The Rice Thresher | Wednesday, September 23, 2020

VOLUME 105, ISSUE NO. 5 | STUDENT-RUN SINCE 1916 | RICETHRESHER.ORG | WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 23, 2020

BLACK AT RICE: EDEN DESTA EXTENDS AN INVITATION TOMÁS RUSSO THRESHER STAFF

A First Look into the Moody’s Fall 2020 Exhibition: States of Mind: Art and American Democracy MICHELLE MIAO THRESHER STAFF

What really is democracy? What does it mean to be a democracy and what does it entail? The Moody Center for the Arts’s new fall exhibition, “States of Mind: Art and American Democracy,” seeks to answer these questions, although perhaps not in the way you might imagine. Moody’s newest exhibit, organized by Associate Curator Ylinka Barotto, introduces new perspectives and angles from artists telling their own stories in their own ways, particularly focusing on national issues affecting Texas. Its goal is to drive new thoughts and deeper revelations in viewers. Art, after all, is not about giving direct answers, but coming to your own.

The main exhibition opens with the notable sight of a crumpling Supreme Court covered in homemade paint that resembles crashing waves, artwork produced by Rodney McMillian, an artist based in Los Angeles. The neoclassical exterior of the paint creates a sentiment of supposed perfection, but in through its collapsing state the artist also forces the viewer to come face-to-face with the flaws in our democracy.

In commanding viewers to think about the role that democracy plays in our lives, particularly with respect to elections, Aram Han Sifuentes creates an active space for viewers to engage in the voting process through his creation of a textile voting booth. Inside, viewers can find papers that mimic ballots that they are encouraged to fill out.

As viewers continue through the gallery, they will find the source of sound that can be heard upon first entering the space — a large television stand that displays rock ‘n’ roll legend Aretha Franklin singing “God Bless America.”

The immersive piece, designed by Paul Stephen Benjamin, uses Franklin’s powerful voice to symbolize new hope and life for democracy in the future despite its current flaws. “Including Aretha’s voice is... symbolic of the hope for the new president at the time and what change it could have brought,” said Barotto.

The exhibit space is divided into roughly three sections, and as visitors go through a set of doors to enter the next area, they are greeted by glittering black dresses designed by Teresa Margolles.

However, upon closer inspection, Moodygoers will realize that the garments are embroidered with far more than simple sequins. Margolles has carefully stitched into the dress patterns the glass shards that were left by the bullets and violence in areas close to the border and in her mother country of Mexico. What is at first merely a superficial beauty now holds tremendous weight as the glass reflects lost lives.

Chris Burden’s work featuring three enormous Los Angeles Police Department uniforms emphasizes police brutality, leaving the viewer with a foreboding sentiment. The uniforms are so large that they loom over visitors and appear to engulf them, wreaking a sense of helplessness and despair.

SEE MOODY PAGE 6

reopens after shutting down last semester BRIAN LIN ASST NEWS EDITOR

Rice Coffeehouse reopened its doors last Monday after shutting down in mid-March amid the pandemic, carrying out a soft reopening plan it has been shaping for months, according to Brendan Wong, the general manager of Coffeehouse.

According to Wong, Coffeehouse began preparing for a reopening ever since it was temporarily closed due to the pandemic. Although a summer reopening was considered, the opening date for the shop was revised as the pandemic unfolded.

“We actually had multiple plans to try and open during the summer as well, but it wasn’t so much about reopening right away,” Wong, a senior at Jones College, said. “We wanted to reopen it in the most optimal condition possible.”

In the first weeks of its reopening, Coffeehouse has been serving customers by having them order online and visiting a pick-up station within the store, according to Sophie Clayton, the training manager of Coffeehouse. Clayton said that the store has received a high volume of orders during its first days open, with 433 customers ordering its most popular drink, the Nutty Bee. “On our first day, I was a little bit overwhelmed by how many people were coming in to buy Coffeehouse drinks because they had missed it for so long,” Clayton, a senior at Martel College, said.

Lidia Ochoa, a senior at Duncan College, said she felt that the website was easy to navigate and she was able to pick up her drink quickly.

“I never once had to dodge crowds or people waiting for their drink, so it felt very safe,” Ochoa said. “I do miss the music and general vibe of Chaüs, but I am very grateful that I can go back to spending all my Tetra on caffeine.”

Although customers are visiting Coffeehouse to pick up their drinks, there are minimal interactions between the Keepers of Coffee, the employees of Coffeehouse and customers under this new system, according to Clayton.

Clayton said that only two KOCs work behind the bar and that a wall of plexiglass divides the pick-up station from the rest of the store.

SEE COFFEEHOUSE PAGE 4

DIQIAO WANG / THRESHER

Filled with elaborate dance routines, emotional poetry and comedy skits that elicit roars of laughter, Africayé never ceases to catch the eye of students across campus. At the helm of the organization behind this lively cultural event this year is Eden Desta, current president of the Rice African Student Association.

Desta, a Sid Richardson College senior who has been heavily involved in RASA throughout her time at Rice, said that the organization has been the community in which she has found her closest friends.

“The community is really unique, everyone is really welcoming and inviting,” Desta said. “If anyone comes to a RASA meeting, they’ll know that every person is celebrated and every culture is appreciated.

That’s something that really drew me in and keeps me going in the club.”

As president of the club this year, Desta said she has to balance achieving RASA’s mission statement with the realities of the pandemic.

“My goal is centered around the three themes that we aim to foster as an executive board: community, inclusivity and education,” Desta said. “With the pandemic, it was very difficult to see how we could maintain the same strong community/family aspect of RASA. However, we have a lot of things planned this year that will allow us to do so as well as promote inclusivity and education.”

Specific initiatives planned by Desta and the RASA executive board this year include a movie night honoring Chadwick Boseman, Instagram takeovers and a podcast consisting of interviews with members, alumni and professors. RASA’s annual event Taste of Africa, where the Rice community can learn about all the regions of Africa and connect with Houston foods and events, takes place on Sept. 26 this year over Zoom.

Beyond RASA, Desta has also found a community at Rice in DAWA PreHealth Society, a Rice organization in which she has held multiple leadership positions. DAWA means medicine in Swahili and is Rice’s Pre-Health Society for underrepresented minorities. After Rice, Desta plans to build on her major in kinesiology with a master’s in public health. Desta hopes to combine her passions for community health and social justice to help solve sociocultural health disparities.

“I want to work for underserved communities, specifically Black and Hispanic populations, and provide them access to community resources that affect their health,” Desta said.

This past summer, Desta interned at Legacy Community Health, a full-service community health center that provides no-cost or low-cost healthcare services, as a health advocate.

“My role was to ask patients if they had any needs related to food, housing, transportation and utilities and then [connect] them to community resources that would fulfill their need,” Desta said. “This experience confirmed what I want to focus on with my career, making sure underserved populations have the appropriate access to health resources. I strongly believe our health is holistic — all aspects of oppression [contribute] to the disparities present in the healthcare system.”

