Happy Birthday

the the happy happy birthday birthday issue issue

march 2019

cha cha cha!

buzzsaw’s happy birthday. woo-hoo.

You won’t even remember all of this celebrating happening to you. It’s your first birthday. Gooey Chuck E. Cheese pizza and ice cold Sprite cover the table as your friends all sing in unison. It’s your sixth birthday. The rented out bowling alley flashes black lights and only your best friends show up to celebrate with you this year. It’s your thirteenth birthday. The luxury of a country club fits all of your family and anyone else you tangentially know. You’re hoping, praying, for a car.

It’s your sixteenth birthday.

Then suddenly birthdays mean almost nothing more than a Facebook wall post, a text with emojis, a limp hug from your parents, a party you have to plan for yourself because no one else will. You’re 20 with a year remaining until you can drink legally, and a few more until you can rent a car, but at least you’re not a teenager anymore. You’re 20, and nothing matters, but everything does because two decades is a hell of a long time when you think about it. The things that can change in 20 years — politics, the economy, the way you see the world. But some things stay the same. After 20 years, it’s hard to get rid of ‘em… like Buzzsaw. Happy 20th.

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Julia Tricolla Anna Lamb Owen Walsh Alexis Morillo Audra Joiner Mateo Flores Kimberly Morgan Will Cohan Brianna Pulver Tara Eng Rachael Geary Christine McKinnie Emma Rothschild Jess Dresch Rachael Powles James Baratta Mae McDermott Isabel Murray Julia Batista Carlos Figueroa Abby Bertumen Kelly Burdick Bryan Chambala Sam Costello Thom Denick Cole Louison Arnold Printing Co. Sam Fuller

Write Us! Our magazine exists to inspire thoughtful debate and open up the channels through which information is shared. Your comments and feedback are all a part of this process. Reach the editors by email at: buzzsawmag@gmail.com.

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News & Views

Current events, local news & quasi-educated opinions.

Upfront

Selected dis-education of the month.

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Ministry of Cool

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Short fiction, personal essay and other assorted lies.

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Arts, entertainment and other things cooler than us.

Prose & Cons Sawdust

Threatening the magazine’s credibility since 1856.

“The Real Cost of Corporate Social Justice”

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“To Being 20 in 2019”

“Happy Birthday, Mr. President”

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news & views

The Real Cost of Corporate Social Justice How corporations humanize themselves to justify political spending // By Jess Dresch, Contributing Writer

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t’s your birthday. You log onto Facebook and read, “Happy Birthday” in big letters accompanied by a picture of an animated cake. You watch a deodorant commercial about ending the wage gap. You might even eat some fries from McDonalds with a rainbow decorated box for LGBTQ+ pride weekend. Surely, these acts don’t feel all that personal. Mark Zuckerberg didn’t wake up with your birthday circled on his calendar in bright red sharpie, and McDonalds isn’t inviting you to any gay pride parade. These examples reveal a larger pattern: corporate involvement in our personal lives posing as concern for social justice.

Corporations of course have more power than just producing commercials or tracking their users’ birthdays. They play an overwhelmingly dominant role in our neighborhoods, elections, legislation and job markets. Take the city of Seattle for example, home of Amazon’s main headquarters. City officials in 2015 declared a state of emergency regarding homelessness with rises in housing prices disproportionately displacing black and Latino families. And if gentrification wasn’t spelled out already, landlords went so far as to even advertise they would prioritize Google, Microsoft and Amazon employees over other tenants in the area.

In 1971, with so much influence and cascading societal effects, the Committee for Economic Development declared that corporations take on a “social contract” between society and business. The idea being that because corporations function with the consent of the state, they have the moral obligation to be accountable to the public interest rather than just to the products they’re pushing off the shelves. Corporate social responsibility looks different to every company, but its goal is to contribute to the welfare and interests of society.

But when did these mega companies shift from corporate social responsibility to corporate social justice? Nike made Colin Kaepernick the face of their “Just Do It” campaign with the message, “Believe in something. Even if it means sacrificing everything.” In 2017, Pepsi aired a commercial portraying the tension between protesters and police officers which was taken down after immense public backlash for trivializing the Black Lives Matter movement. And this year, Gillette released a short film commercial addressing toxic masculinity.

These commercials aren’t just stirring current national issues. They are the latest maneuver to personify corporations.

At the end of the day, these are profit driven multi-billion

dollar companies. They are appealing to the ever increasing progressive millennial cohort; the goldmine of consumerism.

Nike is not lobbying for criminal justice reform and Gillette Razors isn’t trying to dismantle the patriarchy anytime soon.

Sure, these commercials amplify positive dialogue and reach mass audiences, but they are ultimately creating the facade that corporations are monolithic entities, capable of feelings and opinions. When we personify them we give them social power, and this leaks into the bedrock of American politics.

But what transcends when the personification of corporations enters the legal realm? When corporations humanize themselves, the big money they pour into politics is justified under this rationale: If humans can spend money as free speech, why can’t corporations?

The personification of corporations has been the foreground issue in a myriad of U.S. Supreme Court cases and legislative acts dealing with campaign finance laws and the First Amendment.

1971 President Nixon signed the Federal Election Campaign Act (FECA) requiring the full disclosure of funding for federal candidates, political parties and political action committees (PACs). FECA was amended in 1974, 1976 and 1979.

1974 Following the Watergate scandal and corrupt campaign financing under the Nixon administration, Congress amended FECA and placed strict regulations on individual contributions and party spending. This amendment introduced the first ever public financing system for presidential elections under the Revenue Act and mandated the disclosure of political contributions exceeding $100. Congress also established the Federal Election Commission (FEC), an independent regulatory agency to enforce campaign finance laws.

1976 The Supreme Court case of Buckley v. Valeo in 1976 really put a foot in the door for corporate political spending. The court upheld that limiting direct contributions to campaigns was constitutional for it served the government interest in a “narrowly tailored” way to safeguard the country from disproportionate control by corporate money. However, the court found that independent expenditures, or independently

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spending money for a campaign, is indeed constitutional and is protected by the first amendment as freedom of speech.

In other words, they had no right to be limiting campaign speech (monetary contributions) by individuals, groups, and candidates.

Although PACs have been around since the 1940s, Buckley v. Valeo allowed for them to flourish. A PAC is a way for individuals, corporations, labor unions and ideological interests to raise money to promote a certain candidate.

Later that year, Congress gave a uniform contribution limit to all PACs and made it illegal for any corporation or labor union to donate to PACs directly from their treasuries. So, this was good in theory. In reality, soft money still found loopholes to flood federal campaigns.

While many of these corporate advertisements touch upon impactful issues worthy of dialogue, let us not forget the intentions behind them. It is time the American public insists on transparent campaign finance laws and makes the disclosure of outside spending expenditures mandatory, as well as fights for the abrogation of super PACs. Corporations are not people, people are people, and protecting billions of dollars toward campaign financing under the First Amendment is detrimental to the American political system and the people it serves.

Jessica Dresch is a sophomore Culture and Communication major who is feeling the Bern for the 2020 presidential election. You can reach them at jdresch@ithaca.edu

1990s Due to an incredulous amount of soft money in general elections all throughout the 1990s, Congress passed the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act (BCRA) in 2002. This was intended to limit soft money and made it mandatory that party spending had to be hard money, or regulated money.

Donations made by individuals, PACs or political parties that are regulated by the FEC are an example of hard money.

2010 And finally, we reach the famous Citizens United v. FEC supreme court case of 2010, which futher paved the way for corporate greed in American politics.

Perhaps the most notable outcome to arise from this case is the court deciding there could be PACs with no contribution limitations as long as they do not coordinate with the campaign party. And with this, Congress begat the super PAC, colloquially referred to as PACs with an unlimited funding and spending power. Corporations and labor unions can take funds directly from their treasuries and contribute to a super PAC. Super PACs are paramount to the discourse surrounding big money in politics today.

So what does it look like when corporations and billionaires have the option to spend unlimited amounts of money toward super PACs? Look no further than the 2016 election.

As reported by, Opensecrets.org, the 2016 election for both presidential and congressional elections totaled $6.5 billion dollars.

With outside political spending rapidly escalating, it is natural to question the state of our democracy. When corporations and the top 1 percent befuddle legislation with millions of dollars in lobbying and special interest groups, we shift more and more to a corporatocracy, where the masses and 99 percent are left unaccounted for.

When corporations beguile the public by producing advertisements centered around social justice issues, they attempt to represent corporate interests as congruous with public discourse. In doing this, corporations are humanized and depicted as dealing with the issues the general public does, only with billions of dollars at their disposal.

Commercials like Gillette’s toxic masculinity advertisement only serve to justify the narrative that corporations are people.

It is a meticulous effort to normalize political and social corporate involvement such as funding federal elections.

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Election Season 2020

How candidates are expected to fare in 2020 // By Isabel Brooke, Staff Writer

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ovember 3rd, 2020.

If you live in the United States and you don’t live under a rock, that date means something to you. To many, it represents an opportunity to restore order and dignity to our country’s politics, and to others, it’s the chance to re-endorse the Trump agenda. No matter where you fall on the political spectrum-November 3rd, 2020 is a significant date.

To a select few, it’s especially important. An eclectic mix of 12 Democrats —Senators, former Congresspeople, Mayors, veterans, prosecutors, a tech executive, and a curveball in the form of a self-help and spirituality author— have already announced their candidacies for president.

The voter’s challenge is to navigate a confusing sea of misleading election cycle propaganda, unfulfillable campaign promises and relentlessly negative headlines to determine who to support for the country’s highest office. It’s a tall order, and it’s early yet, but let’s try to make some sense of the top contenders for the Democratic nomination.

One of the most unfortunate byproducts of our two-party system is that many Democrats will choose their candidate by asking, “Who is most likely to beat Trump in the general election?” rather than, “Who best represents the interests of the Democratic party?”

Political scientists refer to this phenomenon as electability: a loaded word in which misogyny and racism play an infuriating central role.

And yet, the data shows the importance of electability to U.S. voters. In fact, an early February poll from Monmouth University found that over half of respondents would prefer a Democratic candidate that they disagreed with but that would be able to beat Trump. Only about a third of respondents would prefer a candidate that they agreed with but that would have a hard time beating Trump.

Out of the 12 Democratic candidates, only a few will be able to successfully position themselves as the most electable candidate to voters, and it’s possible that the best candidate hasn’t even announced candidacy yet.

So, let’s talk about the five most viable, or “electable” candidates: those with the most realistic chances of running against Trump in 2020, those who genuinely hope to make it to the oval office.

One of the most talked about contenders so far is Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren. At 69 years old,

she defeated an incumbent Republican to earn her seat in the Senate in 2012 after a career as a law professor. Since her name was circulated as a possible candidate for the Democratic nomination for president in the 2016 cycle, she has been actively pursuing and gathering support for the past few years. Because of this, she has the advantages of wide name recognition and a loyal base of supporters. However, her claim to Native American heritage and subsequent release of a DNA test to prove it has drawn persistent criticism, almost reminiscent of the email scandal that followed Hillary Clinton in the 2016 cycle. It’s a sexist take that I regret having to put forward, but Warren’s bio, age, career, and even physical appearance are easy to parallel with Clinton’s – and if Clinton couldn’t beat Trump, then Democrats should look to nominate a decidedly different type of candidate.

Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders was another big name in the last cycle. As the only serious challenger to Clinton’s bid for the nomination in 2016, Sanders has high name recognition and finds much of his support from millennials and those further to the left. With his recent announcement of candidacy, he now seeks to build from the reputation that earned him favor with voters in the 2016 primaries. Given his embrace of the title “democratic socialist” and progressive ideology, though, his challenge will be to build support with moderates and independents in a general election. And while it’s still very early, Sanders seems to fare well in polls that hypothesize a general election between him and Trump; both a 2018 Quinnipiac University poll and recent Monmouth University poll show voters’ high favorability of Sanders.

In fact, the only candidate that fares better than Sanders in polls across the board is former Vice President Joe Biden.

Biden is reported to be considering candidacy, but has not announced a campaign yet and it is unclear if he intends to run. With celebrity level name recognition, favorable public impression, and with his appeal to moderates, Biden presents as one of the Democrats’ best hopes when slated against Trump. In the Monmouth poll, Biden easily tops the list of contenders, with an impressive 29 percent saying they would support his nomination for the presidency. A primary appeal estimation map from FiveThirtyEight clearly shows his appeal with party loyalists, but shows that he lacks crucial support from millennial, liberal, and Hispanic and Asian voters. Again, Biden’s candidacy isn’t guaranteed – at press time, he hasn’t yet decided if he will run.

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With 11 percent of respondents backing her, the Monmouth poll shows California Senator Kamala Harris as having the third most support behind Biden and Sanders. As the daughter of two immigrants and as a young woman of color with an impressive legal and political career, Harris is Trump’s antithesis. However, her attempt to position herself as a “progressive prosecutor” are undercut somewhat by a shoddy track record as District Attorney of San Francisco and Attorney General of California. She faces criticism from within her own party for consistent resistance to criminal justice reform, refusal to support body-worn cameras for police officers in California in 2015, and a red-flag-raising record in wrongful convictions. Her positions have certainly become more progressive in recent years, but this imperfect record is sure to be a major point of contention in any election. On FiveThirtyEight’s primary appeal estimation, though, she earns the broadest support from the various Democratic factions. Her main challenges will be in addressing her record as prosecutor and in distinguishing herself and commanding the media in the crowded field, especially from the other three women Senators running.

Finally, polls say that the fifth most popular figure for the nomination is another yet unannounced candidate: Beto O’Rourke. He established name recognition in his 2018 challenge to Ted Cruz’s Texas senate seat. Though he ultimately lost, O’Rourke’s social media driven grassroots campaign, fueled mostly by smaller donations, broke fundraising records, drew national attention and made him something of a celebrity. His career and background enable him to walk some important lines. First, with a progressive ideology but a Texas upbringing, he is more moderate than representatives from blue states. Secondly, unlike other top contenders for the nomination he is neither “establishment” nor a newbie in politics. Third, FiveThirtyEight’s primary appeal estimation map indicates that he draws enthusiastic support from both millennials and party loyalists, and fourth, the recency of his rise and his young age means that he represents a fresh voice, but he is a white male. In other words, his bio is manipulable and has the potential to be attractive to many – a rare but essential quality in determining electability.

Again, “electability” discriminates: deep-seated cultural stereotypes about men and women indicate—and polls reinforce—that voters believe men are more electable than women.

But then again, Hillary Clinton was the first woman to be nominated for president by a major party and to walk down that road. She charted unknown territory in 2016, and the only way to dismantle those destructive stereotypes is to keep walking that path, and to keep proving the illegitimacy of the norms and societal tethers which systematically deny women and people of color positions of power.

With that in mind, I would suggest, somewhat apologetically, the nomination of the more conventionally electable candidate for 2020. Given the potential consequences of four more years of President Trump, to choose the “safe” candidate may be to ensure the restoration of dignity and rationality to the Oval Office.

So, Democrats have a choice. Elizabeth Warren represents a reliably establishment woman candidate. Bernie Sanders is popular, but his popularity is concentrated such that winning

the general election would prove challenging. Joe Biden’s background, name recognition, and favorability rating paint a promising, but perhaps unexciting choice. Kamala Harris is a qualified antithesis of Trump, but her prosecutor background draws concerning criticism from within her own party. And if Beto O’Rourke can capitalize on the momentum and celebrity he built through his highly-publicized Senate campaign, he has the potential to have broad and diverse support that could carry him to the White House.

But it’s a crowded field, it’s early yet, and there is plenty of time for the landscape to be flipped on its head.

November 3rd, 2020.

We have a long road to walk before that day, but mark your calendars. Your future, our future, the United States’ future, and (I’m not being dramatic when I say) the future of our planet rests on that day’s events.

Isabel Brooke is a third-year Philosophy-Religion and Politics double major. You can reach them at ibrooke@ithaca.edu

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How Old Are You Now? The paradox of being college-aged // By Alma Guardado

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n the eyes of the law, 18 year olds are adults, but in college, many students are still treated as children. While students have some new, adult responsibilities, many professors and RAs seem to take on a parental role with students.

College and university students are given mixed signals about their place in society.

RAs are like substitute parents for students— babysitters. A group of friends hanging out on the weekend are still scared of getting reprimanded by their RAs if things get out of hand.

Quiet hours restrict students from being loud in the residence halls, as if they were in their parent’s house getting in trouble for making noise.

Students living in dorms are on alert when hearing the scuttle of footsteps from down the hall to quiet everyone down. On one hand, there are no curfews like at home, but there are still regulations and regulators.

RAs make college students feel like they’re still in high school, and roommates often feel like siblings.

They are encouraged to get along well and respect each other’s space. When problems arise, RAs intervene and try to mediate the conflicts between the two. RAs provide an impartial voice in mediating a feud between two roommates just as a parent would at home.

Adults, however, should be able to mediate their own problems and learn how to fight their own battles without a third person getting involved.

University of North Dakota Philosophy Professor Jack Russell Weinstein writes that adolescence in American culture has been extended to people’s mid-twenties.

College students are entering real life without any knowledge on how to resolve simple fights with their colleagues due to having their problems solved with help from a third party.

RAs –perhaps somewhat superficially– are often required to check in on their residents’ personal and academic lives by doing one-onone meetings. Just as parents do when coming back from a stressful school day, RAs ask whether or not their residents are okay.

College professors also do their part in babying their students by restricting their actions during class.

For example, many enforce bathroom and food policies during lectures. In the workplace, adult individuals have the decision to decide whether or not to eat or go to the bathroom, so why should college students be restricted during classes? Instructors mark student attendance every day and often resort to disciplinary action.

