The Gadfly, Vol. XXXV, Issue 6

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photo by Johnathan Gooch photo by Johnathan Gooch

The Gadfly

02 The student newspaper of St. John’s College 60 College Avenue Annapolis, Maryland 21401 sjca.gadfly@gmail.com

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Founded in 1980, the Gadfly is the student newsmagazine distributed to over 600 students, faculty, and staff of the Annapolis campus.

Opinions expressed within are the sole responsibility of the author(s). The Gadfly reserves the right to accept, reject, and edit submissions in any way necessary to publish a professional, informative, and thought-provoking newsmagazine.

Staff Nathan Goldman • Editor-in-Chief Ian Tuttle • Editor-in-Chief Hayden Pendergrass • Layout Editor Sasha Welm • Illustrator Andrew Kriehn • Staff Robert Malka • Staff Sarah Meggison • Staff Contributors Sebastian Barajas Leslie Howard Jerry Januszewski Patricia Locke Tim McClennen

!"#$%&'&() ! Casey Morris, GI Some nearness now forgotten spends the night blowing coldly against the door’s armor turning scentless confused perennials hung with chains that the sedentary light of morning sets to groan. And the few lawns worth knowing seem mistaken without green as though the first rush for color had been a question of burning in older suns or how to stop the fracas ensuing when shades shift to let go of the burnt ones or gathered damp with fever by the curbs unsung without a fall, and only once it seemed that blood filled without moving when all light gilded the range of the birds.

Patricia Locke

R

Tutor

umor has it that you missed the “info session” about the Marchutz School of Art, because you were watching autumn leaves fall. Perhaps you were out on the edge of Rowe Blvd, in that glorious band of glowing gold, in between the turned trees and their leaves carpeting the lawn below. In fact, you were gold, just for that one afternoon. Well, that is what the Marchutz School is all about, so you are excused.

But if you haven’t even noticed that cluster of trees and their peculiar aura, your eyes need to be opened. The Marchutz School, in Aix-en-Provence, is a school of vision. One learns to see by seeing; one learns to write, draw, paint by painting.

The Marchutz School has both a six-week summer session and a semester/yearlong program for intense study of art through practice, both in nature and by examining great masterworks of art. It is especially amenable to people of all creative stripes, those interested in museum studies, art history, or French culture. If you might be interested in the 2014 summer session, it is time to think about this now.

Pathways scholarships may be available, and the deadline is December 13. You can talk to either Tutors Sarah Stickney or Patricia Locke, both of whom have “done” the Marchutz program. Neither of us had painting experience before attending the Marchutz School, and both came away more fully alive in the world. (I use the royal we; you may get confirmation from Ms. Stickney herself.)

What is it like? Imagine spending four days a week painting in the landscape outside Aix. The terrain includes vineyards, Santa Fe-like air clarity, a large nature preserve with plenty of hiking and the Mt. Sainte-Victoire. It’s Cézanne’s hometown, and his studio, his collège (aka middle school, where his pal was Zola), and his café are still there. You stand where he stood, you look at large reproductions of his work, you look and look again. How did he figure out what in this wide world to paint? Where is the edge, the frame on the seamless flow and endlessly changing world before you? How will you interpret this? And more practically, how will you mix your palette, handle your brush, set off with a backpack of equipment to find the perfect spot?

One day a week, there is rest from the challenges of painting, but the art seminar is about to begin. A hybrid of short readings, conversation about them, and integration of these ideas and questions with analysis of projected images of great art from many times and places. Why do you have the reaction you do? How has the artist set into motion the motif? By the end of the several hour conversation, broken by a lunch of baguettes and cheese, it is time to reconvene in town for an aperitif. All that French you learned in junior language will come in handy! But if not, the homestay families will whip your spoken French into serviceable skills for going to the market, cafés, and further abroad.

