2006-06-22-pine-press

Pine Press

June 2, 2005

ANIMALS !

More Than Fourteen Species Inside!

Next Issue’s Theme:

SPAC E Send your stories, essays, fan-fiction, pictures, dramatizations, compatibility quizzes, Benjamins, novel excerpts, cartoons (you know who you are), and crackpot astrophysical theories to pinepress@gmail.com by June 14 to have them included in our SPACE themed issue.

From the Editor...

I know the animals are laughing at us and they don't even know what a joke is. So I wouldn't follow an animal's advice — I don't care if they're laughing at us. I mean, they're never there when you need them, never there when you call them down. They say they don't need money, that they're living on nuts and berries. They say animals don't worry, but you know, animals are hairy. They ought to be more careful — they're setting a bad example. They have untroubled lives. They think everything's nice. They like to laugh at people — they're setting a bad example.

Go ahead, laugh at me.

Submit your articles to pinepress@gmail.com by June 14 for our next issue S P A C E.

—David Byrne

Contents:

Next Issue’s Theme 2 From the Editor 3 From the Desk of Your Executive Director 4 Meet Your Executive Committee (Sort Of) 5 Point/Counterpoint: Gay Marriage 6-7 Read Fiction, Damnit: Excerpts 8 Delight and Liberty, A Short Story 9-11

From the Desk of Your Executive Joan Bulmer Director…

The theme for this Pine Press edition is animals...that’s a tough one. Do the termites at Phoenix count? You’ll be happy to hear that they are under control; Stu tore open a bedroom wall a few weeks ago and found NO live termites, so all is well. The termite control is working.

And that’s all I have on animals, but I’d like to write about something else and just sneak it into this Pine Press. Maybe Mike won’t notice.* I’d like to make a pitch for a new cooperative in East Lansing. Last semester SHC voted to limit membership in our co-op, the MSU Student Housing Cooperative, to students only, and that leaves a void in our community. Should MSU-SHC assist a group of non student in setting up a new co-op?

Here’s my FAQ on the issue:

*Somebody get me another beer.

—Ed.

President: Meet Your

Executive Committee

(Sort Of)

Arjun Jayaraman

New Community jayaram5@msu.edu

My name is Arjun Jayaraman and I’m your friendly, neighborhood SHC President. As President, I facilitate the Board and Executive Committee meetings, help supervise SHC staff, and act as the spokesperson for SHC. This summer I’m overseeing two additional committees: The Visionary Committee and The Personnel Committee.

The Visionary Committee will discuss how we can improve and update the technology in the coops. We will deal with topics such as an SHC wide network, house print servers, online bill payment and advertising, and the formation of an official SHC ‘technology policy.’

As many of you know, this will be Joan’s last year as Executive Director. Joan has been indispensable to our system and we must take care in hiring her successor. The Personnel Committee will help revise the job description of the Executive Director as well as debate what are our hiring criteria should be. For example: What type of résumé are we looking for?

Oh yeah… I am a master’s student at MSU, have lived in the coops for two years, and have been steadily building up seniority in my house. I am happy to announce that, as of this summer, I have the most kick-ass room in New Comm. The only thing cooler would be that solid gold* room in Mosier that Aaron used to have.

Arjun

Vice President of Education:

Mike Langdon

Phoenix langdon8@msu.edu

A few months ago you elected me Vice President of Education — and seriously, what were you thinking? I’m supposed to run the Education Committee and the first meeting was a huge success — Elsworth and Raft Hill showed up. Get ready for it, the other nine of you, that first one was a freebie, but I’m excited about fines.

Anyway, the Education Committee is supposed to work on the Pine Press — so far I’ve gotten submissions from Fred Longacre and Natalie Marion. The rest of you are obviously slackers. Houses, get on your Education officers, and get on yourselves; form a pyramid if you must, but submit to the Pine Press (pinepress@gmail.com).

I’ve made it easy — there’s a topic for every issue, about which you don’t even have to write if you don’t want.

Co-opers, this is the only opportunity you’ll ever have to be published in a magazine. Don’t blow it.

