Volume 58, Issue 5

Summer 2026

The Magazine About Yale and New Haven

Volume 58, Issue 5

City officials want to build a pool on the site of a defunct power plant.

Residents wonder if the plan will sink or swim.

TheNewJournal

Summer 2026

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Letter from the Editors

Masthead Editors-in-Chief

Dear reader,

We write to you from a “Giant Pool of Questions.” What we mean to say is that we are in our fifth late-night huddle in the second-to-last week of the semester going back over all our unused headlines for Tajrian Khan’s remarkable cover story, “Smokestack Dreams.” We may be having some regrets. “Ruins, Renewal, and the Riverside” anyone? What about “Why a Pool?” If you want to know the answer to that question, read the article to find out.

This is our first issue as a managing board. With admiration and lots of sadness, we bid farewell to Chloe, Calista, Mia, and Tina. We have learned so much from them. Now, we get to try our hand at this.

After two years at Yale and in New Haven, we have a million questions left, and it is the work of our publication to answer as empathetically and creatively as we can. In the lead-up to our 60th anniversary next year, we’ve been looking at our archives for inspiration. To start, we’re bringing back NewsJournals, a TNJ fixture from the 1980s.

Once you’ve swum through Tajrian’s story, take a look at Ella Piper Claffy’s piece about Iranian students watching the war from New Haven. Further in, Oscar Heller explores the moldy underbelly of Connecticut’s cannabis market. Our personal essays will take you from ice fields in Patagonia to frat basements.

As always, thank you for reading, whether you’re a friend who hasn’t seen us in two weeks or you’ve just picked this up because you liked the striking cover art by our wonderful co-creative director, Serina Yan. Either way, let’s dive in together.

With love, Adele, Kelly, Margot, Harry

Creative Directors

Celina Qu Serina Yan

Verse Editor

Sophia Liu

Senior Editors Chloe Budakian Mia Rose Kohn Tina Li Sabrina Thaler

Calista Oetama Drew Storino Will Sussbauer

Associate Editors Tai Caputo Aparna Dhulipala Chantal Eulenstein Kade Gajdusek Leilani Glace Irene Kim Anna Koontz Katerina Matta Liam Swinney Caroline Toll Skye Wu Adriana Zhou Copy Editors

Olivia Barton Fiona Jin Sarea Leung Emily Pedroza

Eden Feiler Smile Jiang Grace Liu

Designers

Anna Koontz James Tibang

Erin Lee

Angelina Kovalchuk Caroline Talis

Nathan Saud

Photography Cassie Boulis

The Hull Barrett Family Fund

Mark Badger Kathrin Lassila Jean-Pierre Jordan Fred Strebeigh Aliyya Swaby Peter Phleger Laura Heymann Steven Weisman Jeffrey Pollock David Greenberg Julia Preston Suzanne Wittebort Armand LeGardeur Romy Drucker Katie Hazelwood James Carney Benjamin Lasman Makiko Harunari R. Anthony Reese Laura Pappano Andrew Court 2

Publisher Ethan Kan

Associate Business Managers

Thank You to Our Donors

The Elizabethan Club

Executive Editor Managing Editor

Adele Haeg Kelly Kong Margot Kohn Harry Lowitz

Marilynn Sager David Gerber Daniel Yergin Jonathan Lear Barak Goodman Elizabeth Sledge Sally Sloan Leslie Dach Jodi Kantor Rollin Riggs Hilary Callahan thenewjournalatyale.com

Web Design

Colin Kim Samhita Kumar

Members & Directors: Haley Cohen Gilliland • Peter Cooper • Andrew Court • Jonathan Dach • Susan Dominus • Elizabeth Sledge • Fred Strebeigh • Aliyya Swaby

Advisors: Neela Banerjee • Richard Bradley • Susan Braudy • Lincoln Caplan • Jay Carney • Joshua Civin • Richard Conniff • Ruth Conniff • Elisha Cooper • David Greenberg • Sophie Haigney • Daniel Kurtz-Phelan • Laura Pappano • Jennifer Pitts • Julia Preston • Lauren Rawbin • David Slifka • John Swansburg • Anya Kamenetz • Steven Weisman • Daniel Yergin

Friends: Nicole Allan • Margaret Bauer • Mark Badger and Laura Heymann • Anson M. Beard • Susan Braudy • Julia Calagiovanni • Elisha Cooper • Peter Cooper • Andy Court • The Elizabethan Club • Leslie Dach • David Freeman and Judith Gingold • Paul Haigney and Tracey Roberts • Bob Lamm • James Liberman • Alka Mansukhani • Benjamin Mueller • Sophia Nguyen • Valerie Nierenberg • Morris Panner • Jennifer Pitts • R. Anthony Reese • Eric Rutkow • Lainie Rutkow • Laura Saavedra and David Buckley • Anne-Marie Slaughter • Elizabeth Sledge • Caroline Smith • Gabriel Snyder • Elizabeth Steig • John Jeremiah Sullivan • Daphne and David Sydney • Kristian and Margarita Whiteleather • Blake Townsend Wilson • Daniel Yergin • William Yuen

TheNewJournal

Contents

Lighting Up in the Land of Steady Habits

12

feature In Connecticut’s stunted legal cannabis industry, many Yale students turn to illicit sellers without knowing the risks.

By Oscar Heller

Smokestack Dreams

18

cover story On the site of a defunct power plant, city officials want to build a multimillion-dollar park with an outdoor aquatic center. While some residents are in favor, many are left asking: Who wants this?

By Tajrian Khan

4 NewsJournal point of departure

snapshot

6 Through Flashes of Red and Gold

8 Holding Vigil

Lunarfest—New Haven’s Chinese New Year Celebration—offers both consolation and a reminder of what cultural displays cannot translate.

As war rages on in the Middle East, Iranian students at Yale grapple with what solidarity and responsibility should look like from so far away.

By Sophia Zhang

By Ella Piper Claffy

poem

endnote

11 Chiasmus

28 Yearning for “Touse” in the Algorithm Mysterious videos featuring montages of aughts-era frat culture begin flooding a writer’s feed. As she searches for what—and who—is behind them, she finds herself not on Nantucket but in the digital equivalent of a dank frat basement.

By Alistair Lam personal essays

23 Employee Handbook, Page 22

By Tristan Hernandez

By Tali Kantor Lieber

25 Climbing a Glass Castle

CROSSWORD: Page 31

By Savan Parikh

May 20262026 Summer

cover by serina yan

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NewsJournal

NewsJournal Class Colors he morning i snuck into Professor TherTamar Gendler’s office hours to ask about CourseTable, the Yale class

cataloging website, I found myself in the company of one Directed Studies student, two members of her seminar, “Intelligence: Human, Animal, Artificial,” and books of all colors.

This spring was the first semester in twelve years that Gendler taught undergraduate courses full-time. She’s returned to a Yale in which CourseTable, the student-designed website that compiles information from all course evaluations, has taken over what was once known to undergraduates as “shopping period,” now known as add-drop.

Shopping CourseTable has made choosing one’s classes feel like online shopping.

I asked Gendler what professors think about CourseTable’s ubiquity among students. Do her colleagues even know about it? “I think everybody knows about CourseTable,” she said, laughing, incredulous at my astonishment.

I asked Gendler what she thought about CourseTable’s color-coding: classes that students had evaluated as requiring less time and effort are coded green, progressing through yellow and orange to red, the most rigorous. Are green, yellow, and red designed to function like universal traffic-signal colors?

Does CourseTable so openly encourage students to take courses considered “easy,” green meaning go? Red as “stop” may be too simplistic a definition. After all, Alex Schapiro ’26, a Computer Science major who ran CourseTable last year, said that red doesn’t necessarily mean “worse,” but rather “more intense.”

Gendler said that we often “overvalue” color distinctions. She suggests that course evaluations might be differently conveyed, saying she “would much prefer it if it were five shades of green, ranging from dark to light, or red, ranging from dark to light.”

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Gendler’s “Intelligence” seminar is in place. Posts must be labeled “Updates, brand-new, so its workload rating on “Reports,” or “Questions.”

It is conventional wisdom that in CourseTable is blank, colorless. I wonder, however, if the deep red of her sweater times like these, people take care of each other. Victims of natural disasters have might provide some clue. been known to help rebuild the homes of —Tai Caputo is a first-year in their neighbors. Compassion rises.

In the airport security line, compasBenjamin Franklin college. sion gives way at times to fierce competition. A woman behind me stops an agent to point out a couple that has cut the line.

Bolus Movements My neighbor notes with an edge that the other line is moving faster.

T’s march 22, 3:57am. The Atlanta We inch forward. airport line has passed the IHOP In the Reddit comments, someand is starting to double back on itself. one asks if Immigration and Customs Travelers chat in place. A young man Enforcement agents have arrived, and a with a beehive of a beard explains the predictable political argument breaks out.

Plane-Train to two older ladies with I only spot them once I’m nearly through handbags. Children plop down on the the line, armed agents standing behind a floor while a father squats on his bag in glass wall. front of the promotional Kia Telluride.

My mouth is dry. In foolish preparaSome have been waiting for hours. It has tion for security, I emptied my water botbeen 37 days since the United States gov- tle two hours ago, and now I am thirsty, ernment paid TSA employees. “I want unable to swallow. As we move towards two lines, please now folks. Two lines…” the machines, I feel we are being swalI’m probably going to miss another flight. lowed by America.

My first flight, to Tweed-New Haven Regional Airport, took off yes—Asher Lytton is a sophomore in terday, presumably empty, as security Silliman College. lines across the country swelled. A friend traveling with me stayed ten hours at the terminal to catch the next available flight to “anywhere-in-train-distance-to-Yale.”

The Opposite of Loss I bailed and returned early this morning, hoping to beat the lines. I have class ROG: AND OTHER ESSAYS, the new book by noted Yale writer and profestomorrow.

On the “ATL Airport TSA Wait sor Anne Fadiman, contains seven essays Times Megathread” on Reddit, one user on widely varied topics, but loss simmers describes the lines as “stagnant” with underneath each. Her ode to a beloved occasional “bolus-movements,” the offi- printer becomes a meditation on her cial term for the process that carries food experience of aging. Her grammarian’s or saliva from the mouth to the stomach. struggle with the singular “they” is also Reported wait times vary between four a reckoning with the perceived loss of grammatical standards. Like salt in good and eight hours.

It is on Reddit that I learn about cooking, loss in Frog elevates every story a lucky few who slipped through the to profundity.