While college students are viewed as young children by college professors and RAs, they might also have more responsibilities than high schoolers.

Students work jobs to support themselves financially; many have bills to pay. Most balance their time between work and school. Students can’t fall behind academically without

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risk of losing scholarships. These are only a few of the many demanding responsibilities college students are expected to uphold.

Many of my own peers have expressed the sentiment, “I’m learning to manage my time, work and social life without anyone holding my hand.

The independence and maturity aspect of college is the reason I chose to go away to college.”

College students want to have the opportunity to begin learning how to balance their own life, but not have the restrictions imposed on them. There is a desire to be resilient, and not run to mommy and daddy for help anymore.

Moreover, students are obligated to do daily tasks that their parents would do for them if they were still living at home: doing laundry, taking out the trash. Many are doing so for the first time. College students’ responsibilities are solely their own. They choose their classes and have the responsibility to get to class on time. Students learn how to manage their time without their parents constantly telling them that they need to do their homework or go to sleep early.

College is the time when students are able to learn about themselves and pick themselves up when they fall down. However, too much responsibility at once can come as a shock.

Alma Guardado is a first year who doesn’t want to grow up.

Remembering Bundy

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Finding the balance between romanticization and erasure // By Rachael Powles

anuary 24, 2019 marked 30 years since the execution of Theodore Robert Bundy, and media outlets have taken notice. The serial killer who commited over 30 known murders in the 1970s has been remembered in the hit Netflix documentary Conversations with a Killer: The Ted Bundy Tapes. And the biopic Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile starring Zac Efron and Lily Collins is slated to hit theaters this fall.

The renewed attention leads us to question the line between remembrance and romanticization when we imagine serial killers of the past. On one end, a new generation of fangirls (or stans) is flourishing on social media, reminiscent of the women who gathered outside the courtrooms 30 years ago hoping to catch a glimpse of the charismatic killer.

On the other side of the spectrum, voices like NBC contributor Natalie Shure maintain that, “There is no productive purpose for any layperson to ruminate on the inner lives of anomalously evil people.”

These two voices have been loudest since the release of Conversations with a Killer. They fit well into the current climate of discourse, especially on social media. Easy answers to complicated problems lead to two clashing communities. “Stans” view figures as harmless and untouchable, while the “cancel culture” demands that problematic aspects be erased without a second thought. This binary thinking is certainly easy, but when examining one of the most gruesome criminals who thrived during one of the most unstable periods in American history, the reality is much more complicated.

The 1970s may be romanticized as a time of disco and bell-bottoms, but in reality things were not so carefree.

At the time of Bundy’s first recorded killing in 1973, the Vietnam War was at an incurable stalemate, the political pendulum swung far to the right after the liberal 1960s and more women — Bundy’s primary victims— were entering college and the workforce than ever before.

From Watergate to the energy crisis, everyday life had become increasingly uncertain. Furthermore, people were not accustomed to the idea that a serial killer could lurk in plain sight. The large scale murders Americans witnessed on television —wars— were committed by established enemies, far away “others” and any other random homicide was thought to be the result of an introverted outcast, an unexplainable “bad seed” people would know when they saw.

This was not what people saw when they looked at Ted Bundy. He was a young, clean-cut, college-educated Republican who smiled for the cameras when he was in handcuffs. As shown in Conversations with a Killer, he frequently cracked jokes in court and spoke in his own defense with the confidence of an actor on stage.

They saw that Zac Efron-like figure.

And as broadcasting technology became more advanced, a wider population of Americans had access to a variety of news outlets, and the charming defendant became a staple of the evening news. “I’m not afraid,” one young woman stated outside his trial, “He just doesn’t look like the type to kill somebody.”

Opinions like these became central to the Bundy narrative, the narrative that persists to this day. But that doesn’t mean it’s accurate. Ann Rule, who worked with Bundy as a suicide hotline counselor during his college years, wrote of her former friend, “Ted was never as handsome, brilliant, or charismatic as crime folklore has deemed him... He somehow became all of those things as the media embraced him.”

Bundy’s influence remained even after he was sentenced to death by electric chair. The widespread nature of his crimes resulted in police stations being more willing to communicate with one another and connect similar evidence.

A generation of increasingly independent young women who grew up in the hitchhiking, drug heavy days of the 1960s were now painfully aware that their safety would always be at risk, a fear that still rests with every

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young woman as she walks down a dark street at night. And most importantly, it became clear to law enforcement and everyday Americans that there were not many guidelines to determine whether or not someone was capable of murder.

Outward appearance, education level and socioeconomic status are not shortcuts to convictions.

Psychological analysis also became more prevalent. Forensic psychologist Katherine Ramsland elaborates, “As we see how Bundy shifted for various contexts, it’s evident that a sophisticated evaluation of chameleonic flexibility would be a useful tool for dealing with predatory psychopaths, in any context.”

Regardless of controversies, Ted Bundy’s actions have become cemented in American folklore. But as far away as his killings seem now, and as quick as we are to bury what we can’t understand, the impact he had on the lives of his victims, their families, and the culture at large cannot be forgotten.

Working to untangle a complicated time in American History and defending the actions of a murderer are not mutually exclusive. And as we continue through this anniversary, perhaps this is one part of the 1970s that should not be examined with rose colored glasses, nor should it be lost to history.

Rachael Powles is a first-year theatrestudies and culture & communications major who wouldn’t date Bundy for a million bucks. They can be reached at rpowles@ithaca.edu

The Advocates of Anti-Abortion

An inside look at the pro-life movement // By Julia Batista, Contributing Writer Photos by Gabriela Ramos-Mata, courtesy of the subject.

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rom a young age, Gabriela Ramos-Mata couldn’t grasp the concept that anyone would want to intentionally kill their child. As a kid in the fourth grade, she heard news about Hillary Clinton and her stance on being prochoice, defending late-term abortion.

This sparked her curiosity, motivating Ramos-Mata to ask her mother about the topic. Since then, Ramos-Mata has been a pro-life advocate, using science and facts to convince others to join the movement.

The morality and legality of abortions has been a palpable nationwide debate since the 1960s and is still going today.

According to a Gallup poll, 64 percent of Americans agree with the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision that established a woman’s right to an abortion. The other 28 percent do not. Many of the latter identify as pro-life advocates, including the religious, the conservative and those who have seen the horrors of abortion with their own eyes.

Different pro-lifers have different reasons for not supporting abortion including a strong belief that they carry a high risk of potential physical, emotional and mental harm for women.

Many more believe that abortion is just a medical means of murdering a child.

Reasons such as these are why RamosMata opposes the risks associated with abortion.

Abortion is a highly personal experience and different for every woman. It can be emotional—some feeling a sense of relief while others experiencing depression, regret or anxiety. There is always a risk that someone is more prone to emotional

distress after an abortion based on religious beliefs or their previous emotional and psychological concerns.

Physical side effects of abortion also vary from woman to woman, including cramping or abdominal pain, vomiting and nausea. According to the American Pregnancy Association, serious complications occur in fewer than 1 out of 100 first trimester abortion.. For late term abortions, there is a 1 out of 50 ratio of women that might experience these complications, such as sepsis, the scarring of the uterine lining and damage to other organs.

“Some would argue that I’m an anti-feminist, which I find fascinating given that I’m a woman,” said Ramos-Mata.

According to her, a true feminist wouldn’t support the idea that a woman can’t make it on her own through an unplanned pregnancy. “True feminists” would support the mother because she can manage the pregnancy, and would believe that she’s capable enough

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to use her resources such as crisis pregnancy centers to find the support that she needs.

Ramos-Mata couldn’t let her passion go. Since then, she has gone to a number of marches, written to state representatives and stood outside numerous Planned Parenthoods speaking to and supporting women that were starting local crisis pregnancy centers.

Crisis pregnancy centers (CPCs) are

meant for women facing unplanned pregnancies. Many of the centers associated with Christian charities.

They are nonprofit organizations that provide pregnancy tests, pregnancy decision coaching and information about pregnancy options. Planned Parenthoods are funded by the government, providing health care such as STD testing and treatment, birth control, cancer screening and prevention, abortion and general health care.

Not only has Ramos-Mata supported crisis centers, but she has also actively involved herself in student organizations.

Students for Life is an organization that hosts a number of their own prolife conferences. Formally known as the American Collegians for Life in 1977, it began as a full-time operation in 2005. For the school year of 2016-2017 alone, the organization was able to visit 641 individual school campuses, start 146 new groups and host 18 regional leadership summits that had 181 schools present.

“Our mission is to abolish abortion because to us, abortion is the biggest trending human rights atrocity of our

day.

We don’t believe that you have different human rights as you age,” Matt Lamb, the Director of Communications for Students for Life said.

Their argument is ultimately that an unborn child has the same amount of human rights and dignity as a full grown adult.

A fetus conceived by its parents is growing according to its unique genetic code, which is by definition a human, Lamb said.

Although embryos are a strange looking stage in the human development process, and fetuses don’t yet look like adults, there is still a common humanity at all stages of human development.

Human rights are meaningless if it doesn’t apply to all human beings.

Thus, there is no distinction between the unborn human and its human rights, Lamb argued.

There are younger advocates too.

Brianna Beauregard, a 16-year-old, is one of many teenagers who believe in the pro-life movement. Although she comes from a religious family that’s prolife, Beauregard prefers to use facts in arguments over religion.

“Life begins at conception. To ignore that is to ignore science, meaning that abortion is the murder of babies,” Beauregard said.

She feels that you can’t dictate what a women does and doesn’t do to her own body. It’s true that a woman’s body is greatly impacted by pregnancy, but abortion is the choice of removing a separate human being from growing.

Abortion isn’t removing a part of a woman’s own body, but it destroys a separate, unique individual, Beauregard said.

Although this is a belief held by many pro-life advocates, those that are on the

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opposite end of the argument would disagree. Unlike newborns, fetuses are unable to continue living if they’re unsupported by their mothers. Scientific research also says that until the 24th week of pregnancy, a fetus can’t feel any pain because they don’t yet have a brain. Facts such as these suggest that abortion isn’t murder according to prochoice advocates.

A Public Religion Research Institute found that a majority of Americans (54 percent) say that abortion should be legal in all or most cases while 43 percent say that it should be illegal in all or most cases. However, in the last decade, public views on abortion haven’t substantially changed. Those of who believed abortion should be legal in all cases in 2008 were 57 percent of Americans while those that thought it should be illegal was at 36 percent.

“Life has lost its value, and as a result, innocent lives are being lost every day. Somebody has to protect those lives, and that’s what the pro-life movement aims to do,” Ramos-Mata said. “Everyone, regardless of race, religion, sexual orientation, how they were conceived, or how much money they’re born into, deserves the equal chance of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.”

Julia Batista is a first-year journalism major who likes getting the inside scoop. You can reach them at jbatista@ ithaca.edu.

What Constitutes a Good Present?

Materialism in Western Society // By Erin Shuster, Staff Writer

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very year, my aunt sends me a birthday card with no gift. There is no money, no gift card tucked in a small envelope and no ribboncovered present. It always says “Happy Birthday!” with no personalized message on the inside.

Every year, I always expect something more, a small gift of some sort that will make me think she actually cares about my birthday, but I always tear through the mail to be greeted with yet another Hallmark card and her sloppy signature on the inside. All I want, for one year out of the twenty-one years in my life, for her to get me something different.

It could be anything. She could give me a $5 gift card to CVS. She could get me a t-shirt two sizes too small with a neon butterfly on the front. She could even get me a watch with Winnie the Pooh on it, and I would be on my merry way.

But, in the back of my mind, I know that this still wouldn’t be enough.

What my aunt doesn’t realize is that there is a certain protocol that comes with getting and giving birthday gifts.

Before you start considering what kind of gift you want to give, you have to understand that everyone wants to feel special on their birthday, even if they won’t admit it. You have to acknowledge that their day is a day to be celebrated.

“Most people, even if they ‘hate’ birthdays, want to feel validated in their personhood, and this is the day they became a person,”says New York Times Styles section Staff Editor Bonnie Wertheim. Most people need to feel like they’re being celebrated by those around them or else their birthday feels like a lost cause. With this in mind, you have to consider what kind of gift they would like to receive, and more importantly, what kind of gift you are willing to give. You have to consider the kind of relationship you share with the other person, or the kind of relationship you would like to have with them. You wouldn’t get your boss a round-trip plane ticket to Fiji (unless you want them out of the office for a week) and you wouldn’t get your mom a gift certificate

to Chuck-E-Cheese (unless she really likes their pizza).

According to Wertheim, “your familial and emotional proximity will likely determine how personable and sizeable the gift will be.” However, sometimes it’s hard to know when too much is too much or when something is way too small. Sometimes the closer you are to the person, the harder it makes it to choose a gift wisely. Dr. Suzanne Degges-White suggests that certain characteristics of the gift can create problems. The main gift-giving roadblock comes down to preference, which can lead to a ‘“gift rift’” between the giver and the recipient. With this in mind, some people might want a gift that exemplifies their unique qualities, while others might want a gift that wows, or even a gift that is unexpected. But sometimes giving, or getting, is what makes the unexpected often difficult to navigate. It’s this variable that may cause some givers to question if their head is in the right place, since it can be tough to anticipate what others may want to receive.

Depending on the recipient, some may prefer a gift that can be preserved.

Receiving a pair of concert tickets or going on a picnic in a park are sentimental, but some people might want something that will last a lifetime, something that goes beyond a fond memory they will keep. For some people, like myself, it is hard to not be stunted by the impression that the gifts we give need to be preserved in a time capsule. I think more often than not, I want the gifts I receive to last for as long as they possibly can; I want to be able to continuously use it and appreciate it.

If the gift is altered in any way, it can lose its value. Some of this reasoning has to do with the striatum -- the place in the brain normally known as “our brain’s monetary reward center.”

Caroline Zink and her NIMH team, National Institute of Mental Health, “used different methods to determine that we process social values in the striatum”, the place where the incentive for reward and social status collides. In

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the study done by NIMH, 72 volunteers tried to earn money while playing a computer game. “The scientists created an arbitrary ranking system of the real and faux players in which some of the bogus gamers appeared to perform better -- and others worse -- than the real ones. The participants were told that their status in the game had no effect on how much money they could win, but that earning money could boost their rank.” Surprisingly, the primary focus of each player was how they were perceived by the other players, not by how much money they were earning in the game. Consequently, the brain’s emotional centers were mostly affected in the players who kept messing up.

So how does the desire for ‘worthy’ gifts relate back to the brain? Often the things that are of value to some people, more closely the things that are received, are equated to how they are perceived by others. If someone were to receive a gift that is not worthy of flaunting to others, they would possibly feel embarrassment that they did not receive something nicer, and shame that the giver did not know them better. Like the experiment, even if money doesn’t boost rank, some people, admittedly like myself, are overcome by the impression that it could to someone else.

Sometimes it is hard to understand why I don’t get the gifts I would like to receive. Sometimes it’s even more difficult to make sense of how someone who is part of my family, could not understand that I may feel upset to not have received something from them on my birthday, on a day where I am supposed to feel great about myself, with no exceptions. I don’t think there will be a birthday where I am ecstatic to receive one of my aunt’s birthday cards, but I think now, knowing that effort can be found even in the smaller gestures, I am able to realize that just because my aunt and I might have an eternal “‘gift rift’”, doesn’t mean we have to have a life rift.

Erin Shuster is a junior writing major who secretly wants a surprise party this year.

upfront

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Happy Birthday, Mr. President

The timeless trend of political sex scandals // By Rae Harris, Staff Writer

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ex scandals are no stranger to U.S. politics. The first notable sex scandal in U.S. history was marked by Alexander Hamilton’s affair with Maria Reynolds in 1797, which he published a tell-all pamphlet about entitled “The Reynolds Pamphlet.”

Fast forward to the 20th century, and many presidents have been linked to extramarital affairs. John F. Kennedy was linked to a number of high profile affairs during his presidency from Marilyn Monroe to Mimi Alford, a 19-year-old White House intern.

Perhaps the most notorious of political sex scandals was between then 49-yearold Bill Clinton and Monica Lewinsky, a 22-year-old White House intern. The relationship ended with the subsequent impeachment of Clinton, and Lewinsky became a punchline.

Lewinsky became one of the first women involved with a political sex scandal to be publically humiliated

on the Internet after the story was first published on the Drudge Report. Fox News even released a poll asking if the public thought Lewinsky was “an average girl” or a “young tramp looking for thrills,” with 54 percent of voters rating her a “young tramp,” according to a Time article. She was slut-shamed relentlessly, and her name has been dropped in at least 125 songs since 1998.

Alison Dagnes, professor of political science at Shippensburg University, and a political ideology researcher, points out that Lewinsky was just 24 years old when the affair was leaked to the public.

“When you have an affair with a married man who’s twice your age and the leader of the free world, that’s too much for one person to handle,” Dagnes said. “Much less someone who’s in their early 20s. And so, she was sort of the poster child for what happens to the woman who’s caught with the man.”

Eventually, she was diagnosed with

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post-traumatic stress disorder, Lewinsky wrote in her 2018 Vanity Fair essay.

Like other female counterparts of political sex scandals, the media was cruel to Lewinsky. Dagnes points out that news coverage of political sex scandals has changed over the past 30 years, with the Internet as the main factor in this. News sources exploded.

No longer was news limited to simply print, television and radio. The Internet became a legitimate place to get news constantly.

The digital age didn’t only create a space for political sex scandals to be discussed, but it altered how they occurred, according to Hinda Mandell, associate professor in the School of Communications at Rochester Institute of Technology and author of several books about political sex scandals.

