Volume 11Number 23

Brandeis University’s Community Newspaper • Waltham, Mass. November 7, 2014www.thebrandeishoot.com

By Ethan BerceliStaff

lost girls This play with a cast of five female Brandeis students opens this weekend in the SCC Theater.photo by sharon cai/the hoot

‘Lost Girls’ tackles tough themesBy Jess Linde

editor

See ARTS, page 16

Students voice concerns at round table with administration

See ROUND TABLE, page 6

Brandeis police arrest suspicious person

By Hannah Schusterstaff

See PRESENTATION, page 2

Prominent Israeli figures speak on campusBy Emily Smith

Staff

Ayal Beer, former Israeli soldier, and Gideon Meir, head of the Israeli Foreign Ministry’s public affairs di-rectorate, visited Brandeis on Tues-day, Nov. 4, to discuss their experi-ences with the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) and other topics.

Beer led the first half of the presen-tation, focusing on Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and combat reactions, using his own time in the IDF to explain its effects on soldiers. Meir led the remaining part of the presentation, which centered on the media’s portrayal of Israel, particular-

ly of the nation’s involvement in war.Beer began his presentation by

showing clips from two different movies, one depicting the funeral of an Israeli soldier in 1982, the other showing Israeli soldiers fighting in 2007. Beer chose these clips so they would demonstrate the changing mindset of Israelis. He said that be-fore 1982, “the state of mind of Israeli society was, ‘We are so invincible, so strong’ … Within the culture there wasn’t space for mourning.” He point-ed out evidence of possible PTSD in the soldiers portrayed in the second film. The soldier, who began crying as another soldier sang, was exhibiting combat reaction, or the “lack of abil-ity to function in the situation,” Beer

explained.Beer concluded his presentation

by telling a story from his experi-ences in combat with the IDF. He read from a journal he kept during the summer of 2006, when Israel was fighting in the Second Leba-non War. He described the area he was in, and spoke of missile at-tacks and his platoon treating their wounded soldiers. At the end of the story, Beer told the audience that though he knows he was there, he has no memory of the event. He also explained that many soldiers,

On Wednesday evening, Nov. 5, students gathered at a round table discussion in Sherman Function Hall with members of the administration. Students asked questions regard-ing major issues within the Brandeis community. The event was sponsored by the Student Union, to bring about greater transparency and give students a chance to make their voices heard.

Students heard from Vice President for Students and Enrollment Andrew Flagel, Vice President for Operations Jim Gray, Provost Lisa Lynch, As-sociate Dean of Director of Student Activities Stephanie Grimes, Dean of Students Jamele Adams and Director of Community Living Tim Touchette. Discourse spanned an array of sub-jects, from Sodexo practices and sus-tainability to budgeting and sexual violence services.

An early topic included the current situation regarding Sodexo’s alleged mistreatment of employees, including cutting hours and violating contracts. One student asked how the university is working to address these issues.

Gray stated he shared concern for the treatment of all employees on cam-pus but said, “The Sodexo employees have a contract that they work under, and I believe that Sodexo works very hard to keep the terms of that con-tract.” Gray noted there are many sides from which to view this issue.speakers On Tuesday, an Israeli soldier and the head of the Israeli Foreign Ministry spoke on campus.

photo by karen caldwell/the hoot

A man in his mid-forties was ar-rested for trespassing on the Brandeis campus and transported to the Waltham Police Department at mid-day on Monday Oct. 27. The person was in the Usdan Student Center for several hours before a custodial worker alerted his supervisor to what he deemed a suspicious person.

He called university police, and the man was found and arrested for trespassing and for the possession of a Class-B substance.

Brandeis encourages students not to let individuals whom they do not know into buildings, and signs are posted to keep the student body aware of the policy.

Students are responsible for their non-student guests as per sections 2.8 and 9.19 of Rights and Responsibili-ties.

Assistant Director for Programs

and Resident Support Allison Lev-enthal says students must use their own judgment to deem who may be potentially suspicious persons.

“We ask our residents and CAs to call Brandeis police if they observe a person in their buildings who does not appear to be a member of the Brandeis community,” she said. “Since that can sometimes be hard to glean, we encourage a ‘better safe than sor-ry’ approach.”

The university police are still un-able to comment on the matter as the incident is an ongoing investigation at this time, but Director of Public Safety Ed Callahan would like to re-mind the Brandeis community to be careful.

“I would advise all members of the community if they encounter any sit-uation that appears to be suspicious or a concern to one’s personal safety, while on campus that they should im-mediately contact the Brandeis police at 781-736-3333,” said Callahan.

“The fact that someone says they’ve done something wrong does not make it so every time,” said Gray. “And the fact that they say they haven’t done anything wrong does also does not make it true. Certainly we try to mon-itor the volume of what’s happening.”