The final essay, “Yes to Everything,” international terminal before the trick got out. User traffic on the thread itself confronts the theme head-on. Marina is so great that protocols have been put Keegan, a brilliant writer and student of

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LAYOUT DESIGN BY CELINA QU

NewsJournal

Fadiman’s, graduated from Yale on May 21, 2012. Five days later, her car crashed on her way to Cape Cod. She was 22 when she died, leaving behind a trove of writing which Fadiman, alongside Keegan’s family, assembled into a collection called The Opposite of Loneliness: Essays and Stories.

The essay tonally avoids melancholy by focusing on Keegan’s righteous love of life. In their first interaction, Keegan wrote to Fadiman and identified herself, only semi-ironically, as someone “hoping to stop the death of literature.” In her junior year, after finding herself rejected from Yale’s secret society system, she wrote to Fadiman: “I’ve vowed to spend 12 hours a week writing,” Keegan said, “If I was willing to devote that much time to chatting in a tomb I should be willing to devote it to writing!”

I cried when I read “Yes to Everything.” Much of Frog revolves around death, but on finishing this essay, I found myself less afraid of the End. I felt far more adamant that I should meet the time before it with vigor.

—Will Sussbauer is a junior in Jonathan Edwards College.

Commons of Yore T USED TO BE THE place to be seen.

Igasbord Walk in and you were met with a smorof the Yale community—firstyear friend groups bound to splinter by Halloweekend, hordes of athletes in knee-length parkas scarfing down Pasta e Basta. Sometimes, you could even spot Dean Pericles Lewis staring eye-to-eye at rotisserie chickens glistening on their spits.

Commons has long been a hallmark of the weekday social scene at Yale. But since the university limited meal swipes to residential dining halls last fall, forcing

Commons banquet, early 1900s. Photo Credit: Detroit Publishing Co.

students to use points, the crowd has shriveled. The high center tables, once in demand, now seat a smattering of Directed Studies students hunched over Kant and Korean fried chicken. Only a few shameful stragglers trickle through the center aisle.

Yale’s tradition of communal dining dates back to 1718, when “Yale College” opened near what is now Bingham Hall, as the first ever combined dormitory and dining facility. Commons has had a tumultuous history. In 1828, student protesters waged the infamous “Bread and Butter Rebellion,” a campaign for improved food quality—many went on strike, refused to eat on campus, and were eventually told to return or face expulsion. In the 1900s, food fights erupted, and service declined as students failed to consistently tip waiters.

Administrators enforced strict expectations of etiquette, requiring jackets, ties, and assigned seating. When Yale

dropped these regulations in 1969 after admitting women to the college, a new wave of complaints decried the loss of storied rituals.

The idea of waiters serving up clementines and Rooted bowls to diners in their Monday best may seem absurd today, yet students seem to feel a bit of nostalgia for the Commons of yore.

Campaigns to vote on meals and pressure on Yale Hospitality to reinstate the meal swipe may indicate an attempt to swing the pendulum back—hopefully, students won’t have to boycott or wage food fights to get what they want now.

Updated menu offerings, a new table arrangement, and cookies every day could very well save Commons. As for me, I’ll be taking up shop in the Elm until they bring back the old pesto pasta recipe upstairs.

—Eden Feiler is a junior in Ezra Stiles college.

TheNewJournal Summer 2026

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Points of Departure

guzheng—a Chinese zither—at a New Haven Chinese Cultural Cooperative (NHCCC) concert at the Peabody. In the midst of a new year spent mostly alone, she found the audience’s enthusiastic response to her performance heartening.

“When people have a mind of discovering other cultures, sharing Chinese culture with them becomes very attractive for me,” she said.

As an international student who grew up in mainland China and attended high school in the United States, I felt a similar sense of recognition at Lunarfest.

Lunarfest—New Haven’s Chinese New Year During the parade, when I heard an a cappella rendition of Dang Ni Lao Le celebration—offers both consolation and a (“When You Are Old”), a song I had reminder of what cultural displays cannot first heard as a middle schooler watching translate.

TV in Shenzhen, I almost cried. I had

By Sophia Zhang not realized those feelings of nostalgia were there. my Zheng sat center STAGE in Although earnest, many the Peabody Museum’s skylit gallery, performances seemed clumsily done: her fingers leaping over the guzheng’s notes out of tune, a few swords and sticks 21 strings, plucking in tune with the dropped, handkerchiefs spun too far ensemble behind her. Music evoking and luckily caught. Zheng also felt that dancing snakes and racing horses—the engagement for other activities—such as old and new zodiacs of the Lunar New a crafts workshop she helped run—was Year—filled the sun-soaked room. After surface-level: “There’s a big challenge the last notes faded, Zheng admitted a in moving beyond only superficial quiet truth to herself. representations of our activities.”

“I’ve lived in China all my life,” she While attendees and organizers said in Mandarin. “So when suddenly praise Lunarfest as an opportunity for there’s a New Year when my family and cultural visibility, many I spoke with felt friends aren’t around, I really miss them.” that the event barely scratched the surface In China, Zheng, a high school of Lunar New Year’s rich traditions. junior, would’ve celebrated Lunar New Among the crowd’s consoling cheers for Year during a nine-day national holiday, each mistake, questions lingered: Is the reuniting with relatives and making event an attempt at genuine celebration, dumplings alongside her family. But or just a performance of culture? To an since moving to Hamden on her own audience of thousands, including many for high school, she doesn’t even get the onlookers unfamiliar with Lunar New day off. This February, she celebrated the Year, could Lunarfest last beyond the holiday at New Haven’s own Lunar New flashes of red and gold?

Year celebration, Lunarfest.

Started in 2012 by the Yale-China Association, Lunarfest is Connecticut’s *** best-attended Lunar New Year celebration. Each year, thousands come HEN YALE-CHINA STARTED in from across the state for a festival Lunarfest, Nancy Yao, the with lion dancing on Whitney Avenue, a organization’s former president, was zodiac scavenger hunt, an artists’ market, most focused on how the event could and workshops across the city. This raise their “profile on campus.” Yao, with year, Zheng participated by playing the Annie Lin, the former director of Arts

A Flash of Red and Gold

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TheNewJournal

Programming at YaleChina, pitched the event as an opportunity for people who usually “don’t interact with China or Chinese culture” to see it in their own city.

“And I just knew it would be fun.

Because who doesn’t like arts and crafts, Lunar New Year, a parade, good food?” asked Yao, “those are easy. Those are lowhanging fruits.”

Lin grew up in Morro Bay, California, a predominantly white town, and came to Yale for college, where she was exposed to a larger Asian community.

After graduating, she joined Yale-China, which first took her to mainland China and Hong Kong, then back to New Haven. Returning to America, Lin began to recognize how invisible her culture had felt during her childhood.

“There was this longing,” Lin said. “I didn’t know that something so ingrained in my blood and my body, something that my parents never felt seen for, could get recognized in this way.”

She was surprised at the size of the crowds that turned up for Lunarfest in its early years, even in sub-zero temperatures. “And you don’t have to go to Manhattan for that, or up to Boston,” Lin said of large-scale Lunar New Year celebrations. “It can be right here.”

“I didn’t know that something that was so ingrained in my blood and my body, something that my parents never felt seen for, could get recognized in this way.”

But Lunarfest’s visibility feels shortlived. When the parade concludes each year, the crowd quickly disperses back into the city. The lion dancers pile into white trucks, packing in their costumes to drive back to New York. Before noon, Whitney Avenue returns to normal.

Nothing remains but the lanterns against a gray sky and the occasional stray LAYOUT DESIGN BY ERIN LEE

Points of Departure

said three kids—a Japanese girl and confetti.

Zheng was moved by the audience’s two white boys—came up to her after appreciation of her performance. But the concert, eager to learn about the once the music faded and she had instrument. She held their hands on answered a few questions, she felt distant the bow as they tried playing their first melodies. from them again.

Growing up in China, Ying’s “It’s not quite like they are closer to us,” Zheng said. Her impression of the parents had made her play the erhu, a bridge built seemed much more one- Chinese two-stringed fiddle, against her way; while it was touching to see her will. She tolerated it until middle school, Chinese culture on display, being seen but quit immediately when she got didn’t quite translate into being known. permission. After moving to the United Camille Chang ’26, a Yale-China States eighteen years ago and hearing fellow who helped run a calligraphy erhu music again in recordings, Ying workshop at Lunarfest, felt that the fell back in love with the instrument. event’s wide reach came with certain “There’s just so much nostalgia,” Ying trade-offs. “There’s not as much said. “Memories about my childhood, culturally specific knowledge that you about how this song was playing on TV.” can put out there,” she said, adding that many “sacrifices” had to be made.

Her impression of the bridge Chang’s maternal side of the family was originally from Fujian, a coastal built seemed much more province in southern China. She felt one-way; while it was touching that she couldn’t put a “Fujianese spin” on Lunarfest, just as other fellows to see her Chinese culture on couldn’t tilt the event towards their own display, being seen didn’t quite traditions. translate into being known.

“It’s the idea of the mythical Asian American identity,” Chang added, “You have to create this event for New Haven, and create a China that is kind of In China, Ying attended concerts imagined.” with musicians in tuxes and dresses, elevated on a big stage. At Lunarfest, *** performers sat only six feet away from the audience. “Like in a village, when ENGXI YING, who played the erhu there’s a bonfire, dancing, and people with the NHCCC at Lunarfest, are just standing around, and maybe

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they can join later, too,” she said. “If only when I was a child, erhu was introduced to me in this way,” Ying added, “I would practice voluntarily.”

Lin, Yale-China’s former arts programming director, hopes that participants might feel inspired like Ying did. “That could be the reason they’re going to end up being someone who appreciates and wants to study abroad, right?” Lin said. “These events are “growth spaces, they’re learning spaces.” *** HENG HAS BEEN IN THE United Zfriend States for almost two years. Her group remains mostly Chinese, and she still finds it easier to joke and express herself in Mandarin. At school, she notices moments of brief connection, but everyday differences—food, humor, and even dating norms—often remind her of the gulf between her Chinese culture and the culture she has moved into.

Despite her doubts about how much a single day of cultural exchange can bridge divides, Zheng still thinks Lunarfest is a crucial step towards mutual understanding. “If we can help them appreciate Chinese music and think that it is beautiful, that’s already very good,” she said.

The small moments of connection after each performance sustain Zheng’s efforts. She recalls questions about her guzheng and an audience member coming up to say: “Your music reminded me of my hometown’s river.”

Trading the atmosphere of Lunar New Year in Beijing for Lunarfest’s flashes of red and gold, Zheng doesn’t consider her choice to study in the U.S. a sacrifice—just a change. “I recognize that if I was in China, I couldn’t bring this kind of music abroad,” she said. “So I feel quite happy. I don’t regret that I’m not at home.”