“The first major political sex scandal involving digital elements was Anthony Weiner in 2011,” Mandell said. “It was the first major one where the digital

, t

al s, r

platform played an important role in how that scandal unfolded because he blamed his inept use of technology at first, on the tweet that he sent before he admitted culpability.”

Weiner used Twitter to send a link of a sexually suggestive photo of himself to a 15-year-old girl which he initially denied before claiming responsibility.

While the digital age has been brutal to the women of political sex scandals, often the men involved are far less criticized. Many continue their thriving political careers. Dagnes chalks this up to the “stud-slut paradigm,” where if a man has sex with a lot of women he’s a stud, and if a woman has sex with a lot of men, she’s a slut.

While the “mistress” is often berated in the media, the wives in political sex scandals aren’t treated well either. To assume the wife is a victim can also be degrading to women, according to Dagnes.

“She may be mad as hell, but it doesn’t mean she’s a victim. She might be quite powerful, actually,” she said. “And because marriage is a very private thing, who knows what kind of arrangement had been worked out, to begin with.”

However, Donald Trump’s sex scandal with Stormy Daniels has shaken up the playing field. Stormy Daniels wasn’t an exploited intern, she perhaps took on a different sort of criticism with a breadth of experience as an adult film actress.

“Stormy Daniels is very sex-positive and is on there sort of ‘clapping back…’

Is that then going to change how it happens in the future? I doubt it,” Dagnes said.

With Trump, Dagnes points out, his supporters knew what they were getting when they voted for him. The Access Hollywood Tape, in which Trump makes crass remarks about women, was aired about a month before the election.

“So he says, ‘Oh women, you can grab ‘em by the pussy and do whatever you want when you’re rich, they let you do that,’ and everybody freaks out.

Democrats and Republicans freak out.

And then there are no consequences to it,” Dagnes said. “So is it a scandal?”

One of the elements of a scandal is there has to be a consequence for it, according to Dagnes.

Like Donald Trump, male politicians are typically the ones getting caught in sex scandals, and that’s no coincidence.

There are far fewer women in politics — only about 25 percent. Women also have the added challenge of running for office. There has never been a major political sex scandal in the U.S. that involves a woman politician, according to Mandell.

“Women are very simply not going to risk that after working that hard for it,” Dagnes said.

Mandell believes that it is important to examine how gender, politics and power manifest together in the U.S. “Men in power are considered sexy.

So you have a lot of underpaid, very young women who work on Capitol Hill who can be exploited by men in power or who they themselves may be attracted to men in power,” Mandell said. “Culturally, in the U.S., women in power don’t have that sexual allure.”

Some politicians are able to survive sex scandals while others aren’t.

Some things are too extreme and unforgivable, while having an affair is unethical but not so extreme, according to Professor Steven Grover, a professor in the Department of Management at the University of Otago in New Zealand.

It also depends on if the behavior fits the persona of the person. It would be more shocking if a politician that is family-focused and religious was a part of a scandal than a scandal coming out about Trump. The amount of political power a person has also matters. If a politician is more valuable, the public is more likely to forgive them.

“Politicians can be successful for apologizing in a heartfelt manner, showing that they understand they were wrong and that they are moving toward improving in the future,” said Grover.

Although society is being desensitized to sex, Dagnes doesn’t foresee political sex scandals becoming commonplace anytime soon. She believes that because we don’t do a good job of discussing major issues, we divert to talking about

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sex. When other people are caught in a sex scandal, it allows other people to compare themselves to them and feel better about themselves.

“I think we’re going to continue to hear about them because they’re easy to talk about and because people are people. And sex is fun. And so they’re going to continue to have it as a resultThe scandals are going to just keep on coming.”

Rae Harris is a senior journalism major who won’t stand for your locker room talk. You can reach them at rharris3@ ithaca.edu.

Birthday Cake....Hold the Gluten Going gluten-free is more than just your average crash diet // By Lauren White Image by Sarah King

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woman at your yoga studio has lost 12 pounds since going gluten-free, your grandma is trying new gluten-free recipes for this year’s family reunion, and the cake you’re making for your best friend’s birthday party just needs to be made with glutenfree flour. Lately, the concept seems to be everywhere we look. Gluten-free eating in our culture can be anything from a health essential, to a diet trend, all depending on the person living it. As the fad steadily persists, more and more Americans are deciding to go against the grain.

Within the last decade, the amount of people pinning gluten as the root of their health issues has increased significantly and gluten avoidance continues to rise in popularity. In 2014, the percentage of people avoiding gluten had jumped to almost four times as much as that of 2010, according to data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey.

This percentage was made up of both individuals with and without celiac disease yet both numbers rapidly increased.

Dr. Kenneth Fine, director of Enterolab, is a gastroenterologist who agrees that gluten sensitivity probably affects half the population. According to research, gluten sensitivity potentially affects far more people

than celiac disease. It is estimated that 20 million people in the United States could have the condition.

“When we did the math, we came up with the number of about one in two are gluten-sensitive,” he said. It is proven that approximately 3 million Americans have celiac disease, so between individuals with gluten-intolerance and those with celiac disease, there are many Americans that can’t eat gluten.

Whether it was their digestion problems, headaches or even depression, millions have eliminated gluten from their diet and their health mishaps have vanished (along with the trips to their favorite downtown bagel shop).

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Andrea Langston is an integrative nutritionist and dietician. Langston’s passion and focus for nutrition developed when she was diagnosed with celiac disease several years ago, and because of this, she specializes in helping clients understand and adapt to a gluten-free diet. She treats conditions such as celiac disease, and gluten sensitivity.

“I have seen absolutely amazing effects of people adopting a glutenfree diet, both with celiac disease and without,” Langston said.

She explained that she has seen many individual’s problems that they never knew were “symptoms” vanish after cutting out gluten. Until a glutenfree diet relieved their struggles, these people thought their medical issues were just a part of who they were.

Langston explains she has seen an array of problems in her clients including extreme fatigue after eating, headaches, irritability, brain fog, digestive problems, low blood pressure and stubborn weight gain.

She claims that these problems faded for many patients once they began avoiding gluten, and improvements in energy and a clearer head surfaced. Anxiety, depression, and sleep concerns no longer bothered them.

“I’ve also had many clients who do not have celiac disease experience huge

improvements in their overall health and well-being. Things such as joint and muscle pain, digestive issues, migraines, and skin problems have cleared up” she said. “In general, many people eat far too much gluten-containing foods on a daily basis and gluten tends to be inflammatory.”

The greatest benefit is often seen in those who not only avoid gluten but also many processed foods in general, moving towards a more healthy, whole foods-based diet.

In terms of an individual’s medical problems, adopting a gluten-free diet seems to have positively changed people’s lives, although there are still many people following the gluten free trend potentially as a diet fad. It is a popular perception that eating glutenfree is generally healthier, but studies show otherwise.

The NPD Group states that only 25 percent of those living in a glutenfree home say celiac disease or gluten sensitivity is the main reason. Among others, one of the main reasons is to improve health.

Professor David Levitsky teaches at Cornell University in The Division of Nutritional Sciences. Levitsky explained that in regards to gluten-free dieting strategies, any reduction of calories consumed will lead to weight loss, and reducing gluten leads to reducing most carbohydrates, circling back to less calorie consumption.

With that said, Levitsky warns that a gluten-free diet, similar to a lowcarbohydrate weight loss plan, is many times a temporary fix.

“They all work for the short term,” Levitsky said. “There is nothing magical about gluten and weight loss.”

Levitsky is currently working on many research investigations and conducting studies on different dieting strategies, weight-gain as a result of dining hall food, and overall efficiency of maintaining weight loss in a safe way over holidays.

Yet, throughout all of these research activities, Levitsky claims that there is nothing in the scientific literature that suggests a relationship between gluten

and body weight. Many professionals tend to agree, and nutritionists often warn against the gluten-free processed foods, explaining to their clients that just because it is labeled gluten-free doesn’t mean it is healthy.

“A cookie is still a cookie, whether it is gluten free or not!” Langston said.

Contrary to popular belief, many of these gluten free foods can be more unhealthy than their gluten-containing version because companies typically add a lot of extra sugar and unhealthy fats to try and compensate for the lack of real gluten in their treats.

The debate of whether going gluten free is the right decision, for either medical or dietary reasons, could be argued from all sides. It is the culture that surrounds gluten-free living that continues to evolve every day. The food industry and society as a whole share a similar attitude toward the glutenfree fad, unfortunately sharing the common tendency to not deal with it as seriously as it should be taken. Though a portion of the population follows a gluten-free diet for reasons other than medical need, there are people out there who risk their health and wellbeing every day by being surrounded by gluten. As for the food industry, Langston says, “While I think there has been a lot of progress in providing safe gluten-free options over the past years and the industry is continuing to grow, there is still a long way to go.” As the percentage of Americans consuming gluten-free products continues to rise, the food production industry should ideally be developing along with it. And though Langston says it is improving, in the variety of products offered especially, there are still many technical issues that make it harder for those who need gluten-free goods. “There are laws outlining criteria for a food being labeled “gluten-free,” Langston says.

However, there have been numerous findings of gluten-free labeled food containing much more gluten than is allowed by law. These inconsistencies can lead to people continuing to be sick and have symptoms even though they believe they are doing what they should

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be doing to eat gluten-free. Langston explained that food can be labeled “gluten free” as long as it contains less than 20 PPM (parts per million) of gluten per serving. This advertising and labeling lead to gluten-free people consuming products under false pretenses and risking their health.

Culturally, society has a long way to go with accepting gluten free living.

Among all positive and negative effects of the gluten-free trend, the popularity of it has raised awareness and brought plenty of attention from the public eye.

This has positively led to an increase in the willingness of food manufacturers and restaurants to provide glutenfree options. But, in this case, not all publicity has been good publicity, and the spotlight on gluten-free living has also brought unwanted criticism towards the medically-required gluten-free consumers. Langston admits, “Some people believe that anyone following this diet is just trying to lose weight, be picky, or difficult.” If these people are the ones working in the kitchen or the store, the issue is often times overlooked, and not taken seriously enough resulting in health risks for celiac patients.

The war on gluten has proven relentless, and it may continue to persist in the future. Dr. Langston and the medically gluten-free community ask for patience, consideration, and an attempt at understanding what goes on in the daily life of someone who is gluten free for health purposes. And as for those who continue to trial the gluten-free diet for any reason at all, you’ve got this!

Don’t be too hard on yourself though: those of us who are lucky enough to be able to eat gluten should always enjoy a cupcake every once and awhile.

Lauren White is a first year journalism major who sometimes gets a little hangry. You can reach them at lwhite6@ ithaca.edu.

Unwrapping the Complexity of Birthday Gifts Gift-giving in the age of social media reminders // By Mae McDermott, Staff Writer Image by Rachael Geary

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e celebrate birthdays to honor others, to celebrate the life of those we love and to wish them continued health and well-being. Revolving around the anniversary of an individual’s birth, birthdays are known to be deeply personal and intimate by nature.

However, the gift-giving that accompanies these celebratory days is seldom as joyful, serene and intimate as the nature of the holiday itself.

Paradoxically, what we have to show for our loved one’s birthdays is a stressful period of time, leading up to what feels like a rigid and obligatory gift exchange in which we feel a pressure to perform, and thus end up acquiescing and purchasing a vague and impersonal gift so as to avoid failure. As the landscape of giving changes and we are inundated with birthday notifications and news of how happily our family, friends and acquaintances spend their special days, we should examine the growing external pressures and changing character of the practice.

The tradition of gift-giving that has become synonymous with birthdays likely began in classical Greece, when good thoughts, cheer and gifts were offered to protect the birthday person from any evil spirits who might be attracted to the splendor of such an important day. The practice, however, has had centuries to evolve. Because of social media, gift-giving has become even more of a socially charged activity. According to Cornell University Assistant Professor of Information Science Rene Kizilcec, “Social media

can remind people of more occasions to give gifts than most people can keep track of.” We have increased exposure to information on people’s birthdays and interests meaning an increased opportunity to offer something material with relative ease. In a recent study, Kizilcec found that “gifts through social media are replacing some of the gifts that would have been given in-person but adding new gifts that would not have been given otherwise.”

This finding could be an indication of spreading kindness… however, it is notable that the 2018 study also found that Facebook gifts replaced offline gifts about half the time, with 42 percent of givers reporting that giving a gift without the social media platform would have been difficult. Furthermore, Kizilcec continues saying that social media “can also make gift exchanges more transparent. For example, Facebook reminds people of others’ birthdays, and when people give gifts these exchanges could potentially be shown in the newsfeed to others. This can change social norms around when giving a gift and what kind of gift are acceptable and expected.” Not only are we thoroughly steeped in materialism, but it appears as though not all of the giving that is done would be done without the aid of social media. We also experience increased pressure to perform as our transactions become more visible and less intimate.

We become influenced not necessarily by what the birthday person moves us to obtain but by the practices prescribed by others as acceptable. The question is whether kindness that is reliant upon external forces like notifications rather

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than an internal drive is genuine. It is difficult to measure, but certainly worth considering where the kindness is coming from.

Further cultural examinations reveal that gift-giving, regardless of culture, is inextricably linked with the expectation that something social or material be given in return. It was French anthropologist and sociologist Marcel Mauss who first found this connection in studying gift-giving and its relationship to culture, and his findings are represented across cultures and time periods: in pre-modern Japan, a person given a gift is socially obliged to the giver. The Yucatec Maya people of southern Mexico fiercely believe that gifts, however small, must be offered upon visiting someone’s house. And Arianne Hartstein, wife to a former Israeli diplomat at the United Nations, similarly points out that at frequent informal gatherings of UN diplomats and ambassadors from all over the world, “guests invariably brought gifts for the host. This was certainly the expectation, and people took care to be appropriate and meet it.”

Less formal but just as culturally ingrained in many American households: the threat that if children do not behave during an allotted period of time, they will not receive their allowance, or they will receive coal in their stockings. A gift will be conferred only in exchange for good behavior. Thus another cloud upon what first appears to be a purely altruistic practice: to many gift exchanges there is an unspoken expectation of reciprocity.

Contrary to the concept of birthdays as days revolving entirely around the

character — one that is less personal, and more centered on materialism and unconscious expectation? It seems as though the act of giving has the potential to become less intimate and more dependent upon the convenience of the giver.

But do the aforementioned experiences really reflect what birthdays are meant to celebrate — the life of, and our love for, those dear to us?

Mae McDermott is a first year writing major who hopes Mark Zuckerberg’s birthday wishes don’t come true. You can reach them at mmcdermott@ithaca.edu.

shining existence of a special somebody, it is possible that our gift-giving practice is touched by our own desire to yield something from someone else’s day.

Again, the question is whether the kindness is coming from a place of altruism and thoughtfulness for another, or whether the desires of the giver bleed into the exchange.

In the face of the stress of materialism and expectation of reciprocity, and possibly also as a result of heavy social pressure, there are more avenues of gift-giving that allow for impersonality, and for breadth over depth. A widely used vehicle for gift-giving today is the gift card, the application of which can often be customized and personalized based on individual purchasing history. Such forms of giving are our reality--but is it ethical and reflective of the intimate nature of the birthday? Gift cards are not the only example of gifts that could

be perceived as impersonal. Carolyn Mahoney, a child psychologist stationed in Montgomery County, Maryland, notes that to celebrate their peers’ birthdays, “students rarely provide physical gifts for their peers aside from decorating lockers… other that that, it’s mostly posting about that person on social media.” While some of these digital messages are surely meaningful and intimate, the ease with which something like a gift card or post can be given enables it to be given thoughtlessly, as an obligation, without the recipient in mind. Even if a gift card is specially selected for the intended person, the gift itself is still open-ended rather than chosen, and something digital may not merely be received by the celebrant, but performed for followers. Is a gift that is a non-gift reflective of the attention and care that characterizes a birthday?

Or, by transforming the gift-giving process, are we giving birthdays a new

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Are We Afraid of Death?

How culture and religion condition people for death // By James Baratta, Staff Writer

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umans are hardwired to not die. Since the birth of everything from medical science to dieting, humans have nurtured the natural drive to remain alive. As crucial as this is to modern lifestyles, why are people so adamant about not dying?

Death is the common denominator for all, and it compels the fulfillment of life in general. This idea is present throughout Western media. From musicians like Logic in the songs “Fade Away” and “Everybody Dies,” to movies like The Fault in Our Stars, Boyhood and Cloud Atlas, death persists throughout all modern media in some way, shape or form and serves as a reminder of individual mortality.

It becomes obvious that there is a common theme of mortality that encourages a somewhat virtuous lifestyle through American media, but this mode of thinking traces back to ideas in philosophy and theology in general.

Explanations for death fill people’s lives to provide security for the day they enter their posthumous existence, or non-existence depending on if the ancient Greek philosopher Epicurus was right. His philosophy theorizes that death is painless because the state that surpasses life cannot be experienced.

However, theologians like Thomas Aquinas emphasized that faith is necessary for living a full life and is reasonable — as exemplified in his Five Ways. This theologian philosophy stresses the notion that God exists indefinitely.

Agnostic atheists may welcome the presence of God, but the unknowable has made it easier for such individuals to believe that death brings no suffering, no subject and no consciousness — hence Epicurus’ philosophy. Although atheism generally practices disbelief in

a higher power, it is still considered a religion.

“Atheists are religious, Atheists have a moral compass and a sense of selfrighteousness,” said Senior Pastor John Yenchko of the North Shore Community Church in Oyster Bay, New York.

The intangibility of death has been left open for interpretation, and humans have done more than interpret this concept throughout the history of humankind. Although the basic tenets of prevailing religions are inherently peaceful, people exploit these codes so that they may push an exceedingly human agenda. Evidence for this lies in everything from the Sunni-Shiite extremist conflict in Iraq to the Crusades of the late Middle Ages.

