Greetings!

I don’t know about you, but the regenerating comfort of the clocks going back an hour has lost its soothing effects. Midterms and milestone papers have been pulling everyone down lately and even if you’ve made it through, odds are you’re still feeling aftershocks. Remember, the brain is like a muscle, and after you run a mile you have to let the tears heal before you hit the open road again. Over exertion is never a good thing—take some time for yourself, even if it’s just a day. Relax, rest, and take in everything you’ve done. Your body needs the break too—with snow coming at us from around the bend, we all need to be in prime condition to fight off finals and flues. Brew some tea, sit back, listen to some music, and take some time to actually breathe. Steadying your breath is a peripheral form of meditation, so give it a try - you’ll thank me later.

IMPORTANT ANNOUNCEMENT:
This is the week of the English Major’s prestigious Open Mic. Come down to hear some amazing poets spin their yarns and some musicians hum their tunes. The ecstatic kinetic creative flow that jets through Brooklyn College like a bolt of lightening can only be measured with entropy—these people are the real deal and are worth your time. Swing by the Woody Tanger Auditorium in the Library from 12:30-2:15. You’ll thank me later for this, too.

-Victor

News Briefs

Tragedy at Texas Army Base

This past Thursday, November 5th, was a tragic day in American history. Eleven American soldiers were killed, and thirty more wounded- on American soil. Even more horrific, the shooter worked in the Army himself- as a psychiatrist, no less. Major Malik Nadal Hasan, age 39, fired two non-military-issued handguns in repeated bursts at the Fort Hood army base in Texas, the largest active duty armored post in the United States. While Hasan was at first reported to have been killed by a police officer, sources now say that he is merely wounded, and his death is "not imminent."

Hasan worked in the mental health facilities at the Walter Reed Army Medical Center from June 2003 to July 2009. As psychiatric intern then resident, Hasan treated soldiers with post-traumatic stress disorder, which likely affected his own mental faculties. Sources say it is not unheard of for therapists to experience the same symptoms as their patients after frequent interaction.

Though no clear motive has yet been established for the appalling crime, Hasan was said to be visibly "upset" about his upcoming scheduled deployment overseas. One man who worked with Hasan, a Retired Colonel Terry Lee, said that Hasan, a lifelong Muslim, had hoped that President Obama would pull troops from Afghanistan and Iraq, and regularly argued with pro-war soldiers.

There are no words to justify the deliberate taking of innocent lives. Though I do not believe mere words of condolences to the victims' families will suffice, that is all we have to offer right now. I sincerely hope, however, that something can be learned from this tragedy; anything that can help prevent a similar incident from occuring, anything that will lead us to hope, to believe, to say, "these soliders have not died in vain."

- Miriam Harari

Sources:
cnn.com
jpost.com
montrealgazette.com
washingtonpost.com

Image Source:
http://blog.mlive.com/saginawnews/2008/01/large_DR%20Fort%20Hood%20Send%20off11.jpg






Andre Agassi, my childhood hero who still remains hung on my wall inside a protective plastic, right beside the 1981 poster of Elvis Costello with the wry smile and the words “Trust” above the spectacled eyeglasses, has recently come out and admitted in preview of his upcoming autobiography to abusing Crystal Methamphetamine in 1997, the year his ranking was at the bottom dregs of tennis and his feeling for the sport itself was a deep hatred. Let it be known that the drugs he took were strictly recreational, and had nothing to do with performance enhancing whatsoever. In fact, it actually hinders tennis ability, especially when your mind is screaming back and forth with stream-of-conscious drivel attacking all the functions of the mind that make a man operate coherently. So it must be clear that no accomplishment of his has been tarnished whatsoever, and he will always remain my hero and the hero of many others.

—David Abady

Culture Corner

THE FEMALE URINALS AT WHITEHEAD

In the fourth and fifth floor ladies’ rooms in Whitehead Hall exists a rare phenomenon. Any female who has ever had a class on these floors is surely aware of it though has perhaps never spoken of it aloud. Between classes female students line up to relieve themselves in a seemingly endless queue that extends out into the hall. Once inside, one finds that each bathroom is equipped with five stalls but that, inexplicably, not a soul ventures into the first two. Most girls assume there is a horrendous mess or a clogged toilet hidden within these stalls and don’t bother to question why two dozen people are waiting around for three toilets. Less squeamish individuals, who have perhaps changed many a diaper and/or bedpan, will peer into the neglected stalls to see what the fuss is all about.

On such an occasion I did just this and found myself staring into one of the strangest contraptions I had ever laid eyes on. Where a toilet should have been there was a long porcelain trough protruding from the wall. I could only assume that one was expected to straddle this contraption and aim one’s stream into the narrow trough without sitting down (or hovering) as with a conventional potty. Having (almost) mastered the equally puzzling squat-toilets popular in the Middle East, I was not about to let this challenge go unmet.



Let me say, dear reader, that these oblong johns are not for the faint of heart. It is an epic feat of concentration to avoid peeing down one’s leg in the process. If your aim is that good, more power to you but, judging by the state of toilet seats in ladies’ rooms campus-wide, most of you can’t even make it into a 14-by-17-inch bowl.

This anomaly emerged from an attempt to reduce wait-time in schools and office buildings by introducing a sort of female urinal. No longer would precious seconds be wasted placing layers of toilet paper on the seat. No need to grasp the toilet paper dispenser for dear life lest your posterior graze the foul porcelain (which, by the way, is probably cleaned more often than the one at your house [and no, you can’t get AIDS/HPV/pregnant from a public toilet seat.]) Ironically, these outlandish commodes have only served to create more congestion in the Whitehead restrooms. Perhaps if the college held a screening of an instructional video on the quad (“The Stand-Up Loo and You”) students would be more inclined to stand astride the porcelain trough and try their luck. Until then, the lines for the bathrooms at Whitehead Hall will be ever long and slow.

-Ariana Costakes
Photos: www.urinal.net
www.hobotraveler.com

Poem of the Week

Meditations in an Emergency, Mayakovsky
Poem by Frank O’Hara


1

My heart's aflutter!
I am standing in the bath tub
crying. Mother, mother
who am I? If he
will just come back once
and kiss me on the face
his coarse hair brush
my temple, it's throbbing!

then I can put on my clothes
I guess, and walk the streets.

2

I love you. I love you,
but I'm turning to my verses
and my heart is closing
like a fist.

Words! be
sick as I am sick, swoon,
roll back your eyes, a pool,

and I'll stare down
at my wounded beauty
which at best is only a talent
for poetry.

Cannot please, cannot charm or win
what a poet!
and the clear water is thick

with bloody blows on its head.
I embraced a cloud,
but when I soared
it rained.

3

That's funny! there's blood on my chest
oh yes, I've been carrying bricks
what a funny place to rupture!
and now it is raining on the ailanthus
as I step out onto the window ledge
the tracks below me are smoky and
glistening with a passion for running
I leap into the leaves, green like the sea

4

Now I am quietly waiting for
the catastrophe of my personality
to seem beautiful again,
and interesting, and modern.

The country is grey and
brown and white in trees,
snows and skies of laughter
always diminishing, less funny
not just darker, not just grey.

It may be the coldest day of
the year, what does he think of
that? I mean, what do I? And if I do,
perhaps I am myself again.