Sophia Zhang is a sophomore in Timothy Dwight College.

Emy Zheng, right, performing the guzheng with the NHCCC. PHOTOS BY Daniel havlat

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Snapshot

Holding Vigil As war rages on in the Middle East, Iranian students at Yale grapple with what solidarity and responsibility should look like from so far away.

By Ella Piper Claffy

Yale Alliance for Solidarity with Iran’s (YASI) tabling event on Beinecke Plaza, March 4, 2026.

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N NEW HAVEN, a world away from his home country Iran, Hadi Mahdeyan ’27 had been waiting for a strike. At 6:30 a.m. on February 28, his girlfriend urgently shook him awake. “I think they’ve started to attack,” she said.

Hadi checked the news and saw that the United States had launched an airstrike on Ayatollah Khamenei’s compound in Tehran. Whenever there was military action in the Middle East, pundits and bloggers flooded Iranian news channels and chat platforms speculating that the Supreme Leader had died. Hadi knew better than to expect anything. He

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waited for more information.

Some outlets began to report that the Ayatollah had been killed, others held off. Finally, in the early afternoon, Prime Minister of Israel Benjamin Netanyahu hosted a press conference and announced that there were “many signs” that Ali Khamenei was dead. Later that day, the U.S. confirmed. They were at war with Iran.

It was the news Hadi had been waiting for most of his life. He rushed to tell friends, calling a fellow Iranian in the School of Drama and a graduate student working in a lab. Both answered and asked to call him back.

“No, no, you don’t understand,” Hadi urged them. “Khamenei’s dead.”

The next day, @yasi.yale—the Instagram account for Hadi’s newly founded Yale Alliance for Solidarity with Iran (YASI)—made its first post: a grainy photo of Iranian and Israeli flags hanging next to each other from the backyard balcony of a Yale fraternity house. The caption reads: “The end of his life is a blessed day.

Long live Iran.

Khamenei’s finally fucking dead.

Long live Iran.”

LAYOUT DESIGN BY SERINA YAN

***

(IRGC), the regime’s primary armed is unthinkable. force that has killed tens of thousands Shervin Issakhani, an Iranian graduADI foundeD YASI LAST February. of demonstrators in January. Hadi had ate student at Yale and member of YASI, The group hosted their first event, a intended to fully exercise his freedom of feels guilty all the time; for leaving his protest on Beinecke Plaza, on Valentine’s speech in the U.S. He was disappointed family and watching this war from halfDay—Reza Pahlavi, the son of the when the PSA asked him to keep his way across the world; for spreading news deposed Iranian shah, had designated vigil apolitical to protect public-facing from sources he’s never 100 percent sure it a “Global Day of Action” against the members who might run into trouble if he can trust; for not doing enough for Iranian regime following the massacre of they visited family in Iran. the people of Iran. tens of thousands of protesters in January.

Hadi was taken aback. “I said, ‘Well, He has no regrets, however, about his Hadi, who has dark curly hair and she was killed by the regime.’” advocacy for the war. He would die if it a fondness for black-framed sunglasses, Nader Granmayeh ’23.5 was an unof- meant a free Iran. grew up in Iran. He ficial leader of the PSA Milad Davaran ’28, outgoing PSA wouldn’t say exactly at the time. Before 2021, treasurer, told me that he did not know where, since revealthe PSA operated as of any Iranians on campus who opposed ing his family’s specific an “informal network” the war. Shervin believes any who did “It is a very common goal, location could put them of Persian students would be too “embarrassed” to say so. not just for me, but for in danger. But he didn’t who knew each other After months of searching, I couldn’t find basically most people hesitate to say that he through Farsi language any Iranian students currently attending grew up hating the classes. Even by 2023, Yale who are anti-intervention. my age in Iran, to Islamic regime that has most PSA gatherings Nader, who grew up in the States leave forever.” governed Iran since the were the products of and graduated from Yale in 2023, is veherevolution in 1979—a open-invite texts in mently in favor of regime change. But regime that parked their group chat. he is against the war, and was surprised tanks in the alley right The group held their that there is no visible anti-war sentioutside his house and gassed his neigh- first political event a year before Hadi’s ment from Iranians on campus. Nader borhood so frequently that his younger arrival: a vigil at the Women’s Table for has witnessed the question of intervenbrother now has chronic eye infections.

Amini right after her death, where they tion divide his family and the rest of the “It is a very common goal, not just for displayed her portrait alongside bouquets Iranian diaspora. me, but for basically most people my age of lilies. The PSA was motivated to show Nader thinks Iranian citizens or support for Iranians, in Iran, to leave forever,” Hadi said. those who grew up But it is difficult for Iranian students demonstrating that in Iran are more to come to the U.S. for college. Less “there is an interna- Nader thinks Iranian citizens likely, having expethan a dozen American universities offer tional community rienced the regime’s or those who grew up in Iran need-blind admission to international that is behind them violence, to feel that are more likely, having students. With the dollar currently val- in their fight for freerevolutionary change ued around 1.3 million Iranian rials, most dom,” as Nader told is urgent—anyexperienced the regime’s applicants from Iran have considerable the Yale Daily News in thing else would be a violence, to feel that financial need. The SAT is not admin- 2022. betrayal. revolutionary change is istered in Iran, so Hadi had to travel to Since its foundThis distinction Turkey for the test. ing, the Yale Alliance is felt on Yale’s camurgent—anything else When he got into Yale, he won what for Solidarity with pus. Neither Hadi nor would be a betrayal. he considered “basically a lottery.” In Iran (YASI) has held Shervin can safely go the fall of 2023, Hadi arrived on cam- weekly vigils for those back to Iran until the pus looking for a community of fellow killed in the January current government Iranians. He found the Persian Students 8 and 9 Rasht massacres. Under Hadi’s has been deposed—they have been vocal Association (PSA). leadership, the vigils are every bit as polit- about their anti-regime opinions and That September marked one year ical as what he wanted for the PSA. On would likely be executed should they be since the death of Mahsa Amini, an Thursdays, YASI gathers at the Women’s forced to return. Their Iranian-American Iranian woman who died in prison after Table to read out each victim’s name, their peers have an extra level of security she was arrested for wearing her hijab too birth year, and the refrain that they were because they have American passports. loosely. Her death sparked the grassroots “killed in 2026 by the Islamic republic for Shervin recalls how surreal it was Woman, Life, Freedom movement. Hadi the crime of protesting.” to walk around campus in early January, was eager to see how the PSA planned to after the regime’s massacres. Friends of commemorate the anniversary—but they his had been killed. It felt like no one had weren’t planning anything at all. *** a clue that anything had happened. He So, Hadi asked to organize somespent that day in a trance.

RANIANS WHO SUPPORT THE WAR thing himself. The PSA met him with For members of the Iranian diaspora, often compare the conflict to che- taking a stance in this conflict means support. They agreed to help him host a vigil and set up some candles and flowers. motherapy; removing a cancer like the signing on to a cascade of related opinIn Iran, protests are haunted by the regime, they argue, isn’t supposed to be ions. Pro-war voices tend to reject diploIslamic Revolutionary Guard Corps easy. The war will hurt, but the alternative matic solutions. They are also more likely

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PHOTOS BY COLIN KIM

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Snapshot

to align with Israel, a deeply polarizing force within the war.

Aaron Abrams ’27, a Persian Jew on YASI’s board, sees the stakes of this war as twofold: protecting Iranians from an oppressive regime and removing the Islamic government, which he sees as an existential threat to Israel, from power.

Neither YASI nor the PSA have any religious component to their organizations—both identify with the millennia-old Persian culture rather than Islamic practices. Having grown up in the theocracy, Hadi and Shervin are no fans of Islam.

“We have seen the true face of Islam and Iran,” Hadi said. “The way that this country is being run­—it’s exactly what’s written in the Quran, what Islam wants.”

Nader thinks Iranian citizens’ firsthand experience with the regime can get in the way of them accepting diplomatic solutions. He has been shocked and saddened that anyone could advocate for the bombing of their own home.

But for Hadi and Shervin, who are Iranian citizens, faraway “diplomatic” discussions of issues like the Strait of Hormuz are really just corrupt backroom dealings with the regime. “You don’t negotiate with terrorists,” Hadi said.

YASI tabling, March 4

their journalists seldom venture inside Iran’s borders. The outlet’s reporting is largely based on analyses of videos that make it out through Starlink.

Since the regime restricted Iranians’ access to the internet on February 28, it’s been nearly impossible to get calls through to Iran. The blackouts heighten the anxiety of having family in an overseas warzone. In January, during a shorter blackout after the massacres, Milad watched violent videos released *** via Starlink, but was unable to immedisIDE FROM ON-CAMPUS political ately confirm his family’s safety. During events, the vast majority of YASI and blackouts, all messaging from inside Iran PSA members’ engagement with this depends on Starlink. Texts are occasionconflict occurs on social media. ally possible, but unreliable.

On March 1, the PSA posted a stateHadi has since verified that his famment on Instagram: “Yesterday marked ily is alright, and he was able to get a the end of one of the most evil leaders few texts through to his younger brother in modern history.” It continued, “This before the Iranian New Year on March is only the beginning. Stay informed. 20. Aside from the news that his brother Listen to Iranians. Stand firmly with the had received a Lego set for the holiday, people of Iran.” For the last two months, no texts came back in response.

YASI has reposted everything from news stories to techno-musical remixes of *** Trump’s announcement of Khamenei’s death to the definition of “Iransplaining.”

ASI HOSTED A CELEBRATION OF the Instagram also serves another purIranian New Year, or Nowruz, at the pose for YASI: informing their followers. Yale Farm. For Nowruz, there is a traGiven the compromised news and com- dition of recognizing the exact moment munication channels in and out of Iran, when winter turns to spring according to it is difficult to reliably deliver accurate the ancient Persian calendar. Since he’s information. been at Yale, Hadi has FaceTimed his Hadi says much of his news comes family to wish them a happy new year. from Iran International, a London-based This year, Nowruz fell three weeks into media outlet—allegedly funded by the the blackouts. More than a month later, Saudi royal family—intended to inform he still hasn’t heard their voices.

So instead of family, he gathered the Iranian diaspora. But because Iran International has been declared a terror- with twenty fellow students. Several othist organization by the Iranian regime, ers also hadn’t been able to speak to their

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Summer 2026 TheNewJournal

families for weeks.

Together, they replicated other traditions. On the Haft Seen table—traditionally arranged with seven items beginning with the Persian letter “seen”— YASI members had laid out flowers and figurines, an apple and sprouts, each with a symbolic meaning. The attendees sat around the table and talked about the war, about their families, and about the three young men who had been hanged in the city of Qom the day before.