In the 11th century, Pope Urban II started a holy war with the Muslims of the Middle East to capture sacred holy sites like Jerusalem. The first period of the Crusades was pioneered by the Byzantine emperor at the time who needed protection from the Ottoman Empire. When manpower was becoming an issue, Pope Urban II told the people of the Holy Roman Empire that fighting in the Crusades would absolve them of their sins.

The Middle East, typically in Iran and Saudi Arabia, has a wide array of issues separate from its religious conflict between Sunni and Shiite Muslims.

Many of these include hunger, disease and oil possession.

Although the human interpretation of certain holy books has caused a portion of the world’s violence, the core of monotheistic religions is to encourage their respective followers to live a benevolent, nonviolent lifestyle.

Religion provides a set of guidelines to eliminate the fear of death so that when life comes to an end, the individual is prepared for whatever may come next.

Regardless of the similarities and differences of belief systems,

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accountability in death persists throughout all of them. Whether the end goal is enlightenment or passage into heaven, the inevitable mortality of human life acts as a motivation to live that life virtuously.

Imam Muhammad Abdul Jabbar of the Islamic Center of Long Island in Westbury, New York, said that mortality plays an important role in both the lives of Muslims and other religious people.

“Mortality is always there, and it affects our behavior, our transactions with other people and why we should be honest,” said Jabbar. “This is not the whole life and people have to go to God with accountability.”

Without religion, humans still seem to manage. According to American Atheists, humans are born with instincts that prevent them, for the most part, from outright murdering someone because they disagree with them.

Culture also fine-tunes instinctual behavior to encourage people to blend in with the environment they’ve been exposed to.

“For some people, finitude is a license to do what you want. Whereas for some people, the thought of finitude makes every moment more valuable in doing the right thing,” said Professor of Philosophy Terry Godlove of Hofstra University, “I tend to think more people are virtuous by nature.”

Whether or not the idea of an afterlife seems viable, in the end, it probably serves to not be an asshole in life. In the words of Senior Pastor John Yenchko, “You can’t go into heaven with dog crap on your soul.”

James Baratta is a first-year journalism student who’s here for a good time, not a long time. You can reach them at jbaratta@ithaca.edu.

Shots!

Shots!

Shots!

It’s your birthday...you can drink if you want to

By Mila Phelps-Friedl, Staff Writer Image by Emma Rothschild and Tara Eng

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here are a few major birthdays in our young lives that mark important doorways into societal acceptance. At 15 or 16, depending on the state, you are deemed capable enough to operate a motor vehicle. At 18, you’ve passed the bar for voting eligibility. And then there’s 21 — a year punctuated by the gleaming promise that you can now legally consume alcohol. Pay no mind to the fact that we learn how to drive before many people learn how to safely handle alcohol, and that the mix of these two “birthday privileges,” have proven to be deadly.

For many people in the United States, a 21st birthday is more than a simple celebration — it is an occasion, an extravaganza, a “rite of aging passage.”

The addition of legal alcohol to your lifestyle, pulls painfully on your wallet and your liver, but also opens the door to a slew of social opportunities that were previously conducted behind closed doors. These days, 21st birthdays aren’t complete without ridiculously shiny golden number balloons, and a typically exorbitant amount of alcohol consumption. But what is the dangerous reality behind 21st birthdays being considered a rite of aging passage? Not only is it a huge responsibility to suddenly have full access to a legal alcohol filled world, but the hype around 21st birthdays does seem to be inherently tied to an extreme social pressure around drinking.

One of the elements that increases these outrageous expectations is the consistent double edged sword of social media.

Most of the time, what appears on social media is an edited version of the truth a rosy picture of the good times you’re supposed to be having as opposed to the less edited reality. The interaction of 21st birthdays with social media results in a change of scenery from the typical “birthday dinner” or “dorm room party” to a fully-public drinking affair — cue the booming club music.

Some people definitely have a bit of a narcissism complex when it comes to their birthdays, and why shouldn’t you? It

is your day after all, but the introduction of staged social media posts may have contributed negatively to the pressures around turning 21. According to Alaina Johns, Editor-in-chief at Broad Street Review, social media doesn’t make us narcissistic, it just lets us be more public about it. “I think probably that social media gave us the outlet that our narcissism needed all along — and when we have that constant audience of hundreds or thousands, whatever is showing up, is probably what was there naturally, it’s just getting amplified by this feedback loop of that constant connectivity.” So not only does social media give us a place to participate in the culture of 21st celebrations, but it also normalizes everyone else seeing this incredibly public occasion for lots of drinking — which, in most cases, unless in a very safe environment, isn’t good for you in general.

So how does one navigate the high-pressure drinking expectations around turning 21, if that’s not actually something that you want to do? Renee Tite, a senior sociology major at Brandeis University, has done multiple studies in relation to drinking in college and alcohol treatment. One study focused specifically on collegiate socialization while sober, examining how being sober in college effects ones interactions while out amongst the culture of drinking.

Through the course of her research she found that many students who remain sober throughout college, or drink selectively, feel as if their decision to abstain from alcohol suddenly becomes a great responsibility. It is up to them to stand by their choice, staying sober often pigeon-holing them into the role of peer management or “drunken-friend caretaker.” And because college parties typically don’t stay in one location, you’ll move houses or head to the bars, while those individuals who try to stay out of the current of social drinking pressure, find themselves feeling isolated from continuing past the first leg of the party.

Tite, who turned 21 six months ago, decided to be sober long before she reached college. “I dreaded my 21st birthday because I didn’t want the social

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pressure that is associated with 21.

I didn’t want to feel like I had run out of excuses and I knew it would change the entirety of my social interactions… it changed the structure of drinking.”

Again, this goes back to how much responsibility actually does come with turning 21, a responsibility typically reported in the media only in relation to binge-drinking, and not in relation to the decision to abstain entirely.

Associate Professor William Sonnenstuhl, who works in the Department of Behavioral Organization at Cornell University, focuses his research specifically on the misperception of college drinking. He explained that the term “binge-drinking,” has been twisted and blown up by the media.

According to Sonnenstuhl, the hysteria surrounding college binge-drinking has more of a basis in yellow journalism than in verifiable data. Sonnenstuhl explained that the term was originally “heavy episodic drinking,” coined during a study done in Berkeley in 1969.

Says Sonnenstuhl, “This variable was never intended to convey the idea that everyone who drinks at that level is a serious problem, its a variable that’s used to indicate that there might be some risk involved.” When the media exchanged “heavy episodic drinking” for its sexier synonym, “binge-drinking,” it started to convert a misleading picture of out of control excessive alcohol abuse.

In his own research with Cornell students, Sonnenstuhl has found that “the data for the most part actually indicate that most students are either abstinent or they drink responsibly.

Most college students, when they do consume it, consume so they get a buzz but are not doing themselves harm.” In fact, it would seem that our usage of alcohol has not changed all that much in the past four decades or so. Sonnenstuhl mentioned a study done by the University of Michigan each year that details how “heavy episodic drinking” has not in fact skyrocketed in the past 44-45 years.

So, if we cast aside the notion that every college student is a “bingedrinking alcoholic,” why is there still

so much pressure around turning 21?

A lot of it has to do with the minimum age drinking laws. The United States is one of the only countries that has legal restrictions about alcohol usage under the age of 21. The minimum age requirement was only put into effect in 1984 by President Ronald Reagan, in response to the drunk driving epidemic.

While it did decrease the number of accidents, it also changed the culture of drinking for young people. A massive cultural shift like that meant that underage drinking suddenly took on an underground meaning. “The 21 drinking age has created a toxic environment for colleges because students come to college you know, hearing all the stories that are told about drinking and they believe those stories, and specifically freshman think they have to consume a lot of alcohol in order to fit in,” said Sonnenstuhl.

For students like Tite, who have chosen to abstain from drinking, post21st birthday, become thrust into an often unforgiving culture where it’s more acceptable to carry a red solo cup of water rather than go to a party emptyhanded. The sudden exposure into

the drinking limelight can not only be overwhelming, but hard to get around if you don’t want to participate but simultaneously still wish to be included.

“Without the secrecy it makes it a lot less of this deviant culture, so without the deviance aspect to it, it seems a lot less normal to not be drinking,” said Tite.

It is no small thing that in other countries and cultures, alcohol is not a deviant substance. Can it make you do stupid things? Yes. But there’s something to be said for allowing alcohol to be a learnable substance — meaning you understand your own tolerance and limit as well as what you like and what you don’t. The alternative is what we see in collegiate drinking culture today — behind closed doors, typically socially pressured, and then suddenly incredibly public — a world of alcoholic beverages at your fingertips the moment the clock strikes midnight on your twenty-first birthday. The fact that sobriety may feel like a responsibility and that it’s more acceptable to carry a cup of water rather than just say “no” highlights the culture of cover-up that has resulted directly from the discrepancies in legislation

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surrounding a minimum drinking age.

Until these issues are properly addressed, it is important to be able to see through the rose-colored glasses of social media, social pressure and social drinking that feed into 21st birthdays being a toxic, “rite of passage.” For Tite, the decision to stay sober has become a “prominent feature in [her] own concept of self,” explaining how “It was never something that I needed or wanted, it was just something that was there. And I’ve appreciated it, I’ve loved it … sometimes makes my life more cumbersome but it certainly is an aspect of my identity that I wouldn’t change for the world.”

Know yourself, take care of yourself, and be brave enough to stand up for yourself if you’re unhappy participating in something when all you really want is to be included.

Mila Phelps-Friedl is a senior journalism major who feels a particular satisfaction when walking past the Moonies line on her way to Lot 10. You can reach them at mphelpsfriedl@ithaca.edu

ministry

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A History of “Happy Birthday to You” Birthday cake isn’t the only thing being served // By Tyler Opropta, Staff Writer

O

ne of the richest exercises in the wheel of capitalism was Warner/Chappell Music’s monopoly over “Happy Birthday to You.” The most well-known song in the English language has a treasured history, from roots in AfricanAmerican culture, to a brief, deplorable era of copyrights and class-action lawsuits.

In 1893, two Kentucky schoolteachers conceived the tune, set to the melody of “Good Morning to All.” Patty Smith Hill, with lyrics, and Mildred J. Hill, with piano, based the song in part on the cries of the African-American street vendors.

They had to teach the songs to children, so they had to be as simple and terse as possible. Hence the four-line ditty.

From there, the teaching duo repurposed the song endlessly for holidays and times of day. But it was the original birthday jingle that spread like wildfire, making it to the stage with the Broadway show “The Band Wagon” in 1931. The producers did not have to pony up money for the copyright claim, because there was none enforced, and it’s possible that the song emerged on the radio at this time, too.

The Hill sisters had published the song in Song Stories for the Kindergarten in 1924, and the tune continued to be republished for years. Jessica Hill — Patty and Mildred’s sister — claimed the copyright 10 years after Song Stories, and when it was republished the following year, the Clayton F. Summy Company did so with a copyright notice attached. Here enters the copyright details, for the tale of “Happy Birthday to You” is inextricably linked to copyright law and America’s affinity to capitalism. Clayton F. Summy Co. reportedly held the song’s rights after the book’s publishing. Every sieve of copyright that, according to many different attorneys, the song may or may not have fallen through since, follows Clayton F. Summy Co., who expected to have the rights until 1991.

The course of “Happy Birthday to You” as it lazily rolled down through the river of history was mostly unremarkable.

Marilyn Monroe famously regaled then-President John F. Kennedy with the song in 1962. A 1987 documentary about Martin Luther King, Jr. used the song and was sent a bill for $5,000 for clearing the copyright, and from there, everything from The Colbert Report to Star Trek: The Next Generation either joked about the absurd copyright or had to forego singing it on television. (Star Trek couldn’t even get away with singing it in Klingon.)

Monroe, Clayton F. Summy Co. rebranded as Birch Tree, and Warner/Chappell Music acquired the company in 1988.

While copyright claims on the song were relatively relaxed pre-1988, under Warner/Chappell, they exploded. Some

estimate Warner profited $2 million every year from royalties.

But on September 22, 2015, two years after documentarian Jennifer Nelson filed her original suit against Warner concerning the song’s copyright status, a Los Angeles judge ruled that Warner’s claim to the copyright was invalid. The evidence? A 1922 songbook containing the song, sans copyright notices. Those eight notes, which had brought millions of dollars of profit to Warner throughout decades of copyright enforcement, were now no longer the property of Warner, and several months later, a second trial began to trace the song’s history and decide whether or not it would become public domain.

The following February, in 2016, the song was declared royalty-free, and Warner settled the case for $14 million. It’s only a fraction of what the company made in its nearly three decades of ownership. But thanks to the David-and-Goliath lawsuits, we can now enjoy Star Trek episodes wherein “Happy Birthday to You” is sung in either Klingon or English.

The song’s troubled, turbulent history, from kindergarten ditty to the most-sung tune in the English language, perfectly illustrate the lengths to which companies are willing to go to exploit for monetary gain even the most innocent elements of our culture.

For decades, the song put independent filmmakers and documentarians in a vice. How to communicate quickly and effectively that we’re witnessing a birthday party when your project must take place in a world where nobody sings the birthday song for fear of copyright infringement? Not everyone has $5,000 to spend on music.

The kangaroo court of copyright law will continue to be a thorn in the side of many independent artists for decades to come. The endless copyright strikes on YouTube aren’t going away, and laws surrounding when work enters the public domain will continue to be exploitative and excessive. (We’ll all be dead before you can safely and freely use Lady GaGa’s “Poker Face” in a movie.) This cessation of lawsuits around the English language’s most iconic song might not seem like much, but these past few years have at least ended the grip a major company has had on one of the most famous songs of all time. So happy birthday to you, reader, royalty-free.

Tyler Obropta is a fourth year Cinema and Photo major and staff writer who’d rather hear the infamous birthday song in Klingon instead of English. You can reach them at cobropta@ ithaca.edu

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Playing Your Cards Right

Is it still cool to send e-cards? // By Alexis Morillo, Upfront Editor

M

y sophomore year of college I thought it would be hilarious to send an eCard out to all of my friends using their Ithaca email accounts. It was an invitation to my roommate’s birthday pregame that was going to be hosted in a quad room of Emerson Hall. The irony of sending out a virtual invitation for a less than luxurious event made it all the more humorous. But am I the only one still doing this? Are the days of the obnoxious Hoops and YoYo singing “Happy Birthday” long gone? When next holiday season rolls around, is it totally uncool to paste our faces into the same old template provided on Elf Yourself?

The answer is complicated. In fact, upon starting my research for this piece, I casually typed into my Google Search bar “Do people still use ecards?” The top two results were advice forums of people polling the masses about this very issue, wondering if it was still socially acceptable to send their regards via automated link.

In a world where technology is thought to be the evil force that makes people forget how to communicate face to face, the intimacy of a handwritten card is actually somewhat outdated, according to Forbes. “With postal mail rates dropping and the cost of printing and postage rising—not to mention the state of the environment and our limited natural resources— the whole concept of a greeting card printed on paper and sent in the mail no longer works for business,” writes Forbes.

Handwritten cards are likely to end up in a landfill right next to our plastic straws. Environmentally speaking, eCards might be the right choice.

Still, eCard culture is not thriving enough to completely take out the paper card business, according to a CNBC interview with the chief marketing officer of Hallmark, Lindsey Roy. When it comes to the holiday season, their sales still see a steady increase. “A lot of people I think assume greeting cards are like books or CDs, or some of those kinds of categories, but it’s one of those categories that actually have perennial benefits over time,” said Roy. The act of choosing a specific card for a special someone is still something individuals find to

be very personal — and in fact, integral — to properly wishing someone well on a special occasion.

Like almost all internet fads, there are good and bad aspects of the eCard. For example, eCards can be seen as spam or even hold viruses, as stated in a Sydney Morning Herald article. “There’s a tricky trojan e-card that looks like it comes from Hallmark,” said Wong, an email expert. “It asks you to download an attachment to receive the e-card and that attachment is a virus. This is definitely not going to bring much cheer.” When picking out which eCard to send, it may take just as much care as choosing which paper card just to ensure to viruses aren’t sent.

On the other hand, eCards allow for more opportunity for creativity and personalization, as there are websites with hundreds of templates to be played around with to make the perfect one. Hallmark and American Greetings, two of the most well known card companies, host websites where customers can browse eCard designs too. They’re both profiting off of the possibility that sometimes people go for the easier, electronic option.

It may just be up to personal preference or depend on the situation to decide whether a paper or electronic card is the right way to go. As funny as it was to invite all of my friends to drink from plastic handles in a dorm room via eCard, I will likely be sending handwritten birthday cards to my family or thank you cards to my employers for years to come. There’s just something that seems so much more thoughtful about a paper card. Maybe it’s the ink smudged handwriting or the saliva used to stick down the envelope or the ability to watch your loved ones’ face as they open it… there are just some things an eCard cannot replicate.

Alexis Morillo is a fourth year Journalism major and the Upfront editor who will gladly send you a Happy Birthday eCard. You can reach them at amorillo@ithaca.edu

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Dear Academy, Do Better

Let’s stop honoring problematic cinema // By Julia LaCava

I

’ll admit it: I’m a sucker for awards shows. There’s something about dressing up and spending a night honoring the industry I aspire to have a career in that makes me proud. But it gets harder and harder to defend award shows.

It’s hard to be a fan of film and not be upset about the Oscars this year. After a wonderful but problematic year for film, the Academy of Motion Pictures and Sciences has chosen to play it safe this season with its nominations, picking nominations in an effort to attract a wider audience after last year’s ceremony was the lowest watched in 44 years with an estimated 26.5 million viewers.