I could go on, and will entre nous. Check out the website, under the umbrella heading of IAU College, and a flock of You Tube videos (Don’t miss this one: http:// www.youtube.com/watch?v=QP8A-ygVu0k). Career Services has the fact sheet, pamphlets, and Pathways applications. No experience necessary! This is not a party school; it is a school of learning how to use your senses, especially your eyes. If they have been reduced to tools for reading, it is time to let them return to full glorious functioning. Wait until you see the purple shadows in the leaves in the plane trees on the Cours Mirabeau! !

The Gadfly

03

!"#$%&'(%)*+'%",%-"$, Jerry Januszewski

Counselor

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nce I was invited to the off-campus home of some male women, pay a woman for sex?” He said, “I don’t pay a woman Johnnies. As I approached the front door, I could see for sex. I pay a woman to go away after sex.” What a striking through an opening in the curtain of the large picture window. example of sex without intimacy.

The TV was on, and they were watching a porn film. I knocked Intimacy, I dare say, is the precious pearl we all desire from on the door and prepared myself for an awkward moment. our love relationships. The need for emotional intimacy is When they opened the door and brought me inside I was re- the substance behind the longing for love expressed in practilieved to see the TV was off. cally every romantic song or poem ever written. To be utterly While pornography is as attractive to men as ever, gone are known by another, and cherished for it, may be at the top of the days of taking social risks in public to obtain sexually ex- the list of things we desire beyond individual survival needs plicit material. The Internet has reduced the social and eco- such as water, food and safety. Long after sexual desire passes, nomic hindrances of procuring porn films to near zero. Ac- the need for intimacy persists. No one commits suicide over an cording to a study cited in the NY Daily News, 30 percent of absence of sex, but some do kill themselves over an absence of women and 70 percent of men admit to ever having viewed intimacy, which is loneliness. online porn. My informal inquiries indicate that for college Loneliness is abysmal, and yet intimacy is risky. Authentic students, that number is closer to 100 percent for both genders. emotional intimacy between two people involves an exchange A significant percentage of those students assert that viewing of vulnerabilities, including the vulnerability to rejection. And porn is a positive and healthy activity. rejection plucks the dreadful chords of abandonment and For many boys, porn was their introduction to sex educa- shame in most of us. This makes emotional nakedness far tion. Naturally curious about the mechanics of sex, boys find more perilous than mere bodily nakedness in sex. basic answers in porn. Porn also indoctrinates viewers with This is a conundrum we all face regarding intimacy: live an ethos about relationships, intimacy, and the self. Most men with loneliness or risk rejection. The ever-present sex drive view porn long before their first real sexual enis all too ready to step into that void to provide counter. By the time a man engages in sexual aca soothing connection. But to surrender to sex Sexual pleasure while still emotionally defended further isotivity with another person, he has likely received hundreds, if not thousands, of images into his unsustained by lates the self that hungers for real intimacy. It psyche of other human bodies having sex. meaningful inti- may feel less risky to rely on fantasy, or one may Even if watching online porn is now the norm, macy eventual- seek to detach the emotions from sex. But then we do well to ask if viewing porn is healthy for the sex act becomes little more than a pantoly drifts towards mime of human closeness: sex without intimathe sex lives of men and women. Do these films emptiness. provide essential knowledge that leads to satiscy, pleasure without authentic meaning. That fying sexual relationships? was how Clark Gable handled the dilemma.

