2011-2-8

THE TUFTS DAILY

Snowy 34/9

TUFTSDAILY.COM

TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 8, 2011

VOLUME LXI, NUMBER 8

Where You Read It First Est. 1980

Judge: Tufts’ handling of NQR case inappropriate BY

BEN GITTLESON

Daily Editorial Board

DANAI MACRIDI/TUFTS DAILY

Tisch Library is fielding suggestions from students and faculty for a strategic plan for improvements that will be finalized in May.

Tisch Library seeks input on longterm improvements, new projects BY

MICHAEL DEL MORO Daily Editorial Board

Tisch Library will adopt a new long-term strategic plan next semester, a product of months of student and faculty collaboration and one of Library Director Jo-Ann Michalak’s final contributions to the university before she leaves in May. The library is currently soliciting input from the Tufts community via an online form distributed in an e-mail to

students and faculty on Jan. 25. Respondents will be able to submit suggestions for the library’s future until the end of March.

The library’s strategic plan for improvements and new projects will be finalized in mid-May. Until then, Michalak said, the specifics of Tisch’s longterm strategy for development remain up in the air and subject to suggestions by the Tufts community.

This new effort to tailor its

services to fit the Tufts community’s suggestions follows the culmination of a previous strategic plan that was implemented in 2008.

Michalak expects the new plan to reflect themes similar to those addressed in plans formulated in past years.

“I think it’s pretty clear we’ve identified an ideal future state that we’re aiming for in the next three years,” she said. see TISCH, page 2

Lamenting what he called Tufts’ inadequacy in dealing with the fallout of last semester’s Naked Quad Run (NQR), a Somerville district court judge in December suggested that the Tufts University Police Department (TUPD) overreacted in arresting a student during NQR, according to a court audio recording obtained by the Daily.

In his comments, made during a Dec. 30 pretrial hearing in the case of the student, a male junior, Somerville District Court Judge Joseph Walker said that misbehavior was to be expected when the university allows an event like NQR — which he said presumably involves intoxicated students — to occur.

“Either they should give the Tufts University police and deputy sheriffs some sensitivity training or give them additional training in terms of what is or what isn’t a crime,” Walker said at the hearing.

The Middlesex Sheriff ’s Office provided support to TUPD at the event.

TUPD arrested the junior at the annual end-of-semester run, which took place on Dec. 10, and charged him with assault and battery of a police officer, assault and battery of a correctional officer and resisting arrest. According to witnesses, he had stepped in to prevent officers from catching a naked student who had escaped from their grasp.

The judge said that the case should probably have just been handled internally at Tufts, since incidents inevitably take

place during rowdy college events like NQR. He called into question the police’s version of the events surrounding the student’s arrest, saying that the junior had admitted to approaching the officers because he thought they might be doing something inappropriate in subduing the naked student.

“How many instances do we have involving the university police, in which they become a little bit excitable and then become a little excessive, you know, in the way they’re handling these students?” Walker said. “These are kids. You know, they’re not criminals — they’re kids.

Walker insisted that he was not condoning misbehavior at collegiate events like NQR. “But, you know, I’ve handled thousands of cases that are similar in nature. And, I, I just for the life of me can’t figure out the times — Tufts being one of the better schools in the country … their approach in terms of disciplining their own students.”

TUPD Capt. Mark Keith yesterday declined to speak about the judge’s comments. “[Once] a matter is before a judge, he/she certainly has the authority to adjudicate the matter in a manner they feel is appropriate,” Keith said in an e-mail, adding that it would be inappropriate to comment further since the case against the student had not been resolved in the university’s judicial system.

Dean of Student Affairs Bruce Reitman yesterday also declined to comment on the judge’s conclusions. see NQR, page 2

JoeyTracker screens ready to go, but still awaiting GPS signal BY

DAPHNE KOLIOS

Daily Editorial Board

Difficulties with the chronically problematic GPS technology that tracks the two shuttles between Tufts’ Medford/ Somerville campus and Davis Square continue to stand in the way of consistent accuracy on the screen displays in the Mayer Campus Center and on the JoeyTracker website.

The website, revamped in the fall but plagued by unreliability since its creation, and the two screen displays, which were installed in the campus center in September, are designed to indicate the number of minutes until one of the shuttles is expected to arrive at its campus center stop.

TuftsLife Chief Operating Officer Michael Vastola, the head of the JoeyTracker project, said he completed coding of the screens’ displays over winter break, though they are still often blank or incorrect because of inconsistent cooperation from Joseph’s

Transportation in turning on the GPS units installed in the vehicles, commonly known as the Joey.

“A problem that we’re having now still is that we’re working with Joseph’s to make sure that the Joey GPS units are always on the Joeys and always running,” said Vastola, a senior who is also the technical manager for the Daily.

Louis Galvez III, administrative service coordinator for the Department of Public and Environmental Safety, attributed the JoeyTracker’s erratic availability to the alternation between vehicles on certain days of the week.

The main Joey shuttle, which operates alone Sunday through Wednesday, has a GPS permanently installed in the vehicle, Galvez said. The additional shuttle that runs the route between campus and Davis Square on Thursday, Friday and Saturday nights uses a portable GPS device that must be placed in it before each use.

JIAJIE SU/TUFTS DAILY

see JOEYTRACKER, page 2

The two campus center screens that show the Joey’s estimated minutes until arrival became operable over winter break but still occasionally appear blank.

Inside this issue

Today’s Sections

Award-winning chef Ana Sortun tackles Turkish flavors.

Iron and Wine’s new album may surprise long-time fans, but the new sound is sure to satisfy.

see FEATURES, page 3

see ARTS, page 5

News Features Arts | Living Editorial | Letters

1 3 5 8

Op-Ed Comics Classifieds Sports

9 10 13 Back

THE TUFTS DAILY

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Tuesday, February 8, 2011

NEWS

Somerville Judge asserts NQR arrest was inappropriate NQR continued from page 1

“I wasn’t there; I haven’t heard what he said,” Reitman said, calling this reporter’s reading of the comments hearsay.

The judge’s comments came at a time when students had been questioning the administration’s account of events at NQR. The administration maintains that police officers did not initiate physical force in shutting down the event earlier than usual, but a number of student participants and witnesses have said police officers overreacted.

Speaking on Jan. 20 about the annual run, Reitman said that the university and the police have never been comfortable managing an event in which they are effectively permitting public nudity to occur and in which they encounter an abnormal amount of alcohol abuse.

“It’s something that’s against the law on every other day of the year,” he said.

Director of Public Relations Kim Thurler yesterday in an e-mail said that “Tufts’ overall record when it comes to public safety is excellent,” but she declined to comment on the specific case of the junior since the issue had not been resolved at Tufts.

The student pled not guilty to all three charges in court, according to Cara O’Brien, a spokesperson for the Middlesex District Attorney’s Office.

The judge during the hearing ordered that the student be placed on pretrial probation for about a week for the charge of resisting arrest, pending completion of at least 30 hours of community service and his writing letters of apology to the officers involved.

An official in the court’s probation department last month told the Daily that the student had completed any responsibilities he had. O’Brien said yesterday the case had been disposed.

Walker ordered the two counts of assault and battery to be placed on file without a change in plea, effectively suspending action on them indefinitely. The DA’s office does not plan to appeal the ruling, O’Brien said.

The judge expressed his desire to speed up a resolution in the junior’s case to give him the opportunity to study abroad this semester. He scheduled the pretrial probation period to end a day before the junior, who is spending the semester studying abroad, planned to leave the country.

Tufts’ Student Judicial Process policy states that students on probation in the court system “are generally not eligible to be enrolled at the university,” and it stipulates that students may not “transfer credits for courses taken elsewhere during the probation.”

“I don’t want to see a young guy make one mistake in his career that affects him for the rest of his life,” Walker said after Middlesex Assistant District Attorney Daniel Harren called the one week of pretrial probation “far too lenient.”

A complaint against the junior, filed

by TUPD, is pending in the university’s judicial system and will be taken up in the fall upon the student’s return to campus.

If the student is proven guilty of the charges against him in the university’s system — two counts of assault and battery on a police officer, according to Judicial Affairs Officer Veronica Carter — he could face suspension or expulsion. Carter would not confirm the identity of the student, citing normal protocol in such cases, but she did say that the complaint was the only one

Tisch solicits student suggestions for library’s future TISCH continued from page 1

MEREDITH KLEIN/TUFTS DAILY

A judge in the Somerville District Court in December said that TUPD overreacted in a student arrest at NQR. she could recall that stemmed from the December run.

Multiple times throughout the hearing, Walker drew attention to the fact that the defendant was a college student.

“The bottom line is that, you know, we don’t have John Dillinger before the court,” he said at one point, referring to the 1930s gangster.

At the end of the proceedings, he repeated that refrain.

“You know, John,” Walker can be overheard apparently telling the junior’s lawyer, John Salsberg, “in those days that we had real cases, there were real trials. Those were difficult ones.”

When asked about the judge’s suggestions that the case should not have been brought before the court in the first place, O’Brien said, “The defendant was accused of assaulting a police officer, an offense we take seriously.”

The student last month declined to comment on the record while his case is still pending at Tufts. His lawyer, Salsberg, yesterday afternoon did not return a phone message seeking comment.

The case involving the male junior was just one among several studentpolice confrontations reported by witnesses at the event.

Reitman said last month that university officials had informally discussed the confrontations that took place when TUPD shut down the run. A larger debriefing had not yet occurred, since students had not returned to campus, he said then, although he added that some change to how the event is run was in order.

“I think to go into next year without different plans with how we approach that time of year would be a mistake,” he said.

This ideal state includes an effort to implement a more extensive collaboration between Tisch and other libraries and organizations both on and off Tufts’ campuses, according to Michalak.

Laura Walters, Tisch Library’s assistant director of teaching and research, said responses to the survey thus far have suggested that the library improve the effectiveness of the interlibrary loan system, expand its hours and increase collaboration with the Geographic Information System (GIS) Lab, which is operated by University Information Technology.

Survey respondents have also called for the library to evolve with technological advances, Michalak said.

“We need to develop enough agility to respond to the changes in technology,” she said.

Tufts Community Union Parliamentarian Dan Pasternack, a senior who serves as a student representative to the faculty’s Library Committee, said he will have the opportunity to review and sign off on the final plan later this semester. He hopes that new projects will include the expansion of Tisch’s collection of electronic media, including its journals and books.

It remains too early, however, to determine exactly what aspects of the library will be revised under the plan, Walters said.

“It’s way too soon because we’re really just putting the meat on the bones right now,” she said. “Now we’re talking about ways that we can attain these goals and that’s going to take a lot of brainstorming.”