Besides the Pine Press, the Education Committee is responsible for service projects in the Fall and Spring Semesters. E-mail me your ideas or we’ll sell all the houses to compete for the X-Prize, which we’ll discover was already won by Burt Rutan and Paul Allen only after we land on the friggin’ moon. So what I’m saying is, we need ideas, good ideas.

I’ve also taken it upon myself to build a new website for SHC and for a web version of this very publication — The Pine Press. These should be fully functional by the end of the Summer Semester. If not, feel free to make faces at me until they are.

Mik Next Week: Ross, Karon, and Jess… or e else!

*Aaron Mosier’s Room was actually paved with cheese. —Ed.

Point/Counter-Point: Gay Marriage

POINT

Fred Longacre

Britney The Spears. views expressed in Point/Counterargue that the reason they don’t support gay marriage because it weakens Point For are those solelypeople thosewho of the contributors. the institution of marriage, those two words should be enough to show the hypocrisy of that belief. If Send all letters to pinepress@gmail.com. gays and lesbians who have had a loving commitment for years will weaken the institution of marriage, why don’t they say that people who get married for a weekend weaken it also?

Another argument that the people against gay marriage use is “marriage is between one man and one woman. That has been the way it has been for hundreds of years, and that definition hasn’t changed”. The problem with that definition is that the definition of marriage has changed. Forty years ago, over 15 states in the US had laws saying that marriage between people of different races was illegal. At that time, the supporters made the same argument, that this was historically the way marriage was, and that they were just protecting society.

The same people who use that reason also state that marriage is a religious rite, and that if gay marriage was legal, religions that don’t embrace the “homosexual lifestyle” would have to offer marriage rites. This argument fails due to the fact that in the United States, marriage is more a civil pact than a religious pact. Today, a large percentage of marriages are civil ceremonies, without any religious beliefs at all.

Some people argue that marriage is a societal contract to support families, and that because gays and lesbians cannot naturally procreate (lots of long words here), they should not be allowed to marry. This argument fails on many levels. (1) Gays and lesbians can adopt, have children from previous relationships, or arrange surrogate parenthood, and (2) Even if they don’t choose to have children, should society look at outlawing marriages to people who are sterile, or past child-bearing age.

A forth argument that people use is that gays and lesbians aren’t missing anything by not being married. This argument is used by some supporters of gay and lesbian rights.. In their opinion, there are other issues that should be dealt with first. While they may mean well, the truth of the matter is that gay marriage affects almost all issues that gays and lesbians have to deal with. According to the Government Accounting Office in 1997, there are 1049 laws in the United States that grant rights to married heterosexual couples that gays and lesbians do not benefit from. In an Editorial from March of 2000, the New Jersey Law Journal gives some examples of rights denied to committed same-sex couples. “Same sex couples who are prohibited from marrying are excluded from a panoply of legal benefits specifically tied to legally recognized marriage: for example, access to a spouse's medical, life and disability insurance; hospital visitation and medical decision-making privileges… workers' compensation survivor benefits; spousal benefits under annuity and retirement plans…the right to refuse to testify against one's spouse…” and many others. These instances of discrimination based on the preference for legally married couples effect many people negatively when they least expect it.

Unmarried heterosexual couples, however, have the option of being legally married. Same-sex couples have no such recourse.

The final argument is simple fairness. Should we say that everyone in the United States is equal, and given equal protection under the law, or should we just say “Equal protection except for gays and lesbians.”

Point/Counter-Point: Gay Marriage

COUNTER-POINT

Curt Minskora

been a lotinofPoint/Countertalk around these parts about so-called “gay marriage,” which in and The There viewshas expressed ofPoint itself are is terminologically a contradiction in terms. Marriage is a sacred union between a man and a solely those of the contributors. woman: nothing gay that as far as I can tell. But now a fringe group consisting of the radical Send all letters toabout pinepress@gmail.com. liberal anti-Bush media, the ACLU, and activist judges want to completely alter the course of human history and throw one of our most sacred institutions down into their secular humanist crapper. Why not just wipe our anuses with the Constitution and use the Declaration of Independence in lieu of a super-absorbant tampon?