As an only child raised by two Ethiopian immigrant parents, Desta has always been proud of her African heritage.

During the COVID-19 quarantine, Desta said she learned how to SEE BLACK

AT RICE PAGE 5

THE RICE THRESHER

2 • WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 23, 2020

NEWS

Task force reveals new research as students push for statue removal SERENE LEE THRESHER STAFF

A group of Rice students have continued the summer protest to remove the Founder’s Memorial through daily sit-ins in front of the Founder’s Memorial since Aug. 31. Shifa Abdul Rahman, a junior at Lovett College, organized the sit-ins to advocate for the immediate removal of the statue.

Rahman announced his decision to protest daily by sitting at the Founder’s Memorial until its removal in a Twitter post. Since the first day of the sit-ins, which occur from 6-7 p.m. every day, several students have joined Rahman in his protests.

“I simply want the statue to come down from its pedestal and never be in its glorified position anymore,” Rahman said. “If the multitudes of statues coming down over this summer was possible, if [2,761] people equally expressed agreement about tearing down this statue, then this statue can come down as well.”

Rahman said that he believes the statue should be taken down because the effects of the statue’s existence are immediate for Black and Indigenous students, and other students of color. “[One of my friends] said that them walking by the statue is continuing to perpetuate imposter syndrome and honestly looking back at my time at Rice, I agree,” Rahman said. “The statue is more than just symbolic, it’s causing detrimental effects to Black students at Rice right now. An anti-racist step that Rice has to commit itself to is taking down the statue of its founder as it took down the racist mandate of its founding.”

The status is more than just symbolic, it’s causing detrimental effects to Black students at Rice Shifa Abdul Rahman LOVETT COLLEGE JUNIOR The petition organized over the summer to remove the statue has received 2,761 signatures at the time of publication. The petition, created by Gabrielle Falcon (Martel College ‘20), referenced the fact that several statues were being taken down at the time across the United States, including the Dick Dowling statue that previously existed in Hermann Park.

Falcon said that she and President David Leebron had a constructive conversation in June about the statue, where Leebron stated that it will take time for the decision to be made. Falcon said she and Leebron have not been in contact since.

“It’s frustrating because we have seen other universities around the country remove or announce the intent to remove racists’ names, statues, practices, etc.

FROM PAGE 1

COFFEEHOUSE

“We’re trying to keep all of that interaction to a complete minimum, so we have plexiglass on the other side of the pickup table,” Clayton said. “There’s zero kind of actual face to face interactions between KOCs and customers.”

According to Wong, the interactions between customers and the Coffeehouse has shifted online to platforms like Twitter and Instagram.

CHANNING WANG / THRESHER

Shifa Abdul Rahman has been leading sit-ins at the Founder’s Memorial since Aug. 31. Several students have joined Rahman in his protests.

within days of the Black Lives Matter movement,” Falcon said. “Yet, we need more time to discuss and do research.

I don’t see any evidence that could redeem [William Marsh Rice] within that research. The bar is on the ground, and it literally is not to own other human beings.”

Leebron said in an email to the Thresher that the ongoing work of the Task Force on Slavery, Segregation and Racial Injustice is an important facet in the discussion about the memorial’s future.

“The task force on Slavery, Segregation and Racial Injustice is as part of their work broadly exploring the built environment of the Rice campus.

The statue is part of that inquiry... In the meantime, [the task force] will continue to engage in conversation and listen to the wide range of views we are hearing from the Rice community,” said Leebron.

Kendall Vining, co-author of “Tangible Ways to Improve the Black Experience, as Demanded by Black Students: Inaction is Not an Option” along with Milkessa Gaga said that she and Gaga have also spoken to both Leebron and Provost Reginald DesRoches since this summer.

“The meeting was [Leebron and DesRoches] basically going item by item [on our list] and explaining why certain items would or wouldn’t work. It was disheartening,” Vining, a junior at Martel College, said. “However, [Leebron and DesRoches] did mention that they were open to having more conversations though, and I will emphasize that more than anything, because there’s no excuse for [Rice] to do nothing anymore.”

Vining also said that the list was an amalgamation of demands made by many Black students on campus and a social statement encouraging Rice

to start paying more attention to Black voices. Vining and Taylor Crain, a Lovett College senior, are currently working to form a task force that would keep record of and publicize all efforts of the Rice administration making the university more inclusive.

DesRoches said in an email that the list of demands was too extensive to be fully discussed in one meeting, and he will work to have more conversations with the students in the future.

“We did inform the students [that we] thought some items [on the list] required more discussion, that some would be controversial, and one or two might have legal implications,” DesRoches said.

“The administration is more than willing and ready to meet with [students] again whenever they are interested.”

Leebron said that the task force will continue to engage in conversations with the Rice community.

“We have taken a number of actions over the last several months in response to issues raised by the students who signed the list of demands, as well as by others,” Leebron said. “Among the most important of these is increasing our efforts to hire a diverse group of faculty this year, and to take a range of actions to be implemented over this year to make our campus more inclusive.”

The Task Force had their first weekly “Doc Talk” on Sept. 11, where task force co-chairs Alexander X. Byrd and Caleb McDaniel discussed historical documents that shed light on the university’s past and founder William Marsh Rice.

The conversation touched upon a mortgage deed record between Rice, James Love, and Charles Adams for Love’s sugar plantation, which indicated that they commoditized enslaved people

as collateral in the event of unpaid debts.

“Abolitionism thrived in 1830 Massachusetts,” McDaniel said. “[Rice], who is originally from Massachusetts, would’ve been aware of the movement.

People have choices.”

According to McDaniel, the deed stated that Rice and company had the right to take into possession 18 male slaves and 44 women and children in addition to other properties. Love was unable to pay his debts, but it is unclear whether Rice received possession of said slaves.

The task force is currently working to provide research towards its steering committee, featuring various Rice faculty, current students, and alumni, who will provide recommendations in the future for how Rice should proceed in becoming a more inclusive place.

Both Byrd and McDaniel have also found it difficult to offer their opinion about the removal of the Founder’s Memorial.

“We are not the whole task force,” McDaniel said. “It’s important that we let the steering committee deliberate what to do next, without speaking prematurely on their behalf.”

Falcon said that in order for the statue to be removed, the whole Rice community needs to be involved in putting pressure on the administration to make a definitive action plan for the statue’s future.

“When [Black students] make up less than 10 percent of the student body, it is easy to ignore us,” Falcon said. “It has to be a community effort, and while I had hoped it would be an easier decision for the university to make, so many wonderful initiatives at Rice have been student-led and I suppose this push towards progress will be no different.”

