally debuted almost 60 years ago. “The play raises the issues of being free to think, but also being part of a community.

These are things that currently matter at our university,” Redmond said.

“If we had a campus community that

failed to put on older, more traditional plays, we would be neglecting an important part of our cultural heritage and also a lot of stories that can still speak to us.”

There are currently 86 active members involved with Mask and Bauble, but after its inductions this December, there will be over 100 in total. “We do have the most stringent requirements for membership of any of the theater groups on campus,” Redmond said, “And part of it is the realistic practice of doing theater at a university. We think that it’s really important to educate our members on all of the different aspects of theater.”

Mask and Bauble requires each of its members to complete two show credits before they can be inducted.

At least one of these requirements must be a technical requirement.

“You cannot be just an actor at Mask and Bauble. It is impossible to leave without having hung a light or painted a fence or designed props,” Rosenberg said, “It builds a lot of respect.

No one is too good to climb a ladder or work a wrench.”

Although the group has two advisors from the theater department, Toby Clark and Susan Lynskey, all of the production work is executed by the students. According to Rosenberg, this experience was a crucial part of her education at Georgetown. “The majority of things I have learned here have come from my experience at Mask and Bauble, from learning how to design a website to learning how to plumb a toilet,” Rosenberg said. “From very specific stuff like that to more general things, like how to build a community and lead a room of fifty people. It’s all really meaningful to me.”

NOvember 20, 2014

NOMADIC THEATRE by Steven Criss “We were just some angsty kids who wanted to do angsty plays.”

The Nomadic Theatre mantra has been passed down for decades through multiple generations of oral history, and the spirit of that original angsty troupe, according to Executive Producer Arianne Price, is just as powerful today as it was back when the group was founded in 1982.

The founding members of Nomadic Theatre were previously members of the country’s oldest collegiate theater troupe, Mask and Bauble, but decided that they were not fully satisfied with the traditional kind of productions M&B had become known for. For them, there was only one option if they truly wanted to pursue the darker, edgier pieces they were passionate about.

And so, they started Nomadic Theatre in an effort to make this daring artistic vision a reality. More than 30 years later, the troupe is still challenging the norms of theater.

“What Nomadic does now are works that we have coined as being technically ambitious and socially engaged,” Associate Producer Kathleen Hill said. “We like to do more modern works by modern playwrights that may not have that direct appeal on the surface.”

Instead of putting their efforts into hackneyed works and well-known classics, Nomadic Theatre focuses almost completely on contemporary pieces that allow them to experiment with different technical elements, whether it be lighting, sound design, or even projections as a part of their sets.

“What M&B does is a bit more classical theater—the names might be a bit more familiar to people because that’s what they grew up doing in high school and when they were younger.

Those were plays that their parents

Mask and Bauble. Photo by the Voice

would take them to. We’re basically the plays that your parents would never want to take you to,” said Hill.

“They really make you think … I think more than any of the other groups, we challenge our student designers to really push themselves to find new ways to express themselves.”

The plays put on by Nomadic Theatre do not simply serve as a mode of self-expression for the actors and artists themselves, but also provide an avenue for the group to make an impact on the community. According to Price, each year the group tries to have at least one of their shows engage with the D.C. or even international community. For their next play coming in January, Sick, the group plans to include dialogue with the university’s mental health organization or with another from within D.C. as a part of the production.

“It’s a little dark and it’s a little hard to watch sometimes, but if we can say that we made people leave the theater thinking about something that they may have not walked in thinking about, it’s powerful,” Hill said.

With their theater preferences approaching the avant-garde side of the spectrum, Nomadic Theatre gives members of the opportunity to step outside what is commonly expected of a theater production and open up a new realm of interpretation.

“Theater is really special in that people pay for you lock them in a black room and tell them what to think about,” Price said. “Then they think about it that night, and they think about it the next day and they talk about it in the car ride with their friends. I think being able to do that in a way that’s really fun, it doesn’t feel like work. It doesn’t feel like this big thing, but at the end of it we get to reach out to members of the community and give back in a way.”

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the georgetown voice | 9

“We’re basically the plays that your parents would never want to take you to.”

BLACK THEATRE ENSEMBLE

by Dayana Morales Gomez

The Black Theatre Ensemble was formed in 1979 in an effort to fill the persistent holes in the diversity of Georgetown performing arts groups. The group seeks to better accommodate black student actors in campus productions by using its performances to give a voice to minority communities.

Throughout its history, the group has had trouble maintaining a strong presence among the theater community at Georgetown and this problem persists to this day. The board has even considered changing the name of the group to make it more accessible to a wider audience.

“Looking at the shows that make it big, a lot of them are white-centric,” Executive Producer of the Black Theatre Ensemble Joshua Street (COL ‘15) said. “There aren’t very many African-American roles in theater as a whole. It kind of mirrors society’s racial tensions that have grown throughout the years,” he said.

“Our goals have evolved to include minorities of all colors, creeds, races, religions, and everything,” Street said. “We don’t strictly do black plays. We do plays about minorities—those voices that are not always represented.”

Since its beginnings in the late 1970s, the Black Theatre Ensemble has grown to become a tight-knit theater troupe among a cohort of more conventional groups.

“It had been a very short time since segregation had ended when BTE was founded,” said Street. “There were still many racial tensions between people.

It was founded as a way for black students to find their voice in the theater.

There were black theater students, but they couldn’t really do anything in the theater because those roles weren’t there for them.”

The Black Theatre Ensemble is open to students of all races and backgrounds, priding itself in its open, less conventional structure. Besides the usual staged show offerings, the Black Theater Ensemble strives to establish a strong social presence in the campus community.

The troupe has recently started putting together regular events like coffeehouses and open-mic nights so the wider Georgetown community has the opportunity get to know the Black Theatre Ensemble’s members and board.

“Our coffeehouses show the true spirit of BTE,” said Aloysia Jean (COL ’16), the Black Theatre Ensemble’s board secretary. “Honestly, it’s like a weird family dinner where we eat breakfast foods and watch people perform. Beyond that, in our coffeehouse we are inclusive, caring, and supportive above all else … We want to support [the Georgetown community] and feed them pancakes covered in Nutella.”