Do we, as a society, want our children to grow up in a world of heathens and sinners who parade in the streets, free to commit their disgusting sex acts in our schools and on television with no legal recourse to stop them? You just wait, and if these activist judges get their way, our children will be forced to gather in school auditoriums just to watch one man suck on another man’s penis. And they will be taught by liberal teachers that they are the freaks for not sucking each other’s penises.

Some people want to say that so-called gay marriage is not a threat to the well-being of our children. Well, it is a fact-a science fact-that children raised by gay parents are 67% more likely to suffer from Tracheoesophageal Fistula, Meckel's diverticulum, Androgen insensitivity syndrome, lupus, and various forms of incurable bowel cancer. Can we live with that kind of blood on our hands? As well, most historians would agree that nearly every incident of state-sponsored genocide in the western world has been predicated upon a legalization of gay marriage. Look it up.

If you want these so-called “homosexuals” to be granted the same rights as regular, Godfearing Americans, be ready for priests to be forced to officiate mass with a penis lodged in their anuses. Be ready for the founding fathers, in our children’s history texts, to be re-named the homosexual fathers. Be ready for Hillary Clinton to finally, proudly, admit what we’ve known about At least the dog’s her all along. still cute.

Once we let these so-called “gays” get “married,” you can say goodbye to every single standard of decency we now enjoy as citizens of these United States of America. Bestiality will become not the exception but the rule. No one will even think twice when the First Lady of the United States is a prize-winning warthog. And why stop there? Why, with so-called gay marriage on the books, a man might as well marry his lawnmower. We may see so-called marriages between a dishwasher and a refrigerator. And should we be expected to give hospital visitation rights and tax cuts to a Fridgedaire? Not on my watch. Not in America.

What are we to say to the good, pure, and honest heterosexual couples who have been toiling all these years to make their marriages work? “Sorry Grandma, you might as well kill your husband in his sleep and go lick Mrs. McCallister’s vagina, because marriage means nothing anymore.”

Nothing. Oh, no America, we must not let this abomination happen to us. Marriage has been many things to many different people throughout the course of human history, but one thing it has never been, nor should ever be, is fabulous.

In two weeks: The Environment!

The Pine Press publishes excerpts from published novels without permission on the following premises: 1. These small excerpts, while infringing copyright, can do nothing worse than help the sales of their sources.

2. These excerpts are literary reviews.

3. The authors will never ever see the Pine Press.

Read Fiction, Damnit: Excerpts From White Pigeons

Chris Leo (Fifth Planet Press, 2004) We took the short bus ride out to the beautiful backyard in the suburbs where my sister and my brother Anthony were cooling in the shade while my dad prepared a veggie feast. He was famous for his cuisine. He and my mother became vegetarians in their mid-forties. My brothers and I all came to the same conclusion about not eating meat in our teens, and there's nothing about an Irish-Italian dinner table bearing through the awkward years that would have let any issue go un-argued. So we argued and argued for a year at every meal until one day my father simply said "you're right" and from that day forth he stopped eating meat. It was too late for him to change his palate though. Culinarily, he fell into the same void as that guitar player from Matchbox 20. My brothers and I were young and excited to explore global cuisine to see what options we were left with. Vegetarianism wound up expanding our palates, not restricting us. It sent us on a quest we previously took for granted. It was too late for my dad, though.

There comes a point where all the sane people realize what they're eating. After a lifetime of conditioning it's hard to imagine the burger on your plate is the end product of a living being with nerves and children and we pump a rubber bullet in its head to stun it, hang it upside down, slice open its neck so it bleeds to death, tear off its skin and chew its entrails while we profess our love to our date at a Korean restaurant called Bop. Upon this realization a person either stops eating meat or starts eating calamari and sushi and braised pheasant and Korean food. By dousing it in exoticism they mask the horror and entropy and can continue feeling smart, free of sacrifice. Smart is sacrifice. Modern fools think smart is just a language. It's a sacrifice. Anyhow, my parents were too old to be getting into falafel and mapo tofu and macrobiotics. Instead they just replaced their meat with fake meats: unturkey, not-dogs, soylami. Coming home and believing, if even under false pretenses, that I can still break bread with the world makes me feel lovable still and these fake meats help.