“Now everything is shifted online, we definitely see a lot of customers tweetingcustomers on tweeting about the Coffeehouse. Especially when we first opened,” Wong said. “And definitely it makes us feel like we’re some little celebrity, like some B-list or C-list celebrity.”

Wong said that one of the biggest challenges of managing Coffeehouse this semester is being unable to have spontaneous conversations with his staff.

According to Wong, who is currently living in Taiwan, communicating with his staff involves a slew of Zoom meetings.

“A big part of our functioning is that we usually bump into people in real life before the pandemic,” Wong said. “It’s just generally hard to make sure that a big team is working well together and also that we are communicating well.”

Korista Lewis, associate director of student-run businesses for the Rice Student Center, said that Coffeehouse had to submit a reopening plan to the Crisis Management Team for approval before they were allowed to reopen.

“They closed down last March thinking, as most of us did, that they

would be back in a few weeks once we had a better understanding of COVID-19,” Lewis said. “Now here we are almost seven months later and they have worked hard to create plans.”

According to Clayton, Coffeehouse has also recently begun offering food and catering items to its online menu.

“We did as much planning as we could and we tried to give ourselves and the whole system flexibility in terms of starting with a soft opening, slowly adding parts of our usual Coffeehouse system,” Clayton said.

NEWS

WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 23, 2020 • 3

Rice ranked No. 16 in 2021 U.S. News & World rankings, breaks tie with Cornell BONNIE ZHAO THRESHER STAFF

Breaking its four-year tie with Cornell University, Rice University’s ranking tied with Washington University of St. Louis at No. 16 in the newly released U.S. News & World Report’s 2021 Best National Universities list, one place up from No. 17 last year.

President David Leebron said that as a relatively small university located in Texas, the question is not why we are ranked in the top twenty by the U.S. News & World Report, but how we are able to maintain that status without an Ivy League bump or a medical school.

“Rice is the smallest wide-spectrum top-25 university in the country,” Leebron said. “We’re hurt by rankings because of our size. Whenever factors are adjusted for size, we tend to outperform.”

Out of the nine broad categories U.S. News assesses to calculate rankings, the category for undergraduate academic reputation isn’t adjusted for size. Out of Wall Street Journal’s 15 categories, reputation is the only category that isn’t adjusted for size. Compared to U.S. News, both Niche and WSJ’s methodologies are more student-oriented and consider student surveys as a major source of data.

John Cornwell and his staff from the institutional research team within the Office of Institutional Effectiveness wrote in an email that over the past 20 years, Rice has ranked as high as No. 12 and as

low as No. 19 while U.S. News repeatedly changed its methodology. Rice is among the group of 18 universities that have consistently ranked in the top 20 over the last 15 years.

According to the institutional research team, the most substantial change in the U.S. News methodology this year was the introduction of a new criterion focused on graduating students’ indebtedness.

This criterion uses data on the percentage of students graduating with federal loan debt and the average amount of that debt at graduation.

The percentage of Rice graduates in 2019 who borrowed loans is 25 percent, with an average total indebtedness of $24,292. Among the schools in the top 25, Rice is ranked No. 5 by U.S. News in graduate indebtedness.

“We’re helped by factors around financial aid,” Leebron said. “However, it’s only counted for 5 percent [of the total ranking], and they are based on the 2019 class, which only had one year of benefit from the Rice Investment.”

According to the institutional research team team, since the Rice Investment does not require loans as part of the financial aid packages, it should work to Rice’s benefit in future rankings.

Rice also went up in U.S. News rankings for alumni donation, average freshman retention rate, graduation and overall retention rate and student excellence.

In best undergraduate teaching, Rice is placed No. 6 in the nation.

INFOGRAPHIC BY ANNA CHUNG

Leebron said that even though the U.S. News ranking is important in getting the attention of the most talented students around the world, more students are assessing different rankings to see what the big picture looks like.

“When you look at Niche [website] that combines the rankings of universities and liberal arts colleges, Rice is ranked number seven in the country. And this is part of who we are — the best of both worlds,” Leebron said. “We were also

pleased with the Princeton Review rankings, within which we’re number one in quality of life and number three in best-run colleges. We think those things are all important because they match up against our philosophy of what this university is about.”

Rice is one of the only two universities this year, the other being Johns Hopkins University, to have improved on all of the three major national rankings — U.S. News, Wall Street Journal and Niche.

New Sid Rich on track to be ready for move-in by next semester TALHA ARIF ASST NEWS EDITOR

Construction of the new Sid Richardson College building is on schedule to be completed by the start of the spring semester and will be ready for occupancy when students return in the spring, according to Anzilla Gilmore, senior project manager for new Sid. Some distinguishing features of new Sid will be a larger, more spacious commons connecting directly to Seibel Servery, as well as more public space, a large terrace on the second floor and a quad space, Gilmore said. The new Sid building will also be the tallest building on campus, surpassing the older Sid building.

The most up-to-date renderings of the final building design for the new Sid building can be found on the Sid college website.

Madison Morris, a member of the New Sid Rich Committee since it began in 2017, said that if Sid students were not on the committee, new Sid would not be a tower.

“We had to push for [the tower] and gather some support from current and past Sidizens to really emphasize how important it was for the maintenance of Sid’s culture that the new building also be a tower,” Morris, a senior, said. “We also had a say in most design aspects ... ranging from the color of the bricks new Sid will be built of, to how big of windows we wanted in the rooms ... to furniture.”

Construction hours are Monday through Friday, from 7 a.m. to 5 p.m., according to Gilmore. The weekend is used as makeup days to keep the project on schedule when delays occur during the normal work week. Gilmore said there have not been any issues outside the normal coordination and inspection issues common to any construction project.

“There have been no measurable delays related to COVID-19,” Gilmore said. “The general contractor has made adjustments to the way its workers work on-site consistent with [Centers for Disease Control and Prevention] guidelines and Rice policies related to social distancing and wearing face masks.”

Colin Chan, who lives in the New Dorm side of Will Rice College adjacent to the construction, said the construction during the spring semester was a lot noisier than it has been this semester.

“You hear a bit of banging here and there but overall, not nearly as bad as it was last semester,”

Chan, a senior, said. “My roommate, who is a lighter sleeper, gets woken up occasionally. It can be a minor annoyance during the day as you are trying to watch lectures, but typically if I use headphones it isn’t too bad.”

Parking manager Mike Morgan said he expects the total South Colleges Lot parking capacity to be around 100 spots after new Sid is built. Morgan said the project permanently eliminated around 65 spaces.

“We are reviewing how parking space distribution will be post-construction,” Morgan said. “Once we know more, we will work with the South College parking representatives on the plan.”

Gilmore said old Sid will be used in the future as an undergraduate housing swing space, meaning Hanszen College students will live in old Sid during construction of the new wing of Hanszen during the fall of 2021 and spring of 2022.