According to Street, the group ultimately decided against changing its name “because of the fact that it carries such a huge, historical value.”

In keeping with the Black Theater Ensemble’s philosophy of inclusion, the troupe’s next production, That Face, will be cast with a multicultural family despite the fact that the show has a British playwright and traditionally put on with an all-white cast.

“You might look at it and think, ‘You wouldn’t see this kind of family in real life,’ but at the same time, you can see through who we cast that the problems that they are facing can be anyone’s problems,” Street said.

The Black Theatre Ensemble’s nontraditional approach has seen great success. This year’s production of In the Red and Brown Water sold out multiple times and garnered significant public acclaim. Co-produced with the Department of Theater and Performing Arts, the play had ample resources and funding, allowing for professional direction and a twoweek run.

Jean hopes that the group’s recent success will only grow in the future. “Over the next few years, I see BTE reemerging as an inter-sectional theater group with shows that promote underrepresented stories at Georgetown,” Jean said. “We work hard to bring all members of the community together. Hopefully, one day, we won’t have to remind people that ‘you don’t have to be black [to join]’ over a megaphone at SAC Fair.”

Black Theatre Ensemble. Photo by the Voice

CHILDREN’S THEATER

by Christopher Castano

There are multiple theater troupes on campus, but few allow for casual commitments or membership by inexperienced students. For anyone who is still looking for their niche in the theater, look no further than Children’s Theatre.

“We end up singing Disney songs half of practice,” said Caitlin Snell (COL ‘16). Snell is president of Children’s Theatre and has been a part of its productions since her freshman year.

“I talked to the president after O Show, learned more about the organization,” Snell said. “It aligned well with a lot of theatre I had done in high school, working with kids off campus, and it was a low time commitment and sounded super fun.”

Children’s Theater fills a very specific niche in the theater community at Georgetown. The troupe works to put on shows for children in environments where they otherwise might not be exposed to the performing arts. In addition to staging performances on campus, this mission entails travelling off campus to after-school programs throughout the District and holding performances in children’s hospitals.

“It’s really, really fun. Not that the other groups on campus aren’t, but we pack a large punch in a little amount of time,” Snell said. Members of a Children’s Theatre show give up the majority of their Friday afternoons during the semester to go perform in D.C. “The kids really enjoy it,” said Snell.

“They’re at their afterschool programs and they’re doing their homework, or they’re playing outside, but when we come they get to experience something completely different.”

The students in the audience benefit from the performances in several ways.

For instance, some of the children have never seen a play, and didn’t know that being an actor is a pastime they can learn about before they see one of Children’s Theater’s performances.

“The opportunity to pursue theater is important,” said senior Children’s Theater actor Nathan Oakes (COL ‘15). He’s currently playing the Cowardly Lion in The Wizard of Oz. “It’s good to expose elementary students to these opportunities and show them that this can be fun,exciting,and cool.”

While getting groups of young students to sit still for a performance can be challenging, both Snell and Oakes have myriad success stories that prove the work they do is both engaging and valuable.

“Even if you feel the performance didn’t go very well the kids are always enthusiastic and they want to come up at the end and ask you questions,” Oaks said.

“They think you’re awesome!”

Snell points to one very specific example of a time when she felt like she was truly making a difference. “We went into the props carpet looking for a magic carpet because we were doing Aladdin. We found this giant plank on wheels and turned it into a magic carpet. So we were dragging this thing around the rehearsal space and I said to myself, ‘This is amazing, and ridiculous, and great,and I love it. When we went to the play, and the kids got to ride on the carpet, everyone started bawling with happiness.”

While Snell is happy to put a smile on the faces of these young students, she also hopes that the work of Children’s Theater will encourage children to to set goals and work hard in the future. “They know we go to Georgetown, and it starts to make them think, ‘Maybe I can go to Georgetown and maybe I can be an actor someday.’”

These four groups all make valuable contributions to the arts at Georgetown.

The campus theater community would not be complete without them. While Georgetown’s overall interest in theater performance is mainly recreational, the high quality of the theater troupes keeps the scene fresh and engaging. They work together, like pieces of a puzzle, neatly forming a professional, yet tight-knit group of experts who all collaborate to hone their craft.

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November 20, 2014

The Hilltoss: Corp’s culinary skill rears its head in latest venture SAM KLEINMAN Ron Swanson was once asked whether he’d like some salad.

His response? “Since I am not a rabbit, no, I do not.” I would normally agree with any piece of wisdom taken from “Parks and Recreation,” but for the Corp’s newest venture, The Hilltoss, I was forced to betray the manliest of men. Astoundingly, the Corp has designed a salad joint worthy of man and beast like.

If you’re not careful, the unfinished 8-by-12 wooden door might hit you in the face as you walk into The Hilltoss. The overall aesthetic of this new restaurant is, like its door, jarring and surprising, but, in the end, satisfying. With customers’ feet treading on chipped concrete as they approach the counter, the aesthetics are fitting for the atmosphere the Corp is seeking to create with this new venture: a public space where students can gather with one another, enjoying creative yet simple food.

The Hilltoss’ near-successful attempts at a plethora of reimagined dressings give the new restaurant a mark of distinction.

The blush red-wine dressing for the Jay Gatsby, for example, effec-

tively balances tanginess and saltiness, with a viscosity that enhances the summery feel of the salad as a whole. The creamy balsamic on the Cobb salad is also well-balanced, which is a point that should be stressed. In this acidic bechamel-base, The Hilltoss successfully incorporates two extremes.

“NO I’M SORRY, SIR, WE ONLY SERVE vEGETABLES HERE...”

The Cobb salad was a resounding success. The mesclun mix was both tangy and earthy, suggesting produce as fresh as any Corp location can be expected to acquire.