We all agree viewing porn can be a powerSo what’s the problem with that? Are there ful experience. But being moved by something is not sufficient not simple pleasures that are perfectly fine without attachment proof of its goodness, as Aristotle cautions us in his Nicoma- to meaning, such as feeling the sun on one’s face? I would archean Ethics. How does one make a clear-eyed assessment of gue that all pleasures, even the sun on one’s face, are enhanced the overall effect of porn on a human being? by a connection to a greater significance and are diminished by The desire for sex is primal and mind-bending. Jokes are the lack of connection. This is all the more true for far more legion about how the sex drive can distort a person’s rational complex pleasures such as sex, which influences one’s concept powers. We chuckle in agreement when comedian Robin Wil- of self on many levels. liams says, “God gave man a brain and a penis—but not enough Sexual pleasure unsustained by meaningful intimacy evenblood to use them both at the same time.” Add the effects of tually drifts towards emptiness. The sex that once thrilled alcohol consumption, and the arête for sexual self-gover- becomes ordinary, the pleasure more thin, failing to gratify in nance can be almost nonexistent. I’ve known many who were quite the same way as before. Nobody wants this, so the expewounded by such situations. rience must then be artificially boosted to imitate depth and No one disputes that the human sex drive can overwhelm sustain excitement: more novel, more edgy, or more reliant on the rational mind as it cries out for satisfaction. But there is fantasy. another cry that may accompany the sex drive, one that is more In contrast, the textures of meaningful pleasure are abunsubstantial if not as boisterous. This is the cry for intimacy. dant, and become more accessible over time, not less accesWhat then is the relationship between physical sex and emo- sible. We don’t develop tolerance to meaningful pleasure; just tional intimacy? the opposite. We savor meaningful pleasure with deepening Clark Gable, one of the preeminent movie stars of the 20th sensitivity as time passes. century, was once caught with a prostitute. He was asked, Continued On Pg. 05 “Why would you, Clark Gable, who could have your choice of

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The Gadfly

04

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Sebastian Barajas

A’17

• Johnnie Student: a 19-year-old freshman at St. John’s, back home for Thanksgiving break.

• Uncle Callicles: Johnnie’s rarely-seen uncle, who used to be a personal trainer but now works a low-level management position at a company that has something to do with telemarketing.

• Other Guests

J: How strange you are, dear uncle! These points of yours are like different relishes slathered at random onto the same piece of bread, and then presented as though each must have followed logically from the last!

C: I do not understand.

J: You question my planning ability, and by extension you question whether I will be doomed to live with my parents Callicles: Tell me, young Johnnie, if you would: What will forever. But, my dear fellow, how could this possibly be the you do with yourself when you leave St. John’s? case? A man may find other living arrangements through any Johnnie: Oh, dear uncle! If I were to tell you all the things number of means, very few of which seem to require years I intend to do in my life, we would be here until next Thanks- upon years of planning. And furthermore, why should living giving! You must, therefore, either rephrase your question, or with one’s parents be such a torment? prepare for a long speech!

C: Surely, that is obvious. A young man forced to live with C: What I mean is, what use will you make of yourself? his parents is bound to become miserable. He is bound to beWhat line of work will you enter? come a prisoner, and never to grow into a true man.

J: I wish I could answer, but I fear that here, again, we are J: But this does seem strange! Could I be mistaken? Could confronted with the same problem! For, you see, given the ca- it truly be so horrible to live with one’s parents, as you say? pricious nature of life, it is unlikely that I will enter only one Come, shall we not investigate it together? line of work.

C: As long as the wine continues to flow.

C: Perhaps. But I am asking what your point J: Very well! Tell me, uncle, which is the will be in all this. What will you do to contribute more virtuous pursuit: love or money?

Tell me, young to the world? In other words, what will you do C: Love, of course.

Johnnie, if you for money? As a career?

J: Very well. Then the man who is loved but J: Most honored uncle! You have deceived has no money is more virtuous than the man would: What will me! Here you had me thinking you were asking for whom the reverse applies? you do with youronly one question, when in fact you had three!

C: Certainly. self when you C: It is the same question.

J: And we agree that virtue is a good, and leave St. John’s?

J: But surely not! You have just asked, firstly: should be pursued? what will I contribute to the world? Secondly C: We do. you asked: what will I do for money? And thirdly: what will I J: Tell me, then: where is one more likely to find love for do as a career? These, by my count, are three. Each is different, oneself—in the company of one’s parents, or in living apart and must be answered separately, if indeed any of them can be from them? answered.

C: In their company.

C: I do not understand the difference.