Walters said that the system of implementing periodic strategic plans for the library has been one of the positive legacies of Michalak’s leadership.

“She did start the whole strategic planning process here at Tisch, and this is our third strategic plan that we are writing under her leadership,” Walters said. “I think that the strategic-planning process has served us well because we assess what our users’ needs are, and we come up with the most strategic ways to meet those needs.”

Michalak said her impending retirement, which follows 19 years of service as Tisch’s director, was an incentive for the decision to start developing new strategies for the library.

“We decided it was a good thing to be reviewing and not totally be at the final stage when the new director comes on board,” she said.

A search committee composed of graduate students and faculty has been charged with choosing Michalak’s successor.

Pasternack said Michalak has played a pivotal role in improving Tisch’s receptiveness to student input throughout her tenure.

“I know she’s been wonderful to the students at the very least; she’s listened to every request that we’ve made and tried to help us,” he said. “She’s been very knowledgeable about the library, and she was instrumental in getting the library to the point where we’re at now.”

Chronic GPS problems delay JoeyTracker screens, NEC shuttle tracker JOEYTRACKER continued from page 1

“Joseph’s doesn’t always use the same shuttle for the Thursday night shuttle,” Galvez said. “So we’re trying to get all of the bus drivers to understand that when they drive that Thursday night shuttle they have to get the GPS and bring it with them.”

Vastola hopes both the

JoeyTracker and the screens will be back in sync with the GPS units this week.

“It depends on Joseph’s,” he said.

The screens themselves were installed over the summer as part of renovations to the campus center lobby, according to Office for Campus Life Director Joe Golia.

Vastola next wants to install

additional JoeyTracker screens across campus and in Davis Square.

“I think the next natural location is either Carmichael or Wren [Halls],” Vastola said.

“We really want to get one in Davis, but the problem in Davis is finding a place that will actually host it.”

A similar GPS system purchased last semester for tracking

the shuttles for the New England Conservatory of Music (NEC) and School of the Museum of Fine Arts — expected to have been installed during last year’s spring semester — have yet to be put in use, Galvez said.

“We’re attempting to get it up and running,” Galvez said.

The tracker for the NEC shuttle will not have a screen display, though the information

will be available online, according to Vastola.

Golia hopes that the use of screens to find Joey information will become a permanent fixture of student life.

“My hope is that it really becomes [an] established system, one in which students can track the Joey and everyone gets used to the display and really looks at it,” Golia said.

Features

3

tuftsdaily.com

ROMY OLTUSKI | THE DILETTANTE

In with the new

D

GENE BUONCACCORSI/TUFTS DAILY

The high cost of textbooks often places a hefty financial burden on students.

Students seek ways to save money on books Digital textbooks, swapping classes may help ease the burden BY

ANGELINA ROTMAN

Daily Editorial Board

It’s a common complaint on college campuses across the country that textbook prices are out of control. At Tufts, paying hundreds of dollars for textbooks on top of a $50,000-per-year price-tag may seem like rubbing salt in an open wound.

For some Jumbos, the price of a textbook can be a deciding factor in their enrollment in specific classes.

“If I had other classes that were real-

ly textbook heavy, or it was a situation that the textbook was only available new and however expensive, I might consider the price of the book before taking the class,” sophomore Jacob Passy said. “It would also depend on my level of interest in the class. If it was just to fulfill a requirement, I’d be less inclined to buy the textbook and take the class.”

Tufts Bookstore Manager Carolyn LaQuaglia said that she has seen students leafing through textbooks before they sign up for a class, but those are

few and far in between.

“I’ve noticed a couple of people browsing, just to see if they’re going to take a class based on the books, but I’ve only heard of two or three people doing that,” she said.

While not enrolling in a class due to the textbook cost may not be a widespread practice among students, it certainly remains a factor in a student’s course selection.

“To me, it definitely makes a differsee TEXTBOOKS, page 4

PROFILE | ANA SORTUN

Chef Ana Sortun fuses Turkish flavors with more traditional Mediterranean cuisine

BY JON

CHENG

Daily Editorial Board

Like many successful chefs in the greater Boston area, Ana Sortun has experimented with classical French and Mediterranean cuisines, hoping to please clientele with familiar flavors. An unexpected trip to Turkey, however, radically changed her culinary style and led to the opening of Oleana Restaurant in Cambridge.

Sortun was presented with the “Best Chef: Northeast” award in 2005 by the James Beard Foundation for her innovative work at Oleana.

Sortun’s current success is a far cry from her culinary beginnings as a dishwasher in a small Mexican restaurant in Seattle, where she grew up.

“As a kid I just loved to eat good food, [but] working in the kitchen was what drew me,” Sortun said. “[The chefs] encouraged me to move up and within six months I was helping around in the kitchen.”

Sortun found that preparation work in a restaurant did not provide sufficient exposure to the culinary world, so after she became proficient in French, Sortun left her hometown to study at the prestigious La Varenne Ecole de Cuisine in Paris.

The availability of fresh ingredients was one of her main reasons for attending culinary school in Paris.

“You can learn French cooking techniques pretty much anywhere, but what really set it [apart] from going to school here was the ingredient factor — the seasonality set the tone for me that was subconscious at the time,” Sortun said. “The respect for the ingredients and knowing where they came from was something taught to us not directly but by example — that made it very different.”

La Varenne’s traditional curriculum was also an important factor in her choice, Sortun said.

“In culinary school they teach you anything from Spanish techniques to French techniques; the only difference about it being in France was it was taught in a more serious way with the professional aspect being more respected,” she said. “Shopping at the farmers market was just normal — that’s how it was done.”

After graduating from the institute armed with classical French culinary experience, Sortun set out to open her flagship restaurant, Moncef Medeb’s Aigo Bistro in Concord, Mass.

The restaurant’s cuisine was shaped by her experiences living in Spain and Italy in the 1990s, combined with her experience with French cooking.

Soon after, two restaurants in Harvard Square — 8 Holyoke and Casablanca — followed, each employing similar culinary approaches.

Despite the breadth of her cooking, Sortun knew something was missing.

When the opportunity of a lifetime came up, she knew it could not be turned down.

“About 15 years ago, some woman approached me to go study with her in Turkey and it never occurred to me that Turkey was sort of on the map of the [Mediterranean],” Sortun said.

“So I thought, ‘Wow, that could be interesting,’ but I had no clue what Turkish food was and what the Eastern Mediterranean was like.”

Sortun then left for Turkey and was immediately inspired by the complexity of the nation’s cuisine. “[ The Turks] have a mastery of blending spices and knowing how to use them,” she said.

“The easiest way to describe Turkish cuisine is like combing Western technique with Eastern flavors.”

She was particularly drawn to the cuisine’s distinctive flavors.

“It’s not spicy like Indian or Mexican food,” Sortun said. “There is a use of spice to create depth and richness without making things heavy, so it’s a rich cuisine but a lighter style of eating.”

The months spent in Turkey were more than enough for Sortun to completely change her cooking style. She opened Oleana in 2001 with a menu see CHEF, page 4

o everything once. I’m told that someone wise, or else just ubiquitous, said this one time.

Obviously, it’s terrible advice, so I’m not going to do that. But in its idiocy lies a point.

Just as our generation is afraid of commitment, we are afraid of not being committed enough, and often, this pointless dilemma keeps us from picking up new passions, giving them a try without expectation and letting them go just as easily.

For a long time, I was a slave to this reliable guilt machine. I would start something new, bright-eyed, gung ho, and then feel bad when it inevitably drove me to boredom a week later.

The problem is, despite my dwindling enthusiasm, I love nothing more than the excitement of a new craft. It may be surprising to learn that as a senior I went to the Tufts gym for the very first time two weeks ago. (The second time, I ended up collapsing from dehydration, proving my dwindling enthusiasm sometimes useful, but that’s neither here nor there.)

Other things I’ve tried without much intention of long-term devotion: kept a burn book, joined a Weezer cover band, joined a flash mob, joined the circus.

There are so many things left to do before I graduate and hole up in a thousand-dollar cubic foot somewhere in Brooklyn with only my laptop and job applications to keep me warm. If I don’t try them now, how will I know I was not meant to be a pickup artist or a cat caller or a Buddhist monk?

Which is how I came to the inconclusive conclusion that maybe, while I can still afford it, my calling in life should be simply … not to have one. To dip my toes into all fields instead of choosing one; dabble; embrace my dilettantism, just this time with intention.

And that’s what I plan to do. Each week, I will forage into an unknown world in the hopes of learning something new — but without the pressure of needing to. I’ll welcome the surge of vehemence that encourages me to start things with full force but cut out the guilt that results if I don’t follow up with equal zeal. After all, without that vehemence, I may have never climbed a tree or surfed into a shark or shot a rifle.

Or become a hedonist. My closest friends remember this Dionysian phase of mine fondly if for nothing else than because, I’m told, my strong-headedness about the most nonsensical of matters was of entertainment value to almost everyone around me. My mantra was do what I want to do; don’t do what I don’t want to do. And that pertained to everything short of not calling my parents (I’m still a Manhattanite Jew). Working, sleeping, eating, showering, listening to people, going to class — these were all elective activities. Of course, I wasn’t a sadist. When not working became stressful, or I was bored of somersaulting or whatever indulgent activity was occupying my time, of course I would sit down and write an essay.

And then, just as quickly, I grew bored of eating waffle sundaes four meals a day, sleeping for fifteen hours at a time, not sleeping at all and playing music on the grass, and finally gave up the hippy-dippy crap and got on with my life.

But with my return, I realized how many things we don’t do that we’d like to. Since then I’ve tried out a few — some even more than once — and I plan to continue doing so. Hopefully most won’t be as inane as hedonism or as dangerous as hanging out in shark-infested waters. Perhaps in the process you’ll even be able to collect something from my successes and failures, though that’s quite a lofty goal. All I know is that right now, I have about forty-five two-minute dates to go on that I’ll likely be wanting to tell you about next week.

Romy Oltuski is a senior majoring in English. She can be reached at Romy.

Oltuski@tufts.edu.

THE TUFTS DAILY

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Tuesday, February 8, 2011

FEATURES

Expensive textbooks force cashstrapped students to get creative TEXTBOOKS continued from page 3

COURTESY JANICE GOLDSMITH

Chef Ana Sortun combines classic French training with Mediterranean flair.

Chef’s success may spark new ventures CHEF continued from page 3

influenced by Turkish cuisine.

“A lot of the menu items are inspired by traditional dishes but there is always a modern take on something,” Sortun said. “Some of my specialties are tamarind beef with smoky eggplant puree — inspired by an eggplant dish ... with chunks of braised lamb.”