The common ground of disgust lies in the Best Picture category, which seems to be a poorly made hodgepodge of the year’s blockbusters like A Star Is Born and Black Panther, and films that were seemingly loved by the public. Unlike the 2018’s ceremony which was made up mostly of independent and genre films, a lot of people are more likely to see the Oscars this year because they know the films and people being nominated. The Best Picture category displays the Academy’s successes and failures, a slice of where the industry seems to be heading, or in reality, where it seems to be stuck.

Green Book, nominated for Best Picture and four other awards, is a true story of a “friendship” between an African American pianist and the bodyguard who accompanies him on tour through the 1960s south. While some love the film, others have viewed it as a tale of racism through the eyes of a person not affected by it, romanticizing the concept of a white savior to the audience as well as the “friendship” portrayed in the film. According to the family of the actual pianist, Don Shirley, the two were not close at all and had a strictly professional relationship. The Shirley family has subsequently denounced the film.

But it doesn’t end there. In the years since the #metoo movement started gaining media attention, the Academy has made strong statements about standing with survivors, including a montage during the 2018 ceremony led by Ashley Judd, Salma Hayek, and Annabella Sciorra. This year, though, director Bryan Singer has been given a Best Picture nomination for his work on Bohemian Rhapsody, despite numerous reports and allegations of sexual abuse.

Both films follow a template that moviegoers have seen

too often to count: the biopic. These films are systematically chosen to be nominated for the Oscars, no matter what other original content is in theaters that year. In the past 30 years, 32 of 189 nominations for Best Picture have been biopics.

Now that both Green Book and Bohemian Rhapsody are frontrunners for winning, there is cause for concern. With the 2016 Best Picture going to Barry Jenkins’ Moonlight and 2017’s to Guillermo Del Toro’s The Shape of Water, the Academy seems to be taking one step forward and three steps back.

While there are losses in Best Picture, there are also significant wins. Alfonso Cuarón’s critical and commercial hit Roma is nominated, the first foreign film up for the title since 2012’s Amour. Black Panther and Blackkklansman are nominated, both directed by people of color. Black Panther is also the first superhero movie to be nominated in the category.

I could go on about how there are no women nominated for Best Director, despite the high-grossing films in 2018 that were made by women. The Academy seemed to ignore independent films such as Eighth Grade and Sorry To Bother You completely, and only glossing over others, like If Beale Street Could Talk and First Reformed with Supporting Actress and Screenplay nominations. But these are all issues we have heard before.

If this is a problem that seems to never go away, why should we care about the Oscars? Unfortunately, because it has become integral to the film industry. Studios see what films get nominated for and strive to create films like those, and the cycle repeats again and again, with biopics and digestible films.

I want an Oscars ceremony that gives filmmakers like me hope. Hope in the fact that no matter who they are or where they’re from or what kind of story they’re telling, there is still a chance of being recognized.

Julia LaCava is a second year Writing for Film, TV, & Emerging Media major and contributing writer who’ll be watching the Independent Spirit Awards this year. You can reach them at: jlacava@ithaca.edu

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To Being 20 in 2019 Ah, the good ol’ days // By Jordan Szymanski

T

oday, the world seems to be crumbling underneath our feet. We’re on the final few laps of a terrifying presidency only to come upon a typical, cut throat campaign season. Our planet is dying in front of us. Jeff Besos, the founder and CEO of Amazon, released that Amazon’s federal tax bill was zero dollars this year despite the company’s profits being 5.6 billion for 2018.

And to make matters worse, Law and Order: SVU is leaving Netflix in March.

It feels natural in chaotic times, to yearn for a time of simplicity, making many young people search their childhoods for places, people, and things that are worth remembering.

The late 90s was an era of change. In 1999, most of us were newly disrupting our parents’ lives as newborns and the adults in our lives believed in a new millenium that would usher in change. Well, plenty has changed. But for a moment, let’s go back to 1999:

was under $1.50. What a time where the cost of my Spotify subscription could buy me at least a quarter of a tank.

2. Spongebob Squarepants premiered In May of 1999, the very first Spongebob Squarepants episode featuring the high-caliber spatula and the bus loads of singing anchovies we all remember and love debuted on Nickelodeon. From then on, we’ve enjoyed musical performances, heart-warming and belly aching storylines, and lately, some iconic memes. Thanks to the shows creator, Stephen Hillenburg (RIP), we’ve all had our lifelong dream of a Spongebob halftime show partially filled.

A few cultural icons lived and thrived but have since passed: 3. The Harry Potter craze was taking off in the U.S. 4. Napster 5. Blackberry

Below is a list of nineteen things that won’t be turning twenty with us this year.

1. Average gallon of gas was $1.17 This seems like an urban legend. In 1999, the average cost of gas across America

6. iBook, the most aesthetically interesting Apple computer 7. Freak and Geeks premieres its one and only season, a sad truth that’s silver lining is Jason Segal’s career.

Arts, entertainment and other things cooler than us.

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8. Baby Bottle Pops: literal sugar covered baby bottles that we proceeded to dip in more sugar. I think these still exist and anti-vaxer moms are shaking just thinking about it.

9. ICEE spray candy was also another convenient store favorite that might have been vegan because it was quite possibly just liquid plastic.

10. Bluetooth headset premiered: this dead trend might be reviving itself in airpods. Nonetheless, it’s the rich’s original hard flex.

11. Super Smash Bros: the original for Nintendo 64 released in North America and Japan in January of 1999.

12. Twirl-O-Paint: the original art kids known exactly what I’m talking about.

13. Teen Movie era: 10 Things I Hate About You, She’s All That, Never Been Kissed, American Pie all premiered in 1999 – a time in cinema where semi-attractive white people in their upper 20s played spoiled teenagers in lukewarm melodramas, one’s that we all secretly still have on VHS. 14. Britney Spears’ VMAS Baby One More Time performance aired in January of 1999. A sexual awakening moment for pubescent boys, girls, and gays across America that has been sorely missed.

15. Furby Babies: electronic robots that could switch to speaking English and were available in 24 different colors.

Ended racial tensions for a brief moment.

16. Cranium and Cranium Hullabaloo: personally, this is a defining personality trait for me and I will not apologize for that. The original PSAT meme was referencing this game on the playground.

18. JLo’s debut studio album On The 6 release in June of 1999, which propelled Latin Pop Music into the American arena. RIP to a time where Justin Bieber’s poorly done Spanish accent wasn’t dominating the charts but actual Latin Pop artists were playing everywhere from nightclubs to supermarkets.

Meanwhile, our media is zeroing in on Kamala Harris smoking pot and Elizabeth Warren’s 23&Me results. Some things really don’t change.

In 1999 while America focused on who did and did not have sexual relations with Monica Lewinsky, NATO, led by the United States, launched the two-month bombardment of Yugoslavia.

The strikes were not limited to military installations and NATO targets included civilian targets such as factories, oil refineries, television stations and infrastructure. This tension over oil would dominate the foreign policy of the United States for decades to come, spawning a number of small conflicts in the Middle East that would topple democracies and give rise to dictatorships– later groups like Al Queda and the Taliban. The media coverage of this was obsolete. Bill Clinton’s blowjob, however, was everywhere. Our priorities haven’t changed.

A major misstep in nostalgic thinking is memorializing the past instead of learning from it. To be too lenient with our childhood memories is to allow the suffering and implications of 1999 to spill over into a new era. It may be tempting to yearn for a time of innocence and simplicity, but to allow nostalgia to give way to ignorance may be allowing for a repetition of poor (and sometimes catastrophic) mistakes. Some things never change. Unless we start paying better attention. To be 20 in 2019 is relentless; but it is also a unique time full of opportunity for us to learn from 1999’s mistakes, landmarks, and successes– all in the hopes of making a slight increment of change. We may owe change to the people, places, and things that aren’t here anymore. Trayvon Martin would have been 24 this year. The Twin Towers will be gone for 18 years this September. Some of the Parkland victims would have graduated this May. We may owe more than nostalgia to what did not come into 2019 alongside us. While it’s nice to revel in the past every once in a while, we may owe it to 1999 and the past to be better today than yesterday.

Jordan Szymanski is a second year Writing for Film, TV, & Emerging Media major and staff writer who parties like it’s 1999, even though they were a baby then. You can reach them at jszymanski@ithaca.edu

19. The Bill Clinton/Monica Lewinsky scandal came to a close with President Clinton’s acquittal of all charges on February 12 of 1999.

When thinking back to this particular political scandal that dominated pop culture through the rest of the 20th century and into much of the next, I remember how disheartening it can be to be nostalgic for the past we may still be living in.

Just over 20 years ago, a presidential scandal centered on sexual misconduct and perjury to a grand jury. Today, our president has twenty-something outstanding cases of sexual misconduct ranging from mild to severe harassment. There is an ongoing investigation that may prove coercion with Russia to dismantle the democratic elections, for which people close to our president are heading off to jail under perjury charges.

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Pink Floyd’s The Wall Forty Years Later Surprise, it’s still relevant // By Gigi Grady

P

ink Floyd’s world-famous double album The Wall is celebrating its 40th birthday this year after becoming one of the United States’ best-selling albums of all time. The double album illustrates a progression of a rockstar’s life and ultimate isolation; it is considered the London-based band’s most ambitious project, as well as one of the most intricate albums of all time.

Reoccuring themes of rebelling students and being cautious of the government not only paint a picture of 1979, but of 2019 as well.

Released in 1979, the 26-track album was written almost entirely by the group’s bassist, Roger Waters.

Even though the album is portraying an individual’s entire journey into isolation and their fight to reconnect with the world, there is no flat note to be found, and critics who claim that it is difficult to understand what the group is talking about were not listening well enough.

The transitions between each song are mostly without pause, with one song flawlessly connecting into the next. The lyrics, “Isn’t this where…” from the last track swiftly bleed back into the first track, starting with the lyrics, “...we came in?” The complex instrumentals and cunning lyrics continue to be impressive, even after being buried in your parents’ record collection for going-on 40 years.

From the rock ballad “Comfortably Numb” to the theatrical composition “The Trial,” the album does not miss a beat when it comes to style. The Wall’s signature track “Another Brick in the Wall Pt. 2” encompasses everything the world loved about music in the late 1970s, and more. Choruses sung by school children (music producer Nick Griffiths simply walked into the nearest elementary school and asked the music teacher if the students were able to sing at the studio) and an electric guitar partnered with a disco beat snowballed into an “antiauthoritarian” anthem, as well as the band’s only number one single.

The looming flaw is the overwhelming morbidity of the album as a whole, which very much distracts from the fact that the individual experiencing this story does indeed find a resolution to his isolated state. Searching for the light at the end of the tunnel as the album comes to a close is nearly impossible with hints of alienation, destruction, loveless relationships and meaninglessness of life rushing from all different directions.

After aging four decades, the relevance of the album is surprising. One underlying theme is the character’s relationship with women, which only shows up in a few tracks.

The heartfelt track, “Mother,” serves as one of the more emotional works, presenting the rockstar’s relationship with his mother as a child.

Another is “Young Lust,” which represents the focal

character’s attempt to fill an emotional void with sex during his young adult years.

Then there is “Don’t Leave Me Now,” a song about pleading for a woman to stay after her husband’s abuse, with the singer stating how he desires to mold her into a person he wants her to be. Lyrics pleading her to stay so he can have someone to beat “on a Saturday night” while continuing to ask her, “How can you treat me this way?” present women as the vile image of not only being a man’s doormat, but also his personal punching bag.

Domestic violence is still very much present in 2019, and the fight for the rights of all people continue to be a global struggle. The first step towards awareness was two years after The Wall’s release in 1981 with a “Day of Unity” held in October. Since then, the Day of Unity has grown into the month of October being Domestic Violence Awareness Month. With technology and social media existing during a time in which all forms of abuse are unacceptable, an individual of any status with a history of abuse can be held accountable. Although steps have been taken to bring awareness to domestic abuse, one of the only differences between being a listener in 1979 and being a listener today is the sick feeling you get after realizing that people are still being treated like objects 40 years later.

On top of the timeless technicalities of the music, lyrics asking if the singer should “build the wall” spoke volumes then and continues to do so now.

In the world of Trump and overwhelming talk of the simultaneously dreaded and desired wall, the album’s overall message of being present in the world remains applicable, proving just as well that life truly does imitate art. Most recently, musician Joy Villa arrived to this past Grammy Awards ceremony in a dress made to appear like The Wall album cover, but instead reading “Build The Wall,” with barbed wire decorated around her shoulders. This was all occurring while politician Beto O’Rourke fought against President Trump’s alleged claims about the wall’s benefits at a rally in El Paso, Texas.

Between constant fights for unification and the recently concluded government shutdown, the country is at war with itself in the same way The Wall’s troubled rock singer was at war with his own mind. The questions posed are just as relevant: what will happen if we build the wall?

Gigi Grady is a first year Journalism major and contributing writer who’s looking for their next music obsession in their parents’ record collection. You can reach them at ggrady@ ithaca.edu

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REVIEWS ON MOVIES, MUSIC & MEDIA

RAW FROM THE SAW

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Shoplifters

By Tyler Obropta

Family is relative. Shoplifters, Japan’s hat in the Best Foreign Language Film ring, envisions family as a cluster of misfits who gravitate toward one another, desperate people trying to get by however they can.

Despite what the title suggests, most of the family works. Patriarch Osamu Shibata (Lily Franky) works construction, while his wife Nobuyo (Sakura Andô) launders clothes and their sister Aki (Mayu Matsuoka) performs at a hostess’ club. The sentinel of the home, Hatsue (Kirin Kiki), buoys the family with her pension checks. But none of this is enough.

Osamu and his son, Shota (Kairi Jō), resort to shoplifting noodles, chips, and shampoo — everything they need to live semi-comfortably in their crowded bungalow. Crafted in the wake of Japan’s Lost 20 Years, Shoplifters reacts to turn-of-the-century Japan’s widespread poverty, but the film’s joy and heart radiate from its Dickensian execution. Hirokazu Kore-eda, who triple-threats as director, writer and editor here, makes Osamu into a Faginesque figure with twice the charm and none of the implied pederasty. Shota’s unwilling Artful Dodger, and the 5-yearold girl, Yuri (Miyu Sasaki), he discovers in the frigid night air becomes their

Roma

Oliver Twist.

Kore-eda steers Shoplifters with the grace and complexity of a master (the film won the Palme d’Or at Cannes).

His precise direction makes the sublime introduction — Osamu and Shota stealing from a grocery store — nothing short of magical. Part of that magic is the control the camera has as it steadily tracks their petty heist. Osamu and Shota communicate in cryptic hand gestures and soft stares, having honed the act of shoplifting into a dance.

For her complicated role, the 7-yearold Sasaki plays Yuri with equal parts timidity and knowingness. Yuri’s parents abuse her, and the actress’ quiet, uncertain stare is all the evidence we need to understand the weight the abuse has had on her. Yuri bonds with Nobuyo — whom she affectionately calls “Mother” — over burn marks on their forearms inflicted with hot irons.

The family of Shoplifters comprises many different types of victims, but under the roof of that small bungalow, where Kore-eda frames the family so simply, like a passive observer, it feels like nothing can touch them, like they’re cordoned off from the harshness of the world.

Sasaki threatens to eclipse the other performers. Franky, plays Osamu with

mischievous glee, a perfect counterpoint to the soft-spoken Hatsue. Kiki, who died last September, was a veteran actress, and she naturally excels in her folksy, sly turn in Shoplifters. Every movement, from her slow shuffle across the floor to the deliberate way she chews her food, fleshes out Hatsue’s character.

The great Japanese director Yasujirô Ozu loved his tatami shots, where the camera is in line with the reed tatami mats on the house floors. Kore-eda’s work in Shoplifters reminds one of Ozu’s poetry, the way he shoots characters through doors, creating portraits within the camera’s eye.

Kore-eda’s delicate character ballet is humanitarian cinema: heartbreaking, funny and mundane. It harkens back to a simpler style of film, when relationships could power a narrative better than any globe-trotting intrigue, murder plot, superhero battle or gunfight.

Shoplifters is harmony captured on film, real life transposed to 35mm. In Yasujirô Ozu’s Tokyo Story, a woman ponders how her children will grow old and drift away from her, and she asks, “Isn’t life disappointing?” It is, Shoplifters says — true happiness never lasts, after all — but the film makes the case that there’s beauty, humor and mischief to be found in all that disappointment.

films, which have taken to the trend of sporadic editing and short shots. The beginning of the film opens with a shot of a tiled floor being washed, the soapy water flowing back and forth like a wave.

The highlight of the film is the protagonist, Cleo, and Yalitza Aparicio’s honest portrayal of a woman trying to survive in 1970’s Mexico with her own struggles and dreams. The film uses Aparicio’s character to look into the lives of the family she cares for, giving the viewer a feeling of voyeurism. As Cleo becomes the link to this family, she captures the audience, bringing us along for the journey. Through Cleo, we watch her own heartbreak, as well as the ending of her employer Sofia’s, played

by Marina de Tavira, marriage.

We learn an essential truth of the film

as Sofia explains, “We are alone. No matter what they tell you, we women are always alone,” before they embrace each other. Roma becomes a film about combating the loneliness around you with those you love.

By Julia LaCava

On the surface, Alfonso Cuarón’s Roma is a film about the ordinary life of Cleo, a housekeeper in 1970’s Mexico City. But it is its mundane aspects that are its strengths.