There is a reason Meditations in an Emergency, the final poem in O’Hara’s collection of poetry, means so much to me, though for the life of me I haven’t figured out exactly why that is. It might just be the language, the simple way in which the words flow and the rhythm settles that, together, form mercurial inside the head of the aware narrator who is only aware that something is different, though is not exactly certain what that difference is. The narrator seems to be recognizing the changes in society—the social norms of the 1950s degrading to the liberation and freedom of the 1960s. This poem to me reads like a foreshadowing of the major changes that will soon occur in the early 60s: Bob Dylan; the Cuban Missile Crisis; the British Invasion; and, most importantly, November 22nd 1963. But the narrator is terrified because he doesn’t want change, nor is he ready for it. All the narrator wants is to remain in power within his home in suburbia, within the office, to continue smoking his cigarettes, wearing his fedora and his gray flannel suit, mixing in with everybody else without standing out. But perhaps what’s changing is the dominance of the men being seconded to the emergence of women in the power field in the upcoming decade, and their sexual revolution, and the narrator, while unknowing of any particular change, is fully aware of a change within himself, and he ends the poem unable to recognize his own identity, and the identity of those around him, and he is thoroughly confused.

— David Abady

Currently Reading

Haunted

Chuck Palahniuk’s six previous novels, Fight Club, Survivor, Invisible Monsters, Choke, Lullaby, and Diary were highly successful books that terrified, inspired, disturbed and excited all of its readers. Haunted is a novel with twenty-three multiple stories to be exact. The characters answer a headline “Writer’s Retreat: Abandon Your Life For Three Months.” They believe that in the retreat, they will be leaving their lives behind them and they will be able to relax, without harping on the distractions of their regular routines. The “retreat” though, is a spacious, elaborate, ancient theater where they are completely isolated from the outside world. There is also a limited supply of food, heat and electricity which thrusts the characters to survive solely by their primal and carnal needs. As the situation turns deadly, the more deceitful their machinations become, to make themselves appear as if they are the hero in this awful position; which in turn, they believe will be made into a play/novel/nonfiction movie.

Haunted is a true satire of reality television and how ludicrous it is. It’s the stuff adult nightmares are made of; the terror of old fears. This novel represents the underestimated cultural persuasion of a ghost story. It is also set in a writer’s retreat, which models the summer off the coast of Italy when Lord Byron took Percy Shelley and his beloved Mary Shelley, with a group of others to tell their worst horrifying tales- Mary’s becoming the famous story of Frankenstein.
In Palahniuk’s version there’s an absence of gloomy nights and man-made monsters but there is lots of blood and gruesome details. Here he is capable of exploring various voices that wander into the mind of the human psyche. The characters have not derived their names from their professions or their regular names but their stories they tell: Saint Gut-Free, the Earl of Slander, and the Baroness Frostbite who attempt to match their tales with Miss America, The Reverend Godless and Miss Sneezy. They want nothing but to be famous and Palahniuk placing them in an abandoned theater is a delightful stab at how ironic reality television can be.

“Guts,” is told by Saint Gut-Free
“The trouble is, even the French don’t have a phrase for the stupid things you actually do or say under pressure. Those stupid, desperate things you actually think or do. Some deeds are too low to even get a name. Too low to even get talked about.” (p.13)

“Under Cover”, a poem about Mother Nature
“I tried to become a nun,” says Mother Nature, “because I needed to hide out.” She didn’t count on the drug test.” (p. 28)

“Punch Drunk”, a story by the Reverend Godless
“Neurons replaced by brain-dead tissue. You put on a curly red wig and false eyelashes, lip-synch to Bette Midler at the Collaris Country Fair and Rodeo, and offer people the chance to punch your face at ten bucks a shot, and you can make some real money.” (p.183)

After writing this novel Chuck Palahniuk stated “My goal was to create horror around very ordinary things: carrots, candles, swimming pools. Microwave popcorn. Bowling balls.” When he first shared this wonderful, repugnant story with his friends, “No one fainted, in fact my friends laughed. At moments, the room had the silence of total shocked attention. No one scribbled helpful notes in the margin of their copy. No one reached for their glass of wine.” Anyone who has read Palahuniuk’s work prior to this great novel knows to expect anything and everything to twist the normal realms of society.

Through this novel Palahniuk explores most of the things that are erroneous within our culture and how individuals are so intent at watching others do poorly. He begs the dire question of where have all the intelligent people gone? Do people read books anymore or even let themselves age with time? Individuals have become so wrapped up in materialistic possessions and over and under the counter medication; they are no longer people but the side effects of material goods. Palahniuk says it precisely on page 102 of Haunted:

“Being born, it’s as if you go inside a building. You lock yourself inside a building with no windows to see out. And after you’re inside any building long enough, you forget how the outside looked. Without a mirror, you’d forget your own face.”

- Alana Linchner
Sources:
http://contemporarylit.about.com/od/mysteryreviews/fr/haunted.htm
http://www.randomhouse.com/doubleday/palahniuk/haunted/html/index.html
http://www.randomhouse.com/doubleday/palahniuk/haunted/html/haunted_aboutAuthor.html
Image Source:
http://search.barnesandnoble.com/Haunted/ChuckPalahniuk/e/9781400032822/?itm=2&USRI=haunted

Currently Listening

Currently listening to…silence??

I remember sitting in my Core Music class when the professor said she was going to show a video of a classical performance given by a composer by the name of John Cage. I saw the orchestra, their instruments, John Cage and the podium in front of him with the sheet music. As Cage begins to conduct the orchestra, I was confused as to the lack of music. The members of the orchestra were moving their pieces and flipping the pages of their music books, and Cage was conducting them but no sounds came out of their instruments. Then, the professor informed the dumbfounded students that the piece titled 4’33” was classified as a silent piece.

Cage was born in 1912 in the city of Los Angeles. He won numerous awards such as the Guggenheim Fellowship and an Award from the National Academy of Arts and Letters for having extended the boundaries of music through his work with percussion orchestra and his invention in 1940 of the prepared piano. Cage was known to make radical innovations with music, because his main interest was creating art in ways that broke away from the rigid forms of the past. Whether he did this with new types of instruments or playing with musical forms the result was always spectacular.
The piece 4’33” was written in 1952, and Cage drew inspiration for this piece by a visit to Harvard’s anechoic (echo-free) chamber, which was designed to eliminate all forms of sound. What intrigued Cage was although this chamber promised silence, he found that the pulsing of his heart and the whistling of his nerves produced a music-like sound. So, Cage decided to play with this form of silent music. He set up a performance in a concert hall, and accompanied by his orchestra they pretended to play music for four minutes and thirty-three seconds, much to the bafflement of the audience. Though, many found it to be absurd, Cage was trying to introduce the notion that music can be found anywhere, and how the world and people around us are producing music everyday.

In an online article about John Cage by Peter Gutmann, he details how there are sounds in silence. Gutmann writes that although nothing is being played in the classical sense “you soon become aware of a huge amount of sound ranging from the mundane to the profound. From the expected to the surprising, from the intimate to the cosmic—shifting in seats, rifling programs to see what in the world is going on, breathing, the air-conditioning, a creaking door, passing traffic, an airplane, ringing in your ears, a recaptured memory.” Gutmann believes that this piece is personal because no two people will hear 4’33” the same. It is the simplicity of the piece that makes it genius.