In fact, The Hilltoss impressively sources 90 percent of its produce from local farms and co-ops. The greens offer a fresh base for the

Breeches&Bodice: A bi-weekly column about fashion by Tim Annick

While many use the terms “fashion” and “style” interchangeably, they have vastly different connotations. The late designer Yves Saint Laurent once said, “Fashions fade, style is eternal,” and he could not have been more correct.

Style has remained more or less consistent throughout the 20th century and into the 21st.

Fashion, however, has shifted dramatically time and time again in a cycle of cultural appropriation and regurgitation.

Some of the most celebrated fashion trends, including the Birkenstock renaissance, or the gentrification of grunge, are nothing but cynical marketing exercises taking advantage of consumers’ gullibility. American style, in particular, has been derived from the glorification of the working class as representative of the American dream. That is, Americans have the potential for historically un-

crunchy bacon, buttery avocado, and crisp cherry tomatoes, completing the resounding interpretation of a classic Cobb Salad.

Though winter is coming, the Jay Gatsby is an exciting sunny weather addition to the menu with more fresh produce and locally-sourced mozzarella. The mozza-

precedented social mobility, and yet we identify with Levi’s jeans and the American Navy’s t-shirt as the most iconic, simple, and elegant of all outfits.

It’s an interesting conundrum, but the simplicity of American style has been hijacked time and time again by European brands because, put simply, American style is the best. The idea of what American fashion is has changed again and again. Everything from James Dean’s Rebel Without A Cause red bomber, jeans, and the workboot to The Official Preppy Handbook and tassel loafers have been adopted and transformed by European companies.

Recently, grunge has been the nom de guerre of subversive American fashion. It’s decidedly American: utilitarian and individual. In an interview with The Fashion Law regarding the 2013 Saint Laurent Paris grunge-rock collection, Courtney Love was quoted as

rella elegantly balances the salad, which would almost certainly be under-salted without it. Though the floral notes of the strawberries were much appreciated, they were undermined by avocado that shared the same consistency. If the Cobb was a home run, the Jay Gatsby was a ground rule double.

Another of the eatery’s signature creations, the Amalfi Coast, is an arugula-based salad with quinoa and predictable caprese staples, tomato and mozzarella.

Quinoa is difficult to pull off in anything, particularly in salads.

Grains in salads will naturally soak up and nullify other flavors,

VICKI LAM

and also undermine the crispness of the fresh ingredients. Unfortunately, this fate is true of the Amalfi Coast. The earthy quinoa renders the oregano and basil effectively non-existent and dulled the mozzarella’s complexity. The counterpoint to this flavor dampening is that, because of the sal-

“I’m like, ‘Yo---that’s fifty dollars for a T-shirt.’” saying, “I love it. It reminds me of Value Village. Real grunge. I love that rich ladies are going to pay a fortune to look like we used to look when we had nothing.”

In case you’ve never heard of Kurt Cobain, grunge was popularized by the garage-rock movement that originated in 1990s Seattle. Visually, grunge was signified by stereotypically working class clothes: jeans, flannel shirts, Doc Martens, and mismatched patterns.

These jeans, however, are typically ripped, the flannel shirts are often oversized, with scuffed and old Doc Martens, representative of the screw-you visual aesthetic that disregarded cultural norms and signified the disillusionment among devotees.

This rejection of conventions is indicative of the American identity, which is individualistic while embracing humble origins.

Ironically, the humble origins of American grunge have been disregarded by gentrification. It has

been repackaged as a cynical exercise in branding.

In the same way that Dadaism capitalized on the readymade and satirically regurgitated mass-market objects, fashion has fallen into the cycle of repackaging pre-existing cultural signifiers. Corporate fashion has appropriated these signifiers without paying the social debt. Love may appreciate the commoditization of her origins, but it devalues the significance of grunge’s rejection of mainstream culture.

The significance of organic stylistic movements cannot be discounted. When we popularize aspects of marginalized cultures, the cultural significance and influence of those cultures are diminished, whether it is gay culture, feminist culture, or the broad variety of unique ethnic cultures, to name a few.

Fashion may be unoriginal and fleeting, but it is also important to heed the cultural cost of appropri-

ad’s blandness, it is the only one of the three that doesn’t suffer from acidity issues.

Though the dressings on their own are balanced, the addition of half of a freshly-squeezed lemon to each salad makes the aftertaste of each bite of the Cobb and Jay Gatsby taste vaguely reminiscent of a tin can.

In the words of the general manager––and brains behind the salads––Monish Sabnani (MSB ’15), “The Hilltoss tries to create an image behind each salad where you can envision what you’re eating.” True to form, each salad appears to do exactly that, from the menu’s corresponding typefaces to the ingredients themselves. The Jay Gatsby does partially transport the customer to a Montauk beach party.

Though many tweaks are left to be made, the Corp’s salads do succeed in telling a narrative as much as they deliver sustenance.

With both cuisine and community, these are no rabbit’s greens, but viands for the social animals among us.

The Hilltoss Healey Family Student Center Mon. - Fri., 11a.m. - 8p.m.

ating visual cues for mainstream culture. The next time you are wearing an oversized flannel shirt, Doc Martens, or a Southwestern Native American motif sweater, remember the origin thereof. It may not have cost you any cultural capital, but it certainly cost a lot to its progenitors.

Wearing clothes that do not relate to your cultural or socioeconomic origin is a disingenuine representation of yourself. Ultimately, clothing is a billboard for who you are and how you perceive yourself.

So, if you don’t sail, don’t wear anchors. If you aren’t of Native American origins, it’s inappropriate to wear patterned sweaters or blankets. If you’re not wholeheartedly rejecting a culture of wealth and privilege, grunge is not for you.

As stylish as high fashion’s appropriation of grunge may be, it is a disingenuine representation of yourself to share. Be true to yourself, and that means remembering who you are and whence you came.