The weekly vigil YASI hosts by the Women’s Table isn’t a large operation.

They set up a projector screen across two metal tables and cast photos of each victim in succession. Sofiia Tiapkina ’28, a Ukrainian international student on the YASI board, sits at a separate table, clicking through the slides on her computer.

One week, Hadi read the names of nearly 100 victims of the January massacres. The sun had just set and a chill was settling into the air. He read the last name, and three other YASI members recited “may their memory live on” in Persian. The projector screen went dark.

How do you keep alive the memory of 30,000 people who died demanding freedom? How do you hold constant vigil for a country of 93 million?

Hadi and the rest of YASI aren’t sure they have it right, but they are trying. They plan protests. They check Iran International’s updated list of victims.

They try to get texts through to family members. And they wait.

Ella Piper Claffy is a sophomore in Silliman College.

Poem

Chiasmus being human differs between human beings long for the serenity of tortoises before long periods of standing and misunderstanding periods. in history when bullets weren’t part of the story in the end of the body endorphins end the pain falling from ourselves the way fall paints Saturdays with strawberry-stained scarves saturating the air with clichés carefully crocheted to air the grievance like a dead squirrel that in all our grief we mistook for a piece of bark what a lovely mistake that we get surprised by the unlikely beetle it is by surprises we get to stay and caress the moment in our lap and stay to do what is asked of us and so we ask what do different human beings see in being human that’s so different — Alistair Lam

illustration by serina yan

TheNewJournal

Summer 2026

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Lighting Up in the Land of Steady Habits

By Oscar Heller Layout Design by Celina Qu Photos by The new journal

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Inside Yale’s Quiet Reckoning with AI

TheNewJournal

In Connecticut’s stunted legal cannabis industry, many Yale students turn to illicit sellers without knowing the risks.

May 2026

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T

HE FACADE OF 7CLOUDS, a half-convenience, half-smoke shop on Howe Street, is less than the length of a Honda Civic, but announces itself as loud as a Hellcat. To the right of the entrance, a neon rainbow “7Clouds” sign hangs over a barred window. When night falls, it fully lights up the patch of sidewalk in front of the store.

Ross, a 21-year-old Yale junior, walks inside, pushing past a sign that reads “NOTICE: The Sale of Cannabis at This Location is Prohibited.” At the register, she asks for two pre-rolled joints stuffed with cannabis. Ross asked to be identified by a nickname to avoid repercussions for purchasing marijuana from 7Clouds.

7Clouds does not have a license to sell cannabis in Connecticut; unlike legal retailers, they aren’t required to run safety tests on their products, meaning customers like Ross have no way of knowing what they actually contain.

In March, I sent a ten-gram sample of 7Clouds’ White Runtz cannabis strain to Northeast Laboratories, one of two Connecticut labs authorized to ensure compliance with state regulations by testing marijuana products for contaminants like mold, which can pose serious infection risks.

The total mold and yeast count from the 7Clouds’ sample came in at over 30 million colony-forming units (CFU) per gram—more than 300 times Connecticut’s legal limit.

“That is dangerous. That is so bad. Wow,” said Erin Kirk, Connecticut’s cannabis ombudsman, an official medical marijuana patient advocate, when she heard the test results. “I’m trying to wrap my head around 30 million CFU. How is that even possible?”

Ross pays the $21.79 total for her two joints and a pack of Oreos. As she leaves, two other Yale students walk in and take a place in line. They are here for the same reason as Ross: cheap, accessible weed.

Connecticut’s cannabis legalization promised to prioritize “public health, public safety, criminal justice, and equity,” in Governor Ned Lamont’s words.

But when Lamont signed recreational weed into law, he also instituted policies that incentivize consumers to do exactly what legalization was meant to counteract: buying from illicit sellers.

’M not really supposed to be smoking, but I IAdderall, do it anyway,” Ross said. She has prescriptions for Lexapro, and Propranolol—medications

that doctors don’t recommend using with cannabis.

Still, she likes the “lightness” it makes her feel. For Ross, the upside of buying from 7Clouds is that it’s

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near campus, open daily from 8:00 a.m. until midnight, and sells weed that, however risky, gets her high.

7Clouds stores its raw cannabis bud in twoinch-tall, opaque plastic pop-top bottles that look like tubes of M&M’s Minis, all kept in an opentop cardboard box. The only information about the cannabis is the strains’ names typed out in allcaps on white stickers: “GUMBO” on a blue bottle, “GREEN TEA” on an orange one, “RAINBOW COOKIE” on pink.

Unlike legal dispensaries, which use packaging like eBottles and mylar bags, 7Clouds’ bottles aren’t air-sealed. Their joints are stored similarly, just in smaller plastic tubes. With little protection from moisture and minimal airflow, mold growth becomes inevitable.

Cannabis users are 3.5 times more likely to have a fungal infection than non-cannabis users, according to a 2020 Center for Disease Control and Prevention study; with a total mold and yeast count of 30 million CFU, weed from 7Clouds puts smokers at an even higher risk of infection.

Among states that have legalized cannabis, Connecticut is unusually permissive with marijuana mold caps. At 100,000 CFU per gram, the state is more lenient than most of the country. Many states allow 10,000 CFU, but some are even stricter: Illinois and Utah cap it at 1,000 CFU. Iowa set their limit at 100.

Still, high mold counts alone don’t paint the full picture; not all mold is harmful.

The results from Northeast Laboratories also flagged the 7Clouds sample for active Aspergillus, a fungus whose spores are heat-resistant and survive combustion. Inhaling Aspergillus-contaminated cannabis puts smokers at risk of contracting a lung infection called aspergillosis.

The best case for someone who gets aspergillosis is a fever and a cough that might bring up some blood. The worst case is invasive aspergillosis, which largely affects immunocompromised people––a 2026 research review estimates a global mortality rate as high as 85%. Symptoms typically don’t show up until the disease has already reached an advanced stage.

Connecticut has a zero-tolerance policy for any cannabis contaminated with Aspergillus. But, because 7Clouds is not regulated by the state and operates outside the legal market, their cannabis is never tested, nor cleaned.

“What the fuck?” Ross said when she learned about the mold contamination in 7Clouds’ cannabis.

“I’m not expecting amazing weed, but I am expecting a somewhat decent product.”

Even for consumer willing to pay for more expensive, safer marijuana, legal weed is not always clean either. Most major producers zap the flower with radiation to eliminate contaminants. According to a McGill University study, the weed cleaning process, called irradiation, does not fully remove harmful fungi or the toxins they leave behind.

“If you put a moldy tomato in the microwave, is

Lighting Up in the Land of Steady Habits

Inside 7Clouds. Credit: Cassie Boulis

it something you want to eat after?” said Kirk. “It just looks more soggy, and the mold is still there.”

Smoking weed, even of the highest quality, will always entail some level of health risk. Many smokers know this. Dexter, a Yale cannabis user identified by his first name, said disclosure is key: “It would be great to know that heavy metals and mold and other toxins don’t exceed an alarming amount in the weed you’re smoking.”

Meanwhile, Connecticut law enforcement has been challenging illicit sellers’ hold on consumers.

Two years ago, State Attorney General William Tong sued Anesthesia, a New Haven smoke shop, for selling cannabis without a license. Now, metal shutters hang in front of Anesthesia’s front doors. In early April 2026, city, state, and federal law enforcement raided Chapel Smoke Shop, also for illicit cannabis sales.

7Clouds has been operating “business as usual” after the Chapel Street raid, said Henry, a Yale student who buys weed from 7Clouds, and asked to be identified by his middle name. “It feels like they have zero concerns about what’s happening.”

One anonymous patron of 7Clouds said the store is an asset because it shields Yale students from worse alternatives: “If they shut us down, that’s gonna create a lot of problems for people. It’s gonna put them in danger.”

“We’re in a safe location. We are good for Yale.

We are good for students,” he said, adding that without 7Clouds, students could run into harsher substances: “crack, heroin, pills, cocaine.” The patron spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of retaliation.

7Clouds ownership declined repeated requests for comment over the phone and in person.

May 2026

HAS A “SUBSTANTIAL HOLD” on Yale’s 7170CLOUDS marijuana market, according to Henry. Among Yale cannabis users who responded to a survey

from The New Journal this April, 41 percent reported 7Clouds as their preferred source of procuring weed, more than any other option.

That Yale students are unable to find safe, affordable cannabis may not seem like a pressing issue, but the prevalence of illicit weed in New Haven is just one consequence of Connecticut legalizing marijuana, only to implement policies that benefit few actual customers.

“Price is the biggest thing for me,” Henry said about his decision to buy from 7Clouds. Anesthesia was closer to where he lives, but a joint from there cost roughly $12. Meanwhile, the joints at 7Clouds are between $8 and $10.

At Insa, the second-closest dispensary to Yale (still an hour walk away, and a 15-minute drive), the average price of a joint is $15. But the higher cost is not within their control.

In 2021, state lawmakers introduced a potency-based tax to cannabis products based on their tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) levels. Unlike other Northeastern states, which generally use a flat-rate model, each milligram of THC sold in Connecticut is taxed between $0.00625 and $0.0275, a tax that accounts for about a quarter of marijuana products’ retail value.

Lighting Up in the Land of Steady Habits

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Lawmakers wanted to limit access to high- 7Clouds has been able to operate a small-scale canTHC cannabis. Instead, their policies made nabis monopoly in New Haven.

Connecticut one of the most expensive marijuana Still, pricing isn’t the only problem. In fact, a markets in the country. new bill, HB 5109, introduced on February 10, Customers are not only driven to purchase seeks to replace the state’s potency-based tax with unregulated cannabis from an illicit seller like a flat-rate model. But the lawmakers will aim for 7Clouds—some even cross state lines for lower a flat rate of 10.75 percent, which Kirk said is too prices, according to Kirk. As of March 2026, 100- high to compete with neighboring states. She recgram gummy edibles in Massachusetts are sold for ommended 10.5 percent: “We need to undercut the about $15.82; in Connecticut, they’re sold for $25.86. other markets. I’m not just pulling 10.5 out of a hat.”

Fourteen percent of Yale cannabis users––24 responAnother bill, HB 5350, passed the House on dents––reported purchasing their weed outside of 4/20 and “aims to reduce overhead costs for dispenConnecticut, which was the second most common saries and support business growth,” according to survey response after 7Clouds.

Representative Roland Lemar’s official website.

Across the country, the most lucrative day for However, neither bill resolves the problem of cannabis sellers is April 20, or 4/20 Day––the drug’s Connecticut’s strict licensing process. unofficial holiday. Every year, dozens of students gather on Cross Campus to celebrate. This year, the largest smoke circle at 4:20 p.m. was a group of about 20 students, one of whom told me they were passing around 7Clouds’ joints.