J: The choice between the two, then, is easy. For where else J: Consider these examples, then, for activity in one area will one find more love than in the company of one’s parents?— does not imply activity in the other two. For instance, might a love, which we both agreed to be more virtuous than money. man contribute to the world even if he lacks both a career and C: You have twisted my words, you young rascal. money? If he were, say, a celebrated vagrant who once saved a J: How so, dear uncle? child from a burning house?

C: You have made it seem as though living with one’s parC: This could be, I suppose. ents were preferable to living apart from them and holding a J: Similarly, might a man accumulate wealth without con- job. Tell me, how is one to become a man if he lives like a child tributing anything to the world, or having a career? Might and does not support himself? heirs and lottery winners be examples of this?

J: An excellent question! Do you mean to say that to live C: Certainly. with one’s parents is childish?

J: And what of certain cultists and terrorists? Might they C: That is exactly what I mean to say. have careers without either contributing anything to the J: And it is manly to live apart from them, and to pursue world or earning money? money?

C: I see your point. But are you trying to tell me that you C: There is nothing manlier, by Zeus. have no ambitions?

J: But we have already agreed that money is less virtuous J: As I have already said: quite the contrary. I have many! than love, and that parents offer more love than the alternaC: But are you not concerned about the bigger picture? tive. Therefore, if a man pursues money elsewhere and forAbout where it’s all leading? sakes his parents, then he is less virtuous than a child. For by J: Not in the least. our reasoning, the child would pursue the thing that turns out C: But you must have some master plan. Surely, you wouldn’t Continued On Pg. 05 want to live with your parents forever?

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The Gadfly Continued From

05 Pg. 4

to be the more virtuous. women, and children, spend our days as C: Only because he does not know bet- pawns of gods, leaders, laws, drives, and ter. urges. Yet it is you who think yourself J: But uncle! How could one ever learn free, simply because you have adopted a better than to pursue virtue? perverted view of virtue, whereas I have C: I’ll tell you. Life has taught me that not. And it is through this perverted view fending for oneself is the highest order. that you have actually become further When you are a child, your parents may enslaved. Tell me, dear uncle: is it not take anything from you at any moment, a torment to live such a constricted life, and without provocation. The only way and yet to compel yourself, day after day, to live freely is to become self-sufficient, to pretend that yours is a fundamentally so no one can take away your possessions freer and superior kind of life? or order you about. You are truly free in a C: What rubbish! You are a rapscallion! way that you can never be while you live A spoiled young hooligan! like an infant with your parents.

J: Furthermore, uncle, I fear that you J: Humor me, dear uncle: do you live are not truly interested in these quesapart from your parents? tions: a curiosity, since you introduced C: I should hope so. them. You tossed them idly at me, indifJ: Then you are a man? ferent to the fact that they dealt with the C: Certainly I am. most fundamental and intimate aspects of J: And by extension, as you said just existence. Because I have not been able now, you are free? to answer them as flippantly as you asked C: Yes. them, you are agitated, as though I were J: Then you may do as you please, and being deliberately unreasonable. I must no one will take your posconclude that you do not sessions from you? care about truth at all.

We call it ‘small C: That’s right.

Indeed, it is incredible J: You may play music as talk,’ when in fact to me that your behavior is loudly as you like? Purchase socially acceptable. These these are the any bauble that catches largest questions profound questions: “ your fancy? Drink as much What’s your plan? What in existence. wine as you please? Sleep do you want to do? What with any woman? Rise at are you going to be?” have any hour? Eat what you become standard filler to like? Nap whenever the mood strikes? be used whenever one is too unimaginaC: By Zeus, no! I would be fired for that tive to think of any other way to begin a sort of behavior. conversation. We call it “small talk,” when J: But uncle, are you telling me that in fact these are the largest questions in your job restricts your activities? existence. Contrast them with the kinds C: Certainly it does. of topics that are mor frivolous, yet inJ: Then you are not truly free, are you? admissible in polite conversation: the C: How ridiculous you are. No one is listener’s attitude towards analingus, say. truly free. Yet I am proud to say that I am One of my classmates recently asked me still freer than a child, for I may do what if I would rather perform or receive it, yet I like with the time that is left after work. I was not offended—partly because it was That is, as long as we are not made to a short question and did not call upon me work after hours. to defend my entire existence, as you have J: What a bother! But your weekends done. But more importantly, I sensed that, are still free? unlike you, he was interested in my anC: Yes...usually. Sometimes we must swer. He too sought truth. come in on Saturday, and Sunday too.

