WEEKEND // FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 10, 2012
NUCLEAR MATTERS What is the energy of the future? BY JO HANLE AND ANDREA WHITE, PAGE 3
TRUELOVE
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CENSORED?
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HEDWIG
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THE PEOPLE BEHIND UBYC
FREE SPEECH, UNCLEAR
THE SEARCH FOR WHOLENESS
Akbar Ahmed profiles the founders of Undergraduates for a Better Yale College.
Yanan Wang finds that channels for open dialogue may be stifled.
Joy Shan reviews ‘Hedwig and the Angry Inch’ — and finds it perfectly balanced.
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YALE DAILY NEWS · FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 10, 2012 · yaledailynews.com
Minor Thoughts on Undergraduate Majors
MOTZKIN
KAHOE AND MADISON
WEEKEND VIEWS
// BY CODY KAHOE AND CALEB MADISON
// BY LAUREN MOTZKIN
The recent creation of the Ethnicity, Race & Migration major, and the division of the Biology major has brought to our attention the limitations of the current majors offered at Yale. Therefore, we have taken it upon ourselves to submit to the Dean of Undergraduate Studies, Joseph W. Gordon, some modifications to the current lineup of subjects. Although it may require some sacrifices, we believe that our changes will allow every student to fully pursue his or her passion at Yale. Our suggestions are as follows:
“Stars.” European Studies: The European Studies major will be split into Greater European Studies and Poland. Students applying to the Poland Major will be encouraged to donate food, money or clothing to the destitute Republic of Poland. Donors of over $100 worth of goods will be granted temporary sovereignty over the country, a Polish province named in their honor, and a lifetime supply of kielbasa. Donors of $10 worth of goods or more will receive a Poland tote bag.
I should probably warn you in advance. I am a second semester senior, already nostalgic, reverting back to those early weeks of freshman year when Old Campus seemed like the most beautiful place in the world and even New Haven’s most questionable characters had a kind of charm. “I like my classes! I like my friends! I like my apartment! I can do anything good!” [PLEASE GET THIS REFERENCE] It’s like I’m in this reverse honeymoon period where everything is rosy because it isn’t forever. There’s something leaking from my bathroom ceiling? Slutever, I’m moving out in 3 months. Heat not working this week? LOL I’m young! Still don’t have a job lined up for next year? It’s ok. All I really want to do is “travel” anyway. A by-product of this infatuation with the last of my bright college years is a desire to participate in everything I might have missed: every Liffey’s trivia night, every IM volleyball game, every German department film screening. But despite my militant enthusiasm, I still haven’t been to a single Master’s Tea this year. Or last year for that matter. Last year, I had an excuse. As an editor of this very newspaper, I barely had time to read that Rosalind Krauss essay for class or visit my roommate in the Buttery, let alone spend a precious hour hearing from a moderately successful entrepreneur or a sophomore’s B-list actor uncle. This year, it’s more complicated. My pre-frosh self would be disappointed. At home over winter break I came across the notebook I brought on my college visits my senior year of highschool. Under the heading “Yale University” I listed the things that stuck out to me about the school (things that could later answer the 200-character “Why Yale” essay on the Common App Supplement). By now these things, once the stuff of college brochures and campus tours, have become #shityaliessay (or don’t say, as the case may be): Residential College System, Inner Tube Water Polo,
DONORS OF OVER $100 WORTH OF GOODS WILL BE GRANTED TEMPORARY SOVEREIGNTY OVER THE COUNTRY, A POLISH PROVINCE NAMED IN THEIR HONOR, AND A LIFETIME SUPPLY OF KIELBASA. Division of the Music Major: To account for the varied musical interests at Yale and to ensure that each interest receives proper attention and care, the Music major will be split into Instrumental Studies and A Capella. Instrumental Studies majors will retain the same requirements and DUS as they did under the Music major. Students interested in the A Capella major will be relocated to two new soundproof residential colleges in West Haven. Economics: A new prerequisite to the Economics major, “The Economics of Economics,” will be added. The class will discuss the relative costs and benefits of spending four years studying economics. Science?: By popular demand, Yale will introduce the Science For NonScience Majors major. Prerequisites include “Planets and Stars,” “The History of Life,” “Planets,” and
BLONDE
MY REVERSE HONEYMOON, A MILITANT TWILIGHT
American Studies: The American Studies major will be partitioned into two new majors: Studies and just being American. The former will retain all responsibilities and requirements of the American Studies major. The latter is self-explanatory. Cognitive Science: A new prerequisite to the Cognitive Science major, “The Cognitive Science of Cognitive Science,” will be added. The class will discuss the mental processes by which students decide to spend four years studying Cognitive Science. Portugese: To offset the costs of these majors, Yale will eliminate the Portugese major. Sorry. Contact CODY KAHOE or CALEB MADISON at cody.kahoe@yale.edu and caleb. madison@yale.edu.
YSO Halloween Show, Sterling Memorial Library. About halfway down my list, underlined and asterisked reads “Master’s Teas.” And yet, I still can’t seem to make it to a Master’s Tea even though I’m only taking three classes (and my senior essay, don’t judge). I did, however, sit in on one of Professor Nemerov’s lectures this week, which turns out, was just as good. Full disclosure: I’m an art history major. I took Nemerov’s class my freshman year and was immediately converted from a semi-pre-med, potentialbio major to a lover of the plastic arts. I am not a blind follower of the School of Nemerov (although my first art history paper was based completely on the “painting hand”), but was feeling nostalgic this week and decided to sit in on his Caravaggio lecture. As Nemz was explaining the hidden meaning behind the concentric circles of Bacchus’s wine goblet (is it the glass or the wine?) I had a moment of realization: I don’t have to go to Master’s Teas to get the full “Yale Experience.” Colorme-predictable, but at this point, I’ll take coffee with a friend over tea with a diplomat. Earlier this week, I participated in a three-legged race. After a collegesponsored, seniors-only beer tasting, some friends and I decided to tape our legs together with novelty duct tape (black with orange-and-red flames) and run across the Branford courtyard. No one saw, although I did hear a few windows slam shut as sad underclassmen rolled their eyes at our barking laughter and got back to their reading. Just for the record: my team should have won. Our opponents saw we were closing in on victory and one rogue racer grabbed my teammate’s leg. She fell, I fell. Inches away from our destination (the Master’s house). Contact LAUREN MOTZKIN at lauren.motzkin@yale.edu .
Saturday Morning Love: remember when you stopped being polite? // BY ERICA BLONDE
I want to start by thanking you for looking at yet another article that appears to be about Yale’s sexual climate. I promise this one is going to be different. Starting this weekend, SML: Saturday Morning Love, a blog based on the New York Times series “Modern Love,” (no, not that MODERN LOVE, upperclassmen) will run on the WEEKEND blog every Saturday. Like “Modern Love,” SML will feature collections of “deeply personal essays about contemporary relationships, dating” and other intimate topics every Saturday. The original inspiration for SML came from my frustration with reading about Yale’s hookup culture, DFMOs at Toad’s and sex signals. I wanted to see us push ourselves to stop making generalizations about our experiences with love and relationships and start making things more personal. I wanted to hear from people thinking more deeply about these issues at Yale as individuals. But why flog a dead horse? Fair question. It seems that
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everyone has something to say about love at Yale these days (and by these days I mean just about every day). By nature though, with a few notable, brave exceptions, this new breed of discourse on the culture of sex and relationships has been impersonal, speaking more generally (and often with more hostility) to the Yale experience. I say this only to set this particular conversation apart, as it’s not my intention for SML to become part of that dialogue. SML is a blog about what love has meant to you in your own life during your time at Yale, nothing else. No abstractions. No generalizations. No blaming Yale’s sexual climate on any pervasive cultural norms that may or may not exist. We want your raw, untainted personal experience. Or as they say on MTV’s “The Real World,” “Remember that time when you stopped being polite — and started getting real?” But in all seriousness, “love” in the context of SML is all-encompassing: love for a pet, love for the open road, love for a spot in the library
// CREATIVE COMMONS
that you may or may not have sex in, frequently. You can tell us about your relationship, whether it’s lasted three dates or three years, or about love for your hometown, your parents or your foreign summer someone. However, submitted content need not be glowing with warmth and positivity. Tell us your fears about ending up a spinster, about life after Yale and about heartbreak. Send us your love notes. Posts should be submitted by Fridays at 5 p.m. and should run between 250 and 500 words in whatever form of literary flourishing you so choose (you may even submit a comic), so long as the topic is about love in your time at Yale.
HACKING ON SCIENCE AND MAKEBELIEVE: READING FROM THE EMERGENCE OF PROBABILITY Phelps Hall 401 // 12:00 p.m.
This must make sense to someone.
TELL US YOUR FEARS ABOUT ENDING UP A SPINSTER, ABOUT LIFE AFTER YALE AND ABOUT HEARTBREAK. SEND US YOUR LOVE NOTES. Email submissions to weekendlovenotes@gmail. com. Contact ERICA BLONDE at erica.blonde@yale.edu .
DMCA WORKSHOP: ADVANCED SIGNAL FLOW – LEARNING TO RECORD Digital Media Center for the Arts // 2:30 p.m.
DMCA has a recording studing named “Horst” and you can use it!
NOTES ON FIFTEENTH-CENTURY REALISM 82-90 Wall, RLL // 3:00 p.m.
Italy, politics, art, real-looking things, etc.
“THE DISCOVERY OF THE MEANS OF RELEASING ATOMIC ENERGY BEGAN A NEW ERA IN THE HISTORY OF CIVILIZATION. IT MAY SOME DAY PROVE TO BE MORE REVOLUTIONARY IN THE DEVELOPMENT OF HUMAN SOCIETY THAN THE INVENTION OF THE WHEEL, THE USE OF METALS, OR THE STEAM OR INTERNAL COMBUSTION ENGINE.” — PRESIDENT HARRY S. TRUMAN
YALE DAILY NEWS · FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 10, 2012 · yaledailynews.com
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WEEKEND COVER
NUCLEAR’S BACK WITH NEW CLARITY // BY JO HANLE AND ANDREA WHITE
// CREATIVE COMMONS
ason Parisi ’15 is passionate about energy issues. He is so passionate that he’s currently writing a book on energy in North Korea and China. When asked a question about the technical nuances of the global nuclear energy debate, Parisi nods, says “OK,” and commences to explain thoroughly. On Thursday, the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission authorized the construction of two new reactors near Augusta, Georgia, in a 4-1 vote. Approval for the reactors was delayed after the March 2011 near meltdown of Japan’s Fukushima Number 2 plant caused concerns over U.S. safety regulations for nuclear power plants. Parisi, who sees a future powered by nuclear fusion, said he approves of the decision. “I’m very surprised — and I suppose I’m very pleased,” Parisi said of the licensing and building of the nation’s first new nuclear reactor since 1978. “If we weren’t dependent on fossil fuels, it would have happened far earlier.”
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tal issues are at the forefront,” he said. In a warmer-than-usual winter, Parisi said he has noticed that many students share the same reaction: Throughout campus Yalies have been walking out their entryways, and saying “Oh — must be climate change!” Whether or not the weather was caused by global warming is irrelevant, Parisi explained. He has observed that Yalies generally understand climate change — they just don’t talk about energy solutions. *** Last March, a Gallup poll found — paradoxically — that Americans simultaneously felt they understood climate change better and were worrying about it less. For the general public, the only thing certain about this debate is uncertainty on how to move forward. Nowhere is this more clear than in the 70-year history of nuclear energy in the United States. Presidents and public figures have hailed the atom as the destroyer of
YALE IS GOING TO PRODUCE SOME INCREDIBLE PEOPLE, AND THEY NEED TO BE NURTURED IN A PLACE WHERE ENVIRONMENTAL ISSUES ARE AT THE FOREFRONT.
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Parisi is this passionate about his chosen field of research, he said, because it saved him. By his second year of high school in inner city London, Parisi said, he was struggling both at school and at home. That summer, he went on a trip with his uncle to the Middle East, where he saw people living in conditions that made his own life seem privileged by comparison. “I saw the condition of people who worked in Dubai and I was just amazed at how divided the energy consumption was,” Parisi said. The clarity that the trip provided Parisi with regard to the economy and energy motivated him to improve his schoolwork. He realized, Parisi said, “that the rules of general relativity apply to more than just physics.” But Parisi is an outlier in Yale’s student body. Economics, physics, and questions of development carried him through his school — and to Yale. But now that he’s here, he thinks it could be better in at least one way. “Yale is going to produce some incredible people, and they need to be nurtured in a place where environmen-
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civilizations and the savior of humanity, sometimes in the same speech. Nuclear energy was all but abandoned in America after the 1979 meltdown at Three Mile Island, a nuclear plant in Harrisburg, Penn. But as the world understands the gravity of climate change, everyone is seeking a solution as large as the problem. It’s in this environment that the debate about nuclear energy has been rekindled. The debate is scattered, happening in the minds of students, professors and government officials, but not always in the mainstream. Some of these students and professors are Yalies, and yet nuclear hasn’t become a buzzword on campus.
HOW TO STUDY ENERGY?