Last year, from April 19 to 21, dispensaries in Massachusetts roped in $14.62 million. In the entire month of April, their Connecticut counterparts only earned around $17.5 million. By the end of 2025, Massachusetts dispensaries had out-earned their CLOUDS IS THE ONLY PLACE I REALLY GO. It’s neighboring Connecticut counterparts by over one within walking distance from where I live and billion dollars.

“We left $160 million, at least, on the table where all my classes are,” said Ross.

The closest legal dispensary to Yale is Lit New just in Massachusetts last year alone,” said Kirk, Haven, which is about a 25-minute walk from Old Connecticut’s cannabis ombudsman.

Connecticut dispensaries do face inevitable Campus.

Kebra Smith-Bolden opened Lit New Haven in disadvantages. Bordering states like New York and Massachusetts have larger populations, and by 2025 through the state’s social equity program, which extension, larger customer bases. But the tax on dis- gives out cannabis licenses through a lottery. The pensary weed is also part of the reason why, despite program was intended to expand Connecticut’s weed retail sales of cannabis beginning three years ago, market by reducing application fees and reserving

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The 7Clouds facade

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Lighting Up in the Land of Steady Habits

The 7Clouds neon light

half of available licenses for aspiring owners from investors, many of whom feel like substantial start-up areas most impacted by the War on Drugs––any- funds are worth more than just a 35 percent stake. where in New Haven outside Yale’s campus or East “Nobody wants to give you that kind of money and Rock. not have control,” Smith-Bolden said.

In other words, the program sought to level the “It’s difficult to navigate a lot of these regulatory playing field. In reality, high costs and rigid require- requirements, and all of the things necessary to open ments have constrained local owners’ entry into these businesses,” she added. “And then on top of the New Haven cannabis industry, enabling smoke it, having to try to raise money in this environment. shops like 7Clouds to sell cheap, low-quality canna- Pretty difficult.” bis without much competition.

Despite reduced application fees for social equity candidates, larger and better-funded companies that could afford the high submission fees submitted thousands of applications; they gamed the system to boost their chances of winning a license.

“In the ninth inning, the cannabis legalization process got thrown a couple little loopholes that worked out for the larger corporations,” SmithBolden said.

It didn’t get any simpler when she opened her oss walks out of 7clouds and heads into the own dispensary. night with her two pre-rolls––the store’s neon After she received her license to sell cannabis, light still blaring behind her. On the building’s Smith-Bolden sought one for cultivation, which awning, the 7 on the store’s logo starts to resemble an would allow her to grow weed herself and maintain ouroboros––a snake eating its own tail.

Soon it will be day. Then night again. There will higher profit margins.

But a cultivation license costs $3 million, and be other customers, but the transactions will be more qualifying social equity applicants must make less or less the same.

Three days after I told Ross about the mold conthan $265,287 annually over the last three years to qualify for the program. Those $3 million for Smith- tamination in the sample of 7Clouds weed, she met Bolden to grow and sell her own weed––a key part up with a friend late at night in a campus courtyard for her dispensary’s long-term success––doesn’t even to smoke one of the joints she had bought at the store.

“Mold contamination is the least of my concerns include the $12,500 she already paid for the retail license, or the $1 million for launching the store, or right now,” Ross texted me before she left that night.

Welcome to the land of steady habits. the potential $10 million for actually operating a cultivation site.

Oscar Heller is a senior in Even worse, the cultivation license requires Ezra Stiles College.

Smith-Bolden to maintain 65 percent ownership interest, making it difficult to attract outside

R

May 2026

Lighting Up in the Land of Steady Habits

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Smokestack Dreams On the site of a defunct power plant, city officials want to build a multimillion-dollar park with an outdoor aquatic center. While some residents are in favor, many are left asking: Who wants this?

By Tajrian Khan

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n eyesore. An icon. A cause for “serious pain in the community.”

This is how New Haveners describe English Station, a defunct 97-year-old power plant in the Mill River District, between Wooster Square and Fair Haven. In the fall, the city announced plans to demolish the plant. In its place? Officials want an outdoor pool.

The English Station site, located on Ball Island, is currently blocked off to the public due to the presence of cancer-causing contaminants. Last July, city officials revealed their vision for the island’s restoration. Their tagline: “Mill River Park: From Abandoned to Amazing.”

The 8.6-acre development would feature New Haven’s first public outdoor pool, including a lazy river and waterslides. The city says that the park would provide much-needed access to swimming and green space.

However, some take issue with the plan. “They need jobs and affordable housing. Anything outside of that is not responding to neighborhood interests,” Anstress Farwell, the president of the New Haven Urban Design League (UDL), said of Fair Haven residents.

Outdoor pools in Northeastern cities are typically only open during the summer, meaning the proposed pool will be closed for most of the year. But more concerning to residents is the city

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Summer 2026

TheNewJournal

officials’ lack of transparency around the cost of the plan. Even more, last summer, the city was unable to open three of its five indoor pools due to maintenance funding shortages.

The city does not yet own the English Station site, and it is contaminated with carcinogens like asbestos and PCBs. In 2016, a partial consent order tasked United Illuminating (UI), the company which operated English Station from 1929 to 1992, with cleaning up the site within three years, but the work has stalled over the past decade.

All of this has left neighbors wondering: Why does the city want to build a pool over a polluted property they don’t even own?

“I won’t even pretend to speak for them. I have no idea,” said Lee Cruz, chair of the Fair Haven Community Management Team.

The city has held five public meetings to discuss the proposal.

In a phone interview, Mayor Justin Elicker said that officials have tabled at community events and issued a survey that hundreds responded to. “Many individuals from the community are enthusiastic,” said Elicker.

This spring, I sat down with eight New Haveners—professors, public officials, and organizers—to talk about the future of English Station. All of them want to see the desolate waterfront transformed into a thriving community center. Few agree on how exactly we can get there. Here are some of their visions.

LAYOUT DESIGN BY SERINA YAN

What do New Haveners want for English Station?

Some want anything but a pool: Lee Cruz, Fair Haven, chair of Fair Haven Community Management Team: “The logical next step is to put a pause on this roulette of acquiring the property for purposes of building a pool, acknowledge that we don’t know what the cost will be, and we don’t know what all the risks are.”

Anstress Farwell, Wooster Square, president of the New Haven Urban Design League (UDL): “We never once heard anyone in our community meetings say that a pool was what they needed. Never once.”

Frank Redente, Fair Haven, Ward 15 Alder: “I’ve seen great proposals come into committee: art museums, ways to retrofit the building. I just don’t think we’ve explored the options enough.”

Some think English Station is an architectural icon in New Haven that should be preserved—Elihu Rubin, Yale Urban Studies professor, called it “a cathedral to electricity.”

Elihu Rubin, Downtown, professor of Architecture and Urban Studies at Yale: “Not everyone looks at a power plant and thinks it’s beautiful,” he said. “I personally believe it has the potential to house new uses.”

In March, Elias, the Ward 1 Alder, voted yes on a proposal allowing New Haven to acquire English Station, by use of eminent domain— governmental power to acquire private property for public use—if necessary. He’s skeptical of the pool proposal, but his priority is to get the site cleaned up.

Elias, Downtown: “If that is not going to happen without the building being demolished, I can accept that.”

Other residents have their hearts set on the park and pool plan: Felicia Shashinka, Milford, New Haven Youth and Recreation Department, Operations Director: “Community partners could run ‘Learn to Swim’ boot camps,” she said. “That gives all residents of New Haven, not just the kids who already know how to swim, the foundation they need to create a safe environment around water.”

Anna Pickett, East Rock, Urban Resources Initiative (URI), Development and Outreach Manager: “It’s really important that we, wherever we can, create more open, more green space in that part of our city.”

Mark Oppenheimer, Westville, journalist and author: “We either want to invest in those neighborhoods, or we don’t. If we do, then we should look for reasons to say yes, not reasons to throw up roadblocks and obstacles.”

Elias Theodore, Downtown, Yale junior and Ward 1 Alder: “It’s a gorgeous, towering building,” he said.

“My dream scenario is that the building is preserved and reused.”

Mill River Park Concept Plan Credit: City of New Haven

PHOTOS May 2026

BY TAJRIAN KHAN, ILLustrations by amy xiao

The New Journal

Summer 2026

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Why a pool?

New Haven doesn’t have a public outdoor pool, and Fair Haven lacks park space. Proponents of the city’s plan want to fix that.

Anna, East Rock: “Fair Haven has more percentage of land dedicated to parking lots than it does to parks and schoolyards combined,” she said.

Anna, whose work at the URI focuses on urban forestry, emphasized that as summer heat becomes more extreme, people will need access to canopy and water more than ever. Designs for Mill River Park include forested paths and a waterfront promenade lined with trees, with the pool and lazy river at its center.

Map of New Haven demographics according to the 2020 U.S. census. Each dot represents five people. Select neighborhoods are highlighted.

Map: Tajrian Khan

Felicia, Milford: “There are so many children and adults in New Haven who don’t know how to swim, particularly Black and brown kids.”

Mark, Westville: “We can always use more affordable housing. Obviously, our education system could always be better. But the logic there seems to be: Until all these other problems are solved, poor Black and brown kids don’t get a place to swim. And I’m just against that.”

The waterfront in Mill River is one of the least forested parts of New Haven.

Map: Tajrian Khan

Anna, East Rock: “It’s not just some mediocre park but a destination that will really attract people.”

Proponents also say that the project would expand swimming access in a working-class, predominantly Black and brown neighborhood.

Drowning rates for Black people under age 30 are 1.5 times higher than for their white peers; access to public pools and swimming lessons would reduce that disparity.

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In February, Mark published an op-ed in The New Haven Independent titled “Let’s Go Swimming: An Argument For Building A Public Pool At English Station.” He wrote that the pool proposal was “one of the best ideas” the Elicker administration has ever had.

Elicker emphasized that it would be difficult to find a more ideal location than Ball Island for a public park and pool: it is central, next to a bus line, has ample parking space, and holds potential to revitalize an under-resourced neighborhood.

“They historically have seen a large, blighted, ugly, and polluted building, and have a beautiful waterfront that can be converted into an incredible asset for the community,” said Elicker.

Mark is not only content with the administration’s support for swimming but also with the funding situation: “They have private philanthropy outside that’s helping to fund it.”

Smokestack Dreams

TheNewJournal

How would we pay for this?

Who gets a say?