From The Light People

Gordon Henry

(Michigan State University Press, 2003) Darkness swelled out of the earth swallowing shadows, leaving only the light of animal's eyes and distant stars to compose the sights I saw. I was not there long when animals came shining low to the ground. They moved up to my face, scratching the earth, scratching dirt into my eyes. After a while, minutes, hours, a thousand blue blinks of stars, a hundred rustlings in the trees, animals sat in a circle around me, outside the ring of tobacco, growling and moaning. Then I understood their language and I felt fear for all of creation. My thoughts raced in the darkness to find the old man, but my body was still in the hole, nervous, shivering in the cold night dirt. There was no magic to match the feeling; no illusions could pull me from the ground. I waited for power and I sang like I always do when I'm nervous. The first song came out rough, a coarse melody, bent with fear, like a sapling resisting strong wind. The deeper I went into the song the more I felt the fear slacken into a strength of human sound mixing with air and elements. Soon the animals joined in, growling to long musical howls, introspective calls and silences. My own vocals hung on for a long time; note faded into note; song faded into song. There were words and there were no words; there were sounds and there were voices from the once fearful gut, grasping each musical movement. Then, when the songs grew longer, I knew no more of the source of the memorized and invented tones. The animals left. I felt their shadows slink back out of the circle and bolt away, skittering across dirt into the leaves, into the bush. In silence and solitude, I heard footsteps behind me; then laughter careened, in a strange dance. I finally caught sight, out of the corner of my eye, of a small person.

Delight and Liberty Michael Langdon Continued from the 5/19/2005 edition of the Pine Press.

The full text is available at http://www.msu.edu/~langdon8/lit/stories/sensaba12.html

The boy in the buffet mirror curls down his bottom lip, thumb and fore pull upon his top. His lips back together, he puffs his cheeks to produce a distinctly flatulent noise.

"Robert!" exclaims the older sister and, "don't you roll your eyes at me." From across the table she narrows her own.

Rob shifts in his chair, reclaiming his obstructed view. Middle fingers at the edges, he pries his mouth into a wide clown sneer. His chair shakes-"Ow!" she shrieks, but then connects-"Ow!" --with Rob's leg. He scowls.

"Robert! Deborah! If you two don't cut it out, I'll give you something to really cry about," says the man.

Scowling, he pulls out the armed chair gets between it and the table and pulls it beneath him. "Paul, Rebecca," he shouts: "Come to the table!" And: "Marie, come on already."

But she stands in the kitchen doorway; brown and burnt oven mitts holding the large silver black-handled pot: "Well I've got to put the food on the table don't I?" And she does. And it's back to the kitchen for the other dish: a long silver platter: flat noodles covered in a red sauce thick with ground beef, vegetables once frozen and mushrooms once canned. Between pasta and sauce are pats of cream cheese. Cut from a slab, the white blocks mingle with the sauce to create secret pink pockets.

She sets this platter on the table: "Now there's more noodles in the kitchen if anyone needs them." She sits.

Between Patty and Debbie, Rebecca pours herself a glass of pink Kool-aid from a plastic pitcher. Beside Rob, Paul takes the large slotted spoon to the large silver platter-"Paul! We have to pray first," says the man.

"Family Dinner" Dramatis Personae: THE MAN - Rob's father, balding, beard, black hair, going grey, glasses THE WOMAN - Rob's mother, younger than the man, short dark brown hair, glasses REBECCA - Rob's oldest sibling and sister, long dark brown hair, glasses DEBBIE - Rob's next oldest sibling and sister, short dark blonde hair, glasses PAUL - Rob's older brother, dark brown hair ROB - Rob, dark blond hair PATTY - Rob's younger sister, long dark brown hair SCENE 1 (A DINING ROOM. A FAMILY OF SEVEN IS GATHERED AROUND A TABLE MADE FOR SIX. THEY JOIN HANDS.) ALL: Blesus oh lord anthese thy gifs which we arbout to receivfrom thy bounty thru christ arlord jesus. (CROSS THEMSELVES) Nameuhthe fatheson, holespirit. (STAGGERED) Amen. (EMPHATICALLY RELEASE HANDS) (CLAMOR. PAUL SERVES HIMSELF FROM A SILVER PLATTER, HANDS THE SPOON TO THE WOMAN. HE HANDS HIS PLATE TO THE MAN WHO LADLES TWO HEAPS OF SAUCE FROM A POT.) ROB: Please pass the Maggiaduli.