A lot of people will probably criticize this piece, and say “Is this music?” The answer is, yes. In the same article Gutmann talks of how music began as an imitation of natural sounds and voices, but then over time became stylized. Cage was bringing back the very nature of music by forcing us to hear the sounds that surround us, and “…where the audience (and the world) become the performer.”

Links to Articles:
http://www.classicalnotes.net/columns/silence.html
http://www.pbs.org/wnet/americanmasters/episodes/john-cage/about -the-composer/471/
https://www.glastonburyus.org/staff/LungL/PublishingImages/a-john-cage.jpg

Currently Watching

The 2009 World Series

What fascinates me about baseball is how trivial it is. At its core, baseball is a bunch of grown men throwing balls at each other, hoping to hit one far enough for a chance to run around a diamond as fast as they can. They wear silly pieces of clothing and bright-colored socks. America is at war with two nations, our economy is gasping for breath, health care is being battered around the Senate. And yet, for up to seven delirious nights, America is frozen to its television screens to watch 35-year-olds play a children’s street game.

And we love every minute of it.

While I am no baseball aficionado, the 2009 World Series, which featured the New York Yankees (yay!) against the Philadelphia Phillies (boo!), was an addicting 6-game match-up of two amazing sports teams. Almost evenly matched, each game had highs and lows, incredible last-minute game savers and excitement that lasted well into the 9th inning. Families, friends, acquaintances, random people in bars, all got together to scream and cry and cheer and hug when Hideki Matsui scored 6 RBIs in one game or Johnny Damon, in a play that is no less than awe-inspiring, stole 2nd AND 3rd base in the 9th inning of game 4, entering scoring position for a Yankees win. While I publicly blame Game 5’s Phillies win mostly to the terrible Yankees pitching, it can’t be denied that Philadelphia’s Clifton Phifer Lee is a pitcher to be reckoned with.

But why do we care so much about something that seems so simple? Why do fans “hang” stuffed dummies with Phillies jerseys on from trees down New York City blocks? Why do Phillies fans do the same? America stops for these games. Last night, during the middle of the final world series game, Manhattan seemed shut down. At 10pm the streets were eerily devoid of people, cops were frozen in front of Radio Shack windows—perhaps even standing next to the would-be criminals they may have arrested had the game not been on. Crime stopped, cars stopped, radios and televisions were blaring the same station everywhere. What is it about our culture that feels so engrossed by sports? Is it our taste for a bloodless victory? When the Yankees won the series last night 7-3 after a final strikeout in the top of the 9th, the looks on the faces of Jeter, Posada, Pettitte, did something to us that was, well, moving. We hope, we pray, and even on the trivial level of hoping for one more hit, or one more run, or loading the bases, watching what we wish for play out in front of our eyes is quite an experience. Even if our team loses, we feel satisfied watching the good fight; we feel ecstatic watching the unexpected happen. We believe the impossible grand slam with two outs in the bottom of the 9th when you’re behind by three can happen; we believe in miracles. And even if it doesn’t, or if it happens to the other team, we chalk it up to fate and say, “it’s still great baseball.”

And hey, there’s always next season.

-Christina Squitieri

Photograph courtesy of UK Daily Mail

At This Moment

This week, in light of the NY Yankees' [fantastic] World Series win, Miriam and Rachel asked the college community:

"What role does baseball play in your life? What role do you think it *should* play in people's lives?"

"Baseball plays a huge role in my life. It's entertaining, exciting, and suspenseful. I always do my best to watch every game. I think it can be a way to relax and take your mind off more serious things in life."
- Menashe

"It's awesome- as those who watched the playoffs have seen. Baseball is the american pastime, a place for americans to chill out, cheer on their team, and have a good time. EVERYONE should appreciate the tangible and intangible benefits of this outlet."
- Dan

"Baseball does not play a major role in my life. I do have a lot of respect for the sport considering it's a great American past time. I won't go out of my way to watch a baseball game but when the Basketball playoffs are on I will sit intentively in front of the tv so I won't miss a single game or moment. I feel most people aren't huge fans of baseball but just watch it to be in the "loop" with everyone else."
- Alana

"I'd much rather play it then watch it. But sadly the last time I played (besides for Wii sports baseball- not really sure if that counts) was back in the day when I was supposed to be doing my job in the office of camp but I sneaked out to play a game with the 3rd graders."
- Aly

"I couldn't care less about baseball. I'm glad it's over so I will no longer be awakened in the night by my neighbor screaming at his television."
- Ariana

"Baseball is just like any other hobby- it's for unwinding and entertainment. Another great benefit of a common interest like baseball is the way it unites fans of different nationalities- at the Yankee games and parade, people weren't looking at each other with cynism or judgement; they were all there for one purpose: to cheer on their favorite team."
- Albert

Image: http://www.personadev.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/01/baseball.jpg

Greetings

"Fall Back; Spring Forward"

I hope you all remembered to switch your clocks back an hour yesterday; otherwise, you may wind up standing alone in an empty classroom, wondering where everybody is, before kicking yourself for not taking advantage of the extra hour of much-needed sleep presented to you!

So if you find yourself wandering the hallways with some extra time, come by the English Majors' Counseling Office to sign up for this term's open mic! Spots are filling up fast, so stop by 3416 Boylan and sign your name as soon as you can! If you missed your chance at the limelight, don't worry, there's always next term- and we encourage you to attend the open mic anyway, Thursday November 12th during common hours at the Woody Tanger Auditorium in the Library.

One last reminder: tomorrow is election day for NYC mayor. I'm sure you've heard this already, but every vote counts, so place your vote for either candidate (incumbent Mayor Michael Bloomberg or City Comptroller Bill Thompson, whoever floats your political boat), and play an active role in your city's democratic system!

To locate the nearest polling site, use this link:
https://voterlookup.elections.state.ny.us/votersearch.aspx

Happy Reading!

- Miriam

Image Source: http://midsouthdiocese.files.wordpress.com/2008/10/daylight-savings-time.jpg

News Briefs

Preventing HPV? Not for Some People

On Wednesday, October 21, 2009, a federal advisory panel of medical experts recommended that Gardasil, the vaccine developed for women to prevent cervical cancer, be used to vaccinate young boys as well.

Gardasil has been used to immunize women against the human papilloma virus, or HPV, a sexually transmitted disease (STD) that is responsible for 70% of cervical cancer cases. The vaccine also works against strains of the virus that are responsible for genital warts, a fact that incited debates on how cost-effective it would be to administer the vaccine to boys and men, despite the fact that the disease is not life-threatening. However, recent medical information is showing that HPV can also cause cancer in males, meaning Gardasil should be administered to all, right?

Wrong. While the advisory panel, a part of the Center for Disease Control, did “recommend” that Gardasil be given to men, it stopped short of urging doctors to administer it. In fact, the advisory board doesn’t even encourage the vaccine because it can prevent cancer, rather because it can prevent genital warts and the spread of the disease to their (female) partners. Yet a simple Google search reveals that since 2007, reports have been made showing the increase of certain cancers in men, especially oral and anal, that have been caused by HPV. So why hasn’t Merck started testing the effectiveness of its vaccine in men as well as women? Why is it focusing on how cost-effective it is to prevent genital warts instead of terminal illnesses? The answer seems to be rooted in the fact that the chance of getting an HPV-related cancer is about 17 times higher for gay and bisexual men than it is for their straight counterparts.