Rip Tim’s jeans at tra25@ georgetown.edu

georgetownvoice.com

“That’d be just fine with the boys on the boat. They weren’t looking for anything more than a way home.” — Apocalypse Now

Mask and Bauble confronts anonymity EMMA MARSHALL

Sonder, Mask and Bauble’s Donn B. Murphy One Acts Festival this year, refers to “the realization that each random passerby is living a life as vivid and complex as your own,” according to the festival’s actors and writers.

As the actors unpack their characters—and, due to the unique writing process, themselves—the audience experiences sonder after sonder. This is a play about names, about facades, about masks, about people, and about connections.

Sonder had a unique birth. Director Marlene Cox (COL ‘16) and her cast originally intended to produce a different student-authored one-act play, but copyright issues prevented them from bringing it to fruition.

“Stuff happens,” actress Michaela Farrell (COL ‘18) said flatly.

The crew had just weeks to write, block, rehearse, and produce a new show.

The script is based primarily on interviews that Cox conducted with her actors. Actress Annie Ludtke (MSB ’18) recounted that Cox had the actors write essays based on prompts, and found similar themes among all of them. Using the interviews, essays, and a collaborative editing process, they created Sonder.

Because the cast had such a large role in the writing of the play, the personalities of the cast are very closely tied with the development of their characters. Each character is named for his or her actress, and in a play that is all about names and identity, this is a significant endeavor.

Of the seven people in the cast, six are freshmen and one is a sophomore. Lack of experience from the young cast was sometimes apparent, but it made the show cozier and made the characters— intended to be reflections of their actors—more likeable.

All seven actors are in constant harmony; there is no main character at any point. Even when individual actors step up to deliver slam poetry on a small stage, all the actors maintain equal attention. The script is written as constant overlapping monologues. The characters interrupt each other’s sentences until they seem to share one powerful, unified voice.

The intimacy of the cast fits perfectly in the cozy, whimsical coffee shop aesthetic, crafted by set designer Sean Sullivan (COL ’17). While the sounds of rainfall and alternative pop blend in the background, the characters read, sip coffee, and chat against Sullivan’s bright blue wall studded

with art, records, and posters.

They create a busy and slightly hipster tableau. Costume designer Meika Harris (NHS ‘16) has her actors clad in the uniform of 20-something Americans who spend their time in slam poetry venues—flannel, florals, denim, and scarves.

Rarely can actors or directors take credit for the text of a play. In this occasion, they can. The script can seem a little pretentious at times, but so can slam poetry, and so can the 20-something hipsters who spend their time in indie coffee shops.

This play is interesting and authentic. It is impressive both in the production itself, and the difficult, strange situation out of which it was born. Cox and her cast and crew have done a remarkable job, and their cohesion and efforts pay off in their one-act production.

The audience knows what Leah Benz (COL ’18) means when she describes the way we see ourselves as “mirrors twisting around trying to look themselves in the eye.”

The characters, in trying to explain themselves, reflect each other, and the Sondern nature of those living around us, more clearly.

the georgetown voice | 11

Reviews Haiku’d The Hobbit “How shall this day end?”

With Bilbo, the homies, and A big ass dragon Fifty Shades of Gray Sex, sex, kinky sex, This girl looks like she’s fourteen What’s with the blindfold?

The Hunger Games Has Katniss lost it Or will she keep up the fight?

Hashtag free Henle The Gambler Marky Mark’s in debt And Jessica Lange is pissed Dolla dolla billz

Into the Woods Sondheim musical Mother fuckin’ fairy tales With a dark-ass twist The Babadook Can’t exactly say What a damn babadook is, But it freaked me out

Poulton Hall, Stage III Nov. 19 - Nov. 22 performingarts.georgetown.edu

Black Movements Dance Theatre raises the barre with Paradigm MANEESHA PANJA A dancer starts her performance uneasily rocking back and forth on a chair, straining to finish a cigarette. Her co-performer struggles to take one more swig of a bottle while stumbling across the stage. Both seamlessly join the other dancers in a series of flowing lyrical sequences, embodying the fluid interchangeability between dancing and acting in Black Movement Dance Theatre’s November showcase, Paradigm.

The production combines crisp dance, theatrical emotion, varied musical styles, and even poetry in an innovative work of performance art. These scenes guide the audience through a thrilling and powerful journey exploring the struggles and celebrations that humans face throughout their lives.

BMDT was formed 30 years ago as an effort to bring the African American experience forward

in the Georgetown community through contemporary dance. Today, the company moves beyond its founding goal, striving to incorporate the entire human experience, with a particular emphasis on women’s issues.

“We wanted to use what we do as dancers and as artists to speak to larger issues as well and say that they’re not just symptomatic to one particular race,” Alfreda Davis, artistic director of BMDT, said.

The title of the show, Paradigm, was inspired by the onset of change that the group has seen with the start of their new season.

“A paradigm is a sequence of doing things, a certain pattern, a certain formation,” Davis said.

This semester, that pattern and sequence of doing things changed drastically for BMDT. The company had a large graduating class at the end of last year.

They moved into their new practice space in the Healey Family Student Center. And this year,

BMDT has its first male student director in the history of the organization. Overall, Black Movements has seen many marks of change, and even progress, that have characterized its new approach to dance as both an art form and a medium of expression.

This showcase exhibits the culmination of BMDT’s paradigm shift in its new voice, as it brings together instrumental music, hiphop, and R&B, even incorporating some spoken word, to build a repertoire encapsulating different facets of the human experience.

To these dancers, the story of the dance is just as important as the visual beauty of strong technique.

The ability to incorporate multiple styles of dance, from modern contemporary to hiphop to tap, gives the performers a unique ability to appeal to a wide audience and diverse interests.

“I’m trained as a tap dancer, so it’s been really great to share my background with the company.”

said Alex Ciejka, the fall student director and BMDT’s business manager, who had the opportunity to choreograph a dance in the showcase. “The girls in my piece have never tapped before, so it’s been a really fun experience, really cool and rewarding to see my work come to life.”

With its students’ meticulous dance technique and risky emotional charge, Paradigm is sure to be a visually fresh and thought provoking production.

“There’s a leek in the boat!”