THE WOMAN: Be patient dear, it'll come around. (SHE SERVES HERSELF FROM THE PLATTER.) THE MAN: We always pass to left, Rob. Just like in cards. Which reminds me. (POURS HIMSELF A GLASS OF MILK) Euchre club seems to be a hit. Two loaner hands today.

THE WOMAN: Well, good for you.

THE MAN: Hand your plate here, Marie, and I'll give you some sauce. (TAKES HER PLATE) How's that?

More?

THE WOMAN: That's fine, thank you. (SHE TAKES HER PLATE, HANDS HIM PATTY'S) And for Patty.

PATTY: Maah-juh-doo-li!

Delight and Liberty Michael Langdon Continued from the 5/19/2005 edition of the Pine Press.

The full text is available at http://www.msu.edu/~langdon8/lit/stories/sensaba12.html

The boy in the buffet mirror curls down his bottom lip, thumb and fore pull upon his top. His lips back together, he puffs his cheeks to produce a distinctly flatulent noise.

"Robert!" exclaims the older sister and, "don't you roll your eyes at me." From across the table she narrows her own.

Rob shifts in his chair, reclaiming his obstructed view. Middle fingers at the edges, he pries his mouth into a wide clown sneer. His chair shakes-"Ow!" she shrieks, but then connects-"Ow!" --with Rob's leg. He scowls.

"Robert! Deborah! If you two don't cut it out, I'll give you something to really cry about," says the man.

Scowling, he pulls out the armed chair gets between it and the table and pulls it beneath him. "Paul, Rebecca," he shouts: "Come to the table!" And: "Marie, come on already."

But she stands in the kitchen doorway; brown and burnt oven mitts holding the large silver black-handled pot: "Well I've got to put the food on the table don't I?" And she does. And it's back to the kitchen for the other dish: a long silver platter: flat noodles covered in a red sauce thick with ground beef, vegetables once frozen and mushrooms once canned. Between pasta and sauce are pats of cream cheese. Cut from a slab, the white blocks mingle with the sauce to create secret pink pockets.

She sets this platter on the table: "Now there's more noodles in the kitchen if anyone needs them." She sits.

Between Patty and Debbie, Rebecca pours herself a glass of pink Kool-aid from a plastic pitcher. Beside Rob, Paul takes the large slotted spoon to the large silver platter-"Paul! We have to pray first," says the man.

"Family Dinner" Dramatis Personae: THE MAN - Rob's father, balding, beard, black hair, going grey, glasses THE WOMAN - Rob's mother, younger than the man, short dark brown hair, glasses REBECCA - Rob's oldest sibling and sister, long dark brown hair, glasses DEBBIE - Rob's next oldest sibling and sister, short dark blonde hair, glasses PAUL - Rob's older brother, dark brown hair ROB - Rob, dark blond hair PATTY - Rob's younger sister, long dark brown hair SCENE 1 (A DINING ROOM. A FAMILY OF SEVEN IS GATHERED AROUND A TABLE MADE FOR SIX. THEY JOIN HANDS.) ALL: Blesus oh lord anthese thy gifs which we arbout to receivfrom thy bounty thru christ arlord jesus. (CROSS THEMSELVES) Nameuhthe fatheson, holespirit. (STAGGERED) Amen. (EMPHATICALLY RELEASE HANDS) (CLAMOR. PAUL SERVES HIMSELF FROM A SILVER PLATTER, HANDS THE SPOON TO THE WOMAN. HE HANDS HIS PLATE TO THE MAN WHO LADLES TWO HEAPS OF SAUCE FROM A POT.) ROB: Please pass the Maggiaduli.

THE WOMAN: Be patient dear, it'll come around. (SHE SERVES HERSELF FROM THE PLATTER.) THE MAN: We always pass to left, Rob. Just like in cards. Which reminds me. (POURS HIMSELF A GLASS OF MILK) Euchre club seems to be a hit. Two loaner hands today.