The audience is transported to Mexico City through sound design. The film has the soundscape of a bustling world, full of street vendors yelling and children playing. The cinematography, courtesy of Alfonso Cuarón himself, is mesmerizing. Shot entirely in black and white, Roma is hypnotic with long shots that sweep through the scene and follow the same pace as its actors. Through this technique, Cuarón has transformed his setting into a character itself. Shots linger and allow the viewer to reflect on what they have viewed during the film, an experience not felt often in modern

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Happy Death Day 2U Happy Death Day 2U isn’t a sequel, not in the normal sense anyways. It has the same premise as Happy Death Day but the film takes place in an alternate universe on the 19th of September.

Even from the opening, the Universal logo splits into two then four and then combines back together to hit the parallel universe theme home.

Not to stray from the Hollywood model, Tree, a college student, is played by Jessica Rothe, an actress 10 years older than the part. But there’s actually not much to complain about here, because Rothe flawlessly pulls off the careless turned sentimental student, making for a quite entertaining lead character. Her boyfriend Carter played

by Israel Broussard (a familiar face from To All Boys I’ve Loved Before) reprises his role from the first film.

While the first Happy Death Day focuses on uncovering the babyface

Vice

By Tessa More

killer, Happy Death Day 2U leans into the romantic side, making us wondering if love will prevail. Will Tree stay in the new alternate universe or bet on her relationship and make it back?

The sequel answers many questions posed in the first movie: What causes the time loop? What is Carter searching for every morning when Tree wakes up? What caused the creepy blackouts in the first movie? If you haven’t seen the first movie, Tree gives a nice little expositional recap early on in the movie to catch you up to speed.

As the movie continues there’s new obstacles at every turn, but some are straight up unnecessary. Although these obstacles provide entertainment, the movie could’ve been well under the 1 hour 40 minute mark.

This movie is light-hearted, witty, but not scary. At times it is genuinely sentimental, flipping the slasher

Groundhogs Day subgenre on its head.

Happy Death Day 2U is rarely anywhere near the realm of horror. Although the movie seems unclear of what genre it’s trying to fit into, the movie still succeeds at what it’s trying to do.

I definitely enjoyed all the little Easter eggs hiding throughout the movie, but they might go unnoticed by the average moviegoer. The crowd was definitely into it too, and huge applause followed the line, “That’s what scientists do.

We solve problems.” There are some contradictions that don’t make sense, but it’s a Blumhouse film so the plot holes are easy to overlook and forgive.

Expect Blumhouse to keep making Happy Death Day movies, as this is a franchise that could grow indefinitely, and the end credit scene definitely sets up the next one. So if you’re interested in a funny and romantic Halloween style franchise, buckle up.

Bush (Sam Rockwell.)

If that seems like a lot its because it is. There is a ton going on in this movie and it skips vast portions of Cheney’s life. Almost none of his tenure as CEO of Halliburton is covered and much of his time as Bush’s VP feels rushed. Telling a story that spans over 40 years is difficult but McKay further complicates it with his ambitious, cutaway heavy style.

That’s not to say that none of McKay’s directorial quirks work. The false ending that occurs about halfway through the movie is hilarious and genuinely unique moment and seeing Dick and Lynne Cheney suddenly recite Shakespeare has to be seen to be believed. However many of McKay’s directorial flairs end up complicating an already busy story and one, involving the reveal of a narrator is down right eye roll inducing. While this busyness is interesting, it also makes for a rather muddled story.

What holds the film together is the tremendous cast. The ensemble turns in all around great performances led

by Christian Bale as Cheney. Bale, who has once again gained weight beyond recognition to play older Cheney, disappears into the role. He’s downright transfixing, not only because of his

physical transformation, but because of his ability to command the screen without doing much at all. The strength of his performance gives the movie leeway to wander a little bit because whatever muddled plot points the movie is presenting, Bale’s commitment is so stunning it keeps the viewer engaged.

Amy Adams’ performance as Lynne is also stunning, as she continually pushes Dick and his political ambitions further.

Steve Carell delightfully chews scenery as Donald Rumsfeld while Sam Rockwell’s George W. is charmingly buffoonish and ultimately underused.

The cast is rounded out with solid performances in the margins from Alison Pill, Justin Kirk and Tyler Perry.

In politically charged times like the ones we are living through, a movie like Vice is going to get a lot of attention regardless, and seems crafted to get as much attention as possible. However when the movie tries to do more than entertain it falls short. Ultimately as muddled and busy as it is, Vice is entertaining and engaging enough to be enjoyable and worth seeing for Bale’s stunning performance alone.

By Dan Martin

Adam McKay isn’t afraid to take a big swing. As the director of some of the best comedies of the 21st century McKay is used to taking big directorial chances, usually for comedic effect. So it’s no surprise that McKay’s latest Vice, a biopic of vice president Dick Cheney, doesn’t play it safe. And while not all of McKay’s swings connect, the result is a thoroughly interesting and entertaining, if flawed, movie.

Vice shows Cheney, played impeccably by Christian Bale, rise from a line worker in Wyoming to one of the most powerful and influential American vice presidents in history. Early on the movie shows Cheney’s DWI arrest as a turning point in Cheney’s life– a moment that prompted his wife, Lynne (Amy Adams), to threaten leaving him if he didn’t get his life together. This desire to please and impress Lynne is what brings Dick to Washington where he starts working for Donald Rumsfeld (Steve Carell) and moving up the Washington food chain– eventually serving as Secretary of Defense under George H.W. Bush. Then, after a stint as CEO of Halliburton during the Clinton administration, Cheney reaches the high office of Vice President to George W.

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Velvet Buzzsaw By Tessa More The premise of Velvet Buzzsaw had the makings of an incredible and unique film but it falls a little short. Writer and director Dan Gilroy teamed up with Jake Gyllenhaal for the first time since Nightcrawler in 2014 (which was Gilroy’s first time in the director seat).

The painted introduction brilliantly details the events to come without being too blatant as to give the plot away.

We settle in with Morf, played by Jake Gyllenhaal, a respected art critic whose influence can make or break an artist.

He’s attending the opening of a new art exhibit at a convention center. He isn’t impressed with the work.

Josephina, played by Zawe Ashton, works in the art curation world. She hasn’t progressed very far in her career, that is until she discovers the body of a neighboring tenant. Vetril Dease, the tenant, was a recluse who spent his life painting his anguish and depression, using his own blood for the dark reds and browns. The artist requested his paintings be burned; they were never intended to make a profit.

The film contemplates the meaning of

art: is it simply self-expression or should it be made profitable? Many artists struggle with selling their work because they make it for themselves and no one else. The art world is pretentious and fake which contradicts the authentic nature of art.

Vetril Dease was in the process of burning his paintings, and requested the rest be destroyed and yet Josephina tries to profit off of them anyways. This is where the film gets fantastical and evil.

Everyone who falls prey to the greed of the art by profiting from them dies.

The name of the film Velvet Buzzsaw comes from a punk band Rhodora Haze, played by Rene Russo, played with before selling out and becoming a bourgeois gallery owner. Rhodora still has tattoos from her punk phase, including a buzzsaw that says “Velvet Buzzsaw” on the back of her neck, and her art comes back to bite her. Rhodora precisely demonstrates the capitalist greed that art can bring out in people.

Rhodora helps Josephina present Vetril Dease’s work; hoarding and hiding most of it away to increase the value to make

You (Season One) By Morriah Lisowski You fulfills almost every Gossip Girl fan’s imagination of what Dan Humphrey would be like 10 years into the future. There are striking similarities with “lonely boy” icon Dan Humphrey and You protagonist Joe Goldberg, from their love of literature and roots in Brooklyn to their peculiar interests with blonde girl-next-door characters.

The only difference is, Joe will stop at nothing for someone he loves– even if that means murder.

What makes You so unique is the fact that the whole show is from the abusers perspective. You is guided

by Joe’s narration as he stalks Beck, a twenty something college student with a love for poetry and books. He gains full access to Beck’s phone and stalks Beck, her friends, her family, and overall tries to control her relationships and her life so she’s only with him. Joe speaks about all of Beck’s friends as obstacles, specifically Beck’s best friend, Peach,

played by former Pretty Little Liar star Shay Mitchell.

It’s hard to initially dislike Joe because most of us are guilty of his actions. In the beginning, everything he learns about Beck is from her social media. He scrolls through her feed to learn more about Beck’s personality through her pictures and commentary. Although we don’t say it aloud, most of us are guilty of falling into a social media hole of scrolling through other people’s lives. The only difference is Joe takes the social media prowling to another degree when he goes out of his way to find Beck at a spoken word event where they “coincidentally” cross paths and everything goes downhill.

Penn Badgley didn’t play Joe as the stereotypical rough, rigged, and violent abuser. Joe was timid, quiet, and sweet (at least to the outside world). Joe was kind to his co-workers, a father figure to his next-door neighbor Paco, and

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them “rare” paintings.

The main theme of the film is the purpose of art, why we create, and who deserves to see it. Velvet Buzzsaw seems to say artists should make art for themselves, to better understand their feelings, not to gain a profit. The end credits demonstrate that, as another artist creates ephemeral art in the sand, not caring as waves wash it away.

Those who survive in the end appreciate and respect art, steering clear of the greed in the lucrative art world. There’s a lot to unpack in Velvet Buzzsaw. Some viewers may walk away confused as to what they just watched, while others begin forming theories and connections immediately. The film is just a drop into the bucket that artists struggle with every day: Should they try to appeal to a buyer even if it means giving up some of their authenticity?

Should an artist create just for themself even if it means going broke? As an average unartistic viewer, the meaning was heavy-handed and made me curious into each decision made by Dan Gilroy.

introspective in his relationships.

Some viewers have criticized the writers for romanticizing Joe’s abusive behavior. There are moments when you root for Joe. When Beck leaves the spoken word event, none of her friends support her or chase after her. But Joe’s there to catch her fall in the subway tracks and pushes her to go after her dreams. By showing flaws in Beck this also allowed the viewer to sympathize with Joe. Beck lied about her past, slacked at her job at Joe’s bookstore, and Joe’s abuse became less obvious.

Most of us are also guilty of revealing a little too much of ourselves online, and after watching You, I’ve been a bit more careful about what I post on my social media and what makes a person inherently good. You is confirmed for a season two, only a short while after premiering on Netflix. The Haunting of Hill House fan favorite Victoria Pedretti is set to play Joe’s next victim.

Homecoming (Season One) By Sean Murphy Homecoming’s unique source material is the least shocking thing about the Amazon drama series. The psychological thriller originated as a fictional podcast of the same name, brought to life by Eli Horowitz and Micah Bloomberg through Gimlet Media, and surrounds a mysterious, elusive, government rehabilitation facility for combat veterans looking to reintegrate into society. The suspenseful podcast instantly became a cult classic.

Julia Roberts stars in the television series adaptation as Heidi Bergman, making her debut on the small screen.

Bergman is a caseworker at the titular Homecoming facility, a workaholic through and through. At least she used to be, that is until, through intermittent flash-forwards, we learn that Bergman has quit her job to work at a marina-side diner while she takes care of her mother, having seemingly cut all ties with her previous life. Bergman’s arc revolves around rediscovering these moments in her life that she can no longer remember. Throughout the course of the season, Bergman realizes that she does not remember key parts of her time working at the facility, and as she struggles to unearth the truth what she learns haunts her.

Supporting Roberts is Stephan James,

playing combat veteran Walter Cruz, a new client of Homecoming who is eager to jump back into life as an American citizen. James’ complex portrayal of a man shaped by hardship makes him the undeniable stand-out of the show, radiating warmth and charisma with each line. Cruz has daily appointments with Bergman, and they discuss his difficulties reintegrating himself back into society.

Their dynamic is the backbone to the show, and each conversation is buoyed by their chemistry.

In flash-forwards, we are introduced to Thomas Carrasco (Shea Whigham), an employee of the Department of Defense looking into the Homecoming facility.

Rounding out the cast is Bergman’s supervisor, Colin Belfast, played by the charming Bobby Cannavale, and Bergman’s mother, Ellen, played by Sissy Spacek. All do a remarkable job bolstering the series’ ensemble quality.

Homecoming takes its time unraveling mystery after mystery. For its thirty minute episode run time, each passing story feels like more of a secret revealed to us, which can be attributed to the show’s nuanced and layered writing.

Tension builds and releases, but the viewer is rarely put at ease, wondering what could possibly be at the root of the organization.

Sam Esmail, the mind behind Mr. Robot, directs all ten episodes and pioneers a mesmerizing, and occasionally claustrophobic, directorial style for the show. To distinguish between 2018 at the Homecoming facility and the time jump in 2022, Esmail narrows the aspect ratio to a slim 4:3, a constricted and often uncomfortable viewing experience. Shots vary from unsettling close-ups to sprawling beautifully composed tracking scenes that feel like they could go on forever.

The show’s sound design reminds you that Homecoming originates from an auditory medium. Despite the unparalleled cinematography and production design, you might be tempted to close your eyes and simply listen to the show. Between old-timey Hollywood orchestral swells to the most subtle sounds of an office aquarium bubbling, attention to detail is crucial in realizing Homecoming.

As an adaptation, the television series is faithful to the source material, but builds upon it with visual flair, stellar performances, and heightened stakes. Homecoming provides not only technically sound television, but a viewing experience that takes its time, inviting you to know everything– but not just yet.

The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel (Season Two) The dynamic duo of showrunner Amy Sherman-Palladino and actress Rachel Brosnahan have done it again. Season 2 of The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel hits just as hard as the first season. It makes you laugh, cringe, and long to live in 1958 New York.

If you haven’t watched Season 1, just watch the first scene of Season 2: you will be in awe of the impressive twominute one shot. It has fantastic acting, directing, writing, cinematography, and music. It’s practically perfect. And it has the awards to back it up.

In Season 2, Miriam ‘Midge’ Maisel is navigating new waters. Midge is demoted from the makeup counter at B. Altman to the call room, directing calls with 11 other women. But much of the season actually takes place between the Catskill Mountain resort and gigs

booked by her agent Susie.

The second season revolves around what it means to put your career first as a woman and the consequences of acting without thinking. Through all of the ups and downs, Midge is learning when and when not to be the center of attention with her humor.

Midge often puts herself first without considering how her actions affect those around her. She goes on vacation to the Catskills for two months without even telling her agent, who has been hard at work getting her performance slots.

But Midge has her redeeming qualities.

She’s a mother who has always taken care of her family before herself, so without her husband, she’s learning how to be a comedian and a mother. As she struggles to balance both aspects of her life, she goes back and forth wondering

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By Tessa More

if success is worth sacrificing her family and personal life.

In Season 2 we get to see more of Midge’s agent Susie Myerson, played

by Alex Borstein, which is an absolute treat. Susie follows Midge to the resort posing as a worker, assimilating very quickly. She takes advantage of every opportunity to get Midge on the stage, culminating in Midge being offered to open for a famous singer on a six-month tour.

The end of Season 2 sets up a fascinating Season 3. Will Midge get back with her ex or continue her new relationship? Will Susie represent a new comedian? Will it still be funny? Filming is set to start soon, so The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel will be back making us laugh in no time.

Lana Del Rey’s “hope is a dangerous thing for a woman like me to have—but i have it” By Julia Batista Two years after Lust for Life, Lana Del Rey releases her third single from her anticipated fifth studio album, Norman Fucking Rockwell. “hope is a dangerous thing for a woman like me to have – but I have it” is the longest used title of her career. With the black and white portrait as its cover, the song is definitely symbolic of her own life and insights.

The long song title maybe could’ve been abbreviated or shortened, given that the repeated words are present in the lyrics. From claiming that she would be “less stressed” if she were “tested less like… these debutantes,” to comparing herself to Sylvia Plath, Del

Rey expresses her unhappiness through this five-minute ballad. Her hypnotizing yet almost heartbroken tone is layered over a simple, soft piano; a sound choice that doesn’t take away attention from her words.

“Don’t ask if I’m happy, you know that I’m not… But at best I can say that I’m not sad” are just some lyrics from the chorus that speak volumes about Del Rey’s emotional conflict. There are also hints of reflection in the song, ones about “fifteen-year dances” in “church basement(s)” and that the “the only life” that she’s ever known is the stage in which she calls “home.” The mix of

depressing lyrics with her high-pitched admissible vocals may be the right combination for the most transparent album that Del Rey has yet to release.

Since the releases of “Venice Bitch” and “Mariner’s Apartment Complex”, the addition of “hope is a dangerous thing for a woman…” already gives Norman Fucking Rockwell a lethargic and passive voice in comparison to Lust for Life’s mostly upbeat and pop tone. We’ll just have to find out the true disposition of the LP on the day of the album’s release date, March 29.

Sharon von Etten’s Remind Me Tomorrow

By Tyler Obropta

When Sharon Van Etten’s Are We There debuted in 2014, she became a revelation. Her fourth album displayed a mellow, confident New York riff on folk traditions with “Every Time the Sun Comes Up” and “Nothing Will Change.” Well, it’s 2019, and something indeed has changed with Van Etten.

Artists, like music, constantly evolve.

And some songs on Van Etten’s synthheavy Remind Me Tomorrow spotlight her signature melancholic voice. But the cacophony of empty, destructive noise, from blown-out bass to wobbling synthpop waves, maroons Van Etten’s vocals, letting them roll through the album like a remorseful tumbleweed.

Call it a cliché, but these electropop tracks lack the truth and sincerity of her folk-focused efforts. The droning instrumentation, rarely reaching past synths, keyboards and percussion, saps the songs of any sonic innovation or emotion. At first, in “I Told You Everything,” the album’s fresh soundscape feels deep and chasmal, and every key hits like distant water dripdropping against Van Etten’s vocals.

Synth tremors beneath the song, but it hasn’t broken through yet. There’s still blank space in the music, gaps between noise that induce a swaying motion.