So how far will this recommendation even go? While the CDC lukewarmly approved the vaccine for men, many insurance companies don’t agree. Ignoring the risk of the fatal anal cancer—the disease Farrah Fawcett died of and which was believed to have been caused by HPV—many who want the vaccine will be forced to spend $130/shot for the three-injection sequence. Not only that, but the vaccine is most effective when given to men and women before they become sexually active, and in a world where some parents fear homosexuality so much that they’d throw their kids out for being gay, how many mothers and fathers will go to the doctor demanding their 9-year-old son, whose sexuality might still be hazy, get vaccinated?

Before we can prevent cancer, we need to eliminate the prejudice we have cultivated in our sexually paranoid society. Whether or not we approve of alternative lifestyles, we need to understand that all lives—gay, straight, rich, poor, male, female, or anything in between—are worth saving, and that a simple vaccine should be available to everyone.

- Christina Squitieri

Sources:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/22/health/policy/22vaccine.html?_r=1&ref=us
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-453990/Men-cancer-HPV-The-facts-HPV.html
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22956090/
http://www.webmd.com/sexual-conditions/hpv-genital-warts/hpv-virus-men

Picture courtesy of babble.com





Cola Wars

Have you noticed that Brooklyn College recently replaced all of its Pepsi vending machines with Coca Cola? Are you happy about that? Perhaps many of us are. But not everyone smiles when the famed bottle-bearing polar bear lumbers into their neighborhood; in fact, the citizens of Kala Dera are positively outraged.

Located in the desert state of Rajasthan, India, the community of Kala Dera depends largely on local groundwater for farming and other basic needs. And due to its natural susceptibility to drought, every drop of water is important. But ever since Coca Cola set up shop in the small Indian village in 2000, groundwater levels in the agricultural Kala Dera have been steadily declining. That’s because Coca Cola uses the same groundwater the villagers use to meet company needs. And to make matters worse, the company’s busiest business months are in the summer—when water is ever more vital and scarce. Things came to a head last year, when the India Resource Center obtained government data from the Central Groundwater Board which stated that between May of 2007 and May of 2008, groundwater levels had plunged nineteen feet. Such an abrupt decrease in groundwater levels is unprecedented in Kala Dera history. But Coca Cola did not apologize.

Various community groups, such as Kala Dera Sangharsh Samiti, have been protesting Coca Cola’s actions in their hometown. "The Coca-Cola Company is denying our fundamental human right to water by continuing to extract groundwater from a rapidly falling aquifer. Every drop of water that Coca-Cola extracts from the groundwater is water taken away from the children, women, and men who are unable to meet their basic water needs, leave alone the farmers who are seeing their crops fail," declares one group member, Mahesh Yogi. "Coca-Cola has contributed significantly to the falling water tables and they must shut down and leave Kala Dera."

Others have joined the cause, but fighting a huge corporation like Coca Cola is not easy. When famed Indian photographer Sharad Haksar displayed the above picture—a billboard that depicts empty jugs beside a water pump in front of a Coca Cola sign—the soft drink company attempted to sue him. And when mainstream media refused to pick up the story because Coke was too valuable a sponsor to lose, Haksar barely stood a chance. But outraged bloggers picked up the story and the negative publicity prompted Coca Cola to drop the charges.

But it didn’t prompt them to leave Kala Dera.

In spite of a 2008 study funded by the Coca Cola company which confirmed that the company is a significant contributor to the drought, in spite of its very own study which recommended that Coca Cola either shut down or import water from other areas to fuel the company, and in spite of all arguments against the makers of the soft drink, Coca Cola stays. In fact, on the Coca Cola India website, the company advertises itself as green environmentalist company that brings water to drought- prone areas, a claim deemed ridiculous by the community, the government, and the India Resource Center. So a large corporation continues to thrive at the expense of a small community.

Granted, a large corporation is a formidable foe. But if the public was able to successfully convince Coca Cola to drop the charges against Haksar, perhaps we, the people, can take it a bit further and convince the corporation owners to move their enterprise elsewhere. To support global justice and take action, go to this link: http://www.indiaresource.org/

- Rachel Weissman

Sources: http://www.indiaresource.org/campaigns/coke/2009/kaladeragroundwater.html
http://www.coca-colaindia.com/

Photo Source: http://www.powerofculture.nl/en/current/2005/august/haksar.html





Fossilized Discovery

In 1915, a German meteorologist and geophysicist named Albert Wegner created the hypothesis of continental drift. He believed that the world was once a supercontinent, dubbing it Pangaea (“all land”). He also believed that around 200 million years ago Pangaea began to drift apart into smaller continents. Wegner and other individuals supported these beliefs by finding an allotment of fossils, structures of rocks and ancient climates on both Africa and South America which indicates that these two landmasses were once united. Now, in 2009, another fossil discovery has been made which may assist Wegner’s idea of Pangaea.

On October 27, a fossilized skull of the giant sea creature called pliosaur was found on the southern coast of Dorchester, England. The skull was discovered by a collector and measures 8 feet in length. Scientists are now speculating that the reptile would have been 52 feet long. This discovery will be put on display in the Dorset museum.

In 2006 on the Norwegian archipelago of Svalbard, parts of the pliosaur’s skeleton and other bone fragments were discovered weathering on the side of a mountain. Dr. Patrick Druckenmiller, a plesiosaur specialist at the University of Alaska Museum, said, “Not only is this specimen significant in that it is one of the largest and relatively complete pliosaurs ever found, it also demonstrates that these gigantic animals inhabited the northern seas of our planet during the age of dinosaurs."

The pliosaur is a type of plesiosaur, marine reptiles that existed in the Jurassic and Cretaceous Periods around 150 million years ago. These sea reptiles were identified by having short necks and elongated skulls. They were carnivorous creatures, evident by their long, powerful jaws which contained sharp, conical teeth. David Martill, a paleontologist from the University of Portsmouth, stated the pliosaur “used paddle-like limbs to propel their bodies through the water.”

The findings of this huge sea creature express that even as much as we have learned about the world before our time, there is still more to be discovered. Also, Wegner may have been correct that Pangaea once existed. As the world unveils its secrets to us, the puzzle of the world we live in slowly begins to merge together.

- Alana Linchner

Sources:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/33497627/ns/technology_and_science-science/
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/02/080229101002.htm

Image Source:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/33497627/ns/technology_and_science-science/

Culture Corner

America: The Blood-Thirsty?

Blood, fangs, and all things associated with vampires have been permeating our media—and that’s not due to Halloween. It seems that teens and young adults alike have recently been consumed with the character of the vampire. The modern day vampire is everywhere from books and movies to television shows. Yet the days of Bram Stoker’s Dracula are over. It seems like America is interested in a new breed of vampires who try to control their desires and lead normal lives. It seems that the modern-day vampire is more of a sympathetic character.

What does the vampire symbolize? Why is it that we are more sympathetic and keen on siding with the dark character? Is the modern day vampire about shedding a new light on these once dark characters? Or is it just something that’s socially popular?