Items on the menu are also influenced by French and Greek cuisines, she said. Pan-seared scallops, for example, are served with lentils, Brussels sprout leaves, pomegranate, green olives and walnuts, while a simple wild-striped bass is dressed with a black garlic-Tahini sauce and topped with beet croutons and a cabbage and

shallot confit.

Another important component of the restaurant is the emphasis on fresh ingredients, a philosophy that was ingrained into Sortun by her Parisian training. All of the restaurant’s organic produce is sourced directly from the nearby Siena Farms in Sudbury, Mass., which is owned by Sortun’s husband.

Sortun later decided to expand and in 2008 opened Sofra, a casual bakery and café, which is more accessible and convenient to the passing customer.

Going forward, Sortun hopes to establish more eateries and stores.

“Something is going on but nothing is set in stone; we’re always growing and evolving,” she said.

ence,” sophomore Liza Bagley said. “I wouldn’t necessarily not take a class because the textbooks are too expensive, but sometimes I try to find alternate ways to take the class, like taking the textbook out of the library or seeing which texts we actually use in class before buying the books.”

Some professors take advantage of photocopying to create course packs and perhaps save their students some money, but course-pack costs can also add up.

“One thing I wish they would do is if a course does have a course pack, I wish they would have it in the library, or available for checkout,” Passy said.

“Oftentimes for my classes, the course packs are more expensive than the books I can buy on Amazon or something.”

From used and rental books to digital textbooks, today’s students have several options when it comes to finding a way around the hefty price of textbooks.

“In my Entrepreneurial Leadership class, the textbook is over $100, so I’m using my friend’s old edition for free,” Bagley said.

Creative solutions to the textbook problem are par for the course for students, and now booksellers are also beginning to think outside the box. This semester, the campus bookstore began a pilot program for yearlong textbook rentals that will allow students to rent books for entry-level courses at up to half the price of purchasing a new copy.

“We’ve always had new and used [textbooks], and digital the past few years, but now that the school approved the rental program, we did a pilot program with the rentals and offer that too,” LaQuaglia said.

Professors, Passy said, should make more of an effort to use the resources Tufts already has, particularly Blackboard, rather than relying on copy shop Gnomon Copy to print course packs.

“When we have the option of getting the stuff for free, why make us pay for a course pack?” he said. “And another thing in general is they don’t do a very good job of advertising when books are available online. Oftentimes, the electronic version will be cheaper.”

LaQuaglia said that the changing makeup of the textbook industry may prove to be financially advantageous for students.

“The one thing I know is that as time goes on, more things will be released digitally,” she said. “The companies are holding the cards right now. Technology is going to force the evolution of [textbooks], and we’ll see where it goes.”

While some students may nurse a deep-seated belief that the bookstore, which is owned by Barnes & Noble, exists for the sole purpose of ripping them off, LaQuaglia — who has been on both sides of the story — says that this is far from the truth: A portion of all bookstore sales goes back to the university.

“As a student, I thought, ‘Oh, the bookstore, corporate greed,’” she said.

“But we don’t determine the price of books. The publishers do. We’re here to service the university. Yes, we happen to be for a company-for-profit, but the more the company can grow, the more we can service the students [and] then give back to the school. It’s like a domino effect.”

Ultimately, the textbook situation inevitably leaves some students with an empty wallet and the irritating sense that they could have gotten a better deal elsewhere. Bagley, for one, would like to see students take more control over this perpetual problem.

“I would love to see a more organized system for textbook exchange among students,” she said. “I know there’s one on TuftsLife, but I feel like it’s often underused, and I think there are a lot of students who have texts they’re never going to use again and can’t sell back.”

Use Your Voice Mentor Inspire Teach Lead Explorations or Perspectives in Fall 2011 Informational Meeting Friday, February 11 12:00 noon 95 Talbot Avenue www.excollege.tufts.edu

Join the ExCollege Board for 2011-2012 Work with Tufts faculty to select ExCollege courses!

For information and an application, go to www.excollege.tufts.edu

Arts & Living

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tuftsdaily.com

ALBUM REVIEW

Iron and Wine explores new yet familiar territory with elements of pop and folk on latest release BY

Huffy Puffs

EMILY BALK

Senior Staff Writer

I

Sam Beam, the bearded singersongwriter better known as Iron and Wine, has gone all grown-up and funky

Kiss Each Other Clean Iron and Wine

Warner Bros. Records in his latest album “Kiss Each Other Clean.” Those familiar with his previous albums know Beam for his hushed voice, folk sound and clean melodies.

This stylistic formula has yielded successful and cohesive work extolled by both critics and average listeners.

“Kiss Each Other Clean” is a risky departure in sound for Beam, exemplified by intervals of conspicuous saxophone, more confident vocals and what sounds suspiciously like a thumb piano sprinkled throughout the songs.

Iron and Wine seems to have woven a thread of psychedelic ’70s funk and African instrumentation through the foundation of the soft soundscapes that typify his work.

This would not be the first time that Beam has inserted seemingly incongruous elements from unrelated genres into his songs. Take, for example, the track “He Lays in the Reins” from his 2005 collaboration with Calexico, “In the Reins.” The lyrical imagery, strumming guitar and bright, punctuating piano notes come together in a way that in itself is stunning. Salvador Duran’s operatic interlude in Spanish that comes seemingly out of nowhere

AMAZON.COM

‘Kiss Each Other Clean’ sports an eye-catching cover that matches its pop leanings. in the middle of the song takes it to another level with the powerful, projecting voice of the Mexican singer driving upward against the flowing backdrop of the guitar.

The extent to which the more popforward funkiness of “Kiss Each Other

Clean” succeeds is variable. The synth and percussion inflected track “Monkeys Uptown” is vaguely reminiscent of Peter Gabriel’s solo work, without the kind of melodic appeal that brings the audisee IRON & WINE, page 6

TV REVIEW

GALLERY REVIEW

Defying vampire mold, ‘Diaries’ knows its place and owns it

Hindu sprituality, pollution meet in artist’s work

BY

MADELINE HALL | THE TASTEFUL AND THE TASTELESS

EMILY POOLE

Contributing Writer

Red contacts, fake blood, plastic fangs — the vampire craze certainly isn’t anything new.

From “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” (1997-2003)

The Vampire Diaries Starring Nina Dobrev, Paul Wesley, Ian Somerhalder, Steven R. McQueen Airs Thursdays at 8 p.m. on The CW to the “Twilight” series and “True Blood,” one would think the world of vampires has finally

been bled dry.

But think again. It’s time to lock your doors and grab some garlic because the second season of “The Vampire Diaries” is back, and it’s redefining guilty pleasure.

Adapted from the books written by L.J. Smith, the series, developed by Kevin Williamson (“Scream” (1996), “Dawson’s Creek” (1998-2003)), revolves around Elena Gilbert (Nina Dobrev), a teenage girl who is thrust into the world of the supernatural when two vampire brothers, Stefan and Damon Salvatore (Paul Wesley and Ian Somerhalder), descend upon her little town of Mystic Falls.

With this first introduction to the paranormal, Elena enters a world of vampires, werewolves and witches (oh my!), where her see VAMPIRE, page 6

BY

WILLIAM OWEN

Contributing Writer

Indian artist Atul Bhalla in 2005 took a series of 14 digital pigment photographs depicting

I Was Not Waving but Drowning At the Arthur M. Sackler Museum, through April 2 Harvard Art Museums 32 Quincy St., Cambridge, MA 617-495-9400 the artist’s gradual descent into the Yamuna River and formed a poignant montage on the spirituality and environmental degradation of the water revered by Indian Hindus. The prints, which are based on the poem “Not Waving but Drowning” (1957) by English poet Stevie Smith, are currently on display at the Arthur M. Sackler Museum at Harvard University.

The Yamuna originates in the Yamunotri Glacier in the Himalayas and, according to Hindu beliefs, is where the revered god Krishna bathed and played with cows as a child.

Devout Hindus worship Yami, the goddess of river Yamuna, along the river’s banks — they believe

CWTV.COM

Elijah (Daniel Gillies) threatens supernatural adversaries with a makeshift stake.

see BHALLA, page 6

am a huge sucker for a juicy conspiracy theory. My overactive imagination has always raced to develop explanations for the more intriguing events in history. I am not a passive citizen; I do not believe the government-certified stories behind assassinations, military coups and other extraordinary occurrences. The United States Government will stop at nothing to cover up their mistakes. When it comes to their explanations, I am a choosy customer … and I am not buying it.

It was a pleasant surprise, then, to find another active questioner breaking ground in the field of conspiracies. On Jan. 28, 2011, the Huffington Post reported by way of Radar Online that a woman by the name of Valerie Joyce Wilson Turks was suing Sean Combs, affectionately termed Diddy, for conspiring with Rodney King in orchestrating the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001. The charges for terrorism and date rape totaled a whopping $1 trillion, an amount whose number of zeroes baffles most simple minds.

The accusation is debatable, of course.

The rap mogul has too many projects on his hands to seriously consider orchestrating a terrorist attack. Between updating his fragrance “Unforgiveable,” designing each season’s line of Sean Jean apparel and changing his moniker (I miss Puffy), this guy has his hands tied. Also, I question how much face-time he can squeeze in for Rodney King. Largely, the lawsuit seems to be a publicity ploy.

That being said, my interest has been piqued. Clearly, lawyers who would agree to take on a case as ludicrous as this one must exist elsewhere in the world. I can find one in the Boston area, and I can begin my tirade against those celebrities who have thus far evaded the long arm of the law. Far too many stars are responsible for our world’s mysteries, and I intend to bring these injustices to light.

Let me begin my list of grievances.

I would like to sue Lil Wayne for the Area 51 cover-up project. This claim is most believable if only because he BLATANTLY ADMITS he is a Martian in his songs. He is not human. He is a Martian. He just doesn’t want to reveal where he keeps his spaceships parked.

I would like to sue Andre the Giant for ruining the Tower of Pisa. More specifically, I would like to sue him for tilting it. I suspect he was tired, and thought nothing of leaning carelessly against it.

Though deceased, I hold him accountable for its unsightly lean.

I would like to sue Jeff Goldblum for conspiring and succeeding in the assassination of President John F. Kennedy.

While my evidence supporting this claim is lacking, I would like to cite his shifty manner and sketchy eyes as clear indicators of his guilt. The man has something to hide, and this seems to fit. Please disregard the fact that he was 11 years old when the assassination took place. Age is irrelevant, of course.

I would like to sue Barbra Streisand for staging the NASA moon landing of 1969.

This is mere conjecture; I would love nothing more than to believe she rented out studio space in Hollywood and succeeded in the most elaborate tricking of the American people. She just seems like the type.

Finally, I would like to sue Macaulay Culkin for destroying my house in 1990.