Sid president Nia Prince said she believes the most notable difference of the new building compared to the old building is the amount of beds. Prince said the new building will have approximately 100 more beds than the old building, which means the total amount of beds will be roughly equal to the number of current Sidizens.

“I’m hoping that with this change the administration will allow us to have more students on campus to the point where we don’t have to do housing jack and move people off campus,” Prince, a senior, said.

Several rooms will be compliant with the federal Americans with Disabilities Act, which means Sid will be able to accommodate students with disabilities for the first time, according to a previous Thresher article.

Morris said the floor lobbies, which are important for developing Sid culture, will look drastically different as they will no longer be double height, have balconies or be as large. Morris also said that new Sid will be primarily doubles and singles and won’t have any suites, which was the only housing option in old Sid. “Since there are varying floor layouts with some floors being larger than others, the very strong floor culture that old Sid has will be affected and traditions such as floor wars will have to be modified,” Morris said. “I do not think these changes are negative; however … since this new layout of bigger floors and no suites might allow an opportunity for students to explore living on different floors and meet new people.”

Sid magister Michel Achard said he is excited to see how Sidizens adjust their culture and traditions to their new building.

“We will have a quad for the first time, and we are looking forward to seeing how it is used in the daily life of the college,” Achard said.

Prince said she is excited for the building to meet several needs that Sidizens have.

“From our college coordinator having her own office space separate from the mailroom, to a makerspace, to a much larger and updated kitchen, to even an outdoor sound system for us to do Radio Free Sid, I believe that this new building really meets the needs that Sid has right now,” Prince said.

APPLE LI / THRESHER

THE RICE THRESHER

4 • WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 23, 2020

OPINION STAFF EDITORIAL

Administration should respond to sit-ins

Rice administration has yet to publicly respond to the demonstrations to remove Willy’s statue that began in the academic quad three weeks ago. Shifa Rahman, the first student to begin protesting regularly and primary organizer of the sit-ins, says administration has not reached out to address the situation in a private fashion either. As more students join the “Down with Willy” cause, pressure is mounting for the administration to respond. Why have they stayed silent for so long?

When the movement to take down Willy’s statue started this summer, administration pointed to the incomplete work of the task force on Slavery, Segregation and Racial Injustice and delayed any concrete commitments to take down the statue.

Although academic studies of Rice’s history with slavery are valuable, conversations surrounding Willy’s statue cannot and should not be visited solely through an academic lens. While conducting investigative research on Rice’s legacy of racial injustice is incredibly important for an informed reckoning with our history, the voices of our present community should receive equal attention to those of the past.

Students are protesting now and thus deserve acknowledgement now, not in a year when the research is released. We understand the purpose of the task force’s research is to produce comprehensive recommendations, but by waiting for the end result, the administration fails to address the situation in real time. It would only make sense for the task force to comment on one of the most pressing issues of racial justice and reckoning on campus today, even without an official document.

Having these conversations now could also potentially foster much needed transparency regarding the task force’s recommendations. With so much weight being given to research and guidance from the task force, administration needs to be more transparent on how it intends to utilize these recommendations in decision making. We hope all the time and effort going into the task force will translate into concrete actions that not only address an academically oriented preservation of history, but also a community minded, compassionate response to what’s being played out before our eyes.

Read the full editorial at ricethresher.org.

read more online: Houston youth: Overcome barriers and take over the polls “Despite the structural barriers facing many young people and people of color, often in tandem, we are ready to show up to the polls and make an impact on our communities this November.”

CAROLYN DALY MCMURTRY COLLEGE SENIOR

MASON REECE HANSZEN COLLEGE JUNIOR

DAPHNE FLORES JONES COLLEGE SENIOR

Corrections

The article “Reckling Park to be on-campus polling location for 2020 election” should have stated that Maddy Scannell is a member of RYD, not president. In the infographic for “Rice among minority of peer institutions to hold in-person classes,” the University of Notre Dame is operating primarily hybrid/in-person, not primarily online.

Have an opinion? Submit your draft to thresher@rice.edu.

GUEST OPINION

Hands off Belarus: What we can do across the ocean September 11, 2020. We are standing on a sidewalk by a skyscraper near West Loop 610. Around 40 people came to this protest, all dressed in red and white colors. We are waving red and white flags. Songs in Belarusian, Russian and English are playing from the speakers.

Many cars passing by are honking and their drivers are waving to us. Along the freeway, there are boards and placards with signs: “Putin Keep Out of Belarus,” “Stop Violence In Belarus” and “Long Live Belarus.”

Many Americans do not even know that Belarus exists. That is why I want to share with the Rice community about what is going on on the frontline of Europe and, more to say, the modern democratic world. Belarus is landlocked between Russia, which approved its dictator for the next 16 years this summer, and democratic Ukraine, Poland and Lithuania.

After the falsified presidential election of Aug. 9, dictator Alexander Lukashenko is trying to hold control over the state despite the majority of the people being against him. The reactions of other countries clearly show who values human life and the nation’s right

to elect its leaders, and who follows only their own interests: while the U.S., Lithuania and most European countries supported the Belarusian people, Russian government is backing Lukashenko, who has been killing people since 1994.

This makes me ashamed to hold a passport that says “Russian Federation” on the cover. That’s why I felt I had no choice but to come to the Friday protest and express my opinion.

When people are killed and tortured and women are beaten up and detained from peaceful actions, nobody can stay ignorant, even if you live across the ocean. Belarusians from Houston, Boston and Washington, D.C. didn’t. They put aside their work and plans on Friday afternoon and stood for several hours under rain and sun along the freeway against Russian Consulate General.

The demands of Belarusians were formulated collectively and stated very clearly: First, we demand the government of Russia stops skulking behind the honorary title of the Big Brother and tells it like it is. The presidential elections in Belarus were rigged and Lukashenko retains the power illegally by force.

Second, stop backing up Lukashenko’s

regime politically and financially.

Third, Putin’s statement on constituting a “reserve” of security forces ready to deploy to Belarus is an intervention into Belarusian internal affairs and a direct threat to the sovereignty of independent Belarus. Fourth, both Belarusians and Russians are equally outraged by the blatant lies, propaganda and bias in Russian state-run media’s coverage of these events, Russia Today’s being the most egregious. Finally, respect the sovereignty of the Republic of Belarus.

Right now is a historical moment, not only for the country of Belarus but for the whole world and democratic values that we share. It deals directly with eliminating the bloody post-Soviet tyrants from the nowadays world. Many of the members of our Rice community are politically active in this important period preparing for the upcoming election, trying to mobilize others to think about the situation in the U.S. I encourage you to think more broadly about the situation in the democratic world, too.

Our mutual support for the people of Belarus is crucial, not only just because of human feelings and the necessity to help those suffering there right now, but

also because of our mission to build the global society into a violence-free and people-oriented environment.