The environmental movement missed an opportunity after the energy crisis of 1971, professor John Wargo GRD ’74 said. Somehow, he explained, the energy issue got subsumed into environmental studies — rather than becoming what it needed to: its very own discipline. Truly understanding energy technologies and the potential for their use, Wargo said, requires knowledge of eco-
FACETS OF FEMININITY IN MODERN AND CONTEMPORARY ART YUAG // 3:00 p.m.
WEEKEND favorite Cokey Cohen teachin’ you thingz.
nomics, physics, biology, law and engineering — basically any discipline north of Yale Law School. As chair of the Environmental Studies major, Wargo has the precise perspective to evaluate the state of Yale’s undergraduate education in energy issues. He sees that Yale students in general do not possess the scientific literacy to understand the complex issues that determine which energy sources can or should be used. But the problem is not exclusive to Yale. “It’s a multidisciplinary problem that has fallen between the cracks of academia,” Wargo explained. In a university where the disciplines define how and who studies what, something that requires an understanding of many can seem monumentally challenging. Some researchers have begun to see the demand for a new, focused, interdisciplinary field of study, potentially housed in its own, discrete department. Wargo said there is progress toward this end: Under his colleague, Gary Brudvig, deputy director of the Yale Climate and Energy Institute, an “energy certificate” program will launch for Yale undergraduates this fall. The pair hope to construct a cohesive program of study where none has existed before. Some students are ready for this kind of focus. Chelsea Andreozzi ’12 is an Environmental Studies major who has noticed the lack of cohesion within the major, and what amounts to a gaping hole in the program — a lack of education on energy issues. “The only class that I’ve taken related to energy was a college seminar that didn’t count for credit in the major, and it contradicted a lot of what I learned in other classes,” said Andreozzi. Her education in Environmental Studies did not teach her about energy solutions to climate change, she said. Though it is covered in bits and pieces across the disciplines, Wargo said that he and some of his colleagues — Brudvig and other members of YCEI — think that energy studies could be a crucially important field.
GLOBAL PROBLEMS, GLOBAL SOLUTIONS
Parisi is involved in the Yale undergraduate chapter of Global Zero, a larger organization dedicated to a goal that is both tangible and enormous: They want no nations to possess nuclear arms. The group began at Yale in 2010, and has since grown drastically — Global Zero’s student leaders are organizing an intercollegiate conference on nuclear disarmament, to be held at Yale next weekend. The organization’s leaders are strongly motivated by the notion that individuals should not hold the power of destruction over millions of people. “No human being should be saddled with responsibility for so much destruction. It’s a responsibility … that no one is capable of having and wielding responsibly,” said Donna Horning ’13, assistant campus coordinator for Yale’s chapter of Global Zero. Unlike many campus organizations, Parisi said, Global Zero is focused on a specific, globally-oriented policy goal. Global Zero is focused on the enormous global problem of nuclear disarmament, while other groups on campus attempt to tackle the similarly massive issue of climate change. One of those organizations is the Yale Student Environmental Coalition, though YSEC takes a markedly different approach.
FORMING NATIONAL FAVO(U) RITES: INVICTUS, IF AND THE LEGACIES OF VICTORIAN RECITATION LC 319 // 4:00 p.m.
Anglophiles, take note!
JULIUS CAESAR
On Feb. 8, the current board of the Yale Student Environmental Coalition sat in the Dwight Hall library discussing Earth Month. They’ve got movies and field trips planned and they praised last semester’s successful protest of the proposed Keystone XL pipeline. The agenda did not include discussing nuclear or alternative energies. YSEC’s President Julie Botnick ’14 explained that anyone wanting to accomplish good for the environment has to set small, tangible goals. Tackling climate change can look like a large, overwhelming task. A large overwhelming task — YSEC Vice President Emmanuel Feld ’13 added — that can make individuals feel powerless. Treasurer Patrick Reed ’15, the only freshman on the board, he said he was surprised to see that there were not more public attempts to push Yale students into a conversation about climate change. He said that he sees the silence on campus as indicative of a national silence. “You could say people have given up hope,” Reed explained, saying that the perceived failures of Obama and the 2009 United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen discouraged many environmentalists. Events Coordinator Rick Herron ‘13 agreed that the absence of a conversation about energy on campus reflects its fall from the national limelight. “[Climate change] is not a flashpoint like sexual culture,” he said. “There was more discussion when it was a live issue on a national level.” On potential energy sources, the group agreed that wind and solar are the ideal energy choices. Feld explained that he, personally, does not see a role for nuclear power in weaning the U.S. off of fossil fuels. “It’s not efficient, not cost-effective. It takes so many years to build a nuclear plant,” Feld said. He also pointed out that most nuclear infrastructure is old and takes years to update. Yale’s chapter of Global Zero has grown enormously over the last two years, focusing on a campaign for a singular global policy initiative, while YSEC has maintained a core of environmentalists dedicated to local solutions to the global problem of climate change. Though YSEC members and other environmentalists often ponder broader solutions, the cohesion and coordination necessary to focus on and rally around a larger solution hasn’t yet been achieved. While Global Zero advocates a simple, focused solution for their global issue, YSEC — and ultimately many environmental groups, programs, and initiatives — are scattered on exactly what to do about climate change and energy issues.
WHO HAS THE ANSWERS?
Nuclear power can be beast, angel — or simple utility. Of all energy sources, nuclear power demonstrates the ability of the public mind to fixate on one quality of a technology and misunderstand the complexities of a global situation. The dangers of nuclear energy are obvious: There is the threat of an accident like last year’s quake that destroyed the reactor in Fukushima in March 2011 as well as the accumulation of radioactive waste that will remain radioactive for hundreds of thousands of years. “Nobody wants a nuclear power
Iseman Theater // 4:00 p.m. Et tu, WEEKEND?
SEE NUCLEAR PAGE B8
“THIS ENERGY IS TO PROPEL THE MACHINES OF PROGRESS; TO LIGHT OUR CITIES AND OUR TOWNS; TO FIRE OUR FACTORIES; TO PROVIDE NEW SOURCES OF FRESH WATER; AND TO REALLY HELP US SOLVE THE MYSTERIES OF OUTER SPACE AS IT BRIGHTENS OUR LIFE ON THIS PLANET.” — PRESIDENT LYNDON B. JOHNSON
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YALE DAILY NEWS · FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 10, 2012 · yaledailynews.com
WEEKEND ARTS
BEES, STRIPPERS, SPERM AND A PRINTER: A READING // BY CAROLINE MCCULLOUGH
On Thursday night at 6:00 p.m., a calculated and pleasant voice broke the florescent hum in the New Haven Free Public Library. The P.A. system announced, “The library is delighted to present The Sixth Annual Readings of Anne Fadiman and her students, Alex Klein, Lauren Oyler and Sophia Veltfort, to take place in the performing arts area.” The performing arts area is a corner of the library’s basement. Due partly to advertising and refreshments provided by the Yale College Dean’s Office, and more so to the admiration of friends, family and fans, about 100 people gathered for a carefully choreographed, and often quite funny, hour of words. Fadiman explained that the event began in 2006 when the library asked her to speak as part of their “Writers Live Program.” Fadiman agreed, she said, “but on one condition, that I be permitted to bring some of my students to read with me.” The library said yes, and the tradition has carried on each year. “I really like the idea of showing the patrons of the local public library who are readers, that’s who they are, what good writers Yale undergraduate are,” Fadiman said, “We are all familiar with the excellent academic works of Yale students, and of course we read the Yale Daily News, but this is a different genre that we might get tastes of in the YDN Magazine or the New Journal. But, it is fun to see them up there reading.” Anne Fadiman is the author of “The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down,” winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award, “Ex Libris: Confessions of a Common Reader,” and “At Large and at Small: Familiar Essays.” She is the Francis Writer in Residence at Yale and teaches two extremely popular writing seminars. The students’ essays were all written for one of these classes. Sophia Veltfort took “Writing About Oneself” last spring. Alex Klein and Lauren Oyler took “Advanced Non-Fiction Writing” last fall. The three students are all incredibly accomplished writers themselves.
Klein has reported for the Times of London, The New Republic, and New York Magazine. Veltfort’s essay cowon Yale’s Wright Memorial Prize, was a finalist for the Norman Mailer award, and is going to be published in the Harvard Review. The day Oyler’s profile was workshopped in class, prolific writer and journalist Gay Talese was visiting. Fadiman recalled that Oyler’s essay, “made a big impression on him and he felt that her piece should be published in Vanity Fair.” Fadiman stressed that because she has so many “terrific writers” in her classes, the most awkward aspect of the reading for her is the selection of the three students. “I could never select my three best writing students,” Fadiman said. “The three that I choose are always among the best writers and happen to have written pieces that I think would be particularly engaging if read aloud.” Fadiman looked on with a humongous smile as each student stood to read. The students’ pieces spanned topics from a mortal fear of bees to a New Haven stripper to a daughter’s search for her father. Although
all of the readings were excerpts from much longer pieces, the writing held together coherently and proved quite powerful, even in reduced form. The readings gave the audience just enough to understand the sentiment of the piece, and want to know more. Alex Klein began the readings with his essay on a month he spent at an apiary, a place where beehives are cultivated. In it’s entirety, Klein’s essay is a profile of the beekeeper there. “I got to know the beekeeper well, and we became quite close. It was probably through getting to know her that I was able to face up to the bees themselves and actually do some beekeeping.” Klein’s excerpt vividly describes the drama of his encounters with the bees in an amusingly self-deprecating performance. He read, “Should I really be afraid? I know these insects. They just sort of help plants get laid.” An experienced performer, Klein seemed comfortable in front of an audience, allowing appropriate pauses for laughter and swinging his voice with the rhythm of his words. “I sometimes write in a voice that I think can be spoken or theatrical,” Klein said.
“I think maybe that’s in my piece.” He said that in writing this piece, he had the opportunity to experiment, to play with his prose. Beyond learning that he could “be around bees without freaking out like a little girl,” Klein said, “I learned you can really create powerful prose opening yourself up a little bit and writing about yourself and allowing yourself to be a bit more vulnerable on the page.” The next speaker, Lauren Oyler, also read an excerpt from a profile entitled “Born Naked.” Oyler wrote about a 19-year-old New Haven stripper. Her first line reads, “The first time I saw Jackie naked was the first time I saw Jackie.” Oyler goes on to wittily describe her experience at the club Cat Walk, her relationship with Jackie and her changing views of stripping. At first uncomfortable at the club, Oyler begins to recognize the opportunities Jackie sees in stripping. Oyler was worried that her sense of humor would not translate well in an oral medium because she tends to utilize long sentences, creative compound adjectives, and scare quotes — devices that resonate best in print. But her worries were ultimately unfounded, and her reading elicited many laughs from the audience. Despite the humor, Oyler’s piece ends on a poignant note that Fadiman describes as “a twist that really makes you stop and think. It ends on a somewhat more serious note. I love the ending because it is like a bell whose tomes keep on echoing in your ear long after the bell has struck.” Sophia Veltfort’s piece also ended on a more serious note. Veltfort’s larger essay addressed the topic of her identity. “My story is unusual,” Veltfort said, “because not a huge number of people have two moms and a sperm donor for a dad.” Sophia’s essay was a series of vignettes taken from different years of her life as she attempted to create an imagining of her father. The essay follows her struggle to come to terms with the unreality of the fictionalized character she had made her father out to be from the few adjectives she knew of him. The plot of her essay seems to mirror the tract of her writ-
// EARL LEE
The Sixth Annual Reading
ing career. “Writing About Oneself” was Veltfort’s first nonfiction class. With a strong background in fiction writing, Veltfort’s nonfiction carries a wonderful sense of storytelling and narrative purpose. The night ended with Fadiman’s reading of a recent essay titled, “My Old Printer.” Fadiman said she truly wanted the night to focus on her students, and described her reading as “an afterthought.” Fadiman’s reading complemented those of her students. Each essay related to an overall theme of attachment, she observed, adding that her attachment was to her ancient, bulky, beloved printer. She described her printer as suffering “the inevitable aches and pains of old age: paper jams, ghost images, toner smears. It needed medical attention, but, like a patient too obese to be lifted from its bed, it required house calls.” Fadiman continued the rhythm of lighthearted jokes followed by a poignant message as she explained that her relationship with her printer was likely based on her association with it. She read, “Surrounded by the lightfooted young, who skitter effortlessly from task to task, we cling to our obsolete equipment because we are afraid that we will be discontinued, that we will be hauled away on Bulky Waste Day.” But Fadiman’s writing and the skills she teaches are far from being taken out on Bulky Waste Day. All of the reader’s words, in their wit and tremendous honesty, demonstrated vitality. There was a clear sense of camaraderie between the group, not excluding, but folding the audience into their world. “I think reading aloud is tremendously important,” Fadiman said, “because we can hear things that we can’t see.” Contact CAROLINE MCCULLOUGH at caroline.mccullough@yale.edu .
THE STUDENTS’ PIECES SPANNED TOPICS FROM A MORTAL FEAR OF BEES TO A NEW HAVEN STRIPPER TO A DAUGHTER’S SEARCH FOR HER FATHER.