In January 2025, seven months before the Mill River Park proposal was made public—when the project was still “in an early stage of planning and review”—David Yassky, the president of the Roxanne and Henry Brandt Foundation wrote to Elicker about their enthusiasm for the park and pool project:

Between July 2025 and January 2026, engineers and economic development administrators held five meetings around New Haven to discuss the Mill River Park design so residents could voice feedback about the city’s plans.

“As one goal of the Roxanne and Henry Brandt Foundation is to expand access to swimming, we were delighted to learn that your initial proposal includes a swimming pool,” Yassky wrote to Elicker. The Brandt Foundation, a multibillion-dollar nonprofit based in New York City, was “prepared to consider contributing up to $10 million to completing a park along the lines you proposed,” Yassky wrote.

Currently, building the park and pool is estimated to cost the city $25 million. Before any construction can take place, however, UI, the utility company that formerly operated English Station, is responsible for cleaning up the site to an industrial standard for $30 million.

Still, after UI’s industrial remediation, the city must clean up the site to a park standard, which would cost $1 million to $5 million on top of the $25 million construction estimate, according to a city spokesperson.

That estimate also excludes the cost of acquiring English Station.

Some said the meetings felt like advertisements for the pool plan.

Frank, Fair Haven: “This was kind of spoon-fed to the neighborhood,” he said. “This is not what we need right now.”

Anstress, who leads walking tours of the Mill River District waterfront, thinks the interests of the community most affected by the pollution should come first.

Anstress, Wooster Square: “We’re looking for meaningful employment and career development. After decades of pollution and abandonment, that is what is owed to this neighborhood, not a swimming pool.”

Frank, Fair Haven: “Who’s going to pay for it?” he said. “The funding stream is not clear. There are too many question marks.”

The Brandt Foundation would contribute a “significant amount of funds to help us reduce the overall cost of the project,” Elicker said.

“We’re very grateful for that offer.” Lee, however, worries that a private donor might have too much influence over the project.

Elicker notes that the city has incorporated many suggestions from residents after community meetings, tabling, and surveys for the park plan, including sports fields, boating access for kayaks and canoes, and more naturescapes. “We’re continuing to collect feedback and alter the design based on that feedback,” said Elicker.

For Mark, skepticism is no reason to stall an ambitious plan for New Haven.

Lee, Fair Haven: “The donor is going to want to have a voice and a vote at very fundamental levels of a project supported by philanthropy,” he said.

“It’s kind of like the tail wagging the dog instead of the other way around.”

May 2026

Smokestack Dreams

Mark, Westville: “There’s always expense. There’s always uncertainty. That is the nature of urbanism,” he said. “But if you want to have a great city, sometimes you move ahead anyway.”

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What about the building?

Many people “resent English Station,” Elias said. But he also thinks the plant is an “iconic New Haven landmark,” and he’s not alone. Elihu, Yale Urban Studies professor, believes the station is an “orienting feature” in the New Haven skyline. “It helps stitch Fair Haven back to downtown visually,” he said.

New Haven can look to surrounding cities for inspiration: A historic power plant in Providence was redeveloped in 2017 into office space and educational centers for several local universities. Another decommissioned power plant in Brooklyn was reborn as Powerhouse Arts, a hub for artists and large-scale art production.

Repurposed South Street Station in Rhode Island.

Credit: ArtInRuins

Several New Haven residents and experts I spoke to believe that there is enormous potential for a building like English Station to become an asset for the neighborhood. For example, Anstress suggested that the giant turbine hall could become a space for pop-up restaurants, artist studios, or community events.

Anstress, Wooster Square: “The turbine halls have beautiful, highly glazed brick and terracotta finishes designed to survive extreme heat and humidity,” she said. “We have no serious doubts that the building can be cleaned up and reused.”

If nothing else, at least its brick walls could be preserved as an architectural scale sculpture, Elihu hopes.

Elihu, Downtown: “I believe in the potential of preservation and adaptive reuse to anchor you in place in a way that is satisfying, even if the uses are completely different from the original ones.”

Lee, Fair Haven: “I like to say that this building, and many other buildings like it, were built to the glory of God. Like churches. The people that were designing and building them were thinking, ‘this is going to be here forever.’”

Although there is optimism about the plan, many New Haveners I spoke to are still skeptical. The latest news on English Station came this March, when the Board of Alders approved the city’s plan to acquire the site by a 17–5 vote. But even if the city successfully acquires the site, will they follow through with their plans? No one really knows the answer.

“It’s important for our community to not just sit by and hope that something nice will go there,” Elicker said. “That hasn’t worked for decades and decades.”

For now, the power plant still looms over the neighborhood—its smokestacks rising above salt piles, scrapyards, and a derelict waterfront. Change is closer now than it’s been before, but it seems like it will be a while before anybody is swimming on Ball Island.

Tajrian Khan is a junior in Benjamin Franklin College.

An English Station plan in Elihu’s office

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Smokestack Dreams

TheNewJournal

Personal Essay

Employee apron, Jersey Mike’s ballcap, KN95 face left the belt to rot in the dusty back cormask. My pants are missing the manda- ner of my dresser, still pristine.

Handbook, Page 22 tory solid black or brown belt (Employee During high school, I always khakis, store-issued polyester shirt and

By Tristan Hernandez alfway through my shift at H Jersey Mike’s, I’m on the brink of passing out. I’ve been on my feet for

three hours with no breaks. Everyone is yelling at me—parents, toddlers, retirees, teens from my high school, employees from Mod Pizza next door, DoorDash drivers who shove their phone in my face like their life depends on the timely delivery of a #13 Original Italian sub. I reek of onions and vinegar. I’m hot and sweaty and uncomfortable, partaking in a trauma ritual I share with the rest of my coworkers.

Except, unlike them, I am wearing a belt an inch below my ribs that squishes my stomach so tight I feel like I might puke up my gallbladder.

I don’t eat the Italian subs. In fact, I hardly eat anything. I relentlessly track my calories in my Notes app, never exceeding 1,200 a day. I’m surrounded by food that I do not wish to eat, if I were even allowed to (Employee Handbook, Page 6). Dying by wasting away at a chain restaurant in a suburban Texas strip mall would be a sad way to go. Also sadly, if I die like this, I’ll be memorialized in my dumb uniform, also known as “proper workplace attire”: Converse, LAYOUT DESIGN BY ANNA KOONTZ

Until starting the job at Jersey Mike’s, I

Handbook, Page 22) and are instead hoisted up by a feeble shoelace. Under the layers of my uniform, no one notices the leather cinching my organs.

thought of this belt as a corset, the kind of Regency-era girdle I’d seen women wear in the Bridgerton series. In actual history, these garments were made of wood or bones, tied in the back with a ribbon. Corsets were used to straighten posture or create a suitable silhouette.

I thought if I could Whether for vanity or necessity, they defined proper society. Who cared if I fix my appearance, was a boy and had no prospects of debutshred every ounce ing into society, if I could mimic nineof fat off my body, teenth-century debutantes’ outfits with a simple belt? I used this theory as a juswither myself away tification for something that was, objecto a shell of organs tively, an odd thing to do.

But a corset—or whatever it was— and blood, then did not bode well for an eight-hour shift naturally, of course, in quick service. I was expected to be everything else in able to lift up to 40 pounds (Employee Handbook, Page 23). I had to be ready to my life would have climb a ladder to grab soda concentrate to run according to or squat to the ground to clean a toilet. plan.

Though there was hardly enough room for more than four people behind the front counter, I somehow took well over 7,000 steps per shift (which, at my height, I received the belt for my First weight, and age, burned approximately Communion in elementary school. It 233.33 calories). I became winded quickly. was the first time I had been forced to I saw stars when I ran from one side of wear nice clothes to church instead of the store to the other. Luckily, when I basketball shorts and a neon Nike tee. whined about being tired, my coworkThe belt was too big for me, so my dad ers saw it as an attempt at camaraderie, had to drill an extra hole into the leather. allowing me to hide in plain sight.

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Personal Essay

I do not know why I started regularly wearing my belt to compress my intestines, not in a way that is complete.

It wasn’t healthy, and it made a negligible change in my appearance. I do know when I started, though. I had on the belt during one of my high school Zoom classes, and no one could see anything below my clavicle on the screen. As the class went on, I shimmied and finagled the belt up my torso until it encircled my ribs, willing my body to shrink to fit into its confines. The action was mindless, but I must have known that it was strange.

I knew that if I put some force into my moves, I could tighten one belt hole and crack a bone. It was thrilling.

I would know if I cracked a rib because I could see them, the thin ridges lining my torso, skin pulled so tight to my chest it looked like a washboard. I had two percent body fat. Professional bodybuilders, when going to competition, only have as low as three percent. I insisted that I was never hungry so often that my friends joked that I had Crohn’s disease. I lied to my parents when I skipped meals.

I had to attend religious education classes for my First Communion. In one of the cultish Catholic movies we had to

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watch, I saw a nun with a cilice, a medieval garment of spiked metal and cloth that she wore around her thigh. I learned that it was for penance, to punish yourself so you could get closer to God. I’m not religious—not since I was thirteen— but I guess my belt served this purpose.

It pinched and chafed and squashed my insides for no good reason, except maybe proving to the anorexic gods that I was worth something.

Looking back, my best guess is that this was all a need for control or an intense obsession with perfection. I am sure it was irrational, this severe discipline I exerted on my body. But it’s difficult to ascribe a definite reason. I have gaps in my memory, and all I’m left with are snapshots where I watch myself like I’m an astral projection. The quandaries of high school seem small in retrospect—grades, deadlines, family, friends, crushes—but perhaps they all added up.

I thought if I could fix my appearance, shred every ounce of fat off my body, wither myself away to a shell of organs and blood, then naturally, of course, everything else in my life would have to run according to plan.

I do not know when I stopped. I know that at some point I left my job,

and that by the time I started college, I wasn’t trapped analyzing nutritional information anymore. I never got help, but I’m still on the email list for an online therapy service. Maybe I stopped because I knew that the belt never worked. It was destined to fail, because my undefined goals were unattainable.

I was trying to both waste away and be noticed, to be helped and ignored.

When my shift is about to end, I am about to pass out. I’ll faint either in the store, or worse, when I’m driving home going 60 in a 35 zone and the cops will find my mangled remains with Megan Thee Stallion still blaring on the stereo. To stay conscious, I steal half a loaf of bread to eat in the walk-in freezer.

This violates the ethics code (Employee Handbook, Page 6), but I still sit on a metal rack next to slabs of beef and vats of sauce and take small bites like a Victorian peasant boy. I loosen the belt for a moment. The bread feels like a brick in my stomach.

Tristan Hernandez is a senior in Pierson College.

Personal Essay

Personal Essay

Climbing a Glass Castle

By Savan Parikh

I

n a tent on a remote Patagonian ice field, where the wind turned rain to bullets, I first heard Juan sing. His deep warble belied a skinny frame and boyish features.