But by the time the low-rider rev of “No One’s Easy to Love” extends into

the trap-influenced “Memorial Day,” Van Etten’s album has begun to deflate.

(Hearing Van Etten and “trap influence” in the same sentence is one of the most surreal things 2019 has brought us so far.

What’s next — Lady GaGa’s releasing a polka album?) A later song, “Jupiter 4,” Van Etten named after the synthesizer.

The song has lyrics, but they’re so forgettable that it had might as well be an instrumental piece.

“Comeback Kid,” a stylish, pulsing, pounding single whose lyrics — “See me look away, I’m the runaway/ I’m the stay-out-late, I’m recovering/ Kid at the top of our street” — suggest Butch Cassidy for the 21st century, and the bold, lofty sound thankfully adds verve to the dull selection. But even those lyrics aren’t anything to write home about. Van Etten’s perplexing ideas fall verses apart, and the chorus just repeats “comeback kid” for six lines (or, tantalizingly, perhaps “come back, kid” — grammar is so fun). The lyricism for Remind Me Tomorrow mostly falls short for an artist whose work normally swims in inspired songwriting.

But the better songs, Van Etten’s “love letter to NYC,” called “Seventeen,” and “You Shadow,” which begins with a delightful organ solo, spelunk into that cavernous sound she establishes in “I Told You Everything.” These

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songs require more of her than her crestfallen crooning, but they still feel underdeveloped.

There’s a strong temptation to criticize an artist for going in a different direction, but subversion doesn’t always mean disappointment. An artist stagnates without reinvention. And whereas the similarly folk-inclined West Coast band Lord Huron recently shifted into electric guitar brio and a more mainstream rock sound, the cosmic glee they brought to their lyrics remained. Van Etten hasn’t transferred her personality into this album. The magic is missing.

The closest Remind Me Tomorrow comes to being inspired is from the final song, “Stay.” It’s a lullaby to Van Etten’s daughter — “Imagining when you were inside/ When you made those kicks at night.” Personal like nothing else on the album, the song soars despite all that noise weighing it down.

To witness Van Etten perform tracks from Remind Me Tomorrow acoustically would be a tremendous treat. But for now, the album hopefully serves as experimentation for a more refined sound yet to come. Are We There may be one of the finest indie folk albums of recent years and a hell of an act to follow, and the somnambulant Remind Me Tomorrow simply huddles, despondent, in its shadow.

prose & cons 39

on being nineteen

by Sarah Moon

It’s my final year of being a teenager. Once I turn twenty, I expect there will be a lot of “Hey, congrats on beating teen pregnancy,” and “Only one more year until you’re twenty-fun!” and other bullshit clichés. Will I become an adult? I don’t think I will ever stop being a child in my parents’ and peers’ eyes. Even when my acne turns into wrinkles and I have children of my own. Or will I simply be nothing? Something in-between? A teen who has aged. What will initiate this change? Does it even matter what I am called? I have a name for a reason, a name I will hold onto all my life. I will only be nineteen for three hundred and sixty-five days. It’s scary, knowing I will be something else in society’s terms. I will feel old, and that’s not something anyone likes to feel.

Then I will be twenty, with a whole new set of questions I don’t have answers for. In the less than three hundred and sixty-five days I have left of being this awkward age, I know I will make a thousand mistakes (especially when I’m twenty-fun). These mistakes will have consequences I probably won’t always know how to deal with. But I will still be me, just a year older, and probably a little bit stupider. Twenty years is a long time, especially when you’re the one doing all the work of living. I guess the only thing I can do is hold on to the people and things I trust (and hope that someone bakes me a cake).

Wilted

by Meredith Nash

I have eight separate stretch marks circling my belly button. They look like tree branches, arching out from a trunk, large in size, with too many rings to count. They don’t move, but they grow. I place my thumb at the top of the stump, saying a little prayer that they will stop.

Maybe they need less sunlight, Or maybe they want less water.

But over-watering means they would die.

I wonder if I’d die with less sunlight.

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I lay on the branch, purring and keeping myself invisible, when the girl approaches. She can’t be more than seven years old. And she’s human. My eyebrows raise, and my ever-present grin widens. She stops at a sign and peers at it, her eyes wide and curious. She wears a blue dress with a white apron, standing out against the permanent darkness of the dense forest, and her blonde hair hangs down her back in a wave of curls. I’ve certainly never seen her around here before.

Upon closer inspection, she trembles with fear, and her eyes swim with uncertainty.

Ah. This must be her first time in Wonderland, then. Newcomers appear every now and again.

Sometimes they come through the Looking Glass or even the Rabbit Hole. Though, looking at the dirt on the girl’s dress, I’d have to guess Rabbit Hole. I chuckle. What an experience that must have been.

She looks up in my direction. I decide to let my body appear and revel in the wonder in her eyes. She opens her mouth and speaks, a soft voice like a tiny bell.

“I’m very sorry, sir, but could you tell me where I am?”

“That depends on where you want to go,” I say, rolling over on the branch.

“Well I—” She stops and puts her hands on her hips in a show of defiance. “I can’t know where I want to go if I don’t know where I am.”

I refrain from rolling my eyes. Newcomers are always this way. Still, this one’s curious.

Most of them are too afraid of me to speak, much less speak with an attitude. One little boy even ran away screaming. A laugh escapes me, and I float down to hover in front of her.

“There are plenty of places to go. You could go see the Duchess,” I sniff, catching the reek of pepper. “Though you just came from there, didn’t you? Or perhaps the Queen?” I flip onto my back and float to her left shoulder, grinning as her gaze follows me.

“I’d like to go home,” she says. “But I suppose I can’t do that. What if they don’t recognize me? I’m hardly the same person I was this morning. Maybe I should go by another name…”

I almost giggle. She’s getting the hang of it after all. No one is ever anyone very long here.

In fact, I’m sure I’m different than I was yesterday. I loved lemon custard then, but this morning I couldn’t stand the sight of it.

“Perhaps you should go to the Hare and the Hatter,” I say, coming back up to the branch.

The tip of my tail begins to disappear. I have places to be after all.

Her eyes light up. “A Hatter? That might not be so bad.” She nibbles on her thumb nail.

“Maybe they’d accept me. Let me stay awhile until I figure myself out again.”

“Do beware of the Hatter though, darling. He’s mad,” I say, as my back legs fade into the darkness of the forest.

“Mad?” She raises her eyebrows. “Oh, I’ve gone ‘round the bend, haven’t I?” She covers her face with her hands and begins to cry. I resist the urge to roll my eyes again.

I chuckle. “Not to worry. Everyone is mad in some form or another.”

My remark doesn’t seem to console her at first, as she continues crying, but after a moment she takes a deep breath and gathers her hands into fists at her sides.

“Which way to the Hare and the Hatter?” she asks.

“That way.” I nod to the left, as my front paws have disappeared. “Good luck…”

“Alice,” she finishes for me.

“Alice,” I say, and my head disappears, leaving my grin behind. She stares at me for a moment before walking down the path, leaving me grinning on a tree branch.

The Curious Girl in the Woods

by Katherine Langford 41

The Birthday Without Friends

I lie here in darkness, As anxiety turns its twisted head, And loneliness echoes through the walls.

My heart yearns for ghosts of old friends.

by Eliana Hood

It was you, remember?

Warping my senses with your words.

You said they were against us, That they just wanted to see me hurt.

There is power in prayers, But sometimes they’re not answered, Not the way I intended them to be.

Friends I’d had for forever— Bitter and betrayed— Screamed at me for defending you, And left cursing your name.

His suffering has ended, And for that I’m grateful, But I was in denial.

I didn’t want to believe it— That his soul was chosen To enter heaven early.

You knew I had a virgin heart, So I couldn’t see your scheme— Twisting and maneuvering Like a snake weaving through weeds.

I miss him.

Stripping away my protection, You became my sun and moon.

Because your art was at a standstill, You decided I would do.

His love His support His encouragement I felt my heart break, As my grandmother said goodbye, And kissed his coffin one last time.

You—Mr. Ego, Mr. So-Called “Enlightened Man—” Needed to feel all-important.

Then Opportunity called, And you ran.

I can still hear his voice— The birthday wishes He left for me on my voicemail.

I’m secretly glad I couldn’t answer the phone, Because now his words live on, “Have a great day sweetheart. Poppy loves you.”

The hypnosis was then lifted.

Debris and rubble filled my sight.

Just shy of my second decade, I was alone to rebuild my life.

Even three thousand miles, And my attempt to begin again, The Loneliness still echoes From that birthday without friends.

My Grandfather

by Gabrielle Topping

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Controlled

by Kristen Gregg

Marina’s key to freedom swirled in Lola’s wine glass. She watched the blood red wine slosh as Lola tilted her hand side to side. Marina gazed out her tinted floor-to-ceiling window from the room twenty stories high and towards the fluorescent sky of New york City. A thrill went through Marina at the thought of dancing along the street at night and slipping down alleyways in the dark.

She remembered sitting in her room with glass walls, staring at the people below. She remembered the shows on the TV screen depicting life in New York, all the beautiful places and delicious meals she could sink her teeth into. All her memories had been built in this tower, filled with Lola and scientists and cuffs on her arms up until age fifteen.

A woman stood leaning against her desk, dressed in the typical white lab coats even though she was technically off duty.“Thank you for letting me make an appearance,” Marina said with a sweet smile. Lola turned around, her face unreadable as always.

“It’s New Year’s Eve, and you’ve finally made progress in showing humanity. It’s good timing to display you to the world.” She remained monotone, very similar to the other men who had taken care of Marina throughout her whole life. Marina knew Lola’s emotionless attitude was only a front, one she put on to climb her way to the top. But Marina had seen Lola’s face—expression full of hope and pride—when she thought no one was looking. She was always excited when Marina acted civil. Marina resented both Lola’s sad attempt at hiding her emotions and for being delighted in Marina’s so-called progress. Lola was just trying to get high enough in the business to finally show how successful she was at taming a vampire, which was, of course, impossible.

Lola set down her glass and looked at Marina, her eyes showing excitement. She placed a hand on Marina’s arm and gave her a light squeeze.

Marina inhaled Lola’s scent as she moved and heard the pulse thrumming through her hand.

Thoughts of blood consumed Marina’s mind temporarily, making her squeeze her eyes shut. When she became grounded, she opened her eyes to see Lola staring at her.

“It amazes me every time you control your temptation. I can’t believe I’ve actually made a vampire control herself,” she said, mystified. Marina clenched her teeth. As if I can be controlled and deny my true nature, Marina thought.

“I say we toast to it,” Marina said, raising her glass towards Lola. “To progress.”

“To progress.” Lola picked up her glass and clinked it against Marina’s before taking a sip.

“Or should I say…” Marina began, watching with a malicious smile as Lola blinked rapidly, her eyes watering and reached for her throat, “to freedom.”

Lola staggered back and gripped onto the edge of her desk, the poisoned wine working its way into her body.

“I’ve been stuck here all my life, and I am sick of it.” Marina watched as Lola began to heave. “All I needed was to get you out of the way so I can leave this disgusting place and finally see the city — see the world!” Marina was momentarily overcome with emotion.

Lola began shaking her head. “It’s not safe. You’re a danger to everyone out there.” She continued to shift her hands along the edge of her desk. “At least here is better than prison. Out there you can’t have the luxury you desire.”

“Oh really?” Marina let her fangs drop down from her gums. “I’d much rather have them try and stop me than be stuck here where I have to follow your strict rules. I’d much rather be me, unlike you. You pretend to be an emotionless man, but you’re not. You care too much. And you’d rather suppress who you are to achieve success than be who you are. Let’s face it — you’re just as trapped as me.”

Lola stared at Marina with wide and betrayed eyes. Marina could feel just how much Lola hated her truthful words.

But Lola’s vigor died along with her. Marina savored every last sound of her slowing pulse. She made her way to the door with a triumphant smile, but it burst open before she could reach it.

An army of people in white uniforms came rushing through the door. Marina cursed under her breath. She had forgotten the emergency button beneath Lola’s desk and had been too focused on the last of Lola’s pulse to notice she pushed it and hear them approach. She bared her fangs and reached out for the nearest man.

He grabbed her, and Marina felt something sharp prick her neck. The world began to sway, and her senses started to dull.

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Birthday I received a present today.

It was quite plain. A bland-colored box, no ribbon or festive wrapping.

No “To:” and “From:” tag either.

I thought maybe my neighbor had sent it.

They never visited or even spoke to me— perhaps our distance all ends now?

I looked across the street. On the porch, sitting stiff in a lawn chair, my neighbor was hidden in the shade.

A lanky shadow clutched at their feet.

I went inside and sat at the table. A cake with half melted candles sagged near me.

Close by, a piñata with its insides spilled out stared— the one eye glaring.

I lift the lid off the gift. I removed some drab tissue paper, a broken hourglass revealed to me. Brown sand poured out.

Oh, no. So, this is how it ends?

I’ve become Ingrid Bergman or Shakespeare— creating the ultimate paradox. I die on the day I celebrate my life.

I saw my neighbor outside the window. Their cloaked figure blocked the sun, their shadow darkened the entire room.

My neighbor was the last thing I saw before I stopped breathing and passed out into the cake.

At least someone remembered my birthday.

by Dariene Seifert 44

Aditya and Abhay have been good friends since childhood. They work as attendants in a government office in Northern India. Their low income restricts them from having three meals a day. A year ago, Aditya recently married Kavitha who has been carrying a child for six months now. On a breezy and dark evening, Aditya calls and asks Abhay to come over to his place immediately. Abhay picks up his bicycle and leaves as soon as he cuts the call. Upon his arrival, Abhay—very tense—sits next to Aditya on the steps outside the house and questions Aditya, asking if everything is fine. Aditya, hopeless and low on morale, has a 250 ml whiskey bottle in front him with plastic cups and a bottle of water. He pours two cups and hands the drink to Abhay who sips his cup twice. There is a brief moment of silence. The only sound is the doors behind them, rigidly opening and closing from the breeze. Aditya, in a small toned voice, says, “It is a girl.” Abhay looks up at Aditya and then looks down at the ground, helpless in this situation. Abhay shyly asks, “Are you sure?” Aditya confirms, “Yes.” Aditya only gets paid 10000 Rupee a month, and a majority of it goes toward his rent, groceries, and medicines for his wife. After saving some money for the past two months, he finally gets his wife a mid-pregnancy ultrasound. The results came in a few days ago.

Because ultrasounds are illegal, Aditya had secretly paid the doctor to find out the sex of the baby. Both Aditya and Abhay look at each other, and Aditya says, “I am not sure how to go about it.” Abhay reacts immediately and responds, “I think Kavitha should get an abortion.” Meanwhile inside the house, Kavitha lays on the floor next to the front doors—an old chair, a pot of water, and clothes a foot away from her and each other. Outside, Aditya still looks all around for options, but he stops at his friend’s advice because he believes he does not have the power and capability to raise a child who’s a girl due to the dowry system. He looks into Abhay’s eyes and nods his head rather forcefully. Abhay lays his hand on Aditya’s and nods. He gets up and leaves.

Aditya sits there in silence, drinking his whiskey. After a while, he goes into the house and closes the doors. He lays down beside Kavitha and places a hand on her shoulder.

Tears still roll down Kavitha’s eyes. Aditya goes to sleep. Later that night, an old lady walks into Aditya’s home and taps on his shoulder. Aditya does not respond. She taps again, and Aditya wakes up. He’s shocked to see his mother. “Mother, what are you doing here at this hour of the night?” The mother places her hand on Aditya’s head and brushes his hair slowly, uttering silently, “Please don’t kill me.” Aditya looks is disbelief. Aditya suddenly wakes up and breathes heavily. He realizes this was a dream because his mother died many years ago. He gets some water and sits in silence until the sun rises in the east. In the morning, he doesn’t utter a word to Kavitha and leaves for work without her knowledge. He is in front of a tea stall, smoking a cigarette while having a cup of chai. Abhay rides his bicycle up to him, parks it on the side, buys a cigarette and a cup of chai from the stall, and joins Aditya. Abhay asks Aditya, “Did you think about it?” Aditya responds, “Let us not talk about it anymore, because it is about my mother we are talking about.” Aditya leaves the tea stall place while Abhay watches him leave.

You cannot stand ground without your mother giving birth to you.

SAVE GIRL CHILD!

by Sairam Reddy Potlapadu 45

sawdust

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Grandpa Insists on Blowing Out Birthday Candles by Himself

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It takes forever // By Sydney Joyce, Contributing Writer

local 80-year-old has broken the record for the amount of time it took someone to blow out their birthday candles. Hal Smithson took five minutes to blow out the candles on his birthday cake at his 80th birthday party this past Saturday in Ithaca, NY. Celebrating his birthday among his family and friends at his home, Hal received a sheet cake to the tune “Happy Birthday.” The cake had 81 candles on it. Hal closed his eyes for a moment to make his wish, then drew in a big breath and blew it out. But as Hal was trying to blow out his candles he started coughing and only one candle blew out. Hal drew in another breath and tried again. This time he blew two candles out. Three down. 78 to go. Hal slowly but surely repeated this process until every candle was blown out, occasionally taking a quick break to cough. After about a minute of this, some of Hal’s younger grandchildren tried to help him –they wanted some cake– but Hal wouldn’t let them. After

about two minutes the candles that were still burning started dripping, decorating the cake with colorful ornaments of wax.

By the time Hal had finally blown out all his candles, five minutes after he had started, about half of the people that were in the room had gotten bored and left and no one was interested in eating the cake anymore.

“Your wish doesn’t come true if you don’t blow your candles out yourself,” says Hal. “Back in my day there would be no helping the birthday boy.”