That’s why I encourage you to reach out to your local government representatives, especially now when many students are spread out across the globe, and voice your support for the nation of Belarus. If you have Belarusian friends or acquaintances, let them know you’re by their side. If there is an event in your area, participate in it: everybody is welcome there. Let our voices be heard and contribute to the victory of humanity over oppression and dictatorship. Long live Belarus!

IVAN GAMOV MARTEL COLLEGE SOPHOMORE

STAFF Ivanka Perez* Editor-in-Chief Rishab Ramapriyan*Editor-in-Chief Amy Qin* Managing Editor

SPORTS Ben Baker-Katz Editor Daniel Schrager Asst. Editor

ONLINE Mateo D’Agaro Web Editor Audrey Yao Video Editor

NEWS Savannah Kuchar* Editor Rynd Morgan* Editor Talha Arif Asst. Editor Brian Lin Asst. Editor

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FEATURES Ella Feldman* Editor Kavya Sahni Asst. Editor

PHOTO Channing Wang Editor

DESIGN Tina Liu* Director Dalia Gulca A&E Designer Katherine Hui Sports Designer Anna Chung News Designer Yifei Zhang Illustrator Chloe Xu Illustrator

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BACKPAGE Simona Matovic* Editor & Designer

COPY Vi Burgess Editor Bhavya Gopinath Editor Morgan McMains Asst. Editor

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THE RICE THRESHER

WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 23, 2020 • 5

FEATURES FROM PAGE 1

BLACK AT RICE cook some traditional Ethiopian dishes with her mom. However, Desta’s pride hasn’t shielded her from the realities of being Black at Rice.

“As a Black student, it’s definitely difficult to go to a university that was not originally built for you. That knowledge in and of itself is very troubling to me,” Desta said. “Some of the things in place make it difficult for Black students to not feel isolated in the Rice community.”

Desta stressed that despite the solidarity and support from the majority of the Rice community for Black students, everyday microaggressions are the biggest culprit in alienating them.

“In general people are really supportive of initiatives that the Black students have, like supporting our [cultural] shows and stuff. But on a day-to-day aspect, when you’re walking past someone and they don’t acknowledge you, [it’s] the little things like that that build up over time,” Desta said.

Desta said one incident in particular left her shocked and appalled.

“A couple of my friends were walking around campus and got shouted out and had drinks thrown at them. [They were] called racial slurs,” Desta said. “Hearing about things like that makes it difficult as a Black student. I wasn’t even there, [but] I could feel the intensity of the situation.”

Yet Desta said she has hope for the Rice community, and believes that the best

Mental Health COVID-19 hasn’t only affected students’ physical health — ­ mental health has suffered too.

See more at ricethresher.org

thing the administration and students can do to improve the situation is to merely listen.

“The Black student list of demands has a lot of work put into by Black students to show examples of tangible ways we can improve as a community,” Desta said. “If all of our efforts are focused on completing those tasks and meeting those demands, I think that would be really really significant change. Even just meeting a few of them would be a significant change.”

Although Desta said Rice has room to grow on issues of diversity and inclusion, she expressed gratitude for the diversity she has discovered here.

“I grew up in Austin and went to a Catholic school that was very homogeneous and had higher income background students,” Desta said. “I was one of only four Black students in a school of like, 400.

It’s definitely been a change of pace to see a lot more people that I can relate to and have a space I can feel comfortable in.”

Rice’s diverse community has been a factor that Desta said has contributed to her growth from a starry-eyed freshman to the confident president of RASA. “I’ve been exposed to a lot of different aspects of life that I wasn’t expecting,” Desta said. “There has been a lot of personal growth that has gone into my Rice experience. My classes, my friends and my mentors on campus have definitely contributed.”

To build an environment at Rice in which every Black student feels welcome and appreciated, Desta said that non-Black Rice students should seek out opportunities

Remote Students From missing friends to enjoying home-cooked meals, students discuss being remote.

See more at ricethresher.org

Crosswords What do tiny waves and hot seats have in common? Find out from one of this week’s puzzles.

See more at ricethresher.org

PHOTO COURTESY EDEN DESTA

Desta, a Sid Richardson College senior who has been heavily involved in RASA throughout her time at Rice, said that the organization has been the community in which she has found her closest friends.

small and large to include Black students.

In return, Desta said, they will be included

by Rice’s Black community.

“Just acknowledging someone, giving someone a smile, can really make someone’s day,” Desta said. “One thing I’ve noticed

is that when I do hang out with a group of Black students ... people who are not Black feel they can’t be a part of that.

That’s definitely not the case. I think as a community we are really welcoming to all people.”

Digital love: Rice students navigate romance during the pandemic ILLUSTRATION BY ELLA FELDMAN

SUMIN YOON FOR THE THRESHER

When Karen Martinez Perez first met Daniel Ling in person after spending countless hours talking on FaceTime, she was relieved to find that the person she had been calling every night wasn’t a catfish. But Martinez Perez was mostly shocked, she said — she did not expect the familiar face on her phone to be 6 feet, 3 inches tall, towering over her 5 feet, 5 inches of height.

“It was really awkward because whenever you are on FaceTime it’s just a little screen, like it’s just your phone and that’s all you see,” Martinez Perez said. “I knew he was tall, but I didn’t mentally prepare myself for how tall he was.”

Although the pandemic and social distancing guidelines have shrunk the dating lives of many, Martinez Perez — a freshman at McMurtry College living on campus — is a lucky outlier. She met her tall companion, Baker College freshman Ling, through Instagram direct messages in early April. Their relationship has blossomed despite the challenges posed by the pandemic.

“We usually eat breakfast together or something like that,” Martinez Perez said. “It’s not like we can go to the movies … [but] we went to the park together [to walk] his dog.”

Martinez Perez said that a lack of physical interaction and natural body language are the two most challenging aspects of in-person dates. Due to social distancing guidelines and masks, Martinez Perez can’t hug Ling or read his facial expressions.

“I’m very much of a hugger, but obviously with COVID you can’t really be doing that as much anymore,” Martinez Perez said.

While Martinez Perez and Ling are not used to dating six feet apart, Thomas Ryu is — the Will Rice College junior is usually 1,200 miles apart from his girlfriend, who goes to school at Washington and Lee University, anyways.

Ryu turned his high school relationship into a long-distance relationship throughout his years at Rice. Although Ryu notes that social distancing guidelines made it more difficult for him to visit his girlfriend over the summer, he said not too much has changed.

“It’s kind of tough that I won’t really be able to visit her and she really won’t be able to visit me during the school year,” Ryu said.

“At this point, like I said, I’ve been doing this for two years now, doing long distance, so I’m pretty used to living like this.”

Ryu’s long-distance relationship has turned him into a virtual-date expert. To anyone who is seeking a new relationship, Ryu said he doesn’t see the pandemic as a major obstacle and recommends that people take advantage of virtual platforms provided over the Internet.