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MATERIAL FREQUENCIES OPENING RECEPTION Davenport College Gallery // 5:30 p.m.
Mingle with art about bodies.
SOUTHEAST ASIA SPRING CULTURAL FESTIVAL
Luce Hall Common Room // 6:00 p.m. Culture! Dance! Music! Hosted by the Southeast Asian Studies Department.
“PAINTING & PRINTMAKING MFA EXHIBITION PART I” OPENING RECEPTION Green Hall // 7:00 p.m.
Your best chance to snare an art student to call your very own.
“THE NATION’S NUCLEAR FUEL SUPPLY IS IN A STATE OF TRANSITION. MILITARY NEEDS ARE NOW RELATIVELY SMALL BUT CIVILIAN NEEDS ARE GROWING RAPIDLY AND WILL BE OUR DOMINANT NEED FOR NUCLEAR FUEL IN THE FUTURE.” — PRESIDENT RICHARD NIXON
YALE DAILY NEWS · FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 10, 2012 · yaledailynews.com
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WEEKEND TRUELOVE
UNDERGRADUATES FOR A BETTER YALE: A PROFILE // BY AKBAR AHMED
On their website, they say they “believe Yale can do better.” In their eyes, they’re making a stand against our campus’ prevalent sexual climate — and they know they’re right. To others, they’re everything from repressed, self-loathing Victorians to killjoys who should stay at Global Grounds to representatives of a larger division at Yale. In the pages of this very publication, they’ve been called everything from “joyless prudes” to “puritanical.” They don’t particularly care what you call them. They’re happy with their successes and are eager to fight for more. Meet Undergraduates for a Better Yale College. They don’t believe in moral relativism, they don’t want your talk of “consent” and “live and let live,” and they’re ready to lay out a hundred and one reasons why. “A number of events last year were indicative of a negative sexual environment on campus, such as the DKE incident, the Title IX complaint and that infamous email where Dean [of Student Affairs] Marichal Gentry spoke about ‘glorious consensual
sex,’ ” said Eduardo Andino ’13, one of the three co-founders of the organization. “The problem is our obsession with sex and the pursuit of pleasure, and UBYC hopes to address that problem at its roots.” Andino is used to giving these answers. He’s been interviewed by everyone from the YDN to MSNBC. After he and his friends established UBYC last semester, and put up a controversial flyer calling out to Yalies dissatisfied with the campus hookup culture, the group has become something of a phenomenon, in large part due to its determination to shut down or otherwise handicap Sex Week, Yale’s bi-annual, quasisex-ed-related week of events celebrating the glorious big S. “People call us all these names — it’s baffling to them that somebody could even question the hookup culture or suggest that Sex Week is bad,” said Isabel Marin ’12, another UBYC cofounder. In her eyes, UBYC is a oneissue group set on helping stable, monogamous, long-term relationships triumph over hook-up culture. And that means not just opposing Sex Week, but push-
ing for a general paradigm shift as well. “If you’re willing to question random hookups, if you’re against friends with benefits, if you think the way to solve the sexual climate is by encouraging students to stay in serious, stable relationships,” Marin emphasized, “consider yourself an ally of UBYC.” As things stand, how many students are willing to adopt that label is questionable. Andino said the largest turnout at a True Love Week event (not counting protesters) has been roughly 40 people, while, on average, they have drawn about 20. “I’d like to see the rooms packed,” Andino said. He added that he has a “genuine” interest in getting to know the whole campus. Perhaps the campus should get to know UBYC first.
TAKING ISSUE WITH ‘MAJORITY CULTURE’
When Courtney McEachon ’15 arrived at Yale from her Catholic all-girls’ high school in Buffalo, New York, last fall, she joined Choose Life at Yale (CLAY), an on-campus pro-life group. She had her mind made up about which direction she wanted to go at Yale: she became involved in CLAY, the William F. Buckley Jr. Program and the Federalist Party, groups that spoke to her “conservative religious perspective,” she said. Then, at one CLAY dinner, she fell into the midst of a conversation that began months earlier. The main speakers: Andino, the president of UBYC and CLAY, and Marin, a senior member of the anti-abortion organization and part of UBYC’s troika of leaders.
“
founders, friends of his, convinced him of the import of their mission early on last semester. “At first, I thought, like many Yale students, that the Sex Week dialogue was useful based on [one’s] lifestyle,” he explained. Heine and several other students friendly with UBYC’s leaders had similar conversations over the next few weeks — in suites and in dining halls — slowly but surely rallying behind UBYC’s ideology. “There’s a lot of overlap with CLAY,” Andino admitted. But he added that this is because the two issues are tied. “They’re both social justice issues, not just conservative causes, that are protecting human rights and dignity in two different ways.”
SAME GOAL, DIFFERENT BACKGROUNDS
Why UBYC’s issue is so pressing is a question Andino’s peers answer in different ways: while common causes may have brought the UBYC’s membership together for this battle and others, they come to the organization with varying perspectives that inform their individual understandings of its mission. Marin, for one, was drawn to UBYC for its condemnation of Yale’s hook-up culture. Although she said she “fully participated in hook-up culture at one point,” she eventually realized that she was “not respecting [her]self.” Reaching out to individuals who might also be both involved in and skeptical of the hook-up scene is a focus of the organization, according to Heine and Andino. “We believe our views will make those people happier,” Heine said. Still, Andino argued that it
Heine said that his own experience with the Bible confirmed the organization’s view that hookups necessitate an “unnatural separation” between emotions and actions. McEachon explained that her Catholic beliefs mean that she never engaged with the hookup culture and that she mostly associates with “like-minded people.” She added that her association with people who share her views means that she sometimes lacks exposure to other perspectives. “A lot of times I can’t relate to some of the things in hook-up culture that I don’t know about,” she said. Heine and McEachon are both involved with groups of undergraduates who don’t participate in hook-up culture, seeking out their own forms of entertainment. But the fact that the groups are comfortable sidestepping Yale’s hook-up culture rather than attempting to reform it can make recruitment difficult. Heine said that prior to speaking to UBYC’s founders, he too had “resigned [him]self” to the “majority culture” of Yale dances likes residential college screws, and tends to avoid them.
WILL YALE BECOME ‘BETTER’?
True Love Week has generated articles, protests and, perhaps most critically to UBYC’s mission, conversations. Yet where the group will go moving forward, in the absence of a clearly defined opponent like Sex Week, is unclear. Andino said he wants to continue spreading an anti-hookup message, particularly because Yale graduates are likely to play important roles later in their lives. “If we can produce indi-
REACHING OUT TO INDIVIDUALS WHO MIGHT ALSO BE BOTH INVOLVED IN AND SKEPTICAL OF THE HOOK-UP SCENE IS A FOCUS OF THE ORGANIZATION.
“
“I heard about UBYC through Isabel and Eduardo, which was the same place I heard about Sex Week,” said McEachon, the sole freshman on the UBYC’s main organizing committee. “They had to preface their explanation of UBYC with what Sex Week was — I understood it to be a series of very unsavory speakers talking about, you know, sex, pornography,” she continued. Marin, Andino and Bijan Aboutorabi ’13, the group’s cofounders, began an email dialogue early last summer about recent events at Yale and the prospect of Sex Week being hosted just under a year on from Title IX. They agreed, Marin said, that a response was necessary. So they set out to bring together students from forums they considered likely to be home to those with viewpoints that matched theirs. Travis Heine ’14, who is involved with CLAY and the Conservative Party of the Yale Political Union, said UBYC’s // VICTOR KANG
From left to right, Eduardo Andino ‘13, Bijan Aboutorabi ‘13, Isabel Marin ‘12
F R I D AY F E B RUA RY 1 0
SAYBROOK COLLEGE ORCHESTRA — WINTER BENEFIT CONCERT Battell Chapel // 8:00 p.m.
Start your night off right with some classical music!
SPECTRAL SCRIABIN
University Theater // 8:00 p.m. Pianoz and sick visualz.
may take a “truly bad” hookup experience for someone to come around to the UBYC view. Such is the position in which Marin found herself, she said. “It took somebody else to respect me more than I respected myself to make me realize I wasn’t respecting myself,” she explained. With that realization, the selfdescribed “super-liberal high school feminist” began to look at her former experiences in a different light. What bothers Marin most now is the danger inherent to a culture based on loosely defined consent. She argued that, despite consent, the hook-up culture inevitably leads to violence against women, rape and sexual misconduct. “It’s a pretence that you can fully communicate with someone you don’t know, especially about issues as powerful, as dangerous, as exciting as sex,” she said. “Real consent needs relationships — a hookup culture will just lead to rape.” A conservative feminist, Marin added that groups like the Women’s Center and the Consent and Communication Educators are often helpful only “after the fact.” Unlike Marin, Heine and McEachon approach membership in the UBYC from more religious points of view.
BULLETPROOF: PROOF OF THE PUDDING’S ANNUAL JAM Sudler Hall // 8:00 p.m.
Sweet tunes from lovely ladies.
viduals with that enthusiasm and that vision, we can increase happiness, trust and friendship,” he added. Even in an ideal situation, establishing such an environment on just one campus may not necessarily lead to the broader cultural changes UBYC envisions. “My friends at other colleges haven’t really come to be as sympathetic with the UBYC views,” said McEachon. “Some of them definitely see the effect of hookups on the campus culture at large, but they’re not willing to give it up.” The battle may be “never-ending,” Heine said, but the organization’s increased visibility after True Love Week may be a cause for some UBYC celebration. “I do think a change will come from people seeing that they are hurt by the sexual culture,” Andino said, “and that they don’t have to be embarrassed about the fact that they might want a relationship.” Perhaps, then, we’ll one day come closer to Heine’s vision of an ideal night out: “toning down the whole hip-hop culture […] any dancing would be preferable to grinding.” Contact AKBAR AHMED at akbar.ahmed@yale.edu .
“NUCLEAR OPPONENTS, WHO WOULD SHUT DOWN EVERY REACTOR IN THE COUNTRY TONIGHT, SIMPLY ARE NOT IN TOUCH WITH OUR NEEDS FOR TOMORROW. BUT NUCLEAR ADVOCATES, WHO WOULD PRETEND THAT NOTHING WAS CHANGED BY OUR VIGIL AT THREE MILE ISLAND, SIMPLY ARE NOT IN TOUCH WITH REALITY.” — DICK THORBURGH
PAGE B6
WEEKEND SEX
YALE DAILY NEWS · FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 10, 2012 · yaledailynews.com
YALE DAILY NEWS · FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 10, 2012 · yaledailynews.com
PAGE B7
TALK
SEX WEEK: FROM BDSM TO PUBLIC POLICY T
he year of 2011-’12 has been one of much heat for Sex Week. With the release of the Campus Climate Report in September 2011, the biannual tradition was placed on shaky grounds: Its right and its utility as a campus event was seriously questioned, and for a time it seemed that we might not have a Sex Week 2012. And yet here we are, eight days into this renewed endeavor with four more days to go. We’re pleasantly reaffirmed in our right to discuss — to communally educate ourselves on — all matters sexual. WEEKEND dispersed its investigative, critical and opinionated forces into the talks of Sex Week, and is glad to report that the items on the agenda were serious, thought-provoking and adequately addressed. But not without a bit of laughter and cheek added into the mix.
BDSM: Not this year’s blowjob oration // BY NATASHA THONDAVADI Have you ever gotten a hickey? Given a hickey? Most of us have. But what most of us don’t know is that even something as simple as a hickey can share motivations with BDSM, a collective term that denotes the sexual preferences of Bondage and Discipline, Domination and Submission, and Sadism and Masochism. Despite this ignorance, about 40 students gathered on Wednesday to hear a panel on the topic of BDSM. From the experienced kinkster to the virgin, everyone seemed to be curious. To be honest, from the moment I saw the event on the Sex Week 2012 calendar, I was intrigued. As a gaggle of giggling freshmen filed into the back row of the small LC lecture hall, I realized what it was that was so captivating about the event on paper: the spectacle. As a sophomore, I wasn’t at Yale for the famed blowjob oration, and this event probably seemed the closest within this year’s Sex Week repertoire to the hotly debated scandal. So it’s really remarkable that the panelists managed to keep the dialogue mature and the analysis reasonable — if you expected to see one of the speakers whip out a pair of handcuffs, you were probably one of the many students who trickled out over the course of the talk.
The three panelists offered diverse perspectives. Dr. Charley Ferrer, who ran the show, is a Clinical Sexologist and seemed well versed herself in the goingson of the BDSM “community” (more on that later). Judy Guerin’s place on the panel derived explicitly from her extensive experience in the practice and education of BDSM. And adding a sobering tone to the whole experience, Dick Cunningham spoke of BDSM from the angle of a legal consultant on issues of discrimination with WASP flair. Many of the ideas discussed were new to me. The panelists spoke of the “BDSM community” as a source for warmth, advice, acceptance and continuing education — but as one anonymous audience member asked, isn’t BDSM a kinda, ya know, private thing? Especially when the speakers seemed to continually stress the difference between the consensual, if uncommon, sexual practices and actual violence. But BDSM can be private or public, sexual or nonsexual — it’s more of a need to, say, feel like a slave than to necessarily be a sex slave. Guerin stressed this angle of looking at BDSM as an overall desire, describing it as her sexual orientation, much as some people would identify as gay or straight. But regardless of the variety of viewpoints expressed, the panelists agreed that the most important aspect of learning about BDSM is learning to accept the practice. Less than twenty years ago, the desire for BDSM sexual practices was considered a mental illness. While that classification may have been erased, the associated stigmas still exist. And so the speakers stressed that the main take-away from the event should be that BDSM isn’t weird, gross or misogynistic. Rather, it’s anything you and your partner want it to be.