According to a website titled Ezinearticles, modern day vampires seek intimacy and respect; they no longer seek isolation and darkness. We see this in Stephenie Meyer’s Twilight saga; all books have become instant best-sellers and have also been turned into blockbuster hits. In her books, a vampire seeks love and a relationship with a human, rather than the usual quest for blood and lust. The modern vampire has become a success, primarily because the TV and film markets are banking in on the young fans' desire for fantastical stories—and the fans appear to be devouring it. Modern-day vampires are portrayed as more relatable; they confront and battle issues just like the average teenager or young adult, which accounts for the reason why various people are drawn to them.

The vampire has also seeped into our televisions and into the big-screen. Shows like True Blood, The Vampire Diaries and Moonlight have captured fans' attention by placing these vampire characters in modern-day settings (ex: high school) and giving them real-life situations to cope with (ex: identity crisis, teenage angst and relationship issues).

A lot of the popularity stems from the vampire symbolizing the inner self. According to the Ezinearticles website, the modern vampire coincides with how modern culture has evolved into a “darker and more emotional personality type,” and vampires allow us to “explore darker, mostly hidden aspects of ourselves.” Vampires are usually angry, lost, or struggling with harboring their dark secret; and that is why young adults and teens find the Twilight saga and vampire shows so riveting. They are looking for a character who is outside the norm, but to whom they could relate.

The vampire is not a new character to us, so why is it that these latest books, films, and shows have found such success? The best answer I found was in an article in the Northwest Herald titled “Vampire overkill: Hollywood gushes bloodsuckers in latest craze.” Within that article, Nicholas Cage, who starred in the film Vampire’s Kiss and produced Shadows of the Vampire, talked of how the vampire story could never truly die because, “The vampire is always going to fascinating. It’s like the vigilante cop, or it’s like the cowboy or the Western. It’s part of the fabric of society.”

- Sabina Santiago

Sources:

http://www.nwherald.com/articles/2009/10/22/24678730/index.xml
http://www.ezinearticles.com/?Popularity-of-Vampires-in-Modern-Culture&id=2990417

Image Source:
http://urbanfantasyland.files.wordpress.com/2008/05/twilight-tease-poster.jpg

Poem of the Week

From Kaddish
by Allen Ginsberg

IV

O mother
what have I left out
O mother
what have I forgotten
farewell
with a long black shoe
farewell
with Communist Party and a broken stocking
farewell
with six dark hairs on the wen of your breast
farewell
with your old dress and a long black beard around the vagina
farewell
with your sagging belly
with your fear of Hitler
with your mouth of bad short stories
with your fingers of rotten mandolins
with your arms of fat Paterson porches
with your belly of strikes and smokestacks
with your chin of Trotsky and the Spanish War
with your voice singing for the decaying overbroken workers
with your nose of bad lay with your nose of the smell of the
pickles of Newark
with your eyes
with your eyes of Russia
with your eyes of no money
with your eyes of false China
with your eyes of Aunt Elanor
with your eyes of starving India
with your eyes pissing in the park
with your eyes of America taking a fall
with your eyes of your failure at the piano
with your eyes of your relatives in California
with your eyes of Ma Rainey dying in an ambulance
with your eyes of Czechoslovakia attacked by robots
with your eyes going to painting class at night in the Bronx
with your eyes of the killer Grandma you see on the horizon
from the Fire-Escape
with your eyes running naked out of the apartment screaming
into the hall
with your eyes being led away by policemen into an ambulance
with your eyes strapped down on the operating table
with your eyes with the pancreas removed
with your eyes of appendix operation
with your eyes of abortion
with your eyes of ovaries removed
with your eyes of shock
with your eyes of lobotomy
with your eyes of divorce
with your eyes of stroke
with your eyes alone
with your eyes
with your eyes
with your Death full of Flowers

---

Of all the poetry Allen Ginsberg has written, none has touched me as much as Kaddish, a long poem written in response to the death of his mother, Naomi Ginsberg, who passed away after a schizophrenic collapse in 1956. This section, part IV of a five-part poem, is a litany that is beautifully honest in its portrayal of the end of human life; it tells the secrets of our bodies we would never like to share, and it tells the ugliness of us all. Ginsberg doesn’t glorify his mother— Naomi is not beautiful or perfect in her death. She is, instead, a sack of bones and flaccid flesh. Ginsberg writes about her “sagging belly” and “pissing in the park”; he talks about her fallen body, from the “six black hairs” on her breasts and “arms of fat Paterson porches,” to the “belly of strikes and smokestacks” and “long black beard around the vagina”; he discusses her deteriorating mind with “Czechoslovakia attacked by robots,” the “killer Grandma,” and of her “running naked out of the apartment screaming/into the hall.”

And yet, in spite of his honesty, the language of this poem is incredibly beautiful. “Fingers of rotten mandolins” is a line that stops you in your tracks— it is so strange, so new, and yet so perfect to describe the fat, knobby fingers I can imagine his mother having. We get the sense that Naomi was a kind and caring person; for all her faults she still sung “for the decaying overbroken workers,” rode with her dying mother in an ambulance, and went to painting class at night. The repetition of “your eyes,” conveying both the positive and negative aspects of Ginsberg’s mother and her life, allow us to see how much he must have loved her. It is as if, looking down at her body, Ginsberg sees his mother’s entire life laid out in front of him— the good times and the bad— and poetically draws a picture of everything Naomi was: fat; poor; pitying of those less fortunate; remembering Russia; Communist; seeing America; suffering through the death of her own mother; afraid of Hitler; afraid of the world; living in New Jersey; paranoid; sick; operated on; divorced; having a stroke; being a painter; and, in the end, dying alone. It is not a glamorous picture, omitting the bad stuff and painting her up with words as one would a doll, but it is an honest one. To me, that is what makes this poem so beautiful. It is human, acknowledging our faults but not condemning us for them. It even finds the strange loveliness of our imperfections. And, even though Naomi— like the rest of us one day will— suffered, died, and was buried, she is remembered well. After all, the last line Ginsberg gives us is how she will forever be remembered— not with lobotomies or hysterectomies or abortions or strokes— but with her “Death full of Flowers,” a capitalized line that almost smiles at you, a garden filled with sunflowers, as gorgeous and alive as the life she lived.

Like Keats says, “Beauty is truth, truth beauty.” Ginsberg reminds us that that’s all we need to know.