Agreeing to film “Home Alone” in my childhood home did not mean I would allow irreparable damage. This is, of course, less of a conspiracy theory, and more of a reaction to him totally trashing my pad. I’m still picking up marbles, Macaulay.

Madeline Hall is a sophomore who has not yet declared a major. She can be reached at Madeline.Hall@tufts.edu.

THE TUFTS DAILY

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Tuesday, February 8, 2011

ARTS & LIVING

In showing polluted Indian river, ‘I Was Not Waving but Drowning’ poignantly joins humanity and nature

Teenage hearts bleed for ‘Diaries’

BHALLA

VAMPIRE

continued from page 5

continued from page 5

the water to provide spiritual rebirth and cleansing. Tragically, the divinity of this river has been desecrated by pollution.

The photographs of Bhalla were taken in Iagatpuri, near New Delhi, where the Yamuna is the most polluted and dangerous to swim in. “I Was Not Waving but Drowning” juxtaposes the believed spirituality of water with the harsh reality of how the river is treated environmentally.

There is subtle variation among the photographs; the only factors that change are Bhalla’s position and reflection in the water. Each print shows the artist in profile, while his body is hidden by the murk of the water. The only colors evident are the tans and browns of the water and Bhalla himself, as well as a slight green outline in the background of shrubbery along the riverbank.

In the first photograph of the montage, Bhalla’s eyes are open and he has a serene look on his face, despite the filthiness of the water that surrounds him. His eyes gradually close over the next two photographs, and as the photos continue more and more of his facial features are lost to the disconcertingly opaque water.

Bhalla uses the reflections of his own face in the water to create fascinating shapes. In the first few images, when his head is still above the water, his reflection makes it look as though he has two heads, which fuse into one featureless figure by the final photograph. But his reflections are blurred and distorted, representing the abuse endured by the water itself. Despite the distorted nature of these images, Bhalla’s keen photographic sensibility helps the viewer understand the point of his works.

“I Was Not Waving but Drowning” reveals a stunning duality shared between the artist’s physical body and his spiritual essence in the water. His unclear reflection represents his spiritual unification with the water; both tainted by pollution. Bhalla’s reflection,

life seems to be constantly in danger and everyone has a hidden identity.

Picking up from the pre-hiatus cliffhangers, Elena, Stefan and Damon are left fielding threats from every angle.

Jules (Michaela McManus), the maliciously vengeful, though beautiful, werewolf has just tested the theory that a bite from a werewolf kills a vampire, and — much to the chagrin of Damon and his freshly bitten friend Rose (Lauren Cohan) — proves it right.

Meanwhile, Stefan, always trying to protect his beloved Elena, refuses to accept her agreement with the powerful vampire, Elijah (Daniel Gillies): In return for the guaranteed safety of her friends and family, Elena has promised to lend herself as bait in Elijah’s war against an even more powerful vampire, Klaus.

Outside the main trio, Elena’s best friend Caroline (Candice Accola) juggles romantic interests from a werewolf — Tyler (Michael Trevino), who knows she’s a vampire — and Matt (Zach Roerig), who does not. The love triangle leads to one of the night’s funnier lines, “Everyone just needs to stop kissing me!”

Vampire royalty, tan werewolves, love triangles. From a distance, “The Vampire Diaries” can seem like nothing but a duplicate of the “Twilight” series.

In fact, at times Elena and Stefan are remarkably reminiscent of their counterparts Bella and Edward, especially as they insist on rarely smiling and always having perfect hair.

With all these familiar tropes, audiences are often left wondering if this show can bring anything fresh to the table.

The answer lies in complicated plot lines, profound characters and even the occasional laugh. With these elements, “The Vampire Diaries” has succeeded in stepping out from the shadows of “Twilight” and “True Blood,” creating a unique place for itself in an overly crowded trend.

One of the greatest things about the show is its supporting cast. While the extremely attractive Dobrev and Wesley can certainly carry any scene, the real stars of the show are Somerhalder, Accola and the rest of the extended “Vampire Diaries” family.

Unlike “Twilight,” this is a show about a town, not just a couple, and the depth of the cast gives the writers plenty of room to play with different dynamics. The complexity of the characters keeps the show from becoming boring, and the interconnectedness of the gripping plotlines renders the show truly addictive.

“The Vampire Diaries” has certainly mastered the art of the guilty pleasure. Attractive actors? Check. Just ask Entertainment Weekly’s “Sexiest Beast” poll winner Somerhalder. Fighting? Check. The makeup crew must be loved by fake blood manufacturers everywhere. Sex? Definitely.

With its teenage CW audience in mind, the show places itself somewhere between the complete abstinence of the “Twilight” crowd and the near-pornography of shows like “True Blood.” As for the guilt part of being a guilty pleasure? Well …

While the vampire/high school combination can give the show the appearance of a second-class citizen of TV world — something reserved for 14-year-olds or to watch only when there’s no new episode of “Jersey Shore” — “The Vampire Diaries” is actually a credit to its species.

The writers don’t shy away from exploring themes of humanity and love, but when there’s been enough, as Damon says, “doom, gloom and personal growth for one night,” the show also succeeds in just being fun.

The show has embraced its trendy roots.

Yes, with its sex, suspense and violence, it would do any Team Edward member proud. But where other shows resign themselves to becoming replicas of hackneyed fads, “The Vampire Diaries” introduces complex characters like Somerhalder’s Damon and balances suspense with fun in a winning combination.

So while audiences will inevitably be sucked in by the blood and sensuality of the show, they will stay because “The Vampire Diaries” simply knows what it’s doing. “Twilight,” watch your back.

HARVARDARTMUSEUMS.ORG

Bhalla serenely lowers himself into the polluted Yamuna River. and the water itself, exposes how apathy towards the environment is as selfdestructive as it is harmful to our world.

There are many layers to this piece, but one interpretation is that through these photographs Bhalla stresses that we are not only losing the environment to pollution, but we are losing ourselves. The Yamuna is an integral part of Hinduism, and thus its desecration challenges the Hindu identity and the role of water in Indian thought.

As advancing countries like India balance their cultural traditions with the environmental consequences of their

industrialization, works like Bhalla’s “I Was Not Waving but Drowning” will become all the more important. By highlighting the costs of pollution in a religious context, Bhalla is providing a key source of conflict to galvanize concerned Indians.

The observer can also find hope in Bhalla’s work. “I Was Not Waving but Drowning” reveals that, in spite of pollution, man and nature are ultimately in it together. This knowledge will hopefully steer people in the right direction, promoting spiritual reverence for nature.

Sam Beam’s latest, ‘Kiss Each Other Clean,’ includes everything from saxophones to thumb pianos IRON & WINE continued from page 5

ence back for a second listen.

“Rabbit Will Run” has a similar African-inspired feel, prominently featuring the tinny thumb piano and a breathy, flute-type instrument whose sound seems funneled straight from

the intro of the Head Hunters’ version of “Watermelon Man”. What makes “Rabbit Will Run” a better listen is the incredible texture of sounds that Beam creates, sometimes layering, sometimes dropping almost all instrumentation.

The most accessible songs are the ones that feel most like the Iron and

IRONANDWINE.COM

Beam takes a break from his beloved acoustic on his latest tour.

Wine of old, with more subtle manifestations of Beam’s experimental elements. “Half Moon” has that quietly wailing guitar and muted falsetto cadence that made Iron and Wine such a striking addition to the music scene in his first album, “The Creek Drank the Cradle” (2002). This track has that same bare, stripped-down feeling, which makes room for the tambourine and doo-wop of some female background vocals to really shine through and keep the sound fresh.

“Glad Man Singing” is an immediately likable song. It is beautifully balanced with a melody that lends itself well to participatory humming along. Beam’s stellar songwriting skills, as usual, produced lyrics that paint memorable pictures as the chorus twists and morphs over the course of the track: “I’ve become a glad man singing a song/ About the bushes by the gas pump gone to flower/ And a constant star collides/ About a sad man singing they forgotten how/ And the baby quit sucking when the milk went sour/ And the mouth of the river is wide.”

Admittedly, the meaning behind the words is difficult to decipher, but with the hypnotic pull of the building beat and the angelic melodic refrain, the meaning ceases to matter because the music is just so darn catchy.

Aficionados of Iron and Wine’s work may find themselves perplexed by the more distracting elements of Beam’s new sound, but when they are folded tastefully into the folk base, the result is winning.

“Kiss Each Other Clean” demands multiple listens for the vision to sink in, but fortunately, the sound doesn’t go stale.

Tuesday, February 8, 2011

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EDITORIAL

In defense of institutional memory

ALEXANDRA W. BOGUS Editor-in-Chief

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Tuesday, February 8, 2011

EDITORIAL | LETTERS

Next fall will begin a year of change for Tufts. University President Lawrence Bacow will leave in June, and Provost and Senior Vice President Jamshed Bharucha just announced Sunday that he, too, will depart Tufts at the end of this academic year to serve as president of The Cooper Union in New York City.

When Bacow first assumed the position of university president in 2001, he told the Board of Trustees that he intended to stay for 10 years. In spite of this, his announcement last February came as a shock to many. Even more jarring is the fact that Bacow and Bharucha are just two among a handful of university heads who are planning to leave Tufts after this year.

Robert Hollister, co-founder and dean of the Jonathan M. Tisch College of Citizenship and Public Service, Eileen Kennedy, who serves as dean of the Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy and Lonnie Norris, dean of the School of Dental Medicine, will all be leaving Tufts this summer.

Hollister and Kennedy plan on returning to Tufts after a one-year hiatus but in teaching roles. Although all of these administrators have elevated

their respective schools to incredible levels of achievement during their long tenures, their departures coincide with Anthony Monaco’s transition into the position of university president, a critical period for Tufts.

This exodus of key university leaders begs the question: Whatever happened to institutional memory?

A new president assuming office will obviously mean a considerable change in the way Tufts is run. Monaco is clearly capable of living up to the high standards demanded by the Tufts community, but at the end of the day, he is not the same person as Bacow. The decisions he makes will be different — not necessarily better or worse, but different — than anything the university has experienced over the past decade with Bacow at the helm. The departure of three deans and a provost will multiply all of this change tenfold.

To be fair, Monaco is entitled to a new team of people around him. The slew of new university leaders will mark a new period in Tufts’ history and will likely bring exciting advances to the university.

Still, the fact that these things are all happening at the same time seems likely to cause quite a bit of institutional shock.

A search committee created to find the next president of Tufts was formed immediately after Bacow announced his decision to step down last February.

Although the committee worked vigorously and made an excellent decision in choosing Monaco, selecting administrators is a lengthy process, and it took the committee until November to choose its candidate. Now, with the departure of four other integral administrators, the administration is going to have to quadruple its efforts to name successors.