// AUBE RAY LESCURE
S AT U R D AY F E B RUA RY 1 1
WORLD MICRO-MARKET VALENTINES DAY SALE
Dwight Hall Chapel // 11:00 a.m. Buy your sweetheart something international.
THE SWORD AND THE SCREEN – PROGRAM FIVE Whitney Humanities Center Auditorium // 1:00 p.m.
Rare Japanese Samurai Filmz.
“GÖTTERDÄMMERUNG”
Sprague Mememorial Hall // 12:00 p.m. See opera from the comfort of your own city.
Contact NATASHA THONDAVADI at natasha.thondavadi@yale.edu .
“THE FIRST LESSON THAT EMERGED FROM CHERNOBYL WAS THE DIRECT RELEVANCE OF INTERNATIONAL COOPERATION TO NUCLEAR SAFETY.” — DR. MOHAMED ELBARADEI
The right to privacy and the importance of public opinion
‘Stripped’ down to laughter // BY DEVIKA MITTAL
// BY NATALIE COLLINS Privacy as a right was first summoned up from the penumbras of the Constitution in 1965’s Griswold v. Connecticut. It reached new heights in 2001’s Lawrence v. Texas, when the overturning of a Texas anti-sodomy statute gave Americans the right to be free from prosecution for private, consensual, noncommercial, non-injurious sexual conduct. At the Sex Week discussion of “Privacy, Sexuality, and the Law” this past Tuesday, panelists Dick Cunningham, Judy Guerin and Liz Montegary outlined the limitations still inherent in the Lawrence decision and the next steps for activists looking to expand on the sexual freedom it offers. (Cunningham is a lawyer who has played a leading role in landmark cases relating to gender, race, and sex; Guerin is the director of NCSF’s Consent Counts Program to decriminalize BDSM in the U.S. and former advisor to the European Union Human Rights Commission on sexual freedom and LGBTQ issues; Montegary is a visiting lecturer in Yale’s WGSS Department.) With Lawrence’s decision still restricted to the monogamous, noncommercial and non-injurious, the next stage of the expansion of sexual freedom may lie in the work of what Cunningham called “sex-positive activists” looking to legalize certain sexual behaviors like polyamory, sex
work and BDSM. Such lifestyles are often difficult to reconcile with the traditional conception of marriage, the expansion of which has been the main goal of LGBT activism in recent years. The panelists agreed that marriage is problematic, with the potential to coerce as well as liberate. While legal reforms are important for sexual freedom, the speakers stressed the importance of public opinion. Recent victories for the LGBT community, such as the repeal of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell and the rejection of Prop 8, have been made possible by the increasing willingness of the body politic to believe that homosexuality is neither inherently scary nor harmful. Other communities looking for sexual freedom, such as BDSM and polyamory participants, need to accomplish a similar feat. “In some ways, the law can lead public opinion,” said Cunningham. “In other ways, public opinion has to lead the law.” Guerin was optimistic on this front. Noting the 15-20 year lapse between societal evolution and policy change, she posited sexual freedom to be the next big civil rights movement on America’s horizon. Cunningham called the right of privacy and the responsibility of consensuality the two fundamental concepts for sexual-freedom advo-
cates. Once society understands that certain acts are non-destructive as long as they’re consensual, it becomes reasonable that such acts deserve privacy. And this privacy, once achieved, reinforces the need for those who have it to act consensually. Montegary, meanwhile, suggested that the relationship of sex and the law should be contingent not on inherently private and public spaces but on the quality and quantity of pleasure. “What if erotic justice had to do with the degree of pleasure you got from getting fucked, whatever you define as getting fucked?” Ultimately, the freedom granted by Lawrence, while tentative, limited, and in some ways restricting, was seen by the panel as a huge step forward. The discussion’s most heroic sentence came in Cunningham’s description of the Lawrence decision: “Moral disapproval is not a legitimate social interest that can justify the enactment of a statue criminalizing a private consensual sexual act.” The case is over, and the (conspicuously complex) battle for sexual freedom in the United States is just beginning. Contact NATALIE COLLINS at natalie.collins@yale.edu .
Taking seriously syringe exchange
“Stripped Stories: a night of hilarious sex-themed storytelling and games.” As I read this title, I envisioned a twisted Truth or Dare, complete with stories of strippers, whips and whipped cream — maybe even some demonstrations. Being of the “innocently curious” bent that I am, I naturally decided to go. This being Yale — the land of free rainbow parades, dramatic theater majors and “secret” BDSM-themed societies, of course it was what I expected. Conducted by comedians Giulia Rozzi and Margot Leitman, the session was named after their wildly popular show (voted the “best thing to do in Manhattan with your clothes on” by the NY Press). “Stripped Stories” started with Rozzi and Leitman’s disclaimer that the Saybrook Underbrook, for the one-hour duration of the event, would be a “safe zone” — what was said in the Underbrook would stay in the Underbrook. (Whoops, I guess I’m breaking that rule.) The idea was that Yalies brave enough to attend the session would “unite” through the experience. Kind of like surviving Sigma Alpha Epsilon’s “hell week” and being blood brothers ever after. Fun. Now to the actual event. The show entertained four speakers, with an interactive audience game serving as an intermission to their stories. The first speaker, Leslie,
recounted the story of a boy Doug. “You know a Doug — everyone knows a Doug,” said Leslie. He’s a Mike wishing he were The Dude from “The Big Lebowski” or with some failed “Frat City” swag. “A Doug always insists he’s as funny as Adam Sandler AND as Jewish,” she continued. Leslie’s Doug thought that dead birds left in his bed were funny, and so Leslie sent him dead animals in an attempt to seduce him. The next story was one with which every girl can identify: falling in love with a walking, talking European cliché, an older French painter called (cue thick French accent) Pierre. Margot’s Pierre had taken his job as a Pierre very seriously; he even wore a beret. He wooed her with his sexy Frenchness and then, through Margot’s college drama and with lots of heartbreak, left her for a senior girl instead. Oh Pierre. After these two anecdotes followed the best part of any night worth remembering in college (you know you know what I’m talking about): Never Have I Ever. Until that point, I had certainly underestimated the kinkiness of which some Yalies are capable: from changing appearances and walking in on someone to awkward runins with exes to orgies. Needless to say, I now know a lot of unnecessary information about a room full of people whose names I however have yet to learn. That’s probably for
the best. This, I think, is what Margot and Giulia had meant by the event being a uniting experience; you do develop a bond with others when you get to know when, where and why they’ve lost their underwear. On to the next story. The third presenter, Dan, discussed his past as a gangly 16-year-old fashion disaster (complete with a mullet and crooked teeth), whose first encounter had been with a “woman of the night.” This was, of course, at the insistence of his cooler cousin. “I may not have lost my virginity, but I did lose my dignity at 16,” Dan said. All in all, the show was hilarious — having started out being just a teensy bit uncomfortable, the hilarity escalated as the stories just kept getting more cringe-worthy and ridiculous. “Stripped Stories” made me wish I had gone to more Sex Week events. But, as I clutched my stomach and gasped for air while listening to Rozzi regale us with her college attempts to get into a girl’s pants, I realized that the real fun was not a result of my being a part of this awkward community of mishap survivors, as the show presenters had said in the beginning of the show, but a result of laughter and relief: thanking my lucky stars I wasn’t Margot. Or Dan. Or Giulia. Or Leslie. Or Doug’s dead birds. Contact DEVIKA MITTAL at devika.mittal@yale.edu .
// BY JACK LINSHI Compared to other Sex Week talks, “Repeal the Syringe Exchange Ban,” which took place on Wednesday, Feb. 8, seemed a bit dull. But it nonetheless confronted a critical, fascinating issue: the politics of the syringe exchange. Led by moderator Leif Mitchell and panelists Allan Clear, Shawn Lang and Elaine O’Keefe, the lecture and discussion featured strong figures in local public policy and AIDS activism. The Linsly-Chittenden lecture hall was filled, but not packed, with a crowd that was evidently rather self-selective: almost everyone in attendance was familiar with the syringe exchange — or needle exchange — programs. The needle exchange program, which is not a national movement but a local effort, allows injecting drug users to exchange their used hypodermic
needles for sterile ones in an effort to reduce the transmission of HIV through the sharing of dirty needles. But in many areas, federal funding has been slashed, and lives that could have been saved by a simple swap of needles have instead been lost. The panelists’ arguments in favor of the Harm Reduction Program were extremely personal, ranging from involvement in needle exchanges to witnessing drug-injecting friends, who eventually died before they should have, contract HIV through needlesharing. For someone less versed in the politics of syringe exchange, perhaps the most interesting aspect of the talk was the stress that Clear placed on the dangers that result from the stigmatization of injecting drug users. According to Clear, drug users often do not seek help for their addiction
WEEKEND BLOG
Everywhere // 1:00 p.m. Check the WEEKEND blog. You won’t be sorry.
for fear of other people knowing their addictions, or for fear of other people knowing. But when these drug users enter the needle exchange program, the place in which the program takes place becomes a sort of safe haven, a cultural center. There are no stigmas, and important issues that extend beyond the immediate medical safety, such as mental health, can be properly addressed within a supportive environment. Clearly, syringe exchange programs work. They save lives. And that in itself should merit federal funding. Contact JACK LINSHI at jack.linshi@yale. edu .
“GOOD GOODS”
Yale Rep // 2:00 p.m. A play about a general store and a town’s mysterious history.
SHAWN MOORE VIOLA RECITAL Sudler Hall // 5:00 p.m.
He’s a master of music. Like he has a master’s in music.
“IN THE COCK-PIT: ZOFFANY AND THE PERFORMANCE OF EMPIRE IN INDIA” YCBA // 5:30 p.m.
This is not a sexual innuendo, get yo mind out tha gutter.
“EVEN THOUGH WE’VE NOT BROKEN GROUND ON A NEW POWER PLANT – NEW NUCLEAR PLANT IN 30 YEARS, NUCLEAR ENERGY REMAINS OUR LARGEST SOURCE OF FUEL THAT PRODUCES NO CARBON EMISSIONS.” — PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA
PAGE B6
WEEKEND SEX
YALE DAILY NEWS · FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 10, 2012 · yaledailynews.com
YALE DAILY NEWS · FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 10, 2012 · yaledailynews.com
PAGE B7
TALK
SEX WEEK: FROM BDSM TO PUBLIC POLICY T
he year of 2011-’12 has been one of much heat for Sex Week. With the release of the Campus Climate Report in September 2011, the biannual tradition was placed on shaky grounds: Its right and its utility as a campus event was seriously questioned, and for a time it seemed that we might not have a Sex Week 2012. And yet here we are, eight days into this renewed endeavor with four more days to go. We’re pleasantly reaffirmed in our right to discuss — to communally educate ourselves on — all matters sexual. WEEKEND dispersed its investigative, critical and opinionated forces into the talks of Sex Week, and is glad to report that the items on the agenda were serious, thought-provoking and adequately addressed. But not without a bit of laughter and cheek added into the mix.
BDSM: Not this year’s blowjob oration // BY NATASHA THONDAVADI Have you ever gotten a hickey? Given a hickey? Most of us have. But what most of us don’t know is that even something as simple as a hickey can share motivations with BDSM, a collective term that denotes the sexual preferences of Bondage and Discipline, Domination and Submission, and Sadism and Masochism. Despite this ignorance, about 40 students gathered on Wednesday to hear a panel on the topic of BDSM. From the experienced kinkster to the virgin, everyone seemed to be curious. To be honest, from the moment I saw the event on the Sex Week 2012 calendar, I was intrigued. As a gaggle of giggling freshmen filed into the back row of the small LC lecture hall, I realized what it was that was so captivating about the event on paper: the spectacle. As a sophomore, I wasn’t at Yale for the famed blowjob oration, and this event probably seemed the closest within this year’s Sex Week repertoire to the hotly debated scandal. So it’s really remarkable that the panelists managed to keep the dialogue mature and the analysis reasonable — if you expected to see one of the speakers whip out a pair of handcuffs, you were probably one of the many students who trickled out over the course of the talk.