“We live in an age where we can still talk to people online and have really long conversations over the Internet … Before I started dating [my girlfriend], we would just talk for a really long period of time over Discord,” Ryu said. “When you see someone in your Zoom call, just shoot your shot.”

However, not all Rice students have been as successful finding romance in the age of COVID-19.

Yash Shahi, Lovett College freshman, is single and said he is not currently looking for

a relationship due to the difficulty of starting a romantic relationship without having inperson interactions and the potential health risks of meeting someone new.

“The logistics just don’t work out,” Shahi said. “Like, I’m not living on campus. I only see people on Zoom calls.”

Similar to most social events, dates and meet-ups in the pandemic are moving into virtual spaces. However, for students like Shahi, who spends most of the day on online classes, participating in virtual dates could be exhausting and may contribute to Zoom fatigue.

“The last thing I want to [be doing] is getting on some app, getting on some technological, electronic device, when I’m on Zoom classes all day for eight hours straight,” Shahi said.

In addition, for remote students who live with their parents, going on inperson dates may endanger their whole family. Shahi, who lives off campus with his family, said he is reluctant to look for potential partners out of fear that he will spread the infection to campus and to his family members at home.

This year, Rice Program Council is adjusting Screw-Yer-Roommate, their annual blind dating event, to account for students like Shahi who don’t want to risk meeting someone new in person. The event will have

both an in-person and a remote component, according to RPC’s social committee chairs Yasmin Givens and Amy Barnett.

In person, the event will look similar to past Screws with added precautions to comply with social distancing rules.

Participants will be told in advance where to meet their match to ensure that no more than 50 people gather in one place, and physical distancing and mask-wearing will be enforced. Remotely, students will participate in a speed dating event over Zoom, which will allow them to meet a number of fellow Rice students.

“We know that it’s harder than ever for students to find opportunities to meet each other, especially new students, so we wanted to provide a chance in the fall semester for students to experience a traditional Rice event and meet others students in a safe environment,” Givens, a Baker junior, said.

Dating apps such as Tinder and Bumble also seem perfectly equipped for students fearing such risks to their health, as they were built to connect people virtually. However, the apps don’t always meet expectations. That was the case for Saloni Cholia, a sophomore at Sid Richardson College who said she is “single and ready to mingle.”

“In the end, it was just like, small conversations that didn’t really lead to anywhere ... I never hung out with anyone I talked to on Tinder. It was just too impersonal,” Cholia said. “They just say all of these crappy pick up lines and I’m just not about that.”

Martinez Perez and Ryu echoed this sentiment, and said that Tinder is not an effective medium to look for long-term, serious relationships, as many people use it for short-term hookups and relationships.

Saloni said she is now focusing on herself instead of looking for a potential partner.

“This semester I’m going to focus on selfdevelopment,” Saloni said. “And then that way, if you do want to find your partner, you are the best version of yourself.”

Features editor Ella Feldman contributed to this report.

THE RICE THRESHER

6 • WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 23, 2020

ARTS&ENTERTAINMENT FROM PAGE 1

MOODY

With a similar theme of brutality, the work of Hank Willis Thomas encourages the contemplation of gun violence with a giant black flag filled with white stars that pool onto the floor. Each star represents a gunrelated death in the year 2016. Another piece invites visitors to confront gun violence quite literally with the creative work of video artist Lynn Hershman Leeson, “America’s Finest #2.” In this piece, Leeson repurposes an AK-47 assault rifle into a teaching moment

when the viewer is given a chance to look through the eyehole and shoot at someone in a moving portrait. Each “shot” presents viewers with a different image of gun-related incidents until they finally arrive at their own reflection in the crosshairs. Leeson’s work goes a long way to remind us of the deaths that many have become desensitized to.

Camilo Godoy, a Colombian artist based in New York City, contributes a piece titled “Everybody knows they are guilty” which consists of five white sheets of paper embellished with the signatures of the previous five U.S. presidents written in

PHOTO BY ROBERT HEETER

Godoy’s own blood. Godoy says he was inspired by a moment in his studio while studying photographs of President Franklin D. Roosevelt in the Oval Office signing the congressional declaration of war against Japan in 1941. By using his own blood, Godoy reminds spectators that every executive signature comes at the expense of human life. Godoy is not alone in his mission to expose the severe impacts of American political decisions on people, as his work is surrounded by many others that reveal the harsh and complicated realities of democracy.

At “States of Mind”, guests will find remnants of stories past and present, ideas involving surveillance, voting and civic duty, violence and xenophobia brazenly proclaimed at every moment, from every corner. While these pieces all communicate various burdens and consequences of America’s democracy, they also share a sense of hope for change and progress — and a hope that viewers are imparted with a new state of mind.

“States of Mind” will be on view at the Moody Center for the Arts Tuesday through Saturday from 10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. until Dec. 19, 2020.

READ MORE ONLINE REVIEW: NIKI shatters expectations with “Moonchild”

COURTESY 12TONE MUSIC

JULIA LI FOR THE THRESHER

REVIEW: The Flaming Lips dig deep with “American Head”

COLLEGES GET CREATIVE Bakerites channel anxieties into art in new exhibit

Hanszen quad fills with music, community in new concert series NICOLE LHUILLIER

COURTESY WARNER RECORDS

JACOB PELLEGRINO FOR THE THRESHER

THRESHER STAFF

JASMINE LIOU / THRESHER

EMILY MA FOR THE THRESHER

Any other year, Baker College’s presidential quad would be bustling with people gathering to eat, study and socialize. COVID-19 restrictions this semester have subdued some of that energy, but recently, students and faculty across Rice have been flocking there for an unexpected reason. For the next month, the presidential quad will be home to PANDEMIA, an outdoor art exhibit featuring students’ perspectives on the COVID-19 pandemic.

Baker Magister Luis Duno-Gottberg came up with the idea for the exhibit after reaching out to students and finding that many were struggling to deal with the mental strain of isolation.

“I started listening to how [students] were feeling, and how their state of mind and their emotional state was,” Duno-Gottberg said. “And as the summer progressed and the pandemic and the virus evolved ... I thought that not enough has been done regarding the emotional wellbeing of people.”

Masked musicians, small groups and livestreaming equipment, all outdoors — the inaugural concert of the Hanszen Family Heart Chamber Music Festival showed us what performance looks like in a pandemic. The concert, held last Friday, Sept. 18 in Hanszen College’s quad, was the first in a series planned to recur on the third Friday of each month this semester, according to festival organizer and horn player Shawn Zheng.

“It’s very flexible, but the constant aspect is this idea of a casual neighborhood concert,” Zheng said. “That’s how I would summarize these concerts: [events] to help students take a break from their studying, to chill with their friends in a socially distanced manner, enjoy some refreshments and listen to music played by their peers.”