Bharucha, Hollister, Kennedy and Norris are leaving behind major legacies and big shoes to fill. We can only guess how long it will take to find quality successors for each of them.

We at the Daily congratulate Bharucha on his new position. He and the other three deans have made great advancements for Tufts and are entitled to grow in new positions and endeavors, whether they be on the Hill or not.

But how much change can a university endure in one year? Nobody knows for sure, but one thing is certain: Tufts will definitely need to answer that question come next fall.

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EDITORIAL

Judge’s NQR verdict should be a TUPD wake-up call The legal aftermath of this year’s Naked Quad Run (NQR) was finally settled over winter break in a Massachusetts district court. The Daily obtained the transcript from the proceedings, in which Judge Joseph Walker echoed the thoughts of many around campus when he said he believed that the issue should not have gone this far.

Walker felt that the situation — in which a Tufts University Police Department (TUPD) officer arrested a student for assaulting an officer and resisting arrest — should have been handled internally. Walker also recommended that TUPD receive some type of “sensitivity training” to deal with events of this nature.

In both cases, the judge’s comments are appropriate and justified. Based on the testimony given by the student and the corroboration provided by witnesses, his actions on Dec. 10 did not warrant arrest, let alone prosecution. TUPD, which faces other allegations of inappropriate behavior on the night of NQR,

The Tufts Daily is a nonprofit, independent newspaper, published Monday through Friday during the academic year, and distributed free to the Tufts community. EDITORIAL POLICY Editorials represent the position of The Tufts Daily. Individual editors are not necessarily responsible for, or in agreement with, the policies and editorials of The Tufts Daily. The content of letters, advertisements, signed columns, cartoons and graphics does not necessarily reflect the opinion of The Tufts Daily editorial board.

is at the very least guilty of blowing the confrontation out of proportion.

Though many TUPD shortcomings were revealed in this incident, it would be unfair to forget the service the department provides our university. By and large, the officers’ priority is manifestly the maintenance of student safety. The fact is, NQR presents TUPD with a difficult situation. Naked and potentially intoxicated students are clearly not the most compliant people. Even so, it has become apparent that there is a better way to handle these situations.

The parameters of the event must be well defined and set far in advance of NQR. The main problem with this past year’s NQR was the timetable. In a Jan. 20 article in the Daily, Dean of Student Affairs Bruce Reitman said that the majority of incidents and injuries generally occur toward the end of the event and as the hour gets later. If this is truly the case, then it becomes imperative that start and finish times are clearly established prior to the event. Given

the longstanding tradition of NQR, it is inexcusable that a precedent has not been set for the proceedings.

A more established set of regulations would have gone a long way toward preventing the debacle. But the heart of the problem is a question of jurisdiction. A clear distinction must be made between what is a crime and what is merely a matter of university discipline. It seems obvious that in this case, the university should have been able to handle the situation without arrests.

Walker joked to the prosecutor that the Tufts junior was not “John Dillinger” and sentenced the student to only a week of pretrial probation and 30 hours of community service.

In the future, however, a Tufts student may not receive such leniency. It is in the best interest of all involved if TUPD and the Tufts administration make it a point to communicate openly and explicitly their expectations for NQR before the handcuffs come out.

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Tuesday, February 8, 2011

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9

OP-ED

Proposed New Hampshire voting residency rules deserve fair consideration

BY JOHN

K. ATSALIS

I am writing in opposition to yesterday’s editorial titled “Students have right to choose where they vote.” To begin with, the authors of the editorial demonstrate their complete lack of knowledge about the Granite State, expressing concern about the level of income tax that a college student would face in New Hampshire. Fortunately, New Hampshire does not have an income tax on wages, salaries and tips, only taxing income from interest on dividends. In addition, I fail to see the connection between the cost of university [on-campus] housing and the local property tax rate in the case of public institutions of higher education, of which close to two-thirds of New Hampshire students attend, as those institutions do not pay property tax.

In the case of private institutions, the property tax rate has a role in the price of on-campus housing since dormitories are only exempt from property tax on the first $150,000 of valuation. After adjusting for varying rates of on-campus housing and enrollments across schools, according to information from the College Board, about half of on-campus students attend private institutions in New Hampshire, meaning that while local tax rates affect on-campus student populations in New Hampshire, it is a neither uniform nor even effect. Moreover, for public schools, the property tax rate likely has an opposite effect, setting the market for off-campus properties and therefore restraining how much the university can charge for on-campus housing. While it is certainly true that students living off campus pay property tax as a part of their rent, this can be rectified by electing to become a New Hampshire resident and voting on municipal issues.

I do not oppose this new standard of residency, as I have long believed that students should have to change their driver’s licenses in addition to their residency in order to vote in a different state. This is partly to ensure that only individuals committed to residency, and therefore the local issues, vote in elections. It is also to ensure that students do not attempt to vote in more than one location, as it is unlikely that elections officials in a student’s home state would know that a student is also planning to vote in New Hampshire, especially since New Hampshire has same-day voter registration. While it is true that it is more convenient for students to vote at school rather than to mail absentee ballots home, this is only because they are not required to change their driver’s licenses, which many would agree is the hallmark of one’s identity as the resident of a given state.

Just as there are mailing costs associated with absentee voting, there are also costs to applying for a new license and the choice between voting at school and at home should be considered in light of both realities.

Furthermore, after reviewing a list of New Hampshire towns that no longer have a tra-

JAMES CHOCA/TUFTS DAILY

ditional town meeting, it is clear that many ship and the relationship of an individual’s of the larger institutions of higher education, home to their right to vote. I welcome college such as Dartmouth College, the University students to make low-tax New Hampshire of New Hampshire and Plymouth State their home, but only after changing their University are located in towns that still have residency in all aspects of civic life.

I am a firm believer in the New Hampshire town meetings. Town meetings are part of the quintessential New England experience, Advantage and have chosen to vote in my but due to low attendance in modern times, hometown throughout my time here at Tufts they are often susceptible to special-interest for this reason, rather than interfere in the voting when voters turn out to the meeting local politics of Medford and Somerville. in support or opposition of specific causes. This is despite the fact that I find some of While many college students are politically their policies, especially concerning parking, apathetic, a motivated minority may show quite objectionable. The same goes for the up to a town meeting or vote in the local Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Should I elections and affect the internal politics of choose to live in Massachusetts after graduthe town in which they will attend school ation, I plan to take part in the civic process for only four short years. This could cause here and relinquish my New Hampshire resilasting damage. This is also the case for state dency. I have not done so as a Tufts student and federal elections, as students voting for a — despite my presence in Massachusetts for United States Senator could elect a candidate nine months out of each of the last four years whose term will last longer than their likely — since my permanent address remains in New Hampshire. I suspect that many of my residency in New Hampshire.

While I am not familiar with the specifics classmates here and in New Hampshire have of the 1972 U.S. Supreme Court case involv- also maintained their permanent address in ing Hanover, New Hampshire, perhaps it their hometown. Until the student changes would be worthwhile for the judicial system that address, they appear to be temporary to reconsider its ruling in this case, as the visitors who plan to return to that permanent potential for fraud surely exists and the sys- address and should be treated as such. tem is likely exploited by the most politically motivated students. The bill has unfortunately been cast in terms of partisan politics John K. Atsalis is a senior majoring in and should instead be considered in terms International Relations and quantitative of the obligations of residency and citizen- economics. His hometown is Exeter, N.H.

Nation requires better school systems DAILY TARGUM EDITORIAL BOARD Daily Targum

Should a mother ever be arrested for trying to provide her children with a good education? Most people would be appalled at the mere suggestion of punishing natural maternal care, but Kelley Williams-Bolar of Akron, Ohio, was subject to just such punishment when she was convicted of lying about her address in order to send her children to a better school district. While what Williams-Bolar did was, in fact, illegal, arresting her for it seems a bit extreme.

Williams-Bolar should have gone through the proper channels to get her children into the Copley-Fairlawn School District, which she thought would provide them with a better education than the Akron Central District. We won’t contest that. But there was no need to arrest

Civil wrong: untying the knot

I

OFF THE HILL | RUTGERS UNIVERSITY

BY

ELISHA SUM | INQUEERY

her for her conduct. The school merely should have deregistered her children and sent them back to their proper district.

Presiding Judge Patricia Cosgrove admitted that Williams-Bolar was sentenced to prison as an example: “I felt that some punishment or deterrent was needed for other individuals who might think to defraud the various school districts.”

It is unfair to turn Williams-Bolar into an example, especially when all she was trying to do was give her children a better life. She never would have resorted to defrauding the school district if she was provided with better public education inside of her legitimate district. If anyone is at fault here, it is the public school system — public education is failing nationwide. Individuals considering defrauding the school districts do not need a deterrent. Instead, they need better schools, so that they would not have to resort to fraud in the first place.

This debacle lends even more support to Gov. Chris Christie’s education reforms in New Jersey, especially the proposed Opportunity Scholarship Act. The act would make it so people like WilliamsBolar, who find themselves faced with failing public schools, would have the chance to give their children better educations without resorting to criminal activity.

Ohio should take notice of what Christie is trying to do in New Jersey and follow suit. In fact, most of America should pay attention to Christie’s education reforms.

Ohio is not the only place where things like this are happening.

In one way, Cosgrove succeeded in making Williams-Bolar an example — although, not in the way she intended.

Williams-Bolar’s case now stands as an example of how broken the United States’ public school system is and how badly it needs repairs.

t’s strange to start a column without Tori Amos, but it’s time for a change. I’ve enjoyed writing “Our Genderation” for the past two semesters, but this spring I will focus on queer politics and issues. Though the subject matter will differ, the feminist perspective will not, so let’s dive into the wreck à la Adrienne Rich and see what we find.

The mainstream (white) LGBT agenda of late has nauseatingly concerned itself with same-sex marriage. Why? Historically, marriage as an institution has reproduced oppression and consolidated power within families, notably amongst the men. Also, it cannot be pried from its intimate ties with misogyny and racism. Marriage boasts legality and social currency and weight, all of which legitimize nuclear family structures while devaluing other formations, which lack legal recognition and social prestige. This brings us to the concern of this column: Gay marriage as a symptomatic reform cannot solve the issues surrounding marriage.

The rhetoric of those supporting same-sex marriage frames the issue as one of civil rights (Remember that time when Gay was the new Black?). Conceptualizing it as such has led to a troublesome polarization of critiques as either pro-gay or homophobic, which effectively silences debate and obscures the absurdities of the institution itself. Radical queer thought has been left out without a viable venue to shape public discourse and incite institutional changes.

The label itself recreates and reinforces the gender binary and inconsequentially expands the heterosexist definition of marriage. That is to say that it still excludes those residing outside the male-female narrative (e.g., trans identities). Catering to a need to legitimize queer couplings on the majority’s terms will benefit only a select few.