“We never want to have our audience walk away not feeling as if they’ve been inspired,” Davis said. “We want our audience to walk away feeling like there’s something to think about. We want our audience to walk away feeling that they can do exactly what they’ve just seen.”

Black Movements DanceTheatre Walsh Black Box Theater Nov. 21 - Nov. 22, 8p.m. performingarts.georgetown.edu

VICKI LAM

leisure

12 | the georgetown voice

CRITICAL VOICES

Foo Fighters, Sonic Highways, RCA Records Twenty years after founding the post-Nirvana project in Seattle, Foo Fighters frontman Dave Grohl manages to push one of the most important remaining rock ‘n’ roll bands onward into 2015 with Sonic Highways.

The album is the result of the band’s multi-city journey across America to renew their creative spirit. The idea behind this project is that the people, environment,

Ariel Pink, Pom Pom, 4AD When he’s not embroiled in social media beef with fellow artists—“mermaid,” “delusional misogyny,” and “stupid and retarded” were among the jabs traded on Twitter—Ariel Pink produces an eclectic assortment of lo-fi, psychedelic rock music complete with his characteristic eyebrow-perking lyrics.

Pink’s latest release, Pom Pom, marks his first work without his supporting band, Ariel Pink’s

and experience in which a record is written are the elements that make an album stand-out.

Grohl and company spent a week in eight cities with an HBO crew to make an eight-part rockumentary series that premiered a month ago on the network. At the end of each week the band would record one song—the culmination of drinking in the musical history of the city and local artist influence.

In an interview with Grohl, Chicago blues legend Buddy Guy summarized his musical experience by saying he came to the city “looking for a dime but found a quarter.” The Foo Fighters turned this quote into lyrics on the Midwest inspired, “Something From Nothing.” In fact, all of the tracks on Sonic Highways are impacted by interviews with musicians and industry professionals corresponding to the song’s regional impetus.

Artists that personify their home city on Sonic Highways lend a hand to collaborate on a number of tracks as well. Austin’s Gary Clark Jr., for example, comes through on the track “What Did I Do?/God As My Witness” with his expert southern guitar sound—a hard mission to accomplish on a record full of driving guitar hooks.

Sonic Highways’ ambitious concept doesn’t end up yielding a sound that’s anything new for the Foos, but the travelogue itself warrants a listen. Even if predictable in sound, the album serves as a rad ode to American music with voices from the past influencing the future, and Grohl’s monumental career bridging the two.

Haunted Graffiti. Throughout the album’s development, he seems to rehash a lot of ideas present in previous albums. The opener “Plastic Raincoats in the Pig Parade,” with its fuzzy vocals and upper-register synth progression, is standard fare for Pink. However, songs like “Four Shadows” showcase Pink’s artistic growth and movement away from his predictable psych rock elements to create an inspired album that meshes the old with the new.

At times the album seems much more muted than the Pink of his eponymous Haunted Graffiti. In the song “Lipstick,” Pink shows that he can tone down his signature elements to create a song that sounds borderline new wave with its synth solos and contemplative lyrics.

Though confusing at times, the mixing and matching of genres leads to one of the best songs not only of Pom Pom, but also of Pink’s career. “Put Your

Number in My Phone” tells the story of a man wanting to get to know a woman. It perfectly embraces Pink’s typical psychedelic and lo-fi sound in the bridge, but allows sentimentality worthy of The Smiths and equally aplomb guitar work to carry the chorus.

The rich reverb reinforces what could have been a simple acoustic song and transforms it into a deeply visceral experience.

“Mannequins are so afraid, don’t be afraid to show your stripes,” muses Pink on “Plastic Raincoats in the Pig Parade.” Taking his own advice, Pink shows his stripes on Pom Pom making it one of his best releases to date, in a large part due to the experimentation that he undertakes on this latest LP.

Voice’s Choices: “The Feast and The Famine,” “What Did I Do?/ God As My Witness” —CAROLINE KOCH

Voice’s Choices: “Put Your Number In My Phone” “Lipstick” —MICHAEL MOUCH

CONCERT CALENDAR FRIDAY 11/21 Danny Daze U Street, 10 p.m., $10

SATURDAY 11/22 Kenneth Wallum II Bohemian Caverns, 8 p.m., $20

SATURDAY 11/22 Blonde Redhead Howard Theater, 6 p.m., $20

FRIDAY 11/21 Allah-Las Rock & Roll Hotel, 10 p.m., $12

SATURDAY 11/22 Will Eastman U Street, 10 p.m., $10

TUESDAY 11/25 Bob Dylan DAR, 7 p.m., $75

Idiot Box:

November 20, 2014

Only one sex sells

A bi-weekly column about TV by Julia Lloyd-George

I mentioned becoming a new fan of The Good Wife to a guy friend recently, who responded that it didn’t sound like it was a show meant for his demographic. Though it could have easily been a joke, the comment was made in a serious tone. In the predictable words of the Queen when someone inevitably shows her a photo of Kim Kardashian’s shiny posterior, I was shocked.

While it made outward sense to me that a cisgendered, heterosexual male might be averse to something for its overtly female-related subject matter, I didn’t think that anything could be so easily dismissed for that reason. Add “girl,” “woman,” or “wife” to any title, though, and apparently you might have a marketing problem with a key masculine slice of the TV-watching population. Your show is relegated to becoming—gasp with me now—a woman’s show.

Any art form that is commodified is going to run into issues with its target demographic, especially if there’s a female character in the lead role or a woman’s name on the front cover (there’s a strategy behind transforming Jo Rowling into J.K., after all).

I was surprised to read an interview with young adult fiction mother hen S.E. Hinton (see a pattern?), wherein she suggests writing with a male audience in mind, because girls are more likely to buy books geared toward boys than vice versa.

Though young adult fiction might be a world away from network television, Hinton’s comment admits an unfortunate reality of creating art in a man’s world, where men’s stories are considered normative and women’s stories considered trivial.

It’s all about socially constructed preconceptions, man.