Rice students take the mic with new podcasts

This story has been condensed for print. Read the full article online at ricethresher.org

This story has been condensed for print. Read the full story online at ricethresher.org.

ILLUSTRATION BY CHLOE XU

JULIA LI FOR THE THRESHER

ROBERT HEETER / THRESHER

While plenty of Rice students have turned to podcasts to break up the monotony of their routine, a handful of owls have traded headphones for microphones and started shows of their own. If, you’ve struggled to fill the silence of your days in quarantine, consider listening to these four podcasts created by your fellow Rice students. Read the full story online at ricethresher.org.

WEEKLY SCENES AND SCREENS QUEER PUNK BREAKOUT Houston punk historian David Ensminger’s “Queer Punk Breakout,” an indie documentary about queer spaces and personalities in punk culture, will be released by Goethe Pop Up Houston on Wednesday, Sept. 23 at 10 a.m. CST. o receive the video link upon release, register in advance at bit.ly/3hPY1dI

LET IT BLEED Join Insomnia Gallery for a celebration of body art at “Let It Bleed: An Online Tattoo Art Show” this Friday, Sept. 25. Starting at 7 p.m. CST, video preview of original works by local artists will premiere on YouTube.

At 8 p.m., pieces will appear on the gallery’s website for sale. Visit Insomnia Gallery’s YouTube channel Friday to participate in this virtual art show.

GULF COAST READING SERIES

HISPANIC HERITAGE TRIVIA

Lawndale Art Center will present an installment of the Gulf Coast Reading Series featuring poet Eduardo C. Corral this Friday, Sept. 25 at 6:30 p.m. This event is free and open to the public, however seating is limited and masks are required.

Celebrate Hispanic Heritage Month by joining Hispanic Association for Cultural Enrichment at Rice and Society Of Latinx Alumni of Rice for a virtual trivia about Latinx culture this Friday, Sept. 25 from 7:30 to 9 p.m. CST on Zoom. There will be trivia rounds for all ages and raffle prizes available throughout the night. RSVP for the event at bit.ly/2ZWESke

Mary E. Bawden Sculpture Garden 4912 Main Street

THE RICE THRESHER

WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 23, 2020 • 7

SPORTS FORMER RICE STAR RUNNER BECOMES ULTRAMARATHON CHAMPION CADAN HANSON FOR THE THRESHER

Think, for a moment, about how far 45 miles is. 15 times the distance around the outer loop. Almost the distance from Houston to Galveston. Not only did Rice alumna Nicole Mericle run 45 miles at the Grand Traverse Run Ultramarathon on Sept. 5, but she also won the entire female race in her first-ever ultramarathon race.

An ultramarathon is defined as any race longer than 26.2 miles, the traditional marathon distance. In order to train for the ultramarathon, Mericle said she amped up her weekly miles, running for four to five hours at a time and practicing in the mountains and altitude.

“Initially it was pretty far out of my comfort zone and something that I never thought I would do,” Mericle said.

Before this race, Mericle’s longest race had been 18 miles long, and the farthest she had ever run at one time was 30 miles.

“I’ve always preferred the shorter distances,” Mericle said. “I went into the race with the mindset of trying to experience the ultra distance and focus on my own race … not the perspective of winning or placing well.”

That attitude is relatively new to Mericle, who has been running competitively for most of her life. She began playing sports at an early age. She learned quickly, however, that her strength lay in her speed.

“When I played soccer … I realized that I was a good runner because I was always the fastest or one of the fastest on the team,” Mericle said.

Mericle quickly found success; she remembered fondly that at times she was the fastest on both the girls and boys teams. Before long, she was one of the premier runners in the state. After setting numerous school records in high school, Mericle continued her racing career when she joined the Rice women’s cross country and track and field teams.

As an Owl, Mericle excelled on the race course and the track. During her time at Rice, won multiple large meets, received All-Conference honors and even qualified for the National Championships in 2007.

She is the only female athlete from Rice to ever win an NCAA Regional Cross Country Championship twice in her career. Mericle also qualified for the 2008 Olympic trials in the 3000-meter steeplechase (a long race, with water pits and other obstacles such as wooden hurdles).

Mericle said that her favorite memory wearing the Rice Owls singlet came during

PHOTO COURTESY ANTHONY YEPEZ

Since graduating from Rice, former cross country star Nicole Mericle has transitioned into Spartan Racing. She has won multiple world championship obstacle course races, including the 2019 Spartan Race World Championships.

the 2007 cross country season. Her team traveled to the University of Notre Dame Invitational and, despite overwhelming odds, won the race.

“Nobody knew who Rice was,” Mericle said. “Nobody expected us to win the whole meet.”

After a troublesome injury to her labrum during college, Mericle began doing more trail running post graduation. The trails were a type of terrain that would not cause pain and allowed her to run longer distances in beautiful settings. This, combined with a new love of rock climbing, led her to obstacle course races.

These Spartan Races are races of distances anywhere from 2 miles to 20 miles with strength obstacles scattered throughout the race such as crawling under barbed wire, climbing walls, carrying heavy weights and even a spear throw. Mericle is no stranger to success in obstacle course racing, with numerous top finishes and victories in her racing career.

“I found a new way to do what I love: run and compete,” Mericle said of Spartan Races, adding that the races, with obstacles breaking up the running, were beneficial for her hip.

On the day of the Grand Traverse Run earlier this month, Mericle planned to start the race slower and controlled, as to prevent injuries or wearing out too quickly. Early in the race, Mericle was passed by two women.

“Normally this would have made me nervous in a race,” Mericle said. “But I tried to put the whole thing in perspective and know that eight hours of running was a long [time].”

Mericle took the lead after 12 miles, around the high point of the race at 13,000 feet of elevation. At the very start of the descent, she began to have hamstring tightness and sharp knee pain. This was particularly worrisome, considering she was only 16 miles into the race.

On that 5-mile descent, she slowed down to ease the pain until she arrived at the middle aid station. Aid stations are set up along the race route, where athletes have access to their drop bag containing nutrition, water and new running gear.

For the next 20 miles, Mericle was running blind, not knowing where her competition was in comparison to her.

As the miles rolled by, Mericle reached the last aid station at mile 39. She had run out of water three miles prior, and because of the unusual heat of the day, she ended up drinking one and a half liters more water than she expected to over the course of the race.

Another problem Mericle encountered was the true distance of the race. Though it was measured at 43.5 miles by the race organizers, Mericole said it was closer to 45.6 miles. This made the final stretch of the race even harder.

The last 7 miles proved to be the hardest part of the race for Mericle. Fueling became harder because of the heat and pain. With three miles left, there was a point in the race where Mericle began to worry about running the wrong way.

“I’m running, and I don’t see any markers or people around me and I start freaking out a little bit,” Mericle said.