- Christina Squitieri

Image courtesy of CityLightsLover
Poem courtesy of The Pocket Poets Series

Currently Reading

Play it as it Lays
by Joan Didion

Maria Wyeth knows what nothing feels like. After a major catastrophe— one which she indifferently allows to occur— her response is a simple shrug of, “I know what nothing means.” Maria lives in an empty house in Beverly Hills while her husband is off directing a film shoot somewhere in the Mojave Desert. Her everyday problems are as follows: Who will she torture herself to talk with? Who will she sleep with? Who will refill her barbiturates? Maria spends half her days with her eyes shut, the television on very low, the shades drawn, the Seconal beside her pillow, listening to her friend Helene discussing homosexuality among celebrities. The rest of Maria’s days are spent speed driving, driving nowhere, to the market, back to nowhere, along the empty highway, and even cruising to Las Vegas and then immediately returning. But this is where Didion’s adjective-obsessed pen is most powerful, because her metaphor of nothing— of driving aimlessly— is all a guise for a thirty-one-year-old former B-actress who has to spend that drive deciding which doctor will finally perform her long-awaiting illegal abortion, and trying to decide how to reunite with her toddler daughter who has been committed to the psychiatric ward. Underneath the moroseness, Didion creates a suffering woman with the emotional capacity of a little girl, appearing to the reader from beyond the increasing appeal of each abstract adjective written out, up to the point where Didion’s long, anxiety-filled sentences climax on that final adjective of the sentence in an ultimate orgasm, and there is a catharsis on every page, as the prose exhilarates, and explodes like a gunshot, and our minds are aimed to feel like a growth is pressing against our senses with the deepest malignance. But in actuality there is a benign human being there, deep inside Maria, and through Didion’s masterful weaving and chipping away at its consciousness she is brought onto the page in what first appears to be existentialism, but is merely the playing of life’s game— its dirty trick— which we then see is more than just nihilism, and precisely Didion’s aim. Time magazine named Play it as it Lays one of the top hundred novels of the twentieth century, and it is easily Didion’s best, the greatest to regurgitate the myth of Los Angeles­— with Los Angeles as a character in itself— all while nothing surprising happens, or at least nothing that is not part of the game.

— David Abady

Currently Listening

You Are My Sunshine
Jimmie Davis and the Holy Grail of Country Music

The iconic country hit “You Are My Sunshine” has become a staple in the musical vocabulary of America. Even if you’ve never heard the original recording of the song, if someone were to hum a few bars, you’d instinctively follow along. It’s a song that has become embedded in popular American culture. However, few people know its history.



The version that we know today is accredited to country music legend and governor of Louisiana Jimmie Davis, but it was actually created by several individuals over a long period of time. There are two known versions of the song recorded before the release of Davis’s hit in the 1940s. A native Atlanta band known as “The Pine Ridge Boys,” staring Marvin Taylor and Doug Spivey, cut the first recording in August of 1939. In September of that year “The Rice Brothers Gang” recorded another version, with the same name. The band was originally from Georgia, but had relocated to Louisiana. Charles Mitchell and Jimmie Davis were the composers of the final version, but Davis purchased the rights to the song from his co-writer and removed his name. Rumor has it that the price Davis paid was as low as fifteen dollars for ownership of the song, which is now possibly the most crucial and valuable song in country music. The song is not in public domain.

Davis relentlessly searched in vain for a record company to cut his song, until Decca accepted him in 1940. The artist used his song as part of his campaign slogan in his run for governor— he would perform the song at rallies and named his horse “Sunshine,” which he later rode to the capitol in protest of the integration of public schools. He later recanted this objection on his deathbed at the age of one hundred and one, saying he regretted his behavior.



The song has been recorded by a variety of famous artists— notably by Gene Audrey and Bing Crosby- which both topped the charts. Hundreds of musicians have followed in their path, varying from rock to soul to jazz. Such artists as Ray Charles, Bob Dylan, Johnny Cash, Aretha Franklin and Paul McCartney have released recordings of “You Are My Sunshine,” with notable acclaim. The song has also made cameo appearances on television shows as Star Trek, The Simpsons, Angel and the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air.



But what makes this song both so identifiable and desirable? Why have so many people been compelled to perform it and also listen to it? The song has usually been defined as “enthusiastic” and “uplifting,” just like it’s peppy melody— but if you actually pay attention to the lyrics, the song is incredibly melancholic. Johnny Cash blurs two stanzas in his version with Bob Dylan, and sings “now you’ve left me to love another/you have shattered all my dreams.” The song is full of intense internal ache, which can go by seemingly unnoticed. “You Are My Sunshine” is as tragic as it is joyful, and perhaps it is this duality that has allowed it to persevere as long as it has.

- Victor Gurbo

You Are My Sunshine

The other night, dear,
As I lay sleeping
I dreamed I held you in my arms.
But when I woke, dear,
I was mistaken
And I hung my head and cried.

(Chorus)
You are my sunshine,
My only sunshine.
You make me happy
When skies are grey.
You'll never know, dear,
How much I love you.
Please don't take my sunshine away.

I'll always love you
And make you happy
If you will only say the same
But if you leave me
To love another
You'll regret it all some day;

(Chorus)

You told me once, dear
You really loved me
And no one else could come between
But now you've left me
And love another
You have shattered all my dreams;

(Chorus)


http://www.cmt.com/news/country-music/1472470/you-are-my-sunshine-singer-jimmie-davis-dead-at-101.jhtml

Currently Watching

Criminal Minds is a crime drama series on CBS which premiered on September 22, 2005. The show follows an FBI Behavioral Analysis Unit which profiles serial killers, hoping to catch the culprit before his/her next attack. What makes this show differ from other FBI shows is that rather than focus on the crime, the team focuses on the criminal. The team investigates the crime scene and creates a profile for the murderer based on what it has learned. The show has just started its extremely successful 5th season, due not only to the enticing and disturbing cases, but also to the chemistry and precision of the characters within the show.

The team is led by Unit Chief Aaron “Hotch” Hotchner played by Thomas Gibson. He is divorced and has a son, and as the leader of his team, he constantly deals with trying to balance his work and home life.

Senior Supervisory Agent David Rossi is played by the famous Joe Mantegna. His character had previously been in early retirement because the actor wished to write more books and travel to give lecture tours. However, he decided to return to the dangerous life of being an FBI agent and joined the Behavioral Analysis Unit.

The other Senior Supervisory Agent and Unit Chief is played by the also famous Shemar Moore. He is probably the most relatable character since he is portrayed as a confident and headstrong everyman. In a previous season, his past was exposed to viewers and we learned that he attended Northwestern University on a football scholarship, had a black belt in Judo, ran the FBI’s self-defense program and had been on a bomb squad unit.

Matthew Gray Gubler plays Supervisory Special Agent Dr. Spencer Reid, who is literally a genius. His character graduated at the age of 12 from a public school in Las Vegas. It has also been revealed in previous episodes that he holds PhDs in Mathematics, Chemistry, and Engineering, and BAs in Literature and Psychology, and is in the process of completing his BA in Philosophy.

A.J Cook plays Supervisory Special Agent Jennifer “JJ” Jareau. She is the team’s liaison with the media and other police agencies. Paget Brewster plays Supervisory Agent Emily Prentiss. Emily is the daughter of the ambassador and the newest member of the team.

Kirsten Vangsness plays Garcia, the team’s technical analyst at their Headquarters in Quantico. Garcia is a quirky, intelligent, fun-loving and comical character who mellows out her fellow teammates.

The show explores that, based on how the victims were killed, the criminal can be identified. It delves into the intricacies of the mind and how complicated human behavior truly is. It conveys that anyone is able to kill and how volatile human beings are. It also shows that the conscious mind can be extremely dangerous and how powerful individuals can be. It makes me wonder if some people are born this way or if the evolving world has made some individuals fickle.

- Alana Linchner

Sources:
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0452046/
http://www.aceshowbiz.com/tv/criminal_minds/

Image Source:
http://www.randi.org/site/images/stories/swift/criminalminds.jpg

At This Moment

Holiday season in mind, Sabina and Miriam asked the college community:
"What is your all-time favorite Halloween memory?"