The three panelists offered diverse perspectives. Dr. Charley Ferrer, who ran the show, is a Clinical Sexologist and seemed well versed herself in the goingson of the BDSM “community” (more on that later). Judy Guerin’s place on the panel derived explicitly from her extensive experience in the practice and education of BDSM. And adding a sobering tone to the whole experience, Dick Cunningham spoke of BDSM from the angle of a legal consultant on issues of discrimination with WASP flair. Many of the ideas discussed were new to me. The panelists spoke of the “BDSM community” as a source for warmth, advice, acceptance and continuing education — but as one anonymous audience member asked, isn’t BDSM a kinda, ya know, private thing? Especially when the speakers seemed to continually stress the difference between the consensual, if uncommon, sexual practices and actual violence. But BDSM can be private or public, sexual or nonsexual — it’s more of a need to, say, feel like a slave than to necessarily be a sex slave. Guerin stressed this angle of looking at BDSM as an overall desire, describing it as her sexual orientation, much as some people would identify as gay or straight. But regardless of the variety of viewpoints expressed, the panelists agreed that the most important aspect of learning about BDSM is learning to accept the practice. Less than twenty years ago, the desire for BDSM sexual practices was considered a mental illness. While that classification may have been erased, the associated stigmas still exist. And so the speakers stressed that the main take-away from the event should be that BDSM isn’t weird, gross or misogynistic. Rather, it’s anything you and your partner want it to be.
// AUBE RAY LESCURE
S AT U R D AY F E B RUA RY 1 1
WORLD MICRO-MARKET VALENTINES DAY SALE
Dwight Hall Chapel // 11:00 a.m. Buy your sweetheart something international.
THE SWORD AND THE SCREEN – PROGRAM FIVE Whitney Humanities Center Auditorium // 1:00 p.m.
Rare Japanese Samurai Filmz.
“GÖTTERDÄMMERUNG”
Sprague Mememorial Hall // 12:00 p.m. See opera from the comfort of your own city.
Contact NATASHA THONDAVADI at natasha.thondavadi@yale.edu .
“THE FIRST LESSON THAT EMERGED FROM CHERNOBYL WAS THE DIRECT RELEVANCE OF INTERNATIONAL COOPERATION TO NUCLEAR SAFETY.” — DR. MOHAMED ELBARADEI
The right to privacy and the importance of public opinion
‘Stripped’ down to laughter // BY DEVIKA MITTAL
// BY NATALIE COLLINS Privacy as a right was first summoned up from the penumbras of the Constitution in 1965’s Griswold v. Connecticut. It reached new heights in 2001’s Lawrence v. Texas, when the overturning of a Texas anti-sodomy statute gave Americans the right to be free from prosecution for private, consensual, noncommercial, non-injurious sexual conduct. At the Sex Week discussion of “Privacy, Sexuality, and the Law” this past Tuesday, panelists Dick Cunningham, Judy Guerin and Liz Montegary outlined the limitations still inherent in the Lawrence decision and the next steps for activists looking to expand on the sexual freedom it offers. (Cunningham is a lawyer who has played a leading role in landmark cases relating to gender, race, and sex; Guerin is the director of NCSF’s Consent Counts Program to decriminalize BDSM in the U.S. and former advisor to the European Union Human Rights Commission on sexual freedom and LGBTQ issues; Montegary is a visiting lecturer in Yale’s WGSS Department.) With Lawrence’s decision still restricted to the monogamous, noncommercial and non-injurious, the next stage of the expansion of sexual freedom may lie in the work of what Cunningham called “sex-positive activists” looking to legalize certain sexual behaviors like polyamory, sex
work and BDSM. Such lifestyles are often difficult to reconcile with the traditional conception of marriage, the expansion of which has been the main goal of LGBT activism in recent years. The panelists agreed that marriage is problematic, with the potential to coerce as well as liberate. While legal reforms are important for sexual freedom, the speakers stressed the importance of public opinion. Recent victories for the LGBT community, such as the repeal of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell and the rejection of Prop 8, have been made possible by the increasing willingness of the body politic to believe that homosexuality is neither inherently scary nor harmful. Other communities looking for sexual freedom, such as BDSM and polyamory participants, need to accomplish a similar feat. “In some ways, the law can lead public opinion,” said Cunningham. “In other ways, public opinion has to lead the law.” Guerin was optimistic on this front. Noting the 15-20 year lapse between societal evolution and policy change, she posited sexual freedom to be the next big civil rights movement on America’s horizon. Cunningham called the right of privacy and the responsibility of consensuality the two fundamental concepts for sexual-freedom advo-
cates. Once society understands that certain acts are non-destructive as long as they’re consensual, it becomes reasonable that such acts deserve privacy. And this privacy, once achieved, reinforces the need for those who have it to act consensually. Montegary, meanwhile, suggested that the relationship of sex and the law should be contingent not on inherently private and public spaces but on the quality and quantity of pleasure. “What if erotic justice had to do with the degree of pleasure you got from getting fucked, whatever you define as getting fucked?” Ultimately, the freedom granted by Lawrence, while tentative, limited, and in some ways restricting, was seen by the panel as a huge step forward. The discussion’s most heroic sentence came in Cunningham’s description of the Lawrence decision: “Moral disapproval is not a legitimate social interest that can justify the enactment of a statue criminalizing a private consensual sexual act.” The case is over, and the (conspicuously complex) battle for sexual freedom in the United States is just beginning. Contact NATALIE COLLINS at natalie.collins@yale.edu .
Taking seriously syringe exchange
“Stripped Stories: a night of hilarious sex-themed storytelling and games.” As I read this title, I envisioned a twisted Truth or Dare, complete with stories of strippers, whips and whipped cream — maybe even some demonstrations. Being of the “innocently curious” bent that I am, I naturally decided to go. This being Yale — the land of free rainbow parades, dramatic theater majors and “secret” BDSM-themed societies, of course it was what I expected. Conducted by comedians Giulia Rozzi and Margot Leitman, the session was named after their wildly popular show (voted the “best thing to do in Manhattan with your clothes on” by the NY Press). “Stripped Stories” started with Rozzi and Leitman’s disclaimer that the Saybrook Underbrook, for the one-hour duration of the event, would be a “safe zone” — what was said in the Underbrook would stay in the Underbrook. (Whoops, I guess I’m breaking that rule.) The idea was that Yalies brave enough to attend the session would “unite” through the experience. Kind of like surviving Sigma Alpha Epsilon’s “hell week” and being blood brothers ever after. Fun. Now to the actual event. The show entertained four speakers, with an interactive audience game serving as an intermission to their stories. The first speaker, Leslie,
recounted the story of a boy Doug. “You know a Doug — everyone knows a Doug,” said Leslie. He’s a Mike wishing he were The Dude from “The Big Lebowski” or with some failed “Frat City” swag. “A Doug always insists he’s as funny as Adam Sandler AND as Jewish,” she continued. Leslie’s Doug thought that dead birds left in his bed were funny, and so Leslie sent him dead animals in an attempt to seduce him. The next story was one with which every girl can identify: falling in love with a walking, talking European cliché, an older French painter called (cue thick French accent) Pierre. Margot’s Pierre had taken his job as a Pierre very seriously; he even wore a beret. He wooed her with his sexy Frenchness and then, through Margot’s college drama and with lots of heartbreak, left her for a senior girl instead. Oh Pierre. After these two anecdotes followed the best part of any night worth remembering in college (you know you know what I’m talking about): Never Have I Ever. Until that point, I had certainly underestimated the kinkiness of which some Yalies are capable: from changing appearances and walking in on someone to awkward runins with exes to orgies. Needless to say, I now know a lot of unnecessary information about a room full of people whose names I however have yet to learn. That’s probably for
the best. This, I think, is what Margot and Giulia had meant by the event being a uniting experience; you do develop a bond with others when you get to know when, where and why they’ve lost their underwear. On to the next story. The third presenter, Dan, discussed his past as a gangly 16-year-old fashion disaster (complete with a mullet and crooked teeth), whose first encounter had been with a “woman of the night.” This was, of course, at the insistence of his cooler cousin. “I may not have lost my virginity, but I did lose my dignity at 16,” Dan said. All in all, the show was hilarious — having started out being just a teensy bit uncomfortable, the hilarity escalated as the stories just kept getting more cringe-worthy and ridiculous. “Stripped Stories” made me wish I had gone to more Sex Week events. But, as I clutched my stomach and gasped for air while listening to Rozzi regale us with her college attempts to get into a girl’s pants, I realized that the real fun was not a result of my being a part of this awkward community of mishap survivors, as the show presenters had said in the beginning of the show, but a result of laughter and relief: thanking my lucky stars I wasn’t Margot. Or Dan. Or Giulia. Or Leslie. Or Doug’s dead birds. Contact DEVIKA MITTAL at devika.mittal@yale.edu .
// BY JACK LINSHI Compared to other Sex Week talks, “Repeal the Syringe Exchange Ban,” which took place on Wednesday, Feb. 8, seemed a bit dull. But it nonetheless confronted a critical, fascinating issue: the politics of the syringe exchange. Led by moderator Leif Mitchell and panelists Allan Clear, Shawn Lang and Elaine O’Keefe, the lecture and discussion featured strong figures in local public policy and AIDS activism. The Linsly-Chittenden lecture hall was filled, but not packed, with a crowd that was evidently rather self-selective: almost everyone in attendance was familiar with the syringe exchange — or needle exchange — programs. The needle exchange program, which is not a national movement but a local effort, allows injecting drug users to exchange their used hypodermic
needles for sterile ones in an effort to reduce the transmission of HIV through the sharing of dirty needles. But in many areas, federal funding has been slashed, and lives that could have been saved by a simple swap of needles have instead been lost. The panelists’ arguments in favor of the Harm Reduction Program were extremely personal, ranging from involvement in needle exchanges to witnessing drug-injecting friends, who eventually died before they should have, contract HIV through needlesharing. For someone less versed in the politics of syringe exchange, perhaps the most interesting aspect of the talk was the stress that Clear placed on the dangers that result from the stigmatization of injecting drug users. According to Clear, drug users often do not seek help for their addiction
WEEKEND BLOG
Everywhere // 1:00 p.m. Check the WEEKEND blog. You won’t be sorry.
for fear of other people knowing their addictions, or for fear of other people knowing. But when these drug users enter the needle exchange program, the place in which the program takes place becomes a sort of safe haven, a cultural center. There are no stigmas, and important issues that extend beyond the immediate medical safety, such as mental health, can be properly addressed within a supportive environment. Clearly, syringe exchange programs work. They save lives. And that in itself should merit federal funding. Contact JACK LINSHI at jack.linshi@yale. edu .
“GOOD GOODS”
Yale Rep // 2:00 p.m. A play about a general store and a town’s mysterious history.
SHAWN MOORE VIOLA RECITAL Sudler Hall // 5:00 p.m.
He’s a master of music. Like he has a master’s in music.
“IN THE COCK-PIT: ZOFFANY AND THE PERFORMANCE OF EMPIRE IN INDIA” YCBA // 5:30 p.m.
This is not a sexual innuendo, get yo mind out tha gutter.
“EVEN THOUGH WE’VE NOT BROKEN GROUND ON A NEW POWER PLANT – NEW NUCLEAR PLANT IN 30 YEARS, NUCLEAR ENERGY REMAINS OUR LARGEST SOURCE OF FUEL THAT PRODUCES NO CARBON EMISSIONS.” — PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA
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WEEKEND COVER
A PART OF THE SOLUTION NUCLEAR FROM PAGE B3 plant in their backyards,” Wargo said — despite the fact that he lived with one only miles from his home near New Haven until it closed in 1996. Concerns like fears of radioactive clouds and reactor explosions are not assuaged by events like those that took place last March. Economics professor Ken Gillingham, who specializes in environmental and energy economics, noted that global opinion on nuclear power has varied dramatically over the last ten years, but in the US, it has not been warmly embraced — and Fukushima did not help. “There are risks associated with [nuclear] and the U.S. population hasn’t been willing to take those risks,” Gillingham said. But all energy sources possess drawbacks. The question is whether the risk is worth the reward. Robert Mendelsohn, a Yale economics professor and climate change economist, thinks that Americans need to embrace a more pragmatic evaluation of their energy sources. Mendelsohn is currently engaged in the massive endeavor of assessing the possible economic impacts of climate change around the world. Mendelsohn sees nuclear’s negative image as just that: a bad reputation. “It’s possible to vilify every source of energy — but you’ve got to pick something,” he said. Mendelsohn approaches questions of energy sources with a practical attitude that, as yet, does not have a loud voice in the popular discussion of energy options. However, Mendelsohn is also willing to poke holes in the idea that sometimes new energy technology can do no wrong, laughing at the thought of relying on nuclear fusion. The technology does not yet exist — it’s been in the works since the sixties, he said — and Mendelsohn does not count on being able to rely on it in the foreseeable future. Gillingham put it this way: “Fusion has been tens of years in the
future for the past forty years.” In his own work on the economic feasibility of various forms of energy sources, Gillingham is investigating what the future would like if the world was dependent on nuclear energy. He sees the technology as a complicater: a tool with complex pros and cons. Nuclear does not have to be as dangerous as it once was: new technologies have produced reactors that can reuse their waste. He’s currently working with two models to evaluate claims recently made by scientists about nuclear’s vast potential. “What if the whole world switched to being like France? What would that really mean for our emissions and what would that do for the climate? What kinds of subsidies, how many nuclear plants would have to be built? We’re hoping to have some conclusions this summer,” Gillingham said. Gillingham and Mendelsohn agreed that the world cannot wait for fusion, but they also said it cannot bet solely on massive windfarms or hydroelectric power. Mendelsohn sees the single wind turbine planted in New Haven’s harbor as only an illustration that alternative energies exist, not as promise a future in which all electricity can be wind-generated. “There is no such thing as perfect source of energy, and that’s especially true as you scale them up,” Mendelsohn said. The answer, instead, he and Gillingham agreed, lies in combining sustainable solutions in a flexible package. An “energy portfolio,” Gillingham and Mendelsohn called it. A community’s general portfolio will depend on an area’s natural resources. But nuclear energy has an important role to play in that portfolio. “I think if we take climate change seriously, nuclear is a part of the answer,” Mendelsohn said. Nuclear is necessary because it provides the base power required by a community. This power provides a steady amount of energy that wind or solar
cannot. Like Mendelsohn and Gillingham, Wargo said that the US would have to embrace sustainable energy portfolios.