The irony, of course, is that The Good Wife bucks both against that trivialization and the thematic import of its own name. It even takes that concept of image control and turns it on its head, making the difference between public appearances and private lives a central focus.

The show’s eponymous wife, Alicia Florrick, presents a demure and likable face to the world, while quietly pursuing

her own agenda and steadily climbing the rungs of power.

She may stay in a marriage that’s lost all semblance of legitimacy, but she does it to serve her own political goals and fights to exert control over every element of that process.

The inherent contradictions of Florrick’s double act, of course, are what make the show so interesting to watch. The opening scene of the latest episode features Alicia’s campaign team cutting clips of interviews with her, choosing which ones should comprise a campaign video poised to go viral and thus aid her bid for State Attorney.

There’s even a clip with her jackass husband, Peter, churning out glowing sound bites about his wife on air while asking what exactly he’s supposed to say between takes.

Meanwhile, a bewildered Alicia sits back in the cutting room, watching it all and making ignored protests, as her campaign team takes the reigns on her own public presentation.

Though they might be the experts, she’s lost the control she so highly prizes. Her opinions are brushed aside and her image has fallen into hands not her own. It’s a situation in which most political candidates, both male and female, have likely found themselves. However, considering the history of who holds power in most situations, I’m going to take a wild guess and say that more women than men have found themselves in that position.

Fame often becomes the catalyst for that powerlessness, as a celebrity’s image becomes a commodity to be consumed and imitated. In the Internet age, however, even middle schoolers market themselves. There’s more power invested in image than ever before, and not just for women. The difference is that there’s a whole village controlling the levers behind a celebrity’s presentation. The issue is refusing to get hypnotized by the spectacle because, odds are, there’s a whole lot of smoke and mirrors involved. There’s power in that awareness, too.

Get in Julia’s pants at jfl49@ georgetown.edu

georgetownvoice.com

PAGE THIRTEEN

the georgetown voice |13

– Dylan Cutler —Dylan Cutler

voices

14 | the georgetown voice

NOVEMBER 20, 2014

Building your passion should come before building your resume ERIKA BULLOCK Leadership is a quality that almost everyone strives for and sees as an indicator of success.

Throughout my life, I believed being a quintessential leader—an outgoing individual who can rally crowds behind a common cause, who always knows where to go and what to do, and who has an immense sense of agency—was a character trait that only few possessed. I did not think of myself as a leader in high school. I was not on the board of any clubs. I did not have any student government positions. I didn’t apply to any positions outside of the classroom.

The most unsatisfying leadership experience I had came from the pursuit of a title without acting from inspiration first. In high school, I was the vice president of a philanthropic organization. This title was just

that—simply a designation that inspired no action and required very little in terms of actual responsibility.

For months, I struggled to decide whether to stay with the organization or leave it and pursue something more meaningful— something that maybe did not include a leadership title. But I wanted to stay on board for the recognition and felt worried that colleges would see my leaving as a sign that I wasn’t qualified to lead. In short, I was afraid of failure and of the way my leadership was perceived rather than enacted.

Instead, my actual leadership appeared through my devotion to and empathy of certain experiences. Leading involved learning from hardship and using it as context for helping others, as motivation to reach out and impact those around me. Difficulty fitting into the soccer team in high school, trouble transitioning into

a new social environment, and doing poorly on a test caused me to reach out to my teammates, mentor incoming students, and tutor kids in writing, respectively.

Usually, we color such difficult experiences in a negative light, but they can serve as springboards toward action—the essence of leadership. From these experiences, titles followed by the end of high school, I was a soccer captain, a mentorship intern, and a private tutor.

I realize that having a title can result in opportunities— the more you can represent your leadership in concrete terms on an application, the more likely you are to be rewarded for your efforts with a new position, and the cycle can continue.

A classic example of this phenomenon is the importance of leadership positions in college, job, and internship applications (or at least that’s what is perceived by those applying). I can name

more than a handful of peers from Georgetown and back home who invest themselves in activities, joining clubs, and taking internship positions just to put a title on their resumes—I am in no way exempt from this practice. And while I understand that a genuine interest can lie behind these activities, sometimes the title takes precedence.

What frustrates me about some of the approaches to leadership is that people participate in events to get the degree, to get the title, or to get the position, without considering the experience of getting there or if they care about what they are doing—their moment-to-moment actions—in the first place. Their leadership is a presentation rather than an action; the title is void of any substantial meaning.

People should care about the work that they do first and foremost because, in my experience, passionate ac-

tion will lead to the desired leadership titles in many situations. Yet I understand that in some cases, leadership titles open up opportunities for individuals who have a passion, but need to get the credentials first.

I know that my experience is unique, and that there are many positions that are substantiated by actions.

I have just found that the most meaningful experiences I have had, where I truly feel like a leader, have been those when I have acted from my personal convictions, rather than acting backward from title to action. Organize your life around what you enjoy, not the positions you hold—trust that passion drives achievement, and that leadership will follow.

ERIKA BULLOCK COL‘17 has retooled her resume twice in the past week

This college student hates clickbait and the reason why will shock you NOAH BUYON I’m an avowed news junkie.

I spend a perhaps unreasonable portion of my day perusing my favorite online haunt for stories of interest, bestowing clicks on those with sufficiently entrancing headlines.

Reddit has always been a sanctuary for me. Its curated pages are largely free of the kind of philistine content I’ve come to expect from news on Facebook and Twitter. But recently, a great blight has spread over my beloved corner of the Internet: clickbait.

For the uninitiated, clickbait is the evolutionary successor of

those seedy online banner ads that peddle miracle drugs for weight loss. It’s a metastasis of malignant tabloid sensationalism. More specifically, clickbait refers to articles, list-icles, and general content that’s marketed and presented in such a way that encourages would-be readers to click on them. Featuring extravagant headlines that coax users into bridging the so-called “curiosity gap,” as well as an incredibly diffuse social media presence, clickbait, as presented on such platforms at BuzzFeed, Upworthy, and The Huffington Post, has become ubiquitous.