It seems, dear uncle, that you are out in J: I see. Dear uncle, I believe I have for- the cold, with neither virtue nor truth to mulated a very clear picture of the way of guide you. Even now, curiosity tempts me things. Shall I describe it to you? to reciprocate, to ask in turn what your C: Be my guest. plan is. But I fear that such a dismal subJ: I think that you are no freer than I, or ject would anger the gods on this day of than any child. For you and I, like all men, thanks. !

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Continued From

Pg. 3

Consider the excitement of true love and devotion, where the mere touch of the beloved’s hand may elicit long-lasting, passionate delight. The term “pleasurable” is inadequate to describe the contentment of sex nourished by unfettered emotional intimacy. This is a full and highly personalized experience.

Which brings us back to the use of pornography. Porn’s essential feature is to provide a vivid experience of depersonalized sex utterly bereft of intimacy, the thing we desire more dearly than sex. In viewing porn, nothing is demanded that would actually create intimate meaning between living persons.

Loneliness is temporarily soothed, rejection is avoided, but at a cost.

The viewer must see the sex actors, from the outset, as mere objects among many other objects that are used until their usefulness is used up. By emotionally attaching his sexual self to objects, the viewer objectifies not only the porn actors, but himself as well, so that a nonthreatening, fantasy version of intimacy can be held in the mind. And when the porn image that excites becomes banal, as it must, the viewer is progressively desensitized to sexual pleasure. Porn seems to yield benefits in the short term, but it is a losing strategy in the long term for pleasure- loving people.

Being insulated from our deepest emotions is living small, which increases the risk of anxiety, depression, and old-fashioned unhappiness.

Porn use is hostile to the examined life. It leaves one dependent on untruth, the crutch of fantasy, and, over time, more lonely and less capable of emotional connection with a true intimate. As an overall contributor to life satisfaction, porn is a thief disguised as a philanthropist.

The path that values emotional honesty and intimacy is admittedly risky and requires persistent courage, but the rewards have to do with true love. Love is sublime, based on the truth, and very likely the best thing out there. !

06

The Gadfly

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Tim McClennen

W

A’14

e need to talk about government debt. latter, and did in fact make a profFirst, let’s separate “deficit” from “debt.” Deficit cre- it). Increasing tax revenue is also ates debt. The deficit is the amount by which government painful, or so people keep saying. spending exceeds revenue (ie. taxes). If the deficit is positive, This is where the similarity the debt is increasing. If the budget is balanced, the debt re- ends. mains constant. If there is a surplus (a negative deficit), some Now let us examine borrowing. When a private individual of the debt gets paid off. Since 1950, only Bill Clinton’s admin- (or family) borrows money, the lender sets the interest rate. istration saw a balanced budget (in 1997). In 1998 and 1999, he The lender also decides whether to give or not give the loan. managed a surplus.

A person can come begging for a loan and get turned down.