To expand, race plays a notable role in the differential access to marriage and its benefits. As always, we should consider who is shaping the public discourse and for whom the benefits are sought. White, middle-class lesbians and gays are a major driving force behind the push for same-sex marriage. They already benefit from race and class privilege and a social mobility, so marriage becomes just another handy civil right to have.

Yet many queer people of color are disenfranchised, cannot easily climb the social ladder and lack access to healthcare, but these concerns, among others, have not struck a chord with the white-driven queer movement. Why? To continue, reasons for supporting gay marriage do not address the main issue underlying the problems inherent in marriage. For instance, why do legal sanctions of heterosexual relationships determine who has spousal rights? The government should not interfere with our choices in the private sphere of interpersonal relationships. To give another example, marriage has been extolled as the solution to issues of custody for lesbians and gays. However, when we throw race into the equation, that argument begins to break down because it is a major determinant in the recognition of parental status. Thus, marriage may be an answer for some (white) people, but it falls short of creating a world of equality for many queers, especially queers of color.

Marriage should not be such a locus of queer activism. Let’s re-envision the legal enforcement of entitlements and privileges in relationships and recognize that gay marriage is not the marker of equality or humanity, nor is it the main concern on many queer minds.

It only perpetuates a system that regards some as deserving certain rights, such as healthcare and economic benefits, and also polices interpersonal relationships and circumscribes love within a very narrow definition. In short, radical queer thought does not limit itself to employing the tools of the master, to borrow Audre Lorde’s apt metaphor.

Elisha Sum is a senior majoring in English and French. He can be reached at Elisha.

Sum@tufts.edu.

OP-ED POLICY The Op-Ed section of The Tufts Daily, an open forum for campus editorial commentary, is printed Monday through Thursday. The Daily welcomes submissions from all members of the Tufts community; the opinions expressed in the Op-Ed section do not necessarily represent the opinions of the Daily itself. Opinion articles on campus, national and international issues should be 600 to 1,200 words in length. Op-Ed cartoons are also welcomed for the Campus Canvas feature. All material is subject to editorial discretion and is not guaranteed to appear in the Daily. All material should be submitted to oped@tuftsdaily.com no later than noon on the day prior to the desired day of publication; authors must submit their telephone numbers and day-of availability for editing questions. Submissions may not be published elsewhere prior to their appearance in the Daily, including but not limited to other on- and off-campus newspapers, magazines, blogs and online news websites, as well as Facebook. Republishing of the same piece in a different source is permissible as long as the Daily is credited with originally running the article.

THE TUFTS DAILY

10 CROSSWORD

COMICS

Tuesday, February 8, 2011

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MONDAY’S SOLUTION

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Let my people free.”

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Tuesday, February 8, 2011

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11

GOING the DISTANCE with

Rubin “Hurricane” Carter Author of Eye of the Hurricane: My Path from Darkness to Freedom

Lecture and Book Signing

TONIGHT, FEBRUARY 8 7:30pm, TISCH 304 Onetime seemingly unstoppable boxing champion, victim of a false conviction for a triple homicide, and spokesperson for the wrongfully incarcerated, Rubin “Hurricane” Carter is a controversial twentieth century icon.

Dr. Carter, a former middleweight prizefighter whose 1967 imprisonment for a triple homicide at a Paterson, New Jersey, bar became a cause célèbre in the 1970s for individuals like Bob Dylan and Muhammad Ali, was released from prison in 1985 by a federal judge who cited a conviction predicated on “an appeal to racism rather than reason.”

Dr. Carter says that his true freedom was actually achieved within prison walls after he chose to focus not on his release but rather on personal transformation through the study of religious and philosophical texts, a process conveyed in his new book with transcendent wisdom if not concision. Carter also discusses his efforts in Canada to secure the release of similarly wrongly convicted people through Innonence International, which he founded in 2004.

In his new book, Dr. Carter tells of the metaphoric and physical prisons he has survived: his povertystricken childhood, his troubled adolescence and early adulthood, his 19-year imprisonment with 10 years in solitary confinement, and the knowledge that his life was forever altered by injustice. A spiritual as well as factual autobiography, his is not a comfortable story or a comfortable philosophy, but he offers hope for those who have none, and his words are a call to action for those who abhor injustice.

Innocence International (II) seeks to work as a supply depot working in close cooperation with the many Innocence projects throughout the world. Innocence International is in the process of becoming the clearing house for the many miscarriages of justices perpetrated against the wrongfully convicted. When an innocence project, whether in Spokane, Washington or Brussels, Belgium, contacts II with a case of wrongful conviction, II will investigate immediately. Once convinced of the factual innocence of the prisoner, II will utilize all its resources, such as speakers, lawyers, investigators, assisting the local innocence project and seeking the freedom of the wrongfully convicted.

For more information: x3934 or tuftsgloballeadership.org

THE TUFTS DAILY

12

Tuesday, February 8, 2011

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27 Conn. College, which Tufts defeated 5-4 in a regular season match on Nov. 20. Although the Jumbos were the higher-ranked team coming into the contest, this match belonged to the Camels, who came away with a 7-2 victory. With the loss, Tufts finished in last place at the tournament for the first time in more than 15 years.

“Despite the losses, I think we’re still hanging in there,” coach Doug Eng said. “Playing so many freshmen has been tough all season, but I do see these guys at the bottom of the lineup getting better.”

In the Jumbos’ first match of the weekend, Tufts faced No. 21 Wesleyan, ranked seventh in the conference heading into the NESCAC Championships. The Cardinals, who swept Tufts 9-0 in a Dec. 3 match at home, equaled that performance on

Friday with another dominating performance. Tufts’ loss to Wesleyan was its ninth of the season in which it failed to win an individual match.

Tufts put up its biggest fight against Wesleyan at the top of the lineup. Gross and Miller, playing No. 1 and No. 3 respectively, both lost in four highly contested games. Gross won his third game by a 14-12 score before dropping game four, 11-9, to Wesleyan freshman John Steele. Meanwhile, Miller won the first game in his match, 11-8, before losing the next three to Cardinals’ senior co-captain Dale Kobrin.

Senior Ben Rind, playing at No. 2 on Tufts’ ladder, also won a game in his match against Wesleyan senior co-captain Matthew Candal. But Rind had to default midway through the match, automatically giving the win to Wesleyan. The Cardinals lost all three of their remain-

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Team stays optimistic about chances in fourth division despite recent losses MEN’S SQUASH

13

SPORTS

ing NESCAC Championship matches to Williams, Bowdoin, and Colby, finishing eighth in the conference.

The Jumbos wrap up their season with three non-conference matches before team and individual championships. Tufts will face No. 30 Northeastern on Thursday, a team that they may see again in the D-division at the CSA National Singles Championships. Tufts will then take on No. 43 Vassar and No. 57 Bard on Sunday. All three matches should be good opportunities to gauge the team’s progress against lowerranked opponents.

“We haven’t had great success against the teams in the third division, so we need to take care of our matches against teams below us for now,” Gross said. “Right now we are in the fourth division, and I think that we need to try and win.”

MEN’S SWIMMING AND DIVING

Turk named NESCAC Performer of the Week The good news just keeps on coming for freshman Andrew Turk. On Sunday, Turk learned that he will be the 24th and final swimmer on Tufts’ conference championship roster; yesterday, he found out that he is also the men’s swimming NESCAC Performer of the Week.

Turk earned the honors after an excellent performance this past weekend at the Wheaton Invitational. He won the 200yard breaststroke, earned second place in the 200-yard freestyle with the tenth-best time in the conference, swam the first leg of the first-place 400-yard freestyle relay, and swam the eighth fastest time in the conference for the first-place 400yard medley relay team. All of his times were personal bests.

“This past weekend is probably one of the best weekends I’ve had in my life,” Turk said.

“All the guys were behind me 100 percent, and that just made me more confident and able to walk up to the blocks and think, ‘I got this.’ I was just really ecstatic about all of it and really grateful to all the guys.”

Tufts had a great weekend at Wheaton across the board, but coach Adam Hoyt chose Turk because he felt Turk could score the most points at the conference meet in breaststroke events as well as freestyle relays.

Turk’s honor is Tufts’ second such award this year. Junior Owen Rood was also named NESCAC Performer of the Week on Jan. 24.

The Jumbos are now beginning their preparation for the NESCAC championships, which will be held at Bowdoin College from Feb. 25-27.

—by Aaron Leibowitz

Team now needs not only win, but luck, to make NESCAC playoffs HOCKEY continued from page 15

long. Senior goalie Wesley Vesprini denied 12 shots, while freshman Benjamin Coulthard saved ten Tufts attempts. But at the other end of the rink, the Jumbos could not find a way to stop the Bantam attack.

“A team is always more dangerous when they have depth,” Cooper said. “You can play so many lines and keep putting them out because they’re all threatening and they don’t get tired. You can depend on a bunch of guys to score.”

On Friday, Tufts faced Wesleyan and surged to an early 1-0 lead on a goal scored by senior Tom DeRosa. But after

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Cardinals sophomore John Guay broke a 3-3 tie late with a tally late in the second period, Wesleyan controlled the game and went on to hand Tufts its eleventh straight loss with a final score of 6-3.

The Jumbos showed more competitiveness in the second game, though, and after the Cardinals tied up the game after Derosa’s goal, Tufts freshman Kyle Gallegos responded with a power-play goal of his own to bump the Jumbos’ lead back to 2-1. The Cardinals then tied the game at 3-3, and went on to take the lead on Guay’s go-ahead goal.

“We haven’t played with a lead very much this season, and I don’t think we really knew what to do, so we kind of

held back a little bit, and they kind of took advantage of that and capitalized on some key opportunities,” Gallegos said.

In the third period, Wesleyan dominated Tufts, out-shooting the Jumbos 15-1. Koleini had 29 saves, but faced so many shots that it made it hard to keep the Jumbos in the game.

“We kept them around too long and when we did get our chances we didn’t shoot the puck,” Cooper said. “We never took advantage of our chances to get down on their end.”

Before the weekend, the team was optimistic about its playoff chances. But now, after twelve straight losses, the Jumbos know that they have a steep

climb ahead.

“The losses are heartbreakers because we kind of had to win both if we wanted to get in the playoffs,” Cooper said.

“We’ve put ourselves in a situation where we almost have to win out every other game of the season and hope that some of the other NESCAC teams lose some of their games.”

Next weekend, the Jumbos will host the Universities of New England and Southern Maine, still desperately seeking a win that has eluded them for months.

“It was a frustrating weekend for us,” Gallegos said. “We just want to finish the year strong, and hopefully get some momentum going into next year.”