SEPARATION OF MONEY AND STATE
There is a fox in the henhouse. Or rather, there are many foxes in the variety of henhouses that make up America’s energy policy. Wargo explained that the public’s understanding of energies and energy possibilities is undermined by the fractured state of the nation’s energy policies and regulating bodies. He sees the origins of Yale students’ silence on and the public incomprehension of matters of energy in the fractured state of public policy. Governmental agencies contain internal contradictions. The Minerals Management Service provides the offshore drilling licenses to oil companies, cradling industry and regulation in one body. As Wargo put it, “The corporations intended to be regulated end up capturing the regulators.” And the workings of politics protect that relationship, he added. By dividing energy affairs between bodies like the Environmental Protection Agency, the Nuclear Regulatory Committee, and the Department of the Interior, the federal government sacrifices an understandable image of the workings of America’s energy consumption. “There is no national energy pol-
icy,” Wargo summed up. But even the divisions within the bodies the regulate the U.S.’ resources cannot completely explain why there is no public consensus on the future of the nation’s energy. All told, these simultaneous academic and political divisions build on each other, producing what Wargo called a “fractured knowledge base”—no one person who knows all there is to know about energy and thus no independent authority that the public can trust. Researchers who attempt to tackle some portion of America’s energy problem end up spiraling into very specialized, technical issues. Intensely specialized environmental and technological knowledge produces intensely specialized laws and regulations. “The public is left going ‘what?’” Wargo said. The public no longer has a decision-making ability on their energy and energy regulations. Politicians and technical experts do that, Wargo said. Nobody understands their energy portfolio. Nuclear power seems foreign and larger-than-life, like something they do in France or Japan, not in Yale’s backyard. But part of New Haven’s energy portfolio was once provided by the nuclear reactor in Haddam Neck, Conn., about 25 miles from New Haven near Wargo’s home. The power plant had been in operation since 1968, eleven years before the Three Mile island accident. If a conversation grows between policy makers, the public, and researchers in energy studies, than modern nuclear plants just may begin taking its place, providing base power in support of renewable energy sources. Contact JO HANLE and ANDREA WHITE at juliana.hanle@yale.edu and andrea. white@yale.edu .
“
“
THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS PERFECT SOURCE OF ENERGY, AND THAT’S ESPECIALLY TRUE AS YOU SCALE THEM UP.
// CREATIVE COMMONS
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“TONIGHT, TONIGHT” — A SHAKESPEARE CABARET The Lyric Hall // 7:00 p.m.
This ain’t Hot Chelle Rae, it’s a real as it gets.
YALE ALLEY CATS CHAMPAGNE JAMBOREE Battell Chapel // 7:30 p.m.
Alley Cats: poppin bottles for over 65 years.
“MACBETH 1969”
Long Wharf Theater // 8:00 p.m. Shakespeare meets the future that is now the past.
BOSS: DILBERT, YOU HAVE BEEN CHOSEN TO DESIGN THE WORLD’S SAFEST NUCLEAR POWER PLANT. DILBERT: THIS IS THE GREAT ASSIGNMENT THAT ANY ENGINEER COULD HOPE FOR. I’M FLATTERED BY THE TRUST YOU HAVE IN ME. BOSS: BY “SAFE” I MEAN “NOT NEAR MY HOUSE.”
YALE DAILY NEWS · FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 10, 2012 · yaledailynews.com
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WEEKEND SPEAKS
: T U O G N I E N L U A Y T , T N A I H G C N EE I S KIS EE SP FR G AN W N
NA YA Y // B
At around noon this past Monday, a freshman posted a thread on the “Yale College Class of 2015” Facebook group advertising an event. Although the group was initially created to instigate interaction between eager prefrosh, it has since become a bulletin board for the various events held on campus every day. More often than not, these posts are ignored, quickly pushed to the bottom of the page. But this time was different. This student’s post was in support of a talk called “The Person as a Gift,” a segment of True Love Week and the event that inspired this Tuesday’s “kissin.” Far from being ignored, the original poster, who was ostensibly unaware of Providence College Literature professor Anthony Esolen’s more controversial writings, was immediately met with a slew of replies condemning Esolen’s views. “This person thinks I am (and that my community is) sexually deviant, threatening to society, and mentally disturbed,” wrote one commenter. “But I should engage in a dialogue with him? That’s a lot to ask of a person.” Another student objected to the harsh criticism of Esolen, saying, “I don’t see any explicit ‘hatred’ of anyone in this piece, except for Professor Esolen. The issue isn’t cut and dry. And a little dialogue never hurt anyone.” // HARRY SIMPERINGHAM
Kiss-in during True Love Week
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“COSÌ FAN TUTTE”
Shubert Theater // 8:00 p.m. Yale Opera presents a remake of the Mozart classic.
To this, someone asked, “in terms of whether or not gay people are sexually dangerous to children — what about that ‘isn’t cut and dry’?” An extensive debate continued to play out via Facebook until midnight. By the end, the post had amassed 42 comments, addressing issues such as civilized dialogue versus outright obscenity, religion’s place in academic discourse and Sex Week’s mixing of serious discussion with farcical performances like “Hedwig and the Angry Inch.” Much of the conversation centered on whether Esolen should have been invited to speak at all. In the past, Yale has welcomed a host of controversial speakers to engage Yale students both on and off campus — people ranging from the porn stars that spoke at last year’s Sex Week to Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in 2010. The school prides itself on its freedom of speech mandate, but when it comes to language that is potentially hateful, where do we draw the line? *** Since the release of the Woodward Report in 1975, Yale has maintained a firm stance in favor of freedom of expression. University President Richard Levin said that no speaker has ever been denied the chance to speak at the school during his tenure. “We don’t [decide who is allowed to speak on campus],” Levin said. “People, groups and classes make invitations and we don’t try to control that.” Levin further iterated that the Marshall Committee’s investigation into Sex Week had not been u n d e r-
“HEDWIG AND THE ANGRY INCH” Calhoun Cabaret // 8:00 p.m.
Yalies take on the gender non-conforming romp of a movie.
taken to stifle students’ freedom of speech. Rather, they had been interested in removing the more commercial and exploitative aspects of past Sex Week events, he said. Undergraduates for a Better Yale College, a group originally formed to silence Sex Week, now offers Yale students True Love Week, a series of events they bill as an alternative to the week’s more scandalous moments. “Even with ideas that some people find contemptible, the appropriate response is not to silence the speaker, but to rebut the speaker,” added Levin.
are stifled. Despite the Chaplain’s Office’s attempt to create spaces of open and inclusive discourse, she said, there remains a stigma surrounding people of faith on campus. “Many students tell us that they feel they must check their religious identity at the door. They often feel completely misunderstood, unfairly judged or placed in a certain category that is somehow set aside only for religious people,” Kugler said. Esolen also mentioned the sometimes-stifling environment of secular institutions. “My impression of academia as a whole, having been a part of
WHEN IT COMES TO LANGUAGE THAT IS POTENTIALLY HATEFUL, WHERE DO WE DRAW THE LINE? Some of the masters that were interviewed agreed, affirming that they had no qualms with inviting contentious public figures to their Master’s Teas, provided that their presence did not pose a threat to students’ safety. “Yale is an open place — if you cannot discuss matters openly within a university, then where can you?” Jonathan Edwards Master Penelope Laurans said. *** Members of Undergraduates for a Better Yale College don’t necessarily buy the idea that Yale is the fortress of liberty it claims to be. Sex Week, they said, operates under the assumption that Yalies are having sex and enjoying sex regardless of whether or not there are any emotions attached to it. Travis Heine ’14 of UBYC said that while Yalies were very open-minded about certain points of view — namely, liberal ones — they were often quick to dismiss conservative perspectives as staunchly traditional. “It’s wrong of liberal students to assume that their positions are s e l f- e v i dent, and if t h ey h o p e to ca l l themselves ‘ l i b e ra l arts’ students, they must be open to the intellectual questioning which must be applied to any nonobvious conclusion,” said Heine. Could it be true that while Yale attempts to create a progressive environment with events like Sex Week, it is alienating those whose views are on the other end of the spectrum? University Chaplain Sharon Kugler expressed that within the secularity of Yale, there are students who feel that their religious beliefs
TRUMPET STUDENT RECITAL Morse Recital Hall // 8:00 p.m.
Trumpets are probably the most fun instrument.
it for my entire adult life,” Esolen observed, “is that there is, practically, a good deal more freedom of speech at the typical college affiliated with a tradition of faith than there is at secular colleges … But in the shadow of Mount Sinai or Calvary, even questions about politics fade into relative insignificance,” he added. Meanwhile, students in support of the kiss-in argued that rather than infringing on Esolen’s rights, the kiss-in was a demonstration of their own freedom of expression. Students interviewed said that while they were strongly opposed to Esolen’s views on homosexuality, they would not have wanted the school to do anything as extreme as banning him from speaking. With that in mind, they said that the kiss-in was the perfect form of student protest, as it sent a clear message without barring Esolen from expressing his opinion. “Perhaps this protest was disrespectful — but so was bringing in someone as rabidly homophobic as Esolen,” said Ryan Mendias ’13. Esolen himself seemed accepting of the students’ method of demonstration. “I was glad that the students did not shout and carry on,” he said. *** Although UBYC currently presents itself as an alternative for Sex Week, it began as a movement to ban it. On its website, UBYC presents its central mandate as “Say[ing] ‘No’ to Sex Week at Yale”, and there is a page that details the ways in which Sex Week is harmful to Yale’s sexual climate. While the organizers of both Sex Week and True Love Week spar on the battlefield of their respective events, there remains no avenue for the two sides to directly interact with one another. “I think we, as a campus, cling to this idea of ‘engagement’ without really understanding what that means,” said Alexandra Brodsky ’12. When important discussions about religion, freedom and sex are taking place on Facebook instead of on an academic stage, it might be time for Yale to reevaluate whether its campus encourages free, intellectual discourse as much as it thinks it does. Contact YANAN WANG at yanan.wang@yale.edu .
“SCIENCE IS DANGEROUS” — ISAAC ASIMOV
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WEEKEND COLUMNS
A BITTERSWEET ODE TO LOVE AND INSECURITY We’re creeping towards February’s midway point, and it’s becoming more and more obvious that there’s something off in the air. What it is, exactly, could be anything. But rather than insert a half-ass joke about how it could be New Haven’s smog levels, Yale’s smug levels or last Sunday’s atrocious Coca-Cola Superbowl commercials, I think I’ll just come out and say what it really is: love. That’s right — with Valentine’s Day just around the corner, the coupled among us have a reason to smile, while the singles probably just see it as another cold, early morning walk up Prospect Street. But all of us, in some way or fashion, are touched by love (or the lack of it), no matter our age or class or, remarkably enough, our maturity level. Love and sex have been at the forefront of Yale’s campus discourse since last year’s DKE incident. But this column isn’t about what does or does not constitute sexual abuse, nor is it about proving some grand, elaborate, highly politicized point about hookup culture. Let’s face facts: hookups exist, and they’ll probably always exist from here on out. But sexual abuse isn’t love, and neither is the hookup. Then what is it? That’s the point of everything — artists have been trying to figure out love since art’s inception, and it provides (and will always provide) the best fodder for cinema. But that doesn’t mean that we have a universal definition of love by any stretch of the imagination.