THE WOMAN: Well, good for you.

THE MAN: Hand your plate here, Marie, and I'll give you some sauce. (TAKES HER PLATE) How's that?

More?

THE WOMAN: That's fine, thank you. (SHE TAKES HER PLATE, HANDS HIM PATTY'S) And for Patty.

PATTY: Maah-juh-doo-li!

Delight and Liberty Michael Langdon Continued from the 5/19/2005 edition of the Pine Press.

The full text is available at http://www.msu.edu/~langdon8/lit/stories/sensaba12.html

The boy in the buffet mirror curls down his bottom lip, thumb and fore pull upon his top. His lips back together, he puffs his cheeks to produce a distinctly flatulent noise.

"Robert!" exclaims the older sister and, "don't you roll your eyes at me." From across the table she narrows her own.

Rob shifts in his chair, reclaiming his obstructed view. Middle fingers at the edges, he pries his mouth into a wide clown sneer. His chair shakes-"Ow!" she shrieks, but then connects-"Ow!" --with Rob's leg. He scowls.

"Robert! Deborah! If you two don't cut it out, I'll give you something to really cry about," says the man.

Scowling, he pulls out the armed chair gets between it and the table and pulls it beneath him. "Paul, Rebecca," he shouts: "Come to the table!" And: "Marie, come on already."

But she stands in the kitchen doorway; brown and burnt oven mitts holding the large silver black-handled pot: "Well I've got to put the food on the table don't I?" And she does. And it's back to the kitchen for the other dish: a long silver platter: flat noodles covered in a red sauce thick with ground beef, vegetables once frozen and mushrooms once canned. Between pasta and sauce are pats of cream cheese. Cut from a slab, the white blocks mingle with the sauce to create secret pink pockets.

She sets this platter on the table: "Now there's more noodles in the kitchen if anyone needs them." She sits.

Between Patty and Debbie, Rebecca pours herself a glass of pink Kool-aid from a plastic pitcher. Beside Rob, Paul takes the large slotted spoon to the large silver platter-"Paul! We have to pray first," says the man.

"Family Dinner" Dramatis Personae: THE MAN - Rob's father, balding, beard, black hair, going grey, glasses THE WOMAN - Rob's mother, younger than the man, short dark brown hair, glasses REBECCA - Rob's oldest sibling and sister, long dark brown hair, glasses DEBBIE - Rob's next oldest sibling and sister, short dark blonde hair, glasses PAUL - Rob's older brother, dark brown hair ROB - Rob, dark blond hair PATTY - Rob's younger sister, long dark brown hair SCENE 1 (A DINING ROOM. A FAMILY OF SEVEN IS GATHERED AROUND A TABLE MADE FOR SIX. THEY JOIN HANDS.) ALL: Blesus oh lord anthese thy gifs which we arbout to receivfrom thy bounty thru christ arlord jesus. (CROSS THEMSELVES) Nameuhthe fatheson, holespirit. (STAGGERED) Amen. (EMPHATICALLY RELEASE HANDS) (CLAMOR. PAUL SERVES HIMSELF FROM A SILVER PLATTER, HANDS THE SPOON TO THE WOMAN. HE HANDS HIS PLATE TO THE MAN WHO LADLES TWO HEAPS OF SAUCE FROM A POT.) ROB: Please pass the Maggiaduli.

THE WOMAN: Be patient dear, it'll come around. (SHE SERVES HERSELF FROM THE PLATTER.) THE MAN: We always pass to left, Rob. Just like in cards. Which reminds me. (POURS HIMSELF A GLASS OF MILK) Euchre club seems to be a hit. Two loaner hands today.

THE WOMAN: Well, good for you.

THE MAN: Hand your plate here, Marie, and I'll give you some sauce. (TAKES HER PLATE) How's that?

More?

THE WOMAN: That's fine, thank you. (SHE TAKES HER PLATE, HANDS HIM PATTY'S) And for Patty.

PATTY: Maah-juh-doo-li!

Animals !!!

YAY!!!