THE TUFTS DAILY

14

SPORTS

Tuesday, February 8, 2011

WOMEN’S TRACK AND FIELD

Hieber, Allen lead the way for Jumbos at Tufts Invitational BY

CONNOR ROSE

Senior Staff Writer

The women’s track team hosted the Tufts Invitational II this weekend — the second of three meets that Tufts WOMEN’S TRACK AND FIELD Tufts Invitational II at the Gantcher Center, Feb. 5 No Team Scoring Tufts Pentathlon at the Gantcher Center, Feb. 4 No Team Scoring will hold this season — and continued to gain momentum as the championship season approaches.

The meet was non-scoring from a team perspective, but individually the women made significant strides.

Freshman Jana Hieber competed in and won her first pentathlon on Friday night to get things started for the Jumbos. Her overall score of 3,015 also provisionally qualified her for Nationals.

Hieber’s performance in the pentathlon is impressive considering her lack of experience in most of the events. Of the five events she participated in, she had never competed in one before at the collegiate level, and in two more this was only her second collegiate effort. In the last event of the pentathlon — the 800-meter run — Hieber displayed superior endurance, finishing more than 17 seconds ahead of the runner-up with a time of 2:19.27.

“Jana is an awesome all-around athlete,” senior tri-captain Rosie Xia said.

“In any event, Jana can excel. She has the right attitude and has a lot of talent. She only really knew two events well, but she has been able to learn the

events so quickly.”

Hieber was surprised by the length of the pentathlon but caught on quickly.

“I didn’t expect to be as tired as I was,” Hieber said. “Before the 800, I thought I would have more energy. I really liked the way the pentathlon was run; [it was] kind of like gymnastics, and I can identify with that.”

But the highlight of Saturday’s competition was in the throwing circle. After breaking the school record in the weight throw last weekend, sophomore Kelly Allen stretched her record by another 16 inches by throwing 49-4 1/4.

In addition to her improvement in the weight throw, Allen also posted a personal best in the shot put with a throw of 41-6, inching even closer to the provisional qualifying mark. Junior Ronke Oyekunle took second in the shot put with a distance of 40-9.

The Jumbos earned three other victories on Saturday. Junior Heather Theiss won the pole vault in a seasonbest 11-1, a move in the right direction for someone who’s been struggling to regain her form from last season.

Fellow junior Dayorsha Collins won the high jump with a leap of 5-4 1/4 and senior tri-captain Kanku Kabongo won the long jump with a 16-10 1/2 effort.

The 4x200-meter relay team posted a time of 1:47.81, a great mark that put the Jumbos in prime position for the upcoming championship meets.

“Our 4x200 and 4x400 relays have been great,” Xia said. “The 4x200 really put together a great race, and the team’s performance in the 4x400 showed we have a ton of options for that relay. It was really exciting to see those relays do so well.”

For the distance athletes, who often competed in events other than their main focus, the meet was more of a tune-up. The Valentine Invitational next weekend at BU — a great opportunity to compete against quality athletes — will

VIRGINIA BLEDSOE/TUFTS DAILY

Jana Hieber reached 1.47 meters in the high jump in her pentathlon at the Tufts Invitational, provisionally qualifying her for Nationals. be more of an opportunity for these Jumbos to get ready for the Division III New England Championships two weeks from now.

The young core of distance runners had the opportunity to run the mile and get in a little speed work.

Freshman Lauren Creath and sophomore Alyssa von Puttkammer finished in 5:25.82 and 5:25.97, respectively.

Another group of young Jumbos was not far behind. Freshman Madeleine Carey, sophomore Lilly Fisher and freshman Abby Barker all finished together at 5:29. A shorter-than-usual

Jumbos need wins to clinch spot in C-Division of the Howe Cup

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race allowed the group to rest their legs as they prepare for a stretch of longer races to close their seasons.

One meet remains before the New England Championships, and the Jumbos will be looking to make final improvements and get more people qualified for the event. Next weekend, the team will be split between two locations, but Xia is confident in its continued chemistry.

“Our team dynamic is strong, and the split squad won’t affect us too much,” Xia said “Our team has been great, so the support will still be there.”

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good points, but a lot of squash is in your head, and I had the confidence this time to pull it off. I knew I could’ve won last time, so it was great to go out there and finally do it.”

The top three players in the Tufts ladder, along with Doherty in the ninth spot, each managed to take just a single game in their matches. Michael and Barba had each gone to five games in the December match-up, but could not stay quite as competitive in this one.

“I went into the match thinking that we had a good chance to win. Even though we lost 9-0 the first time, and that doesn’t look so good on paper, it didn’t really represent how our team played individually,” Rubine said.

The Howe Cup, held at Princeton

the weekend of Feb. 18, marks the final meet of the Jumbos’ season. Before that, Tufts will face off against No. 28 Northeastern on Feb. 10 and No. 22 Vassar on Feb. 13. After last year’s Howe Cup, Tufts moved up from the D- to the C-division. The Jumbos will need to win at least one of their two remaining matches to remain in their newfound spot. Tufts beat Northeastern twice last season, and feel that they can contend with the Brewers as well.

“It would be really big for us to stay in the C-division because we would get another chance to play teams like Colby and Bowdoin,” Barba said. “If we were in the D-division, it wouldn’t be as challenging, and everyone agrees that when we play more difficult opponents we always see how much better we end up playing.”

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Tuesday, February 8, 2011

THE TUFTS DAILY

15

SPORTS

ICE HOCKEY

ALEX PREWITT | LIVE FROM MUDVILLE

Jumbos fall to two more NESCAC rivals BY

KATE KLOTS

Contributing Writer

The hockey team continued to slip in the rankings this weekend, suffering losses to NESCAC rivals Wesleyan and

I

MEN’S HOCKEY (4-14-1, 3-12 ECAC East) at Trinity, Feb. 5 Tufts Trinity

1 5

1 2

0 — 2 1 — 8

at Wesleyan, Feb. 4 Tufts 2 Wesleyan 1

1 3

0— 3 2— 6

Trinity on Friday and Saturday, respectively.

On Saturday, Trinity sophomore Chris Menard scored two goals in the Bantams’ 8-2 win as seven different Bantams earned points in the contest. Tufts eventually turned to backup freshman goalkeeper Brian Phillips in an attempt to change the momentum after Junior Evin Koleini let up five goals on 17 shots.

The Jumbos simply could not contend with the Bantams’ formidable balance and potent attack. Trinity took an early 5-0 lead, after converting four power-play advantages in the first period alone.

“They had a really good power play,”

DAILY FILE PHOTO

Senior quad-captain Tom DeRosa, pictured here in a game against Saint Anselm, opened the scoring for the Jumbos against Wesleyan on Friday night. senior quad-captain Dylan Cooper said.

“I think we gave up five power-play goals. They set [Menard] up so that he was the shooter on those plays.”

Adding to the team’s troubles, the Jumbos’ leading goal-scorer, freshman Kyle Gallegos, left the game early with an injury.

“I didn’t see the second or third

periods, but in the first period nobody stood out on their team,” Gallegos said. “We had four or five penalties in the first ten minutes. That just kind of buried us.”

The Bantams’ goalkeepers silenced the Jumbos’ scoring threats all night see HOCKEY, page 13

MEN’S TRACK AND FIELD

Solid showings abound at pair of home meets BY

LAUREN FLAMENT

Daily Editorial Board

The Gantcher Center was extra busy this weekend, playing host for the Tufts Pentathlon Friday night and Tufts Invitational II on Saturday.

MEN’S TRACK AND FIELD Tufts Invitational II at Gantcher Center, Feb. 5 No Team Scoring Tufts Pentathlon at Gantcher Center, Feb. 4 No Team Scoring With just two weeks remaining before championship season begins, many Jumbos used the non-scoring meet as a chance to hit New England qualifiers.

In a meet far bigger than Tufts Invitational I, four members of the squad captured third place finishes.

Freshman Benji Hansen took third in the 3,000-meter run among 39 competitors. He crossed the line at 8:57.92, nearly 12 seconds faster than his previous personal record set at Springfield two weeks ago.

“I was really happy with my race,” Hansen said. “I went out hard with the group and got in a good place. The second [1,000-meter] was a little slow, but then I kept working my way up the pack and really picked it up the last 800 meters.”

Just a few seconds away from the Div. III qualifier of 8:55, Hansen will look to cut his time down this weekend.

“It’s going to be a really fast race this weekend, so I plan to just tuck in behind some of the fast guys and just hang on and let them carry me through in a fast time,” Hansen said.

Junior Connor Rose added a thirdplace finish in the 1,000-meter run among 33 athletes, crossing the line in 2:33.46, less than a second behind the winning time.

On the field side, senior co-captain Sam Read tied for third in the pole vault, clearing a height of 14-5 1/4, while sophomore Gbola Ajayi took third in the long jump with a distance of 21-1 1/4.

(500) Days of Steelers

VIRGINIA BLEDSOE/TUFTS DAILY

Ben Crasnopol ran the 400-meter dash at the Tufts Invitational II on Saturday in the Gantcher Center, one of the team’s rare home meets this season.

Tufts’ throwing squad had an outstanding performance Saturday, led by a fourth-place finish in the weight throw among 36 athletes by junior Adam Aronson. The throw of 50 1/2 was a personal best by nearly a meter and qualified Aronson for the ECAC Championships.

“I was very happy with how I threw. It was really good competition,” Aronson said. “I just like to keep pushing forward and take it one meet at a time and see where everything goes.”

In the shot put, sophomore Curtis Yancy and freshman Atticus Swett both secured fourth place. Yancy came in with a distance of 44-5 1/2 among 34 competitors and Swett with a throw of 44-3 1/4.

“Overall we had a great day in the throws,” Aronson said. “Curtis threw very well in weight, qualifying for New Englands, and he did great in shot.

Atticus did great and qualified in the shot for Div. IIIs, which is huge for a freshman. [Senior] Alex Gresham also had a season personal record in weight.

We are looking forward to New Englands in a couple of weeks to see if we can do something great.”

Another strong performance on the track came from freshman Liam Cassidy in the mile run. Cassidy finished fifth among 52 athletes. His time of 4:21.50 is the fastest by any Jumbo this season.

On Friday night, three Jumbos competed in the Tufts Pentathlon, which includes the shot put, long jump, high jump, 60-meter hurdles and 1,000-meter run. All three qualified for Div. III New Englands in their first competition of the season. Sophomore Michael Blair finished third among seven competitors, scoring 3,057 points. Freshmen Andrew Osborne and Daniel Lange-Vagle, who finished fourth and fifth, respectively, in their first collegiate pentathlon, supported Blair in the meet.