Hal has always insisted that he blow out his own birthday candles and has always been a firm believer that every birthday cake should have as many birthday candles as the age of the person celebrating their birthday plus one for good luck.

“It was harder to blow the candles out this year than last year because my asthma has been acting up recently,” Hal offered as an explanation for why he broke a record this year. He is a man committed to getting his birthday wishes, no matter how long it takes him.

Hal’s family has gotten used to his strict birthday rituals, but this year’s celebration was particularly laborious.

“Some of the little kids were getting antsy for cake because it was taking Dad so long,” says Hal’s daughter Chelsea.

All the children were trying to get a hand on a piece of cake, and they knew the only way they could do that was to get the candles out of it.

“By the time Grandpa was finished blowing out his candles the cake was covered in wax,” complains Charlie, Hal’s 12-year-old grandson. “There was barely any of it that didn’t taste gross.”

Though Hal’s stubborn quirks have ruined a birthday cake, they have also set a new world record.

“I love Grandpa,” says Charlie, “but I wish I had gotten to eat cake.”

Sydney Joyce is a second-year writing major who will cut off birthday wishes if the person is taking too long. Reach them at sjoyce@ithaca.edu.

Man Can’t Find Snow Shovel

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Eats snow through car // By Phoebe Harms, Contributing Writer

ocal man Anthony Rosen was found unconscious in his front yard after attempting to travel through several feet of snow to reach his car on Monday morning. Due to the severe winter storm the night prior, three feet of snow had piled in Rosen’s front yard, making it impossible to reach his car and drive to work. Rosen, 36, said it was especially important he got to work that day, as his job is driving a snow plow for Pete N’ Plow Plowing services in Ithaca, NY. “I was already running late, and my shovel broke after last week’s storm,” Rosen said from the hospital. “I did what any man loyal to his career would do.”

Rosen claimed to have tried “absolutely everything” in an attempt to reach his vehicle, and at first attempted to scoop the snow with his bare hands.

Rosen said this process was too slow, as he had forgotten one of his gloves inside.

On his second try, he violently kicked at the snow pile in an attempt to form a tunnel, but to no avail. Rosen said he then attempted to use his wife’s hairdryer to melt the snow, but the length of the cord only allowed him to reach just past the doorstep. These attempts eventually led Rosen to his final resort: eating his way out.

Rosen had eaten through a few feet of snow before fainting, due to mild water intoxication and hypothermia. He had also used various forms of hot sauce to pour on the snow as he was eating it.

He was found less than an hour later by neighbor Marta Schubert, who rushed him to the hospital immediately.

“I would have been more than happy to lend my shovel, had he asked,” Schubert said.

Rosen has since addressed what he feels was his biggest mistake, which was focusing on clearing the width of his yard, rather than creating a direct path

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to his car. He said next time it snows, he will keep things more direct to avoid future injuries. He also plans to have a larger supply of hot sauce stocked up.

“The hot sauce helped with melting the snow and giving it flavor,” Rosen said. “If I had more of that stuff, I probably wouldn’t be in this situation.”

The Rosen family is currently being faced with an outrageous hospital bill to cover the cost of treatment, but they have stressed that money isn’t of any concern as long as their beloved Anthony is safe at home.

A gofundme has been started to raise money for a new snow shovel for Rosen, which can be found using this link: gofundme.com/shovels4anthony.

Phoebe Harms is a second-year writing major who likes to season their snow with cayenne pepper and cinnamon.

Reach them at pharms@ithaca.edu.

IC to Hire More Staff for CAPS It’s just a bunch of guys who say “Damn, that’s crazy,” after every sentence // By Morgan Felberbaum

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e all know that an Ithaca Winter is a hard time for all students and faculty. Seasonal depression and the bitter below zero cold are enough to make anyone feel more run down than they already do while balancing school, work, community involvement, and— maybe if you’re lucky—a social life.

Students have been seen to do nothing but gaze disgustedly up at the dreary sky above them. Many even begin to erupt in sobs as they walk past the Textor fish statue mounted on the charmingly wobbly tiles and shake their fists at the American flag that has been half-mast since Bernie Sanders lost the primaries in 2016. One day in the dead of winter, first-year student Emma slipped on the Textor tiles so effortlessly built for safety and stability and landed flat on her back. She laid there in agony staring at the misconfigured statue and cried out into the frozen void: “This is not what Ithaca looked like in the brochure!” Her words turned to icy pfffs as they left her lips. There she lay, defeated, feeling as though there was no one else she could talk to who would really listen and give her the honest, thoughtful counseling she desperately needed. She knew from her own experience that the Center for Counseling and Professional Services on the Ithaca College campus, CAPS, was usually overbooked and extremely understaffed, knowledge that made her feel like she had no one else to turn to.

As she lay there, deep in thought, Emma pondered what she really wanted in a counselor. She was sick of the humdrum advice the trained professionals had already given her; the professionals’ response was almost too textbook. And was it too much to ask that she wanted someone who didn’t pry so much?

She recalled talking to her recent hook-up, Chad, a business and finance double major with a minor in art history.

He nodded along to her venting, staring at his phone as he scrolled through Reddit, half paying attention, just how she liked it. After she finished explaining

her dilemma to him, she suddenly found an answer to all her problems. Moments after she finished venting her frustration, Chad uttered three words that made her know he cared about her and had listened to everything she said. He chimed in, hardly looking up from his phone.

“Damn, that’s crazy.”

Suddenly, Emma felt totally understood, like a weight was lifted off her shoulders, and she needed to act fast. She knew she must do the one thing necessary for any sort of life solution in 2019– she had to make a petition.

Now, ordinary problem-solving mechanisms pale in comparison to the efficacy and successful results that come from an online petition. One that you do not even have to move from that cozy spot on your bed to sign and fight the Man. Petitions are essential to the starter pack of Liberal Arts advocacy tools.

Emma would petition the school to abandon funding for the hiring of new trained professionals to CAPS who would just inevitably spew academic nonsense and hide behind their expertise in the subject. God, they pretended to know everything. She thought they needed to hire more boys like Chad. Skinny, chainsmoking fellows who would be sure to never make eye contact with you and then watch your Instagram story for the rest of your natural born life. See, with more boys uttering a couple “damnthat’s-crazy” every once in awhile, everyone benefits. And the college can even cut costs by recruiting each candidate straight out of the Roy H. Park School of Communications or the Park Hill Center at the Business School.

Any student could access these refined resources, thus illuminating their outlook on college life with a shining glimmer. With each half-hearted look and Reddit scroll, you can already tell these Park boys will be the answers to your hopes and dreams. Here, take these patient interactions, for example: Patient: “Hey Chad, I got dumped by my boyfriend of three weeks and my self-esteem is really down right now.”

Chad: “Damn, that’s crazy. U got a

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light?”

----------Patient: “Hey Ryan, my Circle Apartment got robbed, and they took my service lizard. I’m really bummed because tomorrow is his first birthday.”

Ryan: “Damn, that’s crazy. Is your roommate single?”

-----------Patient: “Hey Dave, I’ve been having an existential crisis about my E-Portfolio.

How am I ever going to finish it? The ICC is just bureaucratic nonsense the Man created to keep us students locked in this cage of capitalism and systemic oppression.”

Dave: “Damn, that’s crazy. Did you know that my father owns the New York Yankees?”

You see? All these helpful and relatable therapy scenarios show the potential of what you need to help you to become your best self. So what are you waiting for? Join the fight to get rid of boring ineffective trained professionals who pry into your life and replace them with Park boys. Rest assured that these boys have nothing better to do but skip their 2 p.m. class, say “damn, that’s crazy,” and tell you why the film, Pulp Fiction, was the greatest cinematic masterpiece of all-time. The choice is obvious.

Morgan Felberbaum is a fourth-year politics major who can’t wait to have their problems ignored by some chainvaping Park boy in a flannel. Reach them at mfelberbaum@ithaca.edu.

By Morgan Felberbaum, Contributing Writer

Beyoncé Copyrights Blue Ivy’s Birthday Thousands switch their birthdays to January 8th // By Sarah Diggins, Contributing Writer

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eattle first-grader Nicholas Sherman had been looking forward to his seventh birthday party at Chuck E. Cheese’s for months. It was set to be his coveted “golden birthday”, meaning that he would be turning seven on the seventh. However, just two days before the big celebration, Sherman’s parents received an RSVP from someone they didn’t even invite.

Maybe you remember Blue Ivy Carter, the seven-year-old daughter of Beyoncé Knowles-Carter and Jay-Z Carter. She recently made headlines for being the owner of the sole solid gold JoJo Siwa bow in production, simply because no one else can afford it, including Siwa herself. Now, both Carter and her royal parents are under hot water again.

From the moment Blue Ivy came into the world, she was already cooler than you will ever be. From diamond encrusted rattles to a custom California king bed crib to cold hard cash that may as well be Monopoly money. AirPods

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are simply just materials for the slime she makes after watching Instagram tutorials. So where does plebian Nicholas Sherman come in?

Turns out, in addition to copyrighting Blue Ivy’s name shortly after she was born, the couple has finally gained approval to copyright her birthday, January 7th, just in time for her golden birthday. Though, to be fair, every birthday is golden when you’re Beyoncé’s daughter.

What does this mean for doomed Capricorns who also happen to be on born that day? Well, for starters, the date is not permitted to appear in writing. At least, not for free. Restrictions include anything from birth certificates to Twitter bios, to tattoos to yes, Chuck E. Cheese’s birthday party invitations.

This inevitably gives those born on this day two options: pay the fee or move your birthday to January 8th. Nicholas Sherman will not only have to wait one more year for his coveted golden birthday but also one more day for his plastic pizza and ringworm.

Blue Ivy’s other birthday twins were certainly not quiet about the identity change they were forced to go under.

“The birthday change completely misaligns my star chart,” Connor Moore, angrily shared on Twitter.

“I can’t complain,” Haley Reid told a local news outlet stationed outside an area hospital responsible for printing the new certificates, “Since 2012, I’ve never felt worthy of sharing a birthday with Blue Ivy. This just feels like the right thing to do.”

Have a birthday on June 13th? You’re next. It’s only a matter of time before copyright is issued for Blue Ivy’s younger twin siblings.

The Carter family declined to comment. Can we really be mad at Beyoncé though?

danger of being shot through the chest by a winged baby wielding an arrow.

“We have a serious problem on our hands,” Chief Hansom said. “Keeping bow and arrows out of the hands of flying babies has always been a weak point for our department. We know that, and we’re doing our best to better prepare our officers for when the worst happens out there.”

In addition to baby self-defense, Chief Hansom says that she also requested funding for love preventative tactics which would help to nip this problem in the bud before it even has a chance to get out on the streets.

As for the community itself, people are afraid. After the report came out, #cancelvalentines began trending on Twitter and bow and arrow activists started to come out of the woodwork.

“Everyone thought our cause didn’t matter,” said Theresa Doolittle, founder of No Mo’ Bows, an anti-bow and arrow activist group.

“They said, ‘Nobody uses those,’ or ‘What century are you living in?’ Well, I’m living in this century. Look who’s crazy now.”

Theresa petitions local officials to restrict bow and arrow use, starting with cutting off their availability to winged babies. Critics of No Mo’ Bows argue that bow and arrows don’t kill people, tiny mythical cherubs kill people.

Or maybe it’s love itself that is truly to blame for these unfortunate events.

Regardless, if you happen to have any information on the whereabouts of a one-foot tall winged man baby, please contact your local authorities as soon as possible. This is a developing story.

Sarah Diggins is a second-year writing major who’s nervous their birthday is next to be copyrighted. Reach them at sdiggins@ithaca.edu.

Cupid Uses Real Arrows Countless injured on Valentine’s Day // By Sean Stouffer, Contributing Writer

his Valentine’s Day, numerous people were shot with a bow and arrow in a terrible slew of attempted murders all across the country.

Police are still trying to piece together the connection between the cases. It seems as if everyone shot was hoping to fall for the right person this Valentine’s Day but instead fell to the ground and began to bleed out in a remarkably unattractive way.

These attacks beg the question: who would be so brash, so cold hearted as to shoot these hopeless romantics down with such an archaic weapon?

According to an officer, the suspect is a “one-foot-tall, winged man with the face and demeanor of little baby.”

An official report urges the public to refrain from any form of affection for the foreseeable future. Kissing, hand holding, affectionate name calling, prolonged eye contact, or even a playful punch on the arm could put you in

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Sean Stouffer is a second-year writing for film, TV, and emerging media major who wore a full suit of armor this Valentine’s Day. Reach them at sstouffer@ithaca. edu.

Party Hats to be Banned

After stupid kid almost pokes his eye out // By Isabel Murray, Staff Writer

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our-year-old Damien Wilbur of 44 Brooklet Drive, New Jersey recently sent mass hysteria rippling through his home state. After receiving an undeservingly large amount of presents for his birthday and sloughing off plastic tub after plastic tub of Hoodsies, Damien slowed down from a game of freeze tag, possibly disoriented by the complicated rules of the game. He turned his drooling chin to the kitchen full of guests and stripped his head of its party hat, ripping the safe, soft pompom off the top and flinging it wildly off his smut-soaked fingers to fall among gift wrap and discarded gummy worms.

“I thought maybe he was gonna take the thing apart,” said a haunted Mrs. Main, the mother of one of Damien’s party guests. “He just had this vacant look in his eyes like he might, I don’t know,” she leaned in to whisper, “Dismember the whole cone.”

Still, none of the witnesses was prepared for the act of violence that followed. After what felt like several long seconds of Damien standing there, mouth agape, he wielded the hat up with driving force, bumping the paper tip

into his eye and consequently dissolving into sobs, dropping the weapon and stumbling away. Witnesses recall this only in short bursts, many of them having fainted, others rushing to cover their own children’s eyes. Damien’s mother refused to come out of her house for comment, though many witnesses recall her becoming catatonic, shrinking down against the kitchen island.

Damien has not suffered any serious harm from the incident but fear about the influence of such dangerous behavior has spread quickly. Several of the mothers brought the case to local court and have now banned party hats (even blunt ones, lest they be sharpened or cut with safety scissors) from party supply stores throughout the state.

Still, no motive has been presented yet that explains what kind of deranged person would feel so tempted and mesmerized by the bright colors of a party hat that they’d bring it so dangerously close to their eye. Doctors are baffled that anyone could lack the fine motor skills needed to bring the cone close enough to see without maiming themselves. It’s worth noting that police are not yet certain whether

Damien was under the influence, and the possibility of drug use is being strongly investigated.

A group of senior citizens provide an alternate theory. The group worries that this was all some pre-constructed ploy, that Damien’s stupidity was just a cover for premeditated manipulation.

“Somehow, he knew,” said 70-yearold knitting club president Annie Holmes. “He knew that many of us don’t have many birthdays left. He’s using our fear of mortality against us. If he can take the joy out of the few birthdays we have left, there’s no telling what he can get us to do. It’s all too bleak, I just can’t think about it.”

Whatever the reason, concerned parents recommend a cancellation of all birthday parties in the near future until we can understand what it is about birthdays that drives people so helplessly out of control. All of Damien’s friends, siblings, and classmates’ families have set an example by resolving to never again celebrate their children’s birthdays.

If anyone does plan to celebrate in the future, many leaders in the rising anti-birthday movement recommend that the actual celebrant abstain from attending the event, in order to keep things from getting out of hand on their “special day”. All groups hope that as they move forward from this, they can begin teaching children that the day of their birth is as worthless as any other day of the year, thereby destroying any power previously generated from their inflamed sense of self-importance.

Discreet collection groups will come around to select communities this Thursday to pick up any candles, party hats, birth certificates, and other dangerous birthday memorabilia you might be too embarrassed to put out with your usual rubbish.

Isabel Murray is a third-year writing major who recently slipped on a pile of confetti. Reach them at imurray@ithaca. edu.

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buzzsaw asks why... we need to make birthday wishes?

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irthdays are pretty neat. People get presents and cake. They get to spend time with their friends. If they’re over the legal drinking age of 21, they can get incredibly drunk without being a filthy criminal. It all sounds fun. But there’s one birthday ritual that I can never wrap my head around.

When they cake comes out, before anyone gets to eat it, people stick a bunch of lit candles into the frosting.

It’s usually one candle per year but sometimes people just put in one candle shaped like the age the person is turning. But anyways, there’s a bunch of burning, melting candles jammed into the cake but everyone has to sing the birthday song first. Fine. It’s not a great song but I’ll play along for tradition. But then, the birthday person has to make a birthday wish and blow the candles out before anyone gets to eat anything. What’s worse, there’s absolutely no guidelines for what a person can wish for. They could wish to pass their exam next week. They could wish to be emperor of the universe. They could wish for every grain of sand to turn into skittles. No one knows what the person wishes for. No one can veto it. The birthday recipient gets near unlimited power and there’s nothing anyone can do about it.

I want to know where all of these birthday wishes go. I wonder if there’s some kind of Birthday Fairy who gets thousands of birthday wishes delivered to their desk and has to go through them. I’d like to know how the Birthday Fairy decides which wishes to grant and which to deny. I’m honestly curious if they have the resources to grant any wishes at all. I ask because none of my birthday wishes ever came true when I was a kid. Maybe the Birthday Fairy just has a huge backlog and is still granting wishes for people who died like 200 years ago.

Whatever happens to our birthday wishes, if anything at all, I think I have some ways to ease the whole wishing experience.

It’s probably best to wish for something simple that won’t result in the end of the world or break the laws of nature. I also recommend wishing quickly. That way the cake won’t get covered in candle wax. Unless people like waxy cake. In that case, no rush.

Your editor in wishing for more wishes, Will Cohan

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send us presents. it’s our birthday. @buzzsawmagazine