MICHAEL LOMAX CINEMA TO THE MAX Then came film noir, with the femme fatale and the broken hearts and Humphrey Bogart clutching the fake Maltese falcon, describing it as “the stuff that dreams are made of,” before walking dejectedly away, as only Bogie can. Then came the ’50s, the ’60s, the ’70s, and the darker and darker films, with Scorsese eventually appearing with his perverted characters clinging to deconstructed and far-fromideal visions of companionship. And time kept progressing, and movies became more polarized (half in paradise, half in hell), and now we find ourselves staring down the long stretch of 2012 with a medium’s worth of films telling us all something new, something hopefully unique about an ageless emotion. So if anyone wants to try to piece together any kind of universality from this century of adoration, be my guest. Prospective EP&E major and “admitted nice guy” David Lilienfeld ’15 in his article last week (aptly described by YDN commenter “phantomllama” as “cringeworthy”) heavily criticized Yale’s hookup-centric
ARTISTS HAVE BEEN TRYING TO FIGURE OUT LOVE SINCE ART’S INCEPTION. The classical filmmakers saw it as a byproduct of the chase: screwball comedies and Fred Astaire musicals developed love through silly situations built on silly premises that led to silly, and fun, endings. Quick wit, sharp dialogue and high trousers with bowties defined love in the ’20s and ’30s, until things got a little darker.
culture of love. Well, here’s the thing: he’s not Seth Rogen, she’s not Katherine Heigl and you’re not going to find the love of your life at Toad’s. But Lilienfeld did bring up an interesting point that I don’t think he intended to make: love and insecurity are as intertwined as Daniel Hillard and Euphegenia Doubtfire. Insecurity is the worst. Ask
is the dark side of insecurity, that side that doesn’t in the slightest agree with the romantic concept of love we probably all feel is truly right. This insecurity has its roots in everything. “Red Dragon,” an underrated Brett Ratner film, centers around a serial killer with an intense grandmother-complex. The award-winning “Precious” (the best performance actress Mo’Nique will probably ever give) looks at incest and the crippling insecurities and violence that are manifested as a result. And even “Lawrence of Arabia” (my favorite film and objectively one of the greatest ever made) is a story that essentially boils down to a titular character that undergoes extreme identity-finding because he’s thoroughly uncomfortable in his own skin. But these examples really don’t say much. In each of them, insecurity plays a role, but it does so differently, just as it factors in some way or another into nearly every film, work of literature, Tiger Woods affair or Larry King marriage (eight and counting!). Instead, we should consider insecurity the same way we tend to think about our problems: what we’re going through is the worst thing ever and nobody can understand or realize or love us because of this fact. This way, defining insecurity becomes a little bit easier. Insecurity is about sending a
‘Carmen:’ the saddest story ever told If you grew up in the ’90s, you’ve probably seen at least a few installments of “Hey Arnold!”, one of Nickelodeon’s many animated series. Like any other 9-year-old, I was a serious cartoon enthusiast, and this show ranked among my top three. One episode in particular still rattles around in my memory, recently rehashed by the most recent discussion in J.D. McClatchy’s class, “The Opera Libretto.” This episode, first aired in 1997, features a dream sequence between Helga and Arnold wherein they adopt respective roles in Georges Bizet’s “Carmen” (they are, of course, sleeping through a performance of the very same opera). Unfortunately, what Football-Head doesn’t tell you is that while “Carmen” has become one of the most famous modern
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BRAD TRAVIS BACK TO THE CLASSICS operas, it certainly didn’t start out that way; in fact, frustration and ignominy plagued its first days. The history of “Carmen” reflects the heartbreaking story of Bizet’s adult life. In his student days, Georges Bizet enjoyed a brilliant string of successes. In 1857, he secured the Prix de Rome, a prestigious French arts scholarship of the 19th century, for his excellence in composition. Bizet showed brilliant promise at the keyboard, having impressed even the godlike Franz Liszt (then Europe’s darling pianist) with an impromptu dinner party performance in 1861. But for all intents and purposes,
// MADELEINE WITT
Woody Allen. He’s built his entire career on being (not playing) Mr. Insecure. But his is a specific brand of insecurity, one based more on comedy and humor, with “Annie Hall” perhaps his best such expression. In the film, Allen plays lowly Alvy Singer, a comedian-intellectual whose insecurities drive away the love of his life, played by a then-reaching-theprime-of-her-career Diane Keaton. The film itself is a quirky masterpiece and Allen’s defining cinematic moment. What Allen doesn’t touch upon (and appropriately so, given the feel of “Hall”)
Bizet’s professional career floundered. He shied away from public performance, favoring operatic composition instead. Yet Paris, the veritable Mecca of the French operatic tradition, rebuffed most of his music, for Parisians preferred the established repertoire to the efforts of some whippersnapper. Given such a predilection, Bizet’s first two operas, “Les pêcheurs de perles” and “La jollie fille de Perth,” received lukewarm receptions. Worse still, his health was never good — he was constantly afflicted with throat abscesses, and in his own words, he “suffered like a dog.” The last (and saddest) chapter of Bizet’s life began after a stint in the French National Guard during the Franco-Prussian War in 1870. Fortunately, Bizet still had some
VIOLIN RECITAL — PIOTR FILOCHOWSKI
Morse Recital Hall // 12:00 p.m. Swing by during your walk of shame.
girl a text message and trying to drag the conversation on as long as you can and then, even if it goes well, not texting her again for a week, or two, or three, because you don’t want to bother her — because she probably has so much on her mind that seeing your name pop up on her phone has to be tantamount to kicking a puppy in the face. (Trust me on this.) Or perhaps insecurity is about having a dining hall dinner with a girl and asking her if she’s going to see her boyfriend over break, not because you genuinely care if she’s going to but just to find out if she’s still dating that prick, even though you publicly admit that he’s probably not a prick at all. (Don’t ask me how I know this.) Or perhaps insecurity is about taking a girl on a date to see “The Artist,” then not hanging out with her again for a week for the aforementioned reason, and then when you do see her it’s just a simple brunch that leads absolutely nowhere. But you feel confident and you get ready to invite her to walk over to Libby’s together and
s h a r e a c h e e se ca ke (thinking about “Lady and the Tramp” the whole time) when you hear from a mutual friend that she likes this other dude more than you. So you drop the whole damn thing and avoid her and start singing Gotye’s “Somebody I Used to Know” silently to yourself in the shower. (Need I go on?) And while all this is happening, you start hurting from the inability inherent in everything. You feel terrible because you know that there’s nothing hard or difficult about the process, and that all you have to do is pluck up a rudimentary level of courage and make a damn move. But you can’t. Your tongue sticks to the roof of your mouth, and your brain shuts off entirely. Yet your heart still keeps beating and racing while your once limitless possibilities start shriveling and disintegrating as you involuntarily fling them into the sun, where they burn down to fixed and definite particles that eventually become the stuff that stars and planets and dreams are made of. (May Bogart have mercy on our souls.) Then again, maybe insecurity and love aren’t any of these
supporters: Camille du Locle, the artistic director of the prestigious Opéra-Comique, commissioned Bizet to compose an opera based on Prosper Merimée’s 1873 novella “Carmen.” By the summer of 1874, Bizet had finished the score and the Opéra-Comique had secured a leading lady in the famous mezzo-soprano Celestine Galli-Marié. But the “Carmen” project seemed doomed to fail before it had even begun. The orchestra and chorus members declared sections of their parts simply impossible, and the subject matter proved contentious from the get-go: the passionate, and eventually fatal, tryst between a Spanish corporal and a lascivious gypsy woman was a far cry from the normal Parisian fare. Finally, on March 3, 1875, after painful months of rehearsal, “Carmen” debuted to a soldout crowd — the “who’s who” of Paris. The first act was wildly applauded, but as the night wore on, the audience grew notably colder. Bizet’s own reaction after the final curtain said it all: convinced he had put on a
flop, the composer fled the theater and walked the streets of Paris with a friend until dawn. Critics lambasted the libretto in particular, deeming it much too inappropriate for the OpéraComique, a house of culture and family-friendly productions. In fact, “Carmen” was so poorly reviewed that the theater nearly pulled it after only its fourth performance. Wounded, the production continued, and although audiences began to warm to the fledgling work, “Carmen” could not live down its first scathing reviews. Bizet, his throat condition having worsened, left the city to convalesce in his country house. Unfortunately, just after the opera’s 30th performance on June 3, Bizet passed away in the wee hours of the morning. In what must be one of the most tragic twists of fate, Bizet, just the day before, had signed a contract scheduling a Viennese production, the very one that sparked the opera’s precipitous rise to worldwide acclaim. Before the century was out, opera
FAMILY PROGRAM – STORIES AND ART YUAG // 1:00 p.m.
Art thoughtz 4 kidz.
THE SONNET DESSERT
Sterling Memorial Library // 2:00 p.m. MORE THAN 150 PERFORMERS! GADZOOKS!
things. And therein lies the beauty of it. It’s all about the choices we make. We want Bogart and Bergman to be together at the end of “Casablanca,” but we could never actually accept anything other than Bogie letting her go with Victor. Chow Yun-Fat’s dying declaration to Michelle Yeoh’s character at the end of “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon” throws relief onto the rest of the film and helps us see the tragedy (and ourselves) in a new light. And don’t get me started on “Titanic.” The characters in all the greatest romance movies love and love well. They make the conscientious decision to proceed with their passions and throw caution to the wind in the pursuit of that thing which makes them happy, tangible or not. That’s what draws us in; that’s what compels us to keep inching forward day by day. Because (and this has taken a whole column to get to, with each paragraph more rambling than the next) love and insecurity are both a part of the grand sweep of human emotions that we confront, along with every artist from every generation. How we choose to interact with them, in the end, is meaningless unless we’re working towards an aim of personal happiness. And as life and cinema teach us, if we do that, everything else will eventually fall into place. Contact MICHAEL LOMAX at michael.lomax@yale.edu .
houses from Melbourne to Budapest had produced “Carmen,” and just before Christmas Day, 1904, it had already enjoyed its 1000th performance. Before long, Tchaikovsky, Wagner and Brahms all made their support of Bizet’s great work known. Even Neitzsche, in “The Case of Wagner,” confessed that he could not get enough of the opera. And now, more than a century later, productions of “Carmen” still play across the globe. It is in every sense of the word a masterpiece — visionary, impassioned and finely crafted. Would that Bizet might have seen his complex magnum opus find its way from an infamous birth into arguably the best episode of my favorite children’s show. Performances of “Carmen,” as well as many other operas, can be accessed from a Yale server at http://opiv.alexanderstreet. com/. Contact BRAD TRAVIS at bradley.travis@yale.edu .
“A NUCLEAR POWER PLANT IS INFINITELY SAFER THAN EATING, BECAUSE 300 PEOPLE CHOKE TO DEATH ON FOOD EVERY YEAR.” — DIXY LEE RAY
YALE DAILY NEWS · FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 10, 2012 · yaledailynews.com
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WEEKEND THEATER
‘HEDWIG’ BALANCES SASS AND SUBSTANCE // BY JOY SHAN
“It is clear that I must find my other half. But is it a he or a she? … Can two people actually become one again?” Fifteen minutes into the titular character’s monologue in “Hedwig and the Angry Inch,” it becomes clear that this punk-rock musical is much more than just a bawdy, sensationalist show about a sex change gone horribly wrong.
Hedwig) is left with a scarred, dysfunctional mound of flesh between her legs. After the two move to a trailer park in America, Luther leaves Hedwig for another man. Hedwig develops feelings for a boy named Tommy, and the two write music together. She gives him his stage name, Tommy Gnosis, but he leaves Hedwig for greater fame with the music that she
[‘HEDWIG’] POIGNANTLY POSES A FUNDAMENTAL QUESTION: WHAT MAKES A PERSON WHOLE? The show begins with the transgender performer Hedwig (Brennan Caldwell ’12) sashaying in a platinum blond wig, red jumpsuit and Rollerblades. With the first sassy, raunchy number, the show begins as a caricature. But for all its potential to become a mediocre production that attracts an audience solely with its controversy, “Hedwig” does not succumb to the bait. Rather, it poignantly poses a fundamental question: what makes a person whole? Hedwig was formerly Hansel, a boy from East Berlin who has a sexual encounter with Luther, a male U.S. soldier. To get married in Berlin, Hansel must undergo a sex change. But the surgery is botched, and Hansel (now
helped write. The entirety of the play consists of Hedwig relating this story through extended monologue as she deals with Tommy’s rejection. Accompanying Hedwig is her “internationally ignored” band, The Angry Inch. As Hedwig gives her performance, Tommy Gnosis is giving a larger concert in an adjoining venue offstage; throughout the performance, Hedwig will open a door stage left to the sound of Tommy’s voice and the roar of an audience. In perfect harmony with this performance-within-a-performance, the play extends past the stage and into the audience. Perched on a chair in the Calhoun Cabaret, I gradually felt
part of the performance itself. “Hedwig” calls for audience interaction. During bits of the monologue, Hedwig traipses into the audience, interviewing people and handing out maracas and tambourines. Lyrics to sing along to are projected on the back wall. Director Charles Pollinger ’13 purposely chose the Calhoun Cabaret for its closeness. “I wanted a space that felt intimate and felt like a dinky space that Hedwig would make her own,” he said. “I wanted a real cabaret experience, so that it kind of feels like you’re forced to participate.” But despite the audience interaction and the songs that make you want to dance, Hedwig is not gimmicky or (too) over-the-top. It is rife with tension and contains fascinating mythical motifs that all point to the same question: how can another person make a person whole? The number “The Origins of Love” tells a story from Greek mythology: human beings once had four arms, four legs, two heads — until angry gods split each into two. Humans spend lives searching for their “complement,” and sex is how fractured humans try to put themselves back together. The play clev-
erly uses the character of Hedwig to explore the question of finding how to complete oneself. Caldwell completely assumes the demanding role of Hedwig. Though his movements are exaggeratedly feminine in the beginning, they more naturally straddle the line between masculine and feminine as the play progresses. His versatility is incredible — explosive during wild dance numbers, but measured during the more somber numbers. His speech is also sprinkled with self-referential gems. At one point, Hedwig drapes a colorful ivy garland around her neck and talks about her “Gay Ivy.” Hedwig also talks about her desire to “Fluff the Ivory Tower” and her insights on Sex Week (“Sex Week is for people who have sex, Love Week is for people who used to have sex”). The production is a huge balancing act. It is an ambitious experiment — to display iconoclastic subject matter without distracting from the nuanced message. To balance the physical excess of the production — the drag, the naughty dancing and the mannequins wearing dildos — the monologue is marvelously controlled and under-
“Hedwig and the Angry Inch”
// BY YANAN WANG
S U N D AY F E B RUA RY 1 2
undergraduates for a two-hour lineup of skits, monologues and singalongs. With students coming and going sporadically, there was no fixed schedule of performances that was to be put on, making the atmosphere all the more fluid and dynamic. While students presented their work or asked other students to act out their scripts, people sat and watched attentively between bites into doughnuts and sips of coffee. After each performance, someone would stand up and present a new idea. At the Theater of Desire, no acts are constrained. One student who was holding Robert Page’s “Greek Myths” in one hand asked Margolin to pick a number between one and 784. She
chose 441, which, in the book, is the beginning of the story “The Reign of Orestes.” The student then chose people in the audience to act as Iphigenia, Electra, Orestes and Pylades. As he read the text of the myth in its entirety, students mimed the actions that were described. As more characters were introduced, he picked people out of the audience to join the cast. The remaining spectators laughed as they watched the actors struggle to come up with the proper gestures and movements. Another act featured two students reading aloud from an email chain of a message titled “Froshow ’09,” an email that had been sent to those interested in working on the Dramat’s 2009 Fresh-
WINNERS OF THE FRIENDS OF MUSIC RECITAL COMPETITION, IN CONCERT Sudler Hall // 3:00 p.m.