"I'd have to say my favorite Halloween memory is being covered in shaving cream walking down 5th avenue in Brooklyn with a group of friends and seeing what we thought were just guys in police costumes getting off a bus and coming toward us. Some of my friends knew enough to run, but unfortunately I was not one of them. Although being stopped by the cops may not be my favorite thing to have happen, I'll never forget being covered in shaving cream trying to tell the cops I wasn't getting into trouble..."It's just my costume officer...I'm cool-whip for Halloween." I guess it's my favorite memory because all they ended up doing was taking our shaving cream and telling us to go home"
- Meaghan K.

"I would have to say my favorite Halloween memory was when I was older. My parents didn't believe in celebrating Halloween so I don't have any childhood memories of it. But, when I was older I went to a Halloween party that some friends were throwing and I just enjoyed the fact that I got to dress up for the first time, and of course drink."
- Maggie S.

"My favorite halloween memory is going to see the parade in the west village and some how ending up walking in it without knowing how."
- Alex H.

Image Source: http://img.timeinc.net/time/photoessays/2007/halloween_pets/halloween_pets_01.jpg

Greetings

Between the stream of "Brooklyn Morning" newsletter emails, the "Holiday Bash" fliers hurriedly pressed into my hands via my more extracurricular-involved peers, and of course, the blow-up ghost gate blocking the entrance to the BC cafeteria, I can't help but feel touched (or perhaps slightly smothered) by the spirit of Halloween.

For those of you who, like me, don't know much about the holiday aside from glowing pumpkins and kids knocking on doors for candy, I did a little research about the historical origins of Halloween, or "All Hallows' Eve." Turns out, the holiday as we know it is a convergence of pagan and Christian festivals. The first was Samhain, a new year's celebration of the ancient Celts of modern-day Ireland, to mark the end of light, summer harvest days and the beginning of dark, cold winter days. They believed that on the night before Samhain- October 31st- the division between the dead and the living was blurred, and both beloved and harmful spirits could pass through from the Otherworld. Consequently, the Celts wore spooky costumes and masks to ward off evil spirits.

The holiday adopted a Christian face in the 600s, when Pope Boniface IV declared November 1st All Saints' Day (or All Hallows' Day in Middle English), a day to honor saints and martyrs. Many say that the pope was trying to replace the Celtic festival of the dead with a similar festival relating to Christianity. In any case, the night before All Hallows' Day became known as All Hallows' Eve, which is where today's name- Halloween- stems from.

Now, for those of you more interested in partying than a history lesson, I suggest you check out myspace.com/s4s123 to rsvp for BC's Halloween Party, Friday night at the Student Center.

Whether you find yourself trick-or-treating this Saturday night or just hanging out with friends as on any other weekend, I hope you have as stress-free a week as possible in the midst of midterms, and a reinvigorating weekend. Enjoy the blog!

- Miriam Harari

Sources:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halloween
http://www.history.com/content/halloween/real-story-of-halloween

Image Source:
http://i203.photobucket.com/albums/aa121/keepsake_33/spongebob/HappyHalloween.gif

News Briefs

STUDENTS AND FACULTY PROTEST PROPOSED CUNY BUDGET CUTS AT CITY HALL

Students, professors and activists gathered last Thursday at City Hall to protest Governor David Paterson’s proposed $51 million budget cuts for CUNY in addition to the $45 million already cut for the 2009-2010 academic year.

Demonstrators braved both foul weather and intermittent jeering from passers-by as they stood holding home-made banners on the steps of City Hall.
Organizers of the rally said they hoped to draw attention to Paterson’s proposed plans for CUNY, among other public institutions which will bear the brunt of Albany’s attempts to fill the state budget deficit.

The rally was organized by the CUNY Campaign to Defend Education, a group comprised of students and faculty but open to anyone who supports keeping education affordable and accessible. The CCDE also seeks to reinstate CUNY’s original open-admission and tuition-free policies.

Roy Ben-Moshe, a Brooklyn College senior, said the CCDE was founded to unite the student body and to preserve the university as a public facility.
“There are groups of students who are very upset about how the administration is handling our budget,” he said. “[…] [The state government is] cutting every public institution that supports working-class people so the upper-class doesn’t have to pay taxes.”

CUNY was tuition-free until 1975, when the state government cut funding due to a fiscal crisis. In 1999, due to pressure from Mayor Giuliani, CUNY’s open-admissions policy was overturned. Members of CCDE are concerned that, with the newly-proposed budget cuts, CUNY could barely be considered a public university and would restrict options for low-income students.

Larry Hales, a student at City College, stood and spoke after demonstrators were heckled by a passer-by:
“We just had our first right-wing suit pass by and make a derogatory comment,” He said. “He had money for his college education but somehow there is something wrong with us for not being able to afford ours.”

Budget cuts for CUNY passed in May resulted in a tuition hike of $300 per semester in the senior colleges for the 2009-2010 academic year. CUNY’s community colleges raised their tuition $175 per semester, placing them among the most expensive community colleges in the nation.

Doug Singsen, a student at CUNY Graduate Center and one of the organizers of the rally, said it is possible for students to effect change within the universities.
“Our goal in this and future protests is to prevent the proposed budget cuts from taking place,” he said in an email, “something that CUNY students have successfully done in the past.” He cited the 1969 occupation of City College by students and faculty which resulted in the initial administration of the open-admissions policy as well as separate departments for Black and Puerto Rican Studies.

Students and faculty worry that yet another set of budget cuts would force some students to abandon their studies and force departments to cut already limited programs and classes.

-Ariana Costakes

Photo: Ariana Costakes




New Vaccine Raises Eyebrows

A vaccine has been recently released by a pharmaceutical company in the United Kingdom. No, it isn’t a vaccine to prevent swine flu or the recent breakouts of HPV— but a vaccine that can help cocaine addicts break their addictions. This vaccine is known as “TA-CA” and was developed by a pharmaceutical company named Xenova. It is said that the vaccine does not stop the cravings for cocaine, but will stop addicts from experiencing a high when they take it. Xenova states that taking away the factor that causes one to be addicted will prevent people from becoming re-addicted if they abuse the drug again.

But how does this vaccine work?

Mr. Donald Oxlade, the chief executive of Xenova, states, “the vaccine for cocaine addicts works in very much the same way a regular vaccine works.” He further explains that the vaccine is created by attaching the cocaine to a large protein molecule. This stimulates the body’s immune system to produce antibodies that recognize the drug and attack the agents within the drug that cause addiction. Oxlade claims that the vaccine stops the cocaine from getting from the bloodstream to the brain, the heart, or other organs, “… [W]which is where you get the high, and of course where you get the addiction.” Thomas Kosten of Baylor College of Medicine says that while these antibodies are in the bloodstream targeting cocaine, the drug does not have an effect. Kosten makes it clear that the antibodies “…don’t destroy, they neutralize the cocaine and make it vulnerable to a cholinesterase enzyme that will then break it down.”

This vaccine might seem ground-breaking, or mark a turning-point for people who are trying to kick their addictions, but this vaccine also raises a lot of ethical questions. Lesley King-Lewis, the chief executive of Action on Addiction states, “A lot of cocaine addicts have complex social and psychological issues. Once one drug stops working, if these underlying issues aren’t addressed people may move on to another drug that does.”