He also commented that the pro-cess of addressing grievances is never simple and requires a great deal of co-operation from many groups, includ-ing both Sodexo management and the workers’ union.

Another issue raised was that of increased student enrollment and whether, moving forward, the uni-versity plans to stagnate or continue growing. To this question, Flagel an-swered, “The intention is to keep the overall student body to a consistent level, about where we were last year.” He explained that a larger than an-ticipated number of students accepted offers, and this year, admissions will be based off those numbers, likely re-sulting in an even more competitive process.

A student involved with the Office of Prevention Services and the active bystander program asked the panel about changes underway regarding such organizations. Flagel affirmed his belief in the value of bystander training. He also discussed the “evo-lution of concepts for a Rape Crisis Center,” the back and forth regarding

This weekend, Brandeis En-semble Theatre premieres its latest production, “Lost Girls,” a two-act drama about obstacles and trauma faced by women in all walks of life. The play was written and directed by Charlie Madison ’15.

“Lost Girls” explores its themes through five women, each representa-tive of a specific archetype of survivors of trauma. The play begins with Danie-la (Mira Kessler ’16), a college student who arrives in a mysterious pit. Seated circling the pit are four other women: 7-year-old Jessie (Julia Davidovitz ’15), Kitty the bubbly housewife (Abby Kir-shbaum ’16), a pop star named Mehndi

(Joanna Murphy ’17) and poet/novel-ist Sylvia Plath (Lily Elderkin ’18). They have been sitting in the circle for an untold amount of time, gener-ally not speaking to one another, only moving from their seats to sleep or avoid a mysterious wind.

Inside this issue:News: Arrests stem from drunken stupors.Arts, Etc.: The Decemberists release new tune.Opinions: Advisors don’t offer much advice.Sports: Men’s and women’s soccer both fall.Editorial: Admin. needs to offer solutions

Drum circle excitesOpening night for student club draws an engaged crowd and breaks musical boundaries.Arts, etc.: Page 8

stuDent Drivers not fit for BrAnvAnInsurance costs and safety con-cerns warrant hiring of profession-al driversopinions: Page 13

Page 6Page 8Page 12 Page 11Page 10

NEWS2 The Brandeis Hoot November 7, 2014

Heller presentation indicts the death penalty

From PRESENTATION, page 1

Lecture focuses on PTSD, the Israeli government and the media

guberman lecture William J. Leahy spoke to a crowd of Brandeis students, staff and faculty about the death penalty. photo by karen caldwell/the hoot

capital punishment and helped me to not only develop a better understand-ing of the implications of the death penalty and use of drones, but of their heightened presence in our society.” She continued to say, “it was truly ad-mirable to listen to such a profound speaker with both experience in the courtroom and in the classroom.”

after completing their service in the IDF, travel to places like Thailand and other countries in Southeast Asia. After asking the audience what they thought these soldiers did there, he replied, “Drugs, extreme sports, drink, all of these, if you look through the lens of psychology, are escaping mechanisms”. Following Beer’s pre-sentation, Meir spoke. He is the for-mer Israeli ambassador to Italy and

the current head of the Israeli Foreign Ministries public affairs directorate. Meir discussed the media’s portrayal of Israel, a viewpoint he sees as biased and often anti-Semitic.

“It is legitimate to criticize the Is-raeli government,” Meir said. “What is not legitimate is to delegitimize, what is not legitimate is to use a dou-ble standard … I don’t think we Jews, we Israelis, have to do any explaining. We do have to do PR for the state of Israel, but we don’t have to do any ex-

plaining.”Meir explained that, in his view, the

media’s often negative portrayal of Israel is contributing to the growing anti-Semitic atmosphere in Europe and other parts of the world.

Giving an example, Meir showed the now infamous Chicago Tribune picture, which shows a young man covered in blood and an angry Israeli soldier. The picture was captioned to suggest Israeli brutality toward Pales-tine, when in fact the young man was

Israeli and the soldier had been help-ing him. Meir also presented a Brit-ish cartoon depicting former Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon eating a Palestinian baby.

Meir later discussed the media’s portrayal of the conflict between Is-rael and Palestine.

He showed a video taken in Jenin, a town in the West Bank of Palestine. Meir argued that the reporter was falsely creating the image that Israel was killing innocent Palestinians, an

image that he described as being like “a Jew coming out of Auschwitz.” He said that Israel “had to battle in order to convince the world that we did not create a massacre.”

The Brandeis Zionist Alliance and Brandeis Israel Public Affairs Com-mittee hosted the talk.

It was co-sponsored by Hillel at Brandeis, Students for Accuracy about Israeli and Palestinian Affairs, Brandeis Republicans and Alpha Ep-silon Pi.

By Charlotte AaronStaff

The 30th Anniversary Joshua A. Guberman Lecture took place on Monday, Nov. 3, in the Glynn Amphi-theater of the Heller School of Social Policy and Managment. About 75 people were in attendance, including undergraduate and graduate Brandeis University students, faculty mem-bers, and Millie Guberman, founder of the Guberman Lecture and retired Brandeis Professor Sal Touster.