The Jumbos will be split between two meets this weekend — the Valentine Invitational at BU on Friday and Tufts Invitational III in Gantcher on Saturday.

Many athletes will look to finish their seasons on a high note this weekend, while others will search for final qualifiers for New Englands or will be resting for championship season.

“I think the team is looking really [good] all across the board,” Hansen said. “We are so deep within the distance squad, and the 3K next week is just going to be really phenomenal.”

Hansen expects some impressive team results on a notoriously quick BU track.

“Guys are going to start tapering and then going hard this next weekend,” Hansen said. “BU has a really fast track, so we’re going to be able to see some really fast times out there.”

t’s a foregone conclusion that one of my favorite movies of all time is “(500) Days of Summer” (2009). That is not up for debate. I think it’s a great movie, an even better story, and if Joseph GordonLevitt’s character were female I’d have a colossal celebrity crush on her.

To that end, one of my favorite lines in the movie is when Zooey Deschanel and Gordon-Levitt are in a record store, talking about The Beatles. When told that no one loves Ringo Starr, Deschanel replies, “That’s what I love about him.”

This accurately describes my feelings towards the Pittsburgh Steelers.

On Sunday night, there was a football game, which I guess happens on every Sunday night from September to early February. The Green Bay Packers defeated the Pittsburgh Steelers 31-25 behind Game MVP Aaron Rodgers’ 304 yards and three touchdowns. Ben Roethlisberger couldn’t engineer a last-minute comeback, Eminem starred in two phenomenal commercials and Fergie danced like one of those wacky-waving-inflatable-armflailing-tube guys.

I’m not interested in the outcome of the game. I’m interested in the general hatred felt towards the Steelers in the weeks leading up to Super Bowl XLV. Now, I concede that the majority of America — sans the general Pittsburgh area, Wiz Khalifa and anyone who thought “Black and Yellow” has a hot beat — was rooting for the Packers. The question is, why?

In sports, it’s impossible to root for one team and not instantly hate the other.

Active cheering for Team X implies active opposition to Team Y. We then create villains to justify this hatred. The good guys versus the bad guys. The superheroes versus the anti-heroes. Justice will prevail.

In this situation, the Steelers are easy to loathe. Roethlisberger deserves to lose, some say, because of his sexual-assault allegations, especially when compared to a down-to-earth golden boy like Rodgers, who’s a saint when contrasted with his lewd text-messaging predecessor. Hines Ward smiles too much. James Harrison is a dirty player. Mike Tomlin looks like Omar Epps, who, I guess, some don’t like. The list of transgressions is endless for those who seek the Holy Grail of Hatred.

All this shouldn’t make the Steelers more disliked as a franchise. But it’s important here to distinguish between the whole and the sum of the parts. We project our animosity on the entire Pittsburgh franchise, when we really hate the fact that an alleged rapist spent Sunday in the Super Bowl and not in prison.

But this also has a lot to do with America’s love for what the Packers embody. Villlains need good guys, for balance. Rodgers is squeaky-clean, Green Bay is a non-profit organization and the Packers are as community-oriented as professional teams come.

From a football standpoint, the Packers entered the Super Bowl simultaneously as the underdogs and as the favorites. They became the first NFC sixth seed in history to win the Super Bowl, and took down three top seeds en route to Dallas. In doing so, they captured our hearts and became the trendy choice.

Somehow, though, amid the plate of homemade nachos and stacked pizza boxes, I found myself rooting for the Steelers to overcome the 11-point halftime deficit. Maybe that’s because I have the “Rudy” (1993) complex. Maybe I’m not really interested in hopping on the bandwagon of America’s Teams. Maybe I don’t care that the majority of America loves the Packers with equal parts admiration for Rodgers, love for that Greg Jennings YouTube video and hatred for Roethlisberger.

Because ultimately, the majority’s enmity can be the most appealing trait of all.

Alex Prewitt is a junior majoring in English and religion. He can be reached at Alexander.Prewitt@tufts.edu. His blog is livefrommudville.blogspot.com.

Sports

16

INSIDE Ice Hockey 15 Men’s Track and Field 15 Women’s Track and Field 14

tuftsdaily.com

OPEN GYM TIME

Students miss competitive atmosphere of winter intramurals BY

BEN KOCHMAN

Daily Editorial Board

The Athletics Department’s decision to hold “open gym time” in lieu of a winter intramural season was implemented without any major problems, but intramural diehards remain frustrated that they’ll have to wait until late March for the spring season to begin.

“They took away something that we loved,” senior David Attewell said. “Yeah, we know that the winter season had its flaws, but we’d rather have that than nothing at all.”

Attewell and a few friends showed up on Jan. 24 for the first open gym time session, when Director of Intramural Sports Cheryl Milligan reserved both the Cousens and Chase courts for basketball, by far the most popular intramural sport.

The approximately 30 athletes who came out for the debut of open gym agreed that while having an open gym doesn’t hurt, the replacement does not come close to replicating the intense atmosphere of an intramural season, which includes official rosters, score-keeping and an eventual champion.

“It seems like every other school has a super efficient system, almost as intense as a club or varsity team,” senior Chris Nolop said. “That’s what we wanted.”

Many other NESCAC schools

boast intramural programs that last for the entire school year.

Bowdoin runs three intramural basketball leagues and three intramural hockey leagues during the winter. Middlebury has basketball, ice hockey, indoor soccer and dodgeball leagues, as well as a league for a sport called broomball, which involves brooms, an ice rink and sneakers and generally seems like a blast.

“People really enjoy intramurals here. For me it’s a way to keep playing sports that I played in high school,” Greg Dorris, a sophomore at Middlebury who plays on a intramural hockey team, said.

Milligan, who is the sole administrator for a program that included hundreds of students last year, announced in November that she had cancelled Tufts’ winter league due to space issues in Cousens and the Gantcher Center. Varsity sports, such as lacrosse and track and field, practice in these venues until the weather warms up.

“The time that we have right now just isn’t enough,” Milligan said. “We need about six hours to run a full intramural schedule, and we don’t have that time.”

This lack of space likely will be fixed with the construction of the Athletics Department’s new fitness center. Athletic Director Bill Gehling told the Daily in December that he hopes to break ground on the project this spring and open next fall.

VIRGINIA BLEDSOE/TUFTS DAILY

There was a decent turnout for the Athletic Department’s first open gym time block, but athletes expressed frustration at the winter intramural season’s canceling.

The centerpiece of the proposed three-story building is a fitness facility that will supplement the

existing Chase Gym. “This is not a money issue or an equipment issue,” Milligan

said. “It’s a facilities issue. If we had more facilities, we wouldn’t be having this conversation.”

MEN’S SQUASH

Jumbos finish in last place at NESCAC Championships BY

MATT BERGER

Daily Editorial Board

After three losses in the NESCAC Championships this past weekend, the No. 25 Tufts men’s squash team will almost assuredly lose its place in the College Squash Association (CSA) C-division, forcing the squad to compete in the less-prestigious D-division at the CSA National Singles Championships on

Feb. 25 at Harvard. The losses bring Tufts to 4-15 overall and just 1-10 against NESCAC opponents this season.

In a consolation match against No. 24 Hamilton on Saturday, the Jumbos looked to avenge a 6-3 loss to the Continentals earlier this season. But Hamilton overpowered Tufts from the very beginning and swept four out of the nine individual matches on its way to a 8-1 victory.

Juniors Henry Miller and Luke Metcalf,

freshman Michael Abboud and senior Andrew Kim, playing at the No. 2, No. 9, No. 4 and No. 3 spots respectively in the Tufts lineup, each managed only a single game in their matches. It was an especially tough result for Miller, who defeated Hamilton junior Cooper Veysey in the Jumbos’ earlier meeting with Hamilton.

Playing at the No. 1 spot, senior captain Alex Gross bested Continentals freshman Martin Bawden for the second time this

season, 11-6, 11-7, 8-11, 11-5, to record Tufts’ only victory of the afternoon.

“I am happy with the way guys have competed so far,” Gross said. “Because the team is so young and inexperienced, we have been improving during every match, and I think we will only continue to play better at the end of the season.”

Earlier in the day, the Jumbos faced No. see MEN’S SQUASH, page 13

WOMEN’S SQUASH

Tufts falls to Wesleyan, Colby in NESCAC Tournament BY

ANN SLOAN

Daily Editorial Board

The No. 24 Jumbos exited the weekend’s NESCAC tournament, hosted by Trinity, with a series of not-so-surprising results. Tufts dropped matches to Wesleyan and Colby — a pair of teams ranked above them — but took care of business against lower-ranked Conn.

College. The matches brought Tufts’ record to 6-12 overall and 1-4 in the NESCAC. Tufts closed out NESCAC play for the season Saturday afternoon against No. 21 Colby, a team it lost to in a suspenseful 5-4 match just a week earlier. The Jumbos again were competitive, but again the Mules escaped with a 5-4 win.

At the 3-5 spots, junior co-captain Mercedes Barba, sophomore Jess Rubine and junior Alyse Vinoski had the first three wins for the Jumbos.

Sophomore Caitlin Doherty had the fourth win, beating senior Ellie Hoyt in four

games.

“It would’ve been awesome to beat Colby,” Rubine said.

“We know [sophomore No. 6] Ushashi [Basu] can win, and we know Caitlin [Doherty] can keep winning. We’re getting more confident and we’re using it to our benefit. It may not seem like we’re playing that much better because we haven’t been winning that much, but if we keep up the confidence, we could [beat them].”

Earlier Saturday, Tufts faced No. 25 Connecticut College, which was seeded No. 11 in the tournament. The Jumbos finally put together a winning effort, defeating the Camels 6-3 and snapping their sevengame losing streak.

All six wins came at the top six spots in the ladder. The most exciting match came from junior Alix Michael at the No. 1 spot. Michael won the first two games by significant margins, yet dropped the third and fourth games, keeping her

fans and teammates on their toes before pulling out the win in a decisive 11-6 fifth game.

On Friday, the first round of the tournament pitted the No. 10 seed Jumbos against the No. 7 seed Cardinals, with Wesleyan taking an 8-1 victory — the second time they have defeated Tufts this season. This time around, Rubine was the lone winner on the Jumbos’ side, taking down the victory at the No.4 spot against Wesleyan sophomore Tanesha Jackson in a dramatic five games, storming back to take games four and five each by a score of 11-8.

The two had battled to a fifth game earlier in the season, and Saturday’s match proved just as exciting.

“I was really excited to play her again. I felt more confident in this match because I knew how she played, and I used it to my advantage,” Rubine said. “We each had some really see WOMEN’S SQUASH, page 14

COURTESY VALERIE KOO

Senior co-captain Valerie Koo won her match 3-1 as Tufts downed Conn. College 6-3 on Saturday.