The questions I posed to myself while reading this article were: the aim of this company may be to help people kick their cocaine addictions by removing the high, but would this be effective in the long run? Will the addicts turn to a different drug? Or does this vaccine somehow promote the usage of drugs? How powerful is this vaccine? Would it work effectively for someone who is a heavy cocaine user?

But on the flip-side this vaccine could help wean people off cocaine altogether; since they won’t be able to experience a high, they might not be interested in it any more. Plus, if this vaccine is successful, they might be able to make a vaccine to erase the high of other types of drugs. The people looking to kick addiction must take a series of treatments that take around two years, but usually it can take longer to be completely effective. King-Lewis also wants to make it known that this vaccine does not work alone, that other forms of support would also be needed for cocaine addicts to stop using, “…as it is more than just the physiological addiction that causes people to use again. Craving is a very complex issue that won't necessarily be solved with a pharmacological intervention.”

- Sabina Santiago

News Sources:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/3804741.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/8291681.stm

Image Source:
http://newsimg.bbc.co.uk/media/images/46499000/jpg/_46499614_m372285- cocaine_taking-spl.jpg



The Flu Hype:
Which Of Us Has Lost Our Mind?

The newest hype that’s been skyrocketing through Youtube is the story of a young NFL cheerleader, Desiree Jennings, who ten days after receiving a standard flu vaccination, experienced a number of serious side effects. According to the various websites that have pooled information on this tragic incident, Ms. Jennings has contracted a rare neurological disorder known as “Dystonia” which causes her to become racked with frantic muscle contortions and spasms when she tries to walk. While this disability has affected her in every faculty of her life, she strangely has no trace of the disorder when she runs or walks backwards. She serves as the video’s poster child for the anti-flu-vaccination movement and claims she is the voice of “one in a million.”

While I have yet to find a legitimate news source regarding this story, its presence has the same effect. If this horrible trauma is indeed a hoax, it still stands as the panicle of our medical-friendly-fire. Desiree exemplifies our fears, worries, and possibly strongest of all, our paranoia—which strikes us on every front. It causes us to ask ourselves, do the cons, even if rare, outweigh the pros of medicines and vaccinations?

One can easily argue that a fear of such minor occurrences is not a reason to protect ourselves against more debilitating threats. But I believe this vein of thinking raises an even more important, ever-looming topic of debate: are these fears of ours rational or not? Has the American public become overly germaphobic? Has our obsession with medical precautions become harmful? While the flu vaccination and many other precautionary measures have saved thousands of lives, are all of them necessary? Do we overuse them? Flu season has become an almost romanticized occurrence every year, and some people who are fully able to fight off the flu receive the vaccination anyway. Could any complications arise from this kind of behavior—if not in this instance, but in others? Can our behavior create drug and vaccine resistant strains of viruses and germs?

- Victor Gurbo



News Source:
http://www.huliq.com/8059/87650/nfl-cheerleader-suffers-irreversible-dystonia-after-flu-shot

Image Source:
http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2007/09/19/us/flu_span.jpg

Culture Corner

The World of Parkour

Some see the cup half empty; some see the cup half full; and some see the cup as a stepping stool which can be used to climb to the top of a wall. If you are one of the privileged few who view the world as an obstacle course, then you probably are a daring practitioner of parkour.

Perhaps nobody describes parkour better than its founder, David Belle. On his website he says, “parkour is an art to help you passing any obstacle to go from point A to point B only with the human possibilities…this art has been created by few soldiers in Vietnam to escape or reach: and this is the spirit I’d like parkour to keep. You have to make the difference between what is useful and what is not in emergency situations.” Right. Never mind; perhaps it could be better described. But before we jump all over Belle’s grammar, let’s keep in mind that he’s French. And he can probably jump a wall and get at us quicker than we can hit the backspace key and delete. So easy does it, Belle; it’s all good. Never mind the punctuation. We’re more interested in your art anyway. What is parkour?

Parkour is basically a discipline in which traceurs—practitioners of the discipline—run, jump, climb, etc. through an “obstacle course” in the most efficient manner possible. The “obstacle course” is actually the environment around the traceur. While parkour can be practiced anywhere, an urban environment is viewed as the optimal place due to its abundant structures: walls, steps, rails, buildings; all these and more make for better obstacles. The objective of this discipline is to train the body to efficiently navigate itself through its environment during an emergency.

There aren’t many set “moves” in parkour, because the ideal move for a particular situation varies based on the traceur’s body, the speed at which he/she is moving, the obstacle acted upon, etc. The challenge is to train the “bodymind” to react with the most efficient technique in any situation. There are, however, some basic movements that a traceur will learn including landing, balance, swing, vault, climb-up, gap jump, wall jump, etc. Yes, they are what you think they are.

It is likely difficult to truly understand what parkour is without seeing it for yourself, so have a look:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T2XjL1OMbTs

While it appears entertaining, it is important to stress that parkour is specifically intended for use in emergency situations, and its practice is geared toward that. “If you do acrobatics things on the street with no other goal than showing off, please don’t say it’s parkour. Acrobatics existed long time ago before parkour,” says David Belle. So be inspired! Learn the discipline. But not for acrobatics things on the street. Only to “help you passing any obstacle to go from point A to point B only with the human possibilities.”

- Rachel Weissman

Sources:
http://web.archive.org/web/20050508021450/www.pawa.fr/Welcome/welcome.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parkour#cite_note-PAWA-Welcome-11

Image Source:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Daniel_Ilabaca.jpg

Poem of the Week

“Not Dark Yet”

Bob Dylan

Shadows are falling and I've been here all day
It's too hot to sleep time is running away
Feel like my soul has turned into steel
I've still got the scars that the sun didn't heal
There's not even room enough to be anywhere
It's not dark yet, but it's getting there

Well my sense of humanity has gone down the drain
Behind every beautiful thing there's been some kind of pain
She wrote me a letter and she wrote it so kind
She put down in writing what was in her mind
I just don't see why I should even care
It's not dark yet, but it's getting there

Well, I've been to London and I've been to gay Paree
I've followed the river and I got to the sea
I've been down on the bottom of a world full of lies
I ain't looking for nothing in anyone's eyes
Sometimes my burden seems more than I can bear
It's not dark yet, but it's getting there

I was born here and I'll die here against my will
I know it looks like I'm moving, but I'm standing still
Every nerve in my body is so vacant and numb
I can't even remember what it was I came here to get away from
Don't even hear a murmur of a prayer
It's not dark yet, but it's getting there.
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“Not Dark Yet” is one of those weary telltale songs that just has a way of draining its audience of anything remotely bright. Bob Dylan cut the release of Time Out of Mind, the album this song premiered on, shortly after the artist was laid waste by a “Cork Screw Virus,” which is caused by heroine addiction and/or chicken farming (both of which Dylan is rumored to do). Legend has it that this song was directly inspired by his near miss with knockin’ on heaven’s door. The song makes this feeling apparent, with its gloomy nostalgia which makes you feel like “every nerve in [your] body is so vacant and numb.” The words carry with it a weight that can only be compared with that of a hospital bed— the last pistol shot of the dim fading grace of every tear and every sleight of hand, all the afflictions that we pick up and carry through life. The poem brings you into this limbo between dusk and darkness— that it’s truly not dark yet, but it’s getting there.

- Victor V. Gurbo

Image: "Death" by Alex Grey