Winter may be coming, but an article entitled “17 Dogs Who

clickbait. for some reason, we keep on biting.

ellen yaeger

Just Experienced Their First Snow” is already here.

So what? What’s so bad about trying to grab readers’ interest?

Nothing. Clickbait, truth be told, isn’t necessarily dangerous or distasteful. But when it masquerades itself as real journalism, a proverbial line is crossed.

Let’s consider some examples.

First, we have an article by Benny Johnson at BuzzFeed that the site had the unmitigated gall to call “news.” Headlined “The Story Of Egypt’s Revolution In Jurassic Park Gifs,” this questionable piece of reportage attempts to deconstruct the 2013 ouster of Egyptian president Mohamed Morsi by means of a series of short clips from the classic 1993 Steven Spielberg film.

Johnson’s efforts, alas, are not only intellectually demeaning to his audience but also nauseatingly disrespectful to the many Egyptians who have been killed, jailed, or otherwise adversely affected by that nation’s ongoing instability. Comparing Field Marshal Fattah el-Sisi’s coup d’état to a Tyrannosaurus Rex eating a man on a toilet is a gross oversimplification of the situation in Egypt in more ways that one, and constitutes a repugnant breach of the journalist’s informational responsibility to his or her readership.

Immediately below Johnson’s headline comes the following

disclaimer: “This post has been corrected to remove phrasing that was copied from Wikipedia.”

Need I say more?

Next, we have this instance of hard-hitting journalism: “13 Potatoes That Look Like Channing Tatum.” First of all: yes, this is a real article. It comes courtesy of one Lauren Yapalater, a staffer—a paid staffer—over at BuzzFeed. Let me go ahead and spoil something for you: none of the 13 spuds bears even a remote resemblance to Tatum. This, of course, shouldn’t really come as a surprise. If Jesus only deigns to appear on errant slices of toast once in a blue moon, who would believe that 13 fine specimens of Yukon Gold would play host to Tatum’s wholesome visage?

The answer to that is apparently 1,270,771 people—that’s the number of readers who were let down by this “TOP POST” (caps not mine). But, I digress.

This article is praiseworthy, I guess, in that it doesn’t pretend to be something it’s not; the author isn’t so much informing as she is entertaining. But troublingly, for an organization that “takes its responsibility to readers very seriously,” BuzzFeed allowed this article to published with the flimsiest of attribution. Of the seven Tatum-’tater mélanges that Yapalater assigned credit to, only the photos of Tatum were attributed, meaning the hard-working

potato photographers were left without recognition. It sounds trivial, but attribution is one of the most basic standards of today’s media, and BuzzFeed (along with its cohort) consistently fails to meet it.

Of course, the thing about clickbait is that it attracts views— the bread-and-butter of digital media outlets—like nothing else.

Last year, HuffPo averaged nearly 23 million unique monthly visitors, while The New York Times boasted just 16.6 million. But should an uptick in website traffic come at the cost of journalistic integrity? The market might say yes, but ethics say the opposite.

This isn’t to say that you shouldn’t enjoy clickbait—I hold myself to an across-theboard boycott of BuzzFeed and The Huffington Post, but that’s an extreme policy. Click away on lists of “Mean Girls” quotes and poorly-captioned cat pictures. I’d ask, though, that you follow Nancy Reagan’s advice when you happen across an instance of clickbait that has the temerity to claim it’s journalism. “Just say no!”

NOAH BUYON COL ‘17 Is 19 and functionally illiterate

voices

georgetownvoice.com

THE GEORGETOWN VOICe | 15

If you don’t know, don’t go: Put an end to the party crashing KENNETH LEE Growing up outside the U.S. in a protective parental bubble, I wasn’t really exposed to the Mean Girls-esque house rager.

I prefer quieter parties, where everybody relaxes in a cozy apartment, snuggles with each other, and has deep and meaningful conversation. In fact, I think everyone needs these moments once in a while.

In my circle, I call my friends and they come over.

Sometimes we make dinner together. We cut pieces of bread, cheese, and pecan pie to act a little bougie. As the

clock hand edges closer to midnight, we dim the lights, turn up the music, blow on a saxophone, and swing dance our stress away.

But then, there’s a loud knock on the door. Who could it be? Must be more friends, we think. You knew they were on the way so you open the door.

It’s a person who you’ve never met before. No, a group of people who you’ve never met before.

“Hey, how’s it going?”

They shake your hand to reinforce the five seconds of familiarity between us and them. All of them stream into the room. You don’t move

I HATE randos. I HATE EVERY KIND OF randos.

leila lebreton

CARRYING ON

for a while. Your brain need time to process the situation.

What just happened?

The uninvited guests engage in loud conversation.

We stare at them. They laugh and giggle. We are dumbfounded. They automatically file, almost in single file, to the kitchen table in search of refreshments. “There’s beer,” they say.

They inspect your fridge.

They eat your pizza. They piss in your toilet. They send Snapchat stories from your room to document how much fun they’re having.

And with the mighty power of the text message, they call for reinforcements. They are occupying your personal living space. They are party crashers.

“Oh yeah, I have this friend in there,” they say in response to your interrogation about who they know in your own room, their eyes squinting into the deep distance and their head bobbing sideways. Then they rudely push past you and melt into what has become a hot, sticky, unbearable crowd. You’ve lost control of your party.

In one of the more forgettable nights of my freshman year, I remember roaming the streets with some other

Religion inciting inner conflict

BY NICOLE STEINBERG

A rotating column by senior Voice staffers

I’ve always had a complicated relationship with religion.

I grew up celebrating Christmas, but quickly learned that my parents are devout atheists. I naturally adopted their beliefs even while attending a religiously affiliated university. Perhaps not unlike others, my relationship with religion is characterized by conflict, contradiction, and uncertainty. In fact, I wrote my first “Carrying On” article on my thoughts on religion and how it seemed to surround me at every new corner in my life. My current relationship with religion is no less complicated as I find myself more open to the idea of God. My home for the past six months has unquestionably influenced my thoughts on most things—politics, language, and family, as well as religion. The Russian Federation, in its natural and preferable state of isolation, holds diverging views on these topics when compared to other nations, especially when com-

pared to its former self, the Soviet Union. I speak of Russia not only because I am currently studying there, but, being my parents’ cultural home, its ideals and cultural practices have been a part of my life since birth.