Hubo un tiempo en que fui hermoso, y fui libre de verdad.

Guardaba todos mis sueños en castillos de cristal.

There was a time when I was beautiful and truly free.

I kept all of my dreams in castles of glass.

“Canción para Mi Muerte,” or “Song for My Dead,” by Argentine singer-songwriter Charly García, was Juan’s favorite and the first song we played after 40 days in the Chilean backcountry. For a long time I couldn’t understand why Juan, who always seemed so happy, was drawn to such wistful music.

EARLY JANUARY 2024, SEVERAL at his dad’s behest, an economics degree.

Iinnmonths into a pre-college gap year For his first job post-grad, he managed South America, I met Juan Andrés the books at his family’s property devel-

Vargas Reyes in the main square of Coyhaique, Chile. We were joined there by 12 other people—nine other amateur outdoorsmen and three mountaineering instructors—about to embark on a month-long expedition to Patagonia’s Northern Ice Field.

That afternoon, sitting cross-legged on the dusty floor of a lean-to, Juan told me about himself. He was a proud Colombian and a not-so-proud resident of Bogotá, the capital city. He had spent his childhood summers escaping the city, chasing his grandparents’ two cocker spaniels around their ranch in the Andean countryside. The year before, he had graduated from the prestigious Universidad de los Andes in Bogotá with,

opment company. A few months in, Juan was assigned to budget a new infrastructure project that would blast tunnels through the Colombian Sierra Nevada mountain range. He told his dad he’d be stepping down. “There is nothing in the world I love more than the mountains,” he told me.

uan and i spent the first dawn of Jhauling our trip in a remote Chilean village, supplies for the trip onto our motorboat. Groaning under the weight of 14 100-liter packs, our boat sputtered across Lago Plomo and dropped us in “tierra baldía,” no man’s land. We set a course for the ice field. Many of our expeditions—up glaciers, into crevasses,

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Personal Essay

Juan in the ice field. .

J

uan and i PARTED WAYS in mid-Feband summiting mountain peaks—were ruary. We exchanged the most generic derailed by hurricane-level winds and of goodbyes: “Give me a call if you’re ever rain.

But in pockets of peace, when the in Colombia,” he said, and I told him storm clouds paused their brutality, we the same, if he ever came to the States. I explored. One day, after trudging over spent the next month wandering up the dunes on the valley floor, Juan found coast of Chile, with no plans for where a swimming hole. We jumped in and to stay or what to do. I struggled to reccleaned the grime from our skin, despite reate the raw excitement of exploring the stern warnings of our mountaineer- Patagonia with Juan.

In late March, I came across an ing instructors, who worried the water was too still. The next day, in the folds of opportunity to do political science wooded foothills, Juan ditched his tent research at Universidad de los Andes, set-up to sunbathe. We spent the after- Juan’s alma mater. I called Juan to tell noon filling our water bottles with wild him I’d be flying to Bogotá soon. He berries to make jam. Juan was an avid flipped his camera on and panned to botanist and promised the berries were an empty guest bed, which he said was “esperándote”—waiting for me. “edible enough.”

I arrived at his dad’s apartment a I envied the zeal with which Juan chased the heart of Patagonia. Once, he week later, where Juan had been staying spotted an Andean condor carving an since spending the last of his post-grad arc through the sky. He followed its path, earnings on the Patagonia expedition. pushing into a clearing to find himself Juan woke me at 5:00 a.m. the next face to face with a guemal, an Andean morning. We drove to the outskirts of deer. They stared at each other, heads Bogotá in his beat-up Jeep Wrangler and took off down the dirt roads of tilted.

When I asked Juan what he planned the Colombian countryside on foot. to do after the expedition, he brushed off Thanks to several—I suspect intenthe question with a smile and a simple tional—wrong turns, Juan led me on an “no tengo ni idea.” I didn’t have any idea, impromptu half-marathon. Though my either, though I found uncertainty far lungs struggled in the thin mountain more worrying. air and my knees flared with pain over 26

Summer 2026 TheNewJournal

uneven terrain, my physical discomfort was eclipsed by the sight of Juan’s proud grin when we finally found our way back to the car.

Over the next month, Juan introduced me to his routine: spontaneity. I learned to never ask him about his plans for the next day. Initially, I thought he was hiding them. It took me a while to understand that he never knew them either.

Juan found a job that compensated him for adventure. Adidas hired him to lead the running community of Bogotá on weekend trail runs through the nearby mountains. Most mornings, I tagged along as Juan toured the city, stopping every jogger around to plug the Adidas Runners community. Within a few weeks, he persuaded nearly a hundred Bogotanos to wake up at 4:00 a.m. on Saturday mornings, drive two hours, and run trails with him. I was convinced more people were there to see Juan than to run.

Juan doubled as a park ranger on the trail. While the rest of us gasped for air in the high-altitude Colombian wetlands, he backpedaled, explaining how the leaves of the frailejones pulled moisture from the fog to provide water for the millions living thousands of PHOTOS BY Savan Parikh

Personal Essay

meters below them. “Qué lástima,” Juan said. What a shame. What a shame that ranching companies were destroying these wetlands.

When I grew tired of research and Juan found a gap in his Adidas schedule, we filled our backpacks with gear and set out for the Colombian wilderness.

Once, picking our way through a rock field in the mountains of southwestern Colombia, Juan vaulted himself onto a boulder to point out another Andean condor. The bird was exceedingly rare, he explained. Less than seven thousand remain in South America. They roost on the highest mountain ledges and, without a single flap of their wings, glide for several hours and hundreds of miles.

Andean condors are believed to be a bridge between mortals and the heavens.

In parts of Perú, Juan said, indigenous communities memorialize their struggle against the Spanish Empire by tying the leg of an Andean condor to the horn of a bull for a fight to the death. The condor always won.

FTER MONTHS OF SPONTANEOUS A adventures in Colombia, I began to understand why “Canción para Mi

Muerte” was Juan’s favorite song. At 23, Juan had already learned to break his dreams out of the glass castle. He sought them out each day—the mountains and running, the frailejones and condors. He was convinced that our mortality made living a “beautiful and truly free” youth all the more important.

During those two months in Colombia with Juan, I began to live the same way. I stopped needing every adventure to justify itself. Juan’s impulses and mine began to blur. On my last day there, Juan and I took a detour from our run to stop by a tattoo parlor. We got matching Andean condors on our right ankles. By then, we had seen the condor on three separate expeditions.

The last time, we were more than three miles above sea level, on top of a volcano in Colombia’s Parque Nacional Natural Los Nevados. We watched the condor’s ten-foot wingspan of white-accented plumes catch the air currents in big looping swells. The sun forced me to squint, but Juan sat bug-eyed. He traced the condor with an intense desire to take its place.

The author and Juan picking berries for jam.

LAYOUT DESIGN BY CELINA QU

Savan Parikh is a sophomore in Ezra Stiles College.

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Endnote

Endnote

Yearning for “Touse” in the Algorithm Mysterious videos featuring montages of aughts-era frat culture begin flooding a writer’s feed. As she searches for what—and who—is behind them, she finds herself pulled into their nostalgiasoaked world of Nantucket and Natty Light.

By Tali Kantor Lieber

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illustration by maia wilson

Endnote

I

started seeing the videos in the images look completely real, almost the boys.” “Ferda culture is doing everyNovember of last year. They started to as if I were viewing Instagram in the year thing that has to do with frat culture,” said pop up on my Instagram explore page: 2016. The motifs are clear: heavy drinking, Nate, the former social chair of one of montages of images from early 2010s private equity or finance, summer desti- Yale’s most popular fraternities and a comWASP-y (white-Anglo-Saxon-Protes- nations (Nantucket, Martha’s Vineyard, mitted Instagram Reels user. He believes tant-y) manhood would flash before my the Hamptons), women, WASP-y prep he first heard the word around a year ago. eyes, tinged with a 2016-era filter, set to schools (Taft, Exeter, Deerfield), colleges But these are not current frat boys, a slightly dated chart-topper. There were (University of Pennsylvania, Connecticut immersed in a 2026 world of partying and photos of New England beach vacations, College), drug use (primarily cocaine), wealth. The graduation years in the bios clips of lacrosse goals, fraternity houses, and “TOUSE,” the top fraternity house put them at about ten to 15 years out of and excessive amounts of beer. I found on campus. Each account is its own ode to college. All of the content is infused with a them amusing, and Instagram knew it. the supposed heyday of WASP and frater- kind of longing not only for youth, but for Each time I opened the app, I was met nity culture. the specific aesthetics of the 2010s. And with a visual stream of Natty Light and I could see that my mutual followers this nostalgia is popping up all over social Nantucket. were liking the Reels. Was it a kind of media: when 2026 began, Instagram users I began to read the captions and real- amused hate-watch? Spoiled white boys posted photos from ten years ago en masse, ized that these accounts didn’t function being a convenient target for humor? simply captioned “#2016.” like the normal, mass-meme-sharing Or did they catch glimpses of their own The nostalgia in the videos starts accounts that are often responsible for lives in them, recalling past summers on generic. There are #throwbacks, #missthevideos with tens or hundreds of thousands Martha’s Vineyard or boarding school boys, and #goodoldays. But the lengthy of views, nor were they individual content lacrosse games? captions contextualize the longing, which creators with blue checks or massive folPreppy life has also been aestheti- starts by recalling the glory days of “riplowings. The accounts functioned as char- cized and satirized many times over, per- ping bag” and being “touse.” Some devolve acters, and they were telling stories. haps most famously in the 1980s, with into rants about adult life: “No emails.

Chip “Bagnet” Wentworth IV posted The Official Preppy Handbook by Lisa No suits. No meetings.” The captions a video with rotating images of pastel but- Birnbach, which sold more than a mil- from accounts that have bios that read ton-ups, pool parties, and American flags, lion copies. Unlike the eighties handbook, “recently single” sometimes reference their set to a Calvin Harris remix. “07/04/2010,” though, these posts lacked authors. I could “#whorewife” and having to pay alimony. he wrote in the caption, “Had all the boys not find an account that dated back any When I showed the videos to my pop out to my crib on Nantucket for the earlier than November 2025. Their names friends, the Reels joined their algorithms fourth [American flag emoji]. Beach was listed above are doubtlessly fake. Many too. They became hyperfixated, sending nuts when my boy Chet #booted all over of them claim to have played collegiate me the ones that popped up for them via the St. Paul’s chicks jeep. Ran up dad’s lacrosse, but a quick cross-check of 2010s Instagram DM. “I swear you’ve just disAmex at Chicken Box and Cisco and he rosters shows none of their names (or, covered a crazy scheme, there are so many is #PISSED but it had to be done. Ripped at least, the names in their Instagram accounts,” one wrote to me. I was graspso much sack that I got an insane nose- handles). ing for ways to pin down the origins of bleed and got blood all over the seats in Also dubious to me was how these the content, and I expressed my frustrathe defender [snow emoji]. #America accounts diverge from a signature trait of tion to another one of these friends, who #4thofjuly #nantucket #ack #lax #sendy WASP culture: logo-less, stealth wealth asked me something so simple that I was #ferda.” Chip’s account is one of the most that often minimizes flashy displays surprised I hadn’t thought of it: “Have you successful of its kind—when I began fol- in favor of confident, silent status. The tried Google reverse image search?”