Undergrads with classical prowess.
Contact JOY SHAN at joy.shan@yale.edu .
// JOY SHAN
A Theater for Everyone’s Desires Simple, elegant, and spontaneous all at once, the “Theater of Desire” offers a venue for writers and performers alike to experiment with their craft in an open, nonjudgmental environment. It is the brainchild of theater studies professor Deborah Margolin — everyone calls her “Deb” — who conceived of “a space without a critic,” she said. The Theater, which runs on alternate Monday nights, is open to all Yale students. Accordingly, every night brings different surprises before different audiences. “This is the theater that we do because we have to,” Margolin declared. “I maintain that it’s the only theater worth doing.” This Monday, the Theater of Desire hosted a group of about 15
stated. The sexual jokes are plentiful but subtle, and even the most absurdly dramatic scenes have a perfect touch of self-effacement. It is a play of opposites. Crayola drawings projected on the wall illustrate Greek mythology. The songs are bare and simple, in contrast to the flamboyant sexuality of the costumes and set. The poignance was tangible when Tommy Gnosis rejects Hedwig after discovering her physiological defect. As he makes excuses to leave, Hedwig’s unspoken anguish is tangible. In the end, the scene was more about love than lust. The continuous climb of each scene, however, made the ending feel too rushed. Despite its flourish, the open-endedness may leave some audience members unsatisfied. But even without this closure, “Hedwig” managed to combine the raw spontaneity of a rock concert with the close personal feel of a one-person monologue. “Hedwig and the Angry Inch” will be running at the Calhoun Cabaret at 8 p.m. from Feb. 9-11 and Feb. 16-18.
man Show. As they mocked the emails of those who were now, presumably, their close friends, Margolin asked, “Is this ethical?” From there another round of laughter ensued. Although she sat at the back for much of the night, Margolin’s energy and passion is what drives the entire operation. Longhaired and wild-eyed, Margolin’s warmth permeated the room as she greeted each newcomer with a hug and an offering of doughnuts. When it was time for the event to begin, Margolin called the boisterous crowd to attention with a shrill bird call. Despite — or perhaps because — of the informal setting, there was never a lull in the Theater of Desire’s offerings. Performances
JONATHAN EDWARDS COLLEGE PHILHARMONIC WINTER CONCERT Battell Chapel // 3:00 p.m.
JE Sux! (Dvorak doesn’t.)
ranged from a monologue on death to a farcical tale of babysitting gone awry. One particularly poignant scene featured “Romeo and Juliet: Divorced,” a play that one of the attendants had written when she was in high school. “It was the first thing I wrote that I liked,” she said. Such was the fearlessness showcased at the Theater of Desire. For two hours, the participants of the event boldly displayed their work, most of which had never been presented before an audience. Some ideas were brilliant, and others were just for pure amusement. Regardless of the substance of each endeav-
our, the audience of the Theater of Desire encouraged each other with equal spirit. To conclude the night, one student suggested a karaoke singalong of “New York, New York.” As the remaining seven people linked arms and gathered around a single laptop, they belted out the song with all the fervor of a Broadway cast. They weren’t the best singers, nor did they even know all the lyrics — but maybe that’s the point. At the Theater of Desire, it really is up to you. Contact YANAN WANG at yanan.wang@yale.edu .
I MAINTAIN THAT IT’S THE ONLY THEATER WORTH DOING.
WEEKLY READING WITH THE YALE SHAKESPEARE PROJECT Saybrook College, WC-11 // 8:00 p.m.
They’re baaack.
“IF YOU GO ON WITH THIS NUCLEAR ARMS RACE, ALL YOU ARE GOING TO DO IS MAKE THE RUBBLE BOUNCE.” — WINSTON CHURCHILL
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YALE DAILY NEWS · FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 10, 2012 · yaledailynews.com
WEEKEND BACKSTAGE
CHRISTOPHER TOLLEFSEN
// CHRISTOPHER TOLLEFSEN
Philosopher, bioethicist, patriarch // BY BAOBAO ZHANG
P
hilosophy professor Christopher Tollefsen of the University of South Carolina is scheduled to give a talk titled “Chastity and Human Goods” today as part of True Love Week. A bioethicist who attended Emory University for graduate school, Tollefsen co-authored “A Defense of Human Life,” a book that defends right-to-life arguments on scientific and philosophical grounds. He met and married his wife when they were undergraduates at Saint Anselm College, and the couple now has nine children.
A. I grew up in a philosophical family. My dad taught philosophy and I ended up going to the college where he taught. I took a number of classes with him. My wife was also a philosophy major and we both went to graduate school in philosophy. When I was younger, I tried to get out of philosophy partly because that’s what my dad was doing and I wanted to do something else. But that turned out to be what I was best at and it was probably a good choice to stick with it. I turned towards bioethics gradually, especially after graduate school. The issues I was interested in, the moral philosophy about what’s reasonable to do, what goods to pursue and to protect, questions about human action and state interference, all those seem to be implicated in bioethics questions — especially, questions about the beginning and ending of life. Q. Who were your favorite philosophers growing up, in college, and in grad school? A. One contemporary philosopher very important to me is Alasdair MacIntyre. He’s now at Notre Dame and was very influential in the recovery of virtue ethics. His work has always been stimulating for me. Another philosopher is John Finnis, a philosopher of law. I am always astounded by his analytical clarity. For me, however, the philosopher I always go back to, especially when teaching, is Plato. Plato loved truth for its own sake and would pursue it doggedly. He tried the best he could to communicate the love of truth and the inquiry of truth with other people. I think the Platonic dialogues are a fantastic way to get students involved in philosophy.
Q. You taught in Ghana in 1996-’97. How was that experience? A. My wife and I had been looking to do some kind of volunteer work after graduate school that also involved philosophy. There are few such opportunities, but we saw an advertisement looking for volunteers in nursing work or agricultural work or philosophy. And we thought, that’s just what we need. So we went over there. It was a Catholic seminary for the Congregation for the Holy Spirit, which is a missionary operation. All of our students there were English-speaking West African students, so they came from Ghana, Nigeria, Sierra Leon, Liberia. They were different from the students we have in the United States. They came from backgrounds that made them great for philosophy. Philosophy was a form of leisure and privilege to them, to be able to pursue learning for its own sake. They were great students, very eager to learn. We had two children with us while we were over there. The people in Ghana were tremendously friendly; we had great neighbors in the village we lived in. It was a wonderful experience that will always be with us. When we went over to Ghana, I remember going to the librarian at St. Anselm College, where I was as an undergraduate. I asked her if there are any extra books we can bring over to stock. The library at the Institute for Philosophy [in Ghana] was one room. In the offices, in the morning, it wouldn’t be impossible for you to see a snake or a scorpion wander by from time to time. Q. Is it hard to balance work and raising a large family? A. I suppose for many jobs it must be. I’m very fortunate to have a job that has a great deal of flexibility in terms of the hours. Most universities are friendly towards
having children around, so it’s not unusual for me to bring my children to Princeton for various events or to the University of South Carolina. My life at home and my life at work get to be integrated to a greater degree than if I were working at an office where I’m gone for 12 hours a day. I can work at home and I can bring my kids to work. It’s been good for me and good for the kids. They’ve got to see what university life is like dating back to an early age. Q. Any of your kids considering philosophy as a future career? A. My oldest daughter is 19 and she is a freshman at the University of Dallas. I believe she is an English and philosophy major, or at least, that’s what she told me the last time we talked! Q. You’re a practicing Catholic. How does your religious faith relate to your academic inquiry? Do your colleagues or your students ever question you because of your religion? A. They do sometimes. It’s impossible for people to come to philosophy with no presumptions whatsoever. People come with the presumptions they’ve developed living with their families, being formed by the culture and the intellectual environment they grew up in. Philosophy is a way to reflect critically on those presumptions, to push them a little bit and see if they stand up. We then move from those presumptions to deal with further questions that we find interesting. I definitely start with a set of background beliefs that are formed by my Catholic faith. But I try to address the questions philosophically and critically — then to move from where I am now to questions that deal with issues that I don’t understand that I find difficult and challenging and that I want to understand better. I
think that’s what everyone doing philosophy is all about. To that extent, being a Catholic philosopher is like being any other kind of philosopher. It’s just that the starting presumptions are, generally speaking, different. Also because they are held by faith, they exhibit a stronger power. Q. What brings you to True Love Week? A. Actually, I came to Yale in the fall to give a talk to the Buckley program and Choose Life at Yale on whether it’s permissible to lie for the sake of the pro-life cause. I am very involved in the pro-life cause, but I was arguing it was wrong to lie for its sake. After the talk, I was talking to various
“
Q. From what you have read about Sex Week at Yale, what do you think? A. I haven’t read much about it. In preparing to come to Yale, I did read a couple of news articles about it. My worry about Sex Week reflects what’s helpful
Anthony Esolen’s talk “The Person as a Gift.” What was your reaction? What do you do if it happens at your talk? A. There is a time and place for protests of various forms. I think the protest that is most appropriate for an academic community is question and answer. What I was most disappointed with in the response to Esolen was that the opportunity to ask him questions, to push him a bit, to raise theoretical objections — that opportunity wasn’t taken up. Q. The name of your talk is “Chastity and Human Goods.” A lot of people value chastity as a religious moral. If someone is not religious, what value does chastity have? A. Trying to make chastity appealing or intelligible to people is a hard sell for people under most circumstances. My talk is an attempt to look at something that requires a certain amount of discipline. What are the goods that are at stake here? What goods are furthered by being chaste now. I look at a few different goods. One example is that there is some kind of good when one has mastery of one’s desires and ability to
I DEFINITELY START WITH A SET OF BACKGROUND BELIEFS THAT ARE FORMED BY MY CATHOLIC FAITH. BUT I TRY TO ADDRESS THE QUESTIONS PHILOSOPHICALLY AND CRITICALLY.
members of CLAY, some of whom are involved in Undergraduates for a Better Yale College. They mentioned the possibility of putting together some talks in February. Q. What do you think about True Love Week? A. I think it’s a good idea in at least two ways. I think, in an academic culture, it’s important to have a variety of different viewpoints on important issues. Sex is very
about True Love Week. Just looking at the titles, though I am not sure how those talks went, it looks like it trivializes issues surrounding sex and sexuality. It doesn’t look like it’s a very balanced conversation. It celebrates one vision of sexuality only. I think it needs a vision for something broader in an academic community for pursuing that conversation. Q. On Monday, some Yale students staged a “kiss-in” to protest Providence College professor
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Q. How did you become interested in philosophy? And why bioethics, specifically?
important to think about and to consider its importance. If you want to do that, you have to have a variety of people coming in to talk about it. True Love Week is really a reasonable and worthwhile attempt to bring a few more voices to the conversation Yale is having. I also think it’s important because most of the students — all of the students — in Undergraduates for a Better Yale College are interested in living a particular kind of life, the life that is disciplined sexually and open to new life and the idea of marriage sometime down the road. I think it’s difficult to live that life if you don’t have an adequate moral and intellectual culture around you. I think this is an effort to develop an intellectual culture, to understand some of the commitments they have, to probe them a little philosophically, to see how they stand up. I think that’s a noble goal.
act only in accordance with reason, not just what one wants to do at a particular moment. That is incompatible with taking sexual desire as a good enough reason to act on that desire. Chastity requires disciplining that desire and conforming it to your best reasons to take action. That contributes to the good I call personal integrity. Contact BAOBAO ZHANG at baobao.zhang@yale.edu .