“I start trying to flag down cars that are passing to see if someone could tell me where to go. There was a little tiny marking that would have been very easy to miss, because I was tired.”

The final stretch of the race was a steep uphill, and with her friend and dog cheering her on, Mericle crossed the finish line with a time of 8 hours 21 minutes and 56 seconds. Although Mericle was the first woman to cross the finish line, she had to wait 24 minutes to determine if she was the actual winner due to a staggered start. After the nerve-wracking wait, Mericle was crowned champion, winning the women’s division by 38 minutes and finishing fifth overall.

“I was really excited that I finished this lengthy distance that I thought I would never be able to do and excited that I did well in terms of placing,” Mericle said.

The Grand Traverse race was just the newest in a long list of accomplishments Mericle has racked up in Spartan Racing. After getting third at her first obstacle course race in 2016, Mericle has continued to display her dominance. She won the 2017 and 2018 Obstacle Course Racing World Championships, the Tough Mudder World Championships and the 2019 Spartan Race World Championships and Trifecta World Championships.

As COVID-19 continues to put sporting events and competitions on hold, Mericle still has a plan for the upcoming year.

She said that she wants to do more trail running— specifically sky races, a type of trail run with significant vertical gain.

Mericle said she enjoys these races, but they don’t distract her from Spartan and obstacle course racing. “[Obstacle races] will remain my focus and main passion,” she said. “But I think it’s more likely for trail races to come back more quickly than obstacle races.”

Going forward, Mericle is open to continue running ultramarathons.

“I’m definitely more open to it,” Mericle said. “I wouldn’t say it has taken the place of my passion for shorter races, but it was a really great experience and it has made me not fearful of that distance.”

New IM sports unveiled DERRICK KAGWANJA THRESHER STAFF

At Rice, weekends in fall are typically rife with uproarious cries from flag football players draped in their college’s colors.

Camaraderie, competition and championship hopes brew amongst the teams as each game marks a new memory for the students to share. Although this year is marked by the absence of traditional intramural sports due to COVID-19, the passion students harbor for sport is still ever-present.

The Gibbs Recreation and Wellness Center and the competitive sports leadership group spent the summer creating innovative ways to keep IM sports alive during the pandemic.

In addition to the online esports competitions that Rice IMs has hosted in the past, the administrators added a new set of games.

Competitive Sports Coordinator Cara Caspersen is excited to unveil these new sports to the students, and hopes that by providing safe ways to engage in sport.

“We worked really hard over the summer

to come up with creative ways for students to be active, competitive and connected through IMs this fall,” Caspersen said.

In place of traditional team sports, new skill-based competitions have been added to the IM menu. Now students will be able to test out their expertise in these sports by participating in the basketball 3-point contest, the soccer skills challenge, or in football punt, pass, kick.

“One of the ways we adapted was to take some of our most popular team sports and either highlight certain skills or change some of the rules so that there would be options for individual or small (but physically distanced group) group competition,” Caspersen said.

Students will have the chance to participate in axe-throwing and archery, competitions that they may have never encountered before, through Rice IMs. Caspersen said she is especially excited about these new additions.

“Axe throwing is a new and exciting addition this year,” Caspersen said. “Not many students come in with a strong axe

CHANNING WANG / THRESHER

Traditional Rice intramural sports, like powderpuff (above), have been canceled this year due to the pandemic. The Rec has replaced them with socially distanced activities such as a basketball 3-point contest, a soccer skills challenge and a football pass, punt and kick competition.

throwing background, so it shouldn’t be too intimidating for someone to come out and try.”

With regard to archery, she believes that individual competition will be a motivating factor that drives participation.

“Archery we offered last year as a tournament, and this year are trying as an individual sport,” Caspersen said. “There’s

a young Olympic hopeful on campus we are hoping will help us tell students how fun archery is and we can grow involvement that way.”

Despite COVID taking away classics such as flag football and powderpuff, Rice Competitive Sports has done their best to create a safe environment in which students can compete.

BACKPAGE

8 • WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 23, 2020

re Y Screw hold e s u o H

If you’re fully remote, you don’t have to miss out on the fun of posting a Screw-YerRoommate ad for your roommates! Here at the Backpage, we don’t think living at home should get in the way of your love life or the love life of anyone in your household — even if they’re married. This week, we’re proud to provide a space for Screw ads from students living in their childhood homes.

posted by Owen-Lee Childe:

This Screw, you can finally meet the date of your dreams. And my dreams. Because my roommate is the imaginary friend I came up with when I was in elementary school and feeling particularly lonely. We hadn’t spoken in years but really reconnected during quarantine, and you can connect with them too! You can take my imaginary friend home without worrying about breaking social distancing protocols, plus you don’t have to stress about having forgotten how to speak to strangers in the pandemic. Even if you have trouble reading people these days (masked facial expressions are tough), you’ll see right through my imaginary friend. But please make sure to send them back home to me, I’m still very lonely.

This could be you

This could be you

This could be you

This be d coul ou y

posted by Stacy’s Mom:

My daughter is the smartest, kindest, most ambitious freshman at Rice University. I tell people in the parents’ Facebook group all the time! I’m very excited to be writing her S-Y-R post, although I wish she would tell me what it stands for — you Rice kids with your abbreviations: O-Week, PAA, MBYM, EOLRRF, I just can’t keep up! Anyway, I’m sure Stacy would love to hop on Zoom to compare your Gen Chem grades to hers and maybe even discuss any issues I can bring up with admin. Like, why was campus ever wet in the first place — you kids don’t drink, right? And how can we cancel that awful Wiess underwear party once and for all?

Oh, and I’ll be recording your Zoom date to review it after.

posted by Terry R. :

posted by Stacy:

Are you a respectful young Rice student? Are you in search of a MILRZW (mom I’d like to respectfully Zoom with)? Look no further than my mother. But only look her in the eyes, no funny business. I told her I was missing out on a Rice thing, then she felt really bad and wanted to help out, so now we’re in this situation. I also promised her that she could post my ad without me approving what she writes, so please just ignore anything weird. Also, she is married to my father. It’s pretty clear to see that if you’re not the date for me, it might be a little wrong, but you can chat with my mom. Martellians need not apply — you know why.

Calling all those who like it ruff! If you’re into getting down and dirty, a playful option for Screw is my dog. Well, maybe playful is an overstatement. We’ve had him since I was a kid, so he’s slowed down quite a bit. But, unlike 99 percent of Screw dates, this one will definitely result in plenty of kisses with lots of tongue (only his tongue, please — if you kiss dogs on the mouth, read no further and brush your teeth). The pawsibilities are endless and your life could always use some more cocker spaniel. Furries need not apply.

Jonesians also need not apply, your

The Backpage is satire, written by Screwmona Matovic and designed by Simona Mating-call. For comments or questions, please email JamesJoyceLovesFarts@rice.edu

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