I always associated Russia with the stereotype I am familiar with through my parents—the Soviet Union. I arrived in Russia six months ago with the thought that it was an intensely non-religious place, and I was comfortable with that. I expected to come across only museums or war monuments. I was familiar with a post-revolution that celebrated complicated literature and history, completely devoid of religion.

But after visiting golden-walled cathedral after cathedral—that were either closed, renovated, or transformed into museums during Soviet times—I learned that my initial impression was wildly incorrect.

Religion is an active part of culture in today’s Russia. Most

people, apparently in search of a house fiesta. We were streaming, single file, into the house of somebody none of us even knew. The music had stopped and the floor was soaked with beer. “Please get out,” the person none of us knew said. So we did. I could have justified that maybe we were just trying to have a little bit of fun on a weekend night. There’s no reason to be so wary of strangers—we’re just college kids, right?

But I couldn’t rationalize it. I felt ashamed and embarrassed. Maybe some party crashers do have fun and feel welcome, but I certainly did not and will not welcome any.

To this day, I still see no incentive to enter a party you are not invited to. Everyone who is actually rightfully a part of the party will give you hostile glares and shake their head at your parasitic inclinations— after all, you felt entitled to the last remaining drink in the room. So you huddle in a protective circle with the handful of friends you entered the room with so people stop interrogating you. It’s a high price to pay to relish in the ecstasy of sipping wheat-flavored carbonated water or lukewarm rubbing alcohol with artificial fruit flavors.

surprisingly, however, was not the number of gaudy orthodox cathedrals, but the number of devout Russians who frequented these cathedrals. Communism

I expected secularism “totranscend the fall of communism and remain a part of Russian life .

”

in the Soviet Union was synonymous with an anti-religious ideology, so, for some reason, I expected secularism to transcend the fall of communism and remain a part of Russian life irrespective of its current political state—my parents being the driving force in my expectations.

Many non-religious people still existed in Russia, and I knew this, but it was also hard to ignore the crowds of people kneeling on the wooden floors of churches,

whispering to themselves lines from the Bible. Their intense dedication frightened me. It seemed primitive and uncharacteristic of the Russia I knew. They represented a part of the culture that never found its way to me, and which, as a result, I believed didn’t exist. This wave of religious activity in Russia confused me and challenged my familiaritywith the country.

“You don’t believe in God?” asked my Russian host-mother with a crooked smile on her face. I was familiar with this question and had answered it countless times, usually with full conviction. I was always certain in my beliefs. This time, however, I had trouble answering with a definitive “no.”

“I don’t think so,” I said. I was troubled by the words that had just left my lips. I had become so comfortable with rejecting God that anything less seemed unacceptable to me.

She followed with a beautiful Russian anecdote about a baby leaving the womb, who

Party organizers pay the price, too. They are forced to assign doormen who brave the midnight temperatures to try to scare people away.

They lock up the remaining food and drink. They stop the music, flip the lights on, and make everybody leave. They stare at the alcohol-soaked carpet, the overflowing trash can, and their own frustration.

Party-crashers create a lose-lose situation. For me, parties are a way to treasure my time with friends from my classes and clubs. Our time with the people we love is fleeting, especially at a place like Georgetown, and college party-crashers simply ruin that objective with their selfish, superficial desire to just get drunk and not pay for it.

Before you decide to gather a bunch of friends and roam the streets in search of a house of dance music and disco lights, try to actually get an invitation from someone in that house, or get a mirror and feel the shame on your face.

Kenneth lee sfs ‘17 prefers not TO RAGE WITH STRANGERS

confused her mother with God. The anecdote was not aggressive and didactic. It didn’t try to support God’s existence, but rather emphasized not knowing.

It focused on the beauty of life and not religion.

I responded well to her defense of religion—I even liked it.

Recent political events and the pain that came with growing older and experiencing more made me want to believe in God. I felt myself opening up to the idea. I thought it was beautiful and comforting to believe in something more than pain.

I cannot say that my host mom or the discovery of a religious Russia were enough to make me renounce atheism or switch my religious views to believing or even to agnosticism. I think I’m still an atheist. What I recognize now that I had trouble with before was that my views are changing. They are evolving, even dwindling at times.

But this does not scare me.

I am accepting of the challenges that my beliefs will face in the future and am even looking forward to them. If we open ourselves up to alternatives, we become more understanding, capable, and ultimately, complex people. We become better.

GU student theater Presents

MASK AND BAUBLE The Donn B. Murphy One-Acts Festival WEdnesday-Friday, November 19-21 at 8 p.m.

Saturday, November 22 at 2 p.m. and 8 p.m.

POULTON HALL, STAGE III

Urinetown Thursday-Saturday, April 9-11 at 8 p.m.

Sunday, April 12 at 2 p.m.

Wednesday-Saturday, April 15-18 at 8 p.m.

POULTON HALL, STAGE III

Nomadic and MASK and BAUBLE Killer Joe Wednesday-Friday, March 25-27 at 8 p.m.

Saturday, March 28 at 2 p.m. and 8 p.m.

WALSH BUILDING, WALSH BLACK BOX THEATRE

NOMADIC THEATre Sick

BLACK THEATre ENSEMBLE That Face Thursday and Friday, February 12 and 13 at 8 p.m.

Saturday, February 14 at 2 p.m. and 8 p.m.

WALSH BUILDING, WALSH BLACK BOX THEATRE

Thursday-Saturday, January 15-17 at 8 p.m.

Sunday, January 18 at 2 p.m.

Wednesday-Saturday, January 21-24 at 8 p.m.

DAVIS PERFORMING ARTS CENTER, DEVINE STUDIO THEATRE