A lot of people like to compare government finance to pri- In stark contrast, the government sets the interest rate that it vate (or family) finance. The comparison is wrong. I will con- offers on the bonds that it sells. As for getting turned down, sider what government debt is, then the ways that it is unlike there happens to be a large appetite for government bonds in private debt, then what we should do about it. the market. If this appetite wanes, the government can offer Government debt is composed of bonds. Bonds are pur- higher interest rates, and the appetite will increase. This guarchased for a face value, almost invariably $1,000. At their antees that the market appetite for bonds is indefinite, if not “maturation date” the bond’s issuer returns the exact face infinite. Of course, the better our credit rating, the greater the value to the holder (not necessarily the purchaser, who can market appetite for bonds, despite the lower interest rate. sell the bond on the secondary market). In between the purOur government, unlike a family, also has the power to print chase date and the maturation date, the issuer pays interest money. This is a power that the government uses sparingly, bepayments to the holder. cause overuse will cause runaway inflation. Still, it is an availWho holds these bonds?—that is, who owns the debt? Who able power. are we paying back, and can they “call it in”? To begin with, the Finally, we come to credit limit. A family is bound by the largest share of the federal debt is held by U.S. citizens or U.S. credit limit that a lender imposes on them. If they take out a institutions (such as corporations): 31.7 percent. The second- credit card, that company imposes the credit limit. Of course, largest share, 16.0 percent, is owned by the Social Security if they max it out, they can apply for a credit card from a differTrust Fund. The Federal Reserve owns 12 percent, and retire- ent company, and use that to pay off the first. If the family keeps ment funds for various types of government employees (the improving their credit score (by being timely on payments and civil service and the military have separate retirement funds) having any income at all), their second card will have a higher hold 6.9 percent together. China owns 8.4 percent, Japan 6.5 credit limit than the first. This cycle can continue for quite percent and 4 percent total is owned by OPEC members, Bra- some time, until they get refused for the next new card that zil, and the U.K. Other foreign governments own they need. In contrast, the government imposes a total of 14.6 percent. its debt limit on itself. That is, Congress authoWe have nothAltogether, 33.5 percent of the federal debt is ing to fear from rizes the sale of a certain number of bonds. If owned by non-U.S. entities. The rest of owned that limit is reached and people still want to buy the owners of by us. Either one part of the government owes bonds, these buyers go away disappointed. As money to a different part, or the government long as there are buyers lined up, and Congress the national owes money to the citizens. So, who is going to authorizes the sale of the bonds, then there is debt. destroy America by “calling in” our debt? Given no limit to how many can be sold. the above data, no foreign government has the Thus, any comparison between government power to harm our nation by calling in their share. This leaves finance and private (or family) finance is absurd. Families candomestic powers. Neither the Federal Reserve nor the Social not print money, or set the interest rate that they pay on loans, Security Trust Fund are going to act to destroy this country. or arbitrarily set their own credit limit.

That leaves U.S. citizens and corporations. No single one of So, this leads us to what ought to be done. One might imagthem has enough of the debt to do anything. If they all acted ine that I will propose a plan to reduce the debt, but I am not together they could do it, but that is absurd for two reasons: offering that. The idea that we must reduce the debt implies First, if all of the citizens and all of the corporations in the that the debt will cause us problems. The first imagined probUnited States wanted to destroy the United States, our nation lem is that our debt can be used to control us, which I have would have bigger problems than the debt. Second, how do refuted above. The second imagined problem is that there will you get lots of small-time investors to act in concert? We have come a point at which we will be unable to borrow any more, nothing to fear from the owners of the national debt. and thus not be able to pay off the old loans with new (as we Now let us compare national and private finances. have been doing), so we should pay down the debt before that First, revenue. Private revenue is salary, or return on pri- happens. As I have shown above, that point will never come vate investment—and both are difficult to increase: One must unless we impose it upon ourselves. invest more money (which is perhaps unavailable), ask for a So, what ought to be done about the debt? Let it get as high raise, or find additional employment (which may also be un- as is necessary to accomplish the tasks of the government, inavailable, and can be exhausting or stressful). Thus, revenue cluding lifting the economy out of recession. Personally, I find increases are painful. On the national side, revenue is tax reve- low debt aesthetically pleasing, and I would appreciate if it nue, unless the government invests in financial instruments or were to be reduced, but there is no advantage to such reducin industry (our government has done the former, but not the tion other than aesthetic pleasure. None at all. !

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07

The Gadfly

Ian Tuttle

I

A’14

’m not much one for scaremongering, but you wonder when incidents become trends—and when trends become warning signs.