When I loaded screenlowing him last December, his videos only accounts are something else shots of the videos into had 18,000 views. Now, his most popular entirely, brash in their wealth Google, it spit the phovideo has over 800,000 views. and openly indulgent in illetos right back out at I found more Chip-like accounts, gal behavior. me with links to all with similarly styled names: Preston The more attentheir appear“P-dawg” Goldschmidt, Kyle “Ketamine” tion I paid to the ances under Bryler, and Peter “Pass the Bag” Bradley. Reels, the less sense “college throwEach of their bios contained a formula: they made: many of back” tags on boarding school, college, fraternity, drug the captions use lanPinterest, and reference, and where they “summered.” guage that is notably in articles like The videos invoked real places, but the Gen Z, despite the sup“Why You ludicrous names and content told me the posed graduation years Should Date men were, well, made-up. dating the individuals a Frat Guy.” Though the names and bios attached as older. For example, One image of a to the accounts are personalized, the con- they frequently Loomis Chaffee tent itself feels anonymous. Each photo use the term lacrosse player came shows a new, but familiar, gaggle of bros. “Ferda,” a back with a real A few accounts had used AI imagery, popular word name: Jason Sands, with cartoonish portraiture of fratty men among young who graduated with eerie faces and noses dusted with men that shortens from the boarding white powder, but the vast majority of the slang term “for LAYOUT DESIGN BY SERINA YAN

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Endnote

school in 2013. His real Instagram shows wanted to share my glory days,” he replied. the scenes they put in are places I have him smiling innocently on a beach with I was unsure if he was talking about a lit- been and have memories of,” he said, “I someone who seems to be his girlfriend, eral snowstorm or doing profuse amounts watch every single one to see if I’m in it.” likely blissfully unaware that videos fea- of coke. Either way, I felt sort of bad for But he recognized that his perspective was turing his high school lacrosse photos are him. His nostalgia seemed genuine. He particular to him—the engagement with floating around with tens of thousands of generously invited me down to Nantucket the videos could not possibly be driven views. so we could “rip cheddar and bag” together. solely by recent prep school alums.

After hours of scrolling, I could not The more accounts I followed, Nate and his friends had recently dismanage to figure out who was behind the the darker the content got. Once my cussed a shift in the frat rush process. In accounts. So I decided to make one myself. Instagram took note of my preference, it addition to higher rush attendance, “kids I crafted a persona based on what I fed me accounts with similar imagery, but are coming in already speaking a certain had seen. Bradley “Bagger” Wentworth different languages. It started with an way,” he told me. They just seem to know IV’s bio reads “GREENWICH/PM/ #RIPCharlieKirk or a #MAGA here and “what to do.” Were the Instagram accounts PENN LAX ’’12/ Taft Alum / Hamptons there, but then it became more explicit. becoming the guiding figures, leaving the [wave emoji] / The boys [snow emoji].” I Hatcher Hanesberry was feeling nos- older brother demonstrations of maturity followed fifty of my now peer Instagram talgic for back in the day when there were in the past? accounts. Within ten minutes, they started “no #queers to worry about or #minoriBen thought otherwise. Yale’s frafollowing me back. I direct messaged five ties invading the sacred land. Simpler ternity culture and the world of these of them, one of whom was pretending to times.” Other accounts Instagram reels “are be a Yale alum. Maximus “Nose Bleed” proudly stated their separate things,” he said.

What happened to just Jackson’s bio stated that he had attended status as concealed carLike others, he pointed Aphi formal three times and gave a con- riers and touted themto the popularity of the having a beer with boys vincing little “Fuck Harvard.” selves as “Hard Right music and the nostalon Nantucket? How had I sent Nose Bleed a message that MAGA Motherf*ckers.” gia factor of the videos. would resonate with any Yale bro: “Yo fuck In a comments section, “There’s a term for that, my feed devolved into Harvard shit’s bouse.” Bouse is a term for Chadwick Winthrop for a fake nostalgia for something so terrifying, touse’s counterpart, bottom house. told Brady McGee to something you’ve never so fast?

“Harvard is so bouse #fuckthecrimson,” “ask for forgiveness not experienced, where guys glowed on my screen five minutes later. I consent.” my age can look at this had to strategize. How could I squeeze I found myself nosand be like, ‘it would be more personal detail out of him without talgic for the silly, summer-filtered pic- sick to be Martha’s Vineyard 2008 with scaring him away? “Bro,” I typed, “what tures of tan blonde boys wearing Vineyard my frat bros.’” resco were you in my brother was ’10.”

Vines that I had seen just days before.

He couldn’t think of it then, but He took longer to reply, but hit me What happened to just having a beer with he’s correct—John Koenig coined the back with a “Branford thru and thru.” The boys on Nantucket? How had my feed term “anemoia” in his 2012 project The responses were human. I told him that devolved into something so terrifying, so Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows, which my brother was in Branford too, and then fast? attempts to create new words for emoasked him what fraternity he had been a I took a break. I began a new semes- tions that currently lack clear language. part of. “OX,” he wrote. ter, and tried to enjoy the fraternity culture I’m still unsettled by the rapid growth OX, or Theta Chi, has never existed taking place on High Street and not on of the accounts. I still want to know who at Yale University. I asked him where the my cell phone. The accounts grew. More is behind them. When I see the compilahouse was, and he left me on read. and more of my friends seemed to know tions of pastel board shorts and lacrosse Only one other account replied to about them, and when they came across goals, I picture scary men posting from my DM, someone named Chadwick my feed again, the like and view counts dark basements. Whoever they are, Livingston. I prompted him to talk about had spiked dramatically. they’ve made an addictive, transporting lacrosse, and he told me that he used to My curiosity shifted from identi- product—I can’t pull away. When I look play for men’s leagues but that “they don’t fying who was behind the accounts to up in the library at my friends, who are mess with the baggo now I just got a net wondering why they appealed so heavily procrastinating by scrolling on Instagram, in my back yard for my kiddo but to the people around me. I wonder whether these accounts are slithI use it whenever I wanna rip For some, especially ering into a permanent spot in their carea gt and get wired and rip on elite university fully crafted algorithms. There’s no way to shots.” campuses where find out, or even really measure, whether hen I asked if When prep school alums the mass effort poured into their growth he had played for the are overrepre- can be sustained. It’s not clear how long University of Connecticut, sented, the draw is the intoxicating, portal-like effect will last. the college in his bio, he personal. I spoke to Maybe I’ll ask Chadwick, while we rip a told me that his DUI Ben, a Yale student few this summer. made him give it up. I who graduated from a boarding school asked him why he had that is frequently started posting. “Big Tali Kantor Lieber is a sophomore in snowstorm had me remmentioned by the Pierson College. accounts. “Some of iniscing about college and 30

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Comedy 28 32 33 34 host B R A N D A M B A S S A D O R even 29 Only 35 36 37 O A K Y A S H M O prime O G number

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DOWN ACROSS ACROSS 54 Knuckle-crackin 1 Titular protagonist in a Marcel 1 Yale Polo sound 1 Yale Polo sound g or fidget Proust novel 6 Wound protection e.g. planet 10 Strongly encourage 6 Wound 2 Jar Jar Binks’sspinning, 3 Intense hatred 56 Declare openly 14 Waterproof fishing bootprotection competitor 15 “__ Nagila” (Jewish10 Strongly 4 Twizzlers 57 Arcade game 5 Pistachio, e.g. wedding song) encourage 6 “Want me to?”pioneer 16 “Nuh-uh...”

14 Waterproof "Erm ... Not for 7 Rockette’s58 prop 17 __ by the rules 8 Tel __, Israel me" 18 Indigo dye sources fishing boot 9 Acrobat, often 19 Hostile criticism 15 "___ Nagila" 59 ___ Nostra 10 Roll out, as a flag 20 French New Wave (Jewish wedding 60 "Be silent," 11 “Sally, When the Wine Runs 23 Trifling Out” singer musically song) 24 Mailer of many manuscripts?

16 "Nuh-uh"12 Yale Hub fig.

61 Santa Monica “There’s a mouse!”

27 Clothing-option residence 17 ___ by the13rules landmark 21 Young bloke 30 Remote target?

18 Indigo dye 62 Executive Editor 22 Satisfactory 33 Had debts source 25 Licorice flavorlast name 34 Yahtzee cube 26 Nabokov Nos 35 River inlets 19 Hostile criticism 63 ___ Park, 28 Start to center?

36 More than help with 20 French New Colorado 29 Only even prime number 38 Tale of adventure Wave 30 Part of LGBTQ+ 40 Photography workshop DOWN name, 41 Porter and Natalie 23 Trifling 31 Website whose 1 Titular appropriately, anagrams to 42 Black or white 24 Mailer of many “movie” protagonist in a 46 Loss manuscripts?

32 Sullen Marcel Proust 47 “Yeah, and?!”

36 Cons 27 Clothing-option novel 51 Dawns... or a phonic hint 37 Strait of Hormuz liquid residence to the starts of 20-Across, 2 Jarpastries Jar Binks's 38 Stuffed Mexican 27-Across, and 42-Across 30 Remote 40 target?

Black bird planet 54 Knuckle-cracking or fidget 33 Had debts spinning, e.g.

41 Spanish “terrible” to English 3 Intense hatred “terrible”, e.g.

56 Declare openly 34 Yahtzee cube 4 Twizzlers 43 Shake 57 Arcade game pioneer 35 River inlets competitor 44 Mentor to Luke Skywalker 58 “Erm... Not for me” 36 More than 45 help Women’s Table architect e.g.

59 __ Nostra 5 Pistachio, 48 Put into law6 "Want me to?"

60 “Be silent,” musically with 61 Santa Monica landmark 38 Tale of 49 Sign off on 7 Rockette's prop 50 Core-strengthening poses 62 Executive Editor last name adventure that hold the in a right8 body Tel ___, Israel 63 __ Park, Colorado angle shape

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