Here’s the most recent incident, described by Mark Steyn in a troubling column at National Review Online:

First they tased him, but that didn’t work. So they fired a shotgun, hitting him in the stomach with a bean-bag round.

Wrana was struck with such force that he bled to death internally, according to the Cook County medical examiner.

Police claim that Wrana was endangering the staff, but an executive with the facility says that staff were cleared from the room when police arrived and not allowed to reenter, even after asking to intervene. Instead, five to seven police officers entered with riot shields and bean bag shotguns.

There is unnecessary force, and there is recklessness, but this is beyond either. It is yet another example of the danger caused when military tactics become standard operating procedure for agencies that are not military.

It is a trend that Steyn calls the “paramilitarization” of American life. And it’s not just the Los Angeles Police Department that has its own SWAT team. So does the Department of Education, which burst into Kenneth Wright’s California home at 6am—to investigate his estranged wife’s use of student aid funds. (I hope you’re paid up on your loans.) Earlier this year IRS agents were training with AR-15 semi-automatic rifles—this after that agency was caught systematically discriminating against right-wing political groups. During last month’s government shutdown, armed National Park Service rangers surrounded “There is a despotic trend a Yellowstone Park inn to prevent a group in American government. of elderly Australian and Japanese tourists Perhaps Deming, N.M., should consider Too many of our rulers rewriting “the book.” from venturing out to Old Faithful—illegal Steyn also considers Miriam Carey, the “recreating,” according to the NPS. and their enforcers reunarmed woman gunned down near the Steyn sums it up this way: “There is,” flexively see the citizenry White House last month. There were no he writes, “a despotic trend in American primarily as a threat.” indications that Carey, who led police on a government. Too many of our rulers and —Mark Steyn chase along Pennsylvania Avenue, presenttheir enforcers reflexively see the citied a deadly threat to officers—yet her car, zenry primarily as a threat.” But can we be and the young mother, ended up bullet-riddled. surprised? As government becomes ever more centralized, as These are examples that might bolster the thesis of journal- power is vested in an ever smaller proportion of the populace, ist Radley Balko’s recent book, Rise of the Warrior Cop: The and as those who hold power become ever further removed Militarization of America’s Police Forces. Certain aggressive from the people who elected them (if those with the titles tactics, combined with ready access to military-grade weap- were elected at all), law becomes less an incorruptible founonry, have created cops that, in many circumstances, are less dation for civic order and more an instrument of power—as cops than soldiers. do those who enforce it. When those in power forget that, in That was the case in Chicago this summer. Park Forest po- America, it’s We the People who rule, law, and law enforcelice fatally tased and shot with bean bag rounds John Wrana, ment, begin to be wielded against the unwashed masses—the a 95-year-old World War II veteran living in an Illinois senior ruled. As in Chicago, Deming, and D.C., those waving the living facility who was refusing to take his medicine. Per the weapons sometimes no longer deign to distinguish between Chicago Tribune: fellow citizen and foe.

The United States is not a police state, of course. But The old man, described by a family member as “wobbly” we should start to expect more incidents like the above: on his feet, had refused medical attention. The paramedics They are the predictable result of statism super-sized and were called. They brought in the Park Forest police. weaponized.!

David Eckert was pulled over by police in Deming, N.M., for failing to come to a complete halt at a stop sign in the Walmart parking lot. He was asked to step out of the vehicle, and waited on the sidewalk. Officers decided that they didn’t like the tight clench of his buttocks, a subject on which New Mexico’s constabulary is apparently expert, and determined that it was because he had illegal drugs secreted therein. So they arrested him, and took him to Gila Regional Medical Center in neighboring Hidalgo County, where Mr. Eckert was forced to undergo two abdominal Xrays, two rectal probes, three enemas, and defecate thrice in front of medical staff and representatives of two lawenforcement agencies, before being sedated and subjected to a colonoscopy — all procedures performed against his will and without a valid warrant. Alas, Mr. Eckert’s body proved to be a drug-free zone, and so, after twelve hours of detention, he was released….Deming police chief Brandon Gigante says his officers did everything “by the book.”

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08

The Gadfly

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!"#$%&'() Why Was My Broccoli Gritty? *+*',Leslie Howard

Tuesday 11/19 Old-time Music with Mr. Stickney Music Library 12:30 PM Kunai Netball 4 PM Wednesday 11/20 Basketball 7 PM St. John’s Chorus, Great Hall 7 PM Friday 11/22 Kunai Netball 4 PM Lecture: “Dwelling in the Land of the Confessions”

by Mr. Michael Brogan FSK Auditorium 8 PM Saturday 11/23 Basketball Game 1 — 1 PM Game 2 — 3 PM Sunday 11/24 Basketball Game 1 — 1 PM Game 2 — 3 PM If you would like to see your event on the weekly schedule, please email sjca.gadfly@ gmail.com.

I

A’15

did it. I wore sweatpants to the Dining Hall. And the scary part is that I’m only moderately ashamed about it. As this semester comes to a close, and winter break is on the horizon, I can feel myself slowly (or not so slowly) trending into the zombie-like state of being a junior. You see, the thing about zombies is that they’re in that in-between condition of being and non-being, dead and alive: they’re the undead.

And that’s basically what it’s like to be a junior. All the things that used to invigorate you, like going to exciting new classes and learning exciting new things and having exciting new conversations about said things, suddenly cancel each other out in the junior year. But you’re not allowed to curl up and die. So you keep on going, eyes glazed over.

I recently looked “zombie” up in the OED, and the second definition given is exactly what I’m referring to: “A dull, apathetic, or slow-witted person.” As you can see, this is in stark contrast to—and therefore ought not to be confused with—senioritis, which is merely a disinterest in current happenings on account of anticipation of the future. Someone with junioritis has no such hope of future life. It is an undead, dark, sweatpants-wearing time . . . . . . which helps me understand why the dining hall always becomes nigh unbearable right before Thanksgiving and Christmas breaks. You really have to see it from its perspective: every single day, for every single meal, it provides the Polity with an abundance of food for omnivores and herbivores alike. The beginning of the school year, as for all of Someone with juus, is an exciting time, and everyone is invigorated nioritis has no such from the summer for a fresh new start. All things behope of future life. come mundane, however, and right around week ten of the semester, everything falls to shit. Papers start It is an undead, being assigned, freshmen are homesick, sophomores dark, sweatpantsare bored, juniors are dying, and seniors are antsy. wearing time . . .

And the Dining Hall gets junioritis of the worst kind.

Unlike the students, the Dining Hall doesn’t see a dawning St. John’s-free future. It is destined to perpetual servitude to the polity of the next generation. It becomes dark, it becomes hopeless, it becomes undead.

But that still doesn’t explain why my broccoli was gritty. I have been blown away by the improvements that the dining hall has made since the beginning of last year.

The vegetables, although occasionally undercooked (you can’t have everything), are no longer served in pans full of oil. There was a delicious chicken dish just this past week for some occasion which I have yet to identify. But on your any-ol’-day, it honestly is a struggle to find anything good enough to eat. Someone told me just today that the only reason he got a certain dish from the hot line was on the off-chance that he would get more than two pieces of shrimp in the mix, which is really just sad. I was excited to see a pan of only broccoli that hadn’t been cooked with random shit like peppers, and it really was perfectly cooked too, but I soon realized that it must’ve been cooked in sand water. Thankfully, they had all the ingredients for a root beer float.

I think we should all keep the dining hall in our thoughts and prayers as it goes through this dark, pre-holiday depression. I’m sure I haven’t been the nicest to people since incurring junioritis, but for a department that affects so many of us directly, I think this is a crucial time in the life of the dining hall for us to do our best not to upset it. Perhaps we could suggest it make an appointment with Jerry.

But in the meantime, dining hall, we juniors would appreciate it if you served more brains. !

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