The lecture was initially created to honor Joshua A. Guberman, a class-mate of Touster, in 1984. As Touster, now 90 years old, described, Guber-man was a man who valued justice in society, “studying society and the im-portant moral and ethical issues.”

After a half-hour reception, the lecture began with an introduction by Professor Richard Gaskins, direc-tor of the Legal Studies program at Brandeis. He briefly discussed the “common ground that exists between the law… and the great broad ap-proach to social policy and social wel-fare.” Then he introduced Touster and William J. Leahy, JD, the Guberman lecturer.

Upon arriving on the stage, Touster said, “One of the things I’ve learned in the eight, nine years I’ve been go-ing on is that any time you are called upon to speak, make it short and re-turn promptly to your seat.”

On a more serious note, Touster concluded, “With that, I leave this extraordinarily difficult, thought pro-voking and powerful theme that we are to hear tonight with a message that I wish…we might meet here again at the Guberman Lecture on another theme which will be always present to solve problems. Without it, the Heller School will not exist, because we have problem solvers here.”

After both Gaskins and Touster finished their introductions, Leahy began his lecture. Leahy, director of New York State Office of Indigent Le-gal Services, has focused a majority of his career on criminal justice and actively works to end the death pen-alty and improve the representation of low-income citizens in New York.

He began his lecture by introduc-ing facts about the death penalty to-day. He noted that although the death penalty is still legal in 32 states, “five states have conducted over 65% of executions, a mere three states have killed a majority, 53%, and a single state has executed 518 people, more than 37% of the total.” Leahy then made the claim that America is di-vided into three camps regarding the death penalty, “10 states that to widely, varying degrees, actively kill, 18 states that prohibit executions entirely and about 22 states whose ambivalence is in accord with widely mixed public sentiment.”

In addition to discussing the death penalty, Leahy covered the casual-ties that often come along with tar-

geted drone strikes. He concluded his speech by connecting the strikes and the death penalty. He said, “I see a world in which violence is becom-ing more acceptable... respect for every person is being eroded.” To get rid of the death penalty would be to decrease violence in society.

Following the lecture, the audience

asked questions. One student asked if there would

ever be an acceptable reason to kill a terrorist, Leahy responded that if he could prevent Bin Laden from send-ing out 20 suicide bombers with a drone, he would do it. Another stu-dent asked him if he considered “life-sentence without parole” equivalent

to a death sentence, and he responded that in no way is a death sentence the same as a life-sentence without pa-role.

The lecture ended after about 45 minutes of questions. Brittany Wolfe ’18, a first-year in Introduction to Law, stated, “Professor Leahy pro-vided an interesting perspective on

photo by karen caldwell/the hoot

November 7, 2014 The Brandeis Hoot NEWS 3

Liberty in North Korea (LiNK) held a meeting on Monday evening, Nov. 3 in Mandel G12 to raise aware-ness about the situation of North Korean refugees. The event also ex-pressed hopes based on the changes happening in North Korea. The LiNK Nomads, presenters travelling to spread messages about North Korea, discussed the life of the jangmadang generation, young generations, in North Korea.

The E-board who coordinated the LiNK event at Brandeis included President Grace Hong ’16, Secretary Haeyoon Jung ’16, Publicity Chair Abraham Woo ’17 and Interim Trea-surer Judy Nam ’15. About 30 people attended the event.

Following the introduction, the keynote speaker James Lee, a Nomad for LiNK from Texas, introduced the theme of the event. According to the LiNK Facebook page, Lee served as a corporal in the United States Marine Corps for six years before applying to be a Nomad. Growing up, he always heard about North Korea from his parents and teachers. Lee stated he had hoped his experience with LiNK will be the first step in learning more about North Korea.

Lee showed a video clip that ex-plained the establishment of LiNK, a grassroots organization that has mobilized hundreds of thousands of people. Ten years ago, students started sharing the stories of North Korean people with their friends. As more people started to become aware of the challenges the North Korean population faces, more people joined the effort. What started as a word-of-mouth movement quickly became something larger. LiNK was started under one common belief: that the North Korean people should be free in their lifetime.

Lee asked the audience to imag-ine that Massachusetts was suddenly ruled by a dictator. The first thing that would disappear, he stated, is the Internet. Government propaganda would become the only information allowed. Then the government would make it illegal to travel without gov-ernmental approval. He cautioned that this is the reality of North Korea.

He continued to share the three important points of the jangmadang generation, and how this group is dif-ferent from the previous generation. First, the jangmadang generation tackled the status of the North Ko-rean economy from an early age, at a time when the economy was crash-ing. The per capita income of North Korea is 20 times less than South Ko-rea. Lee also stated, “This is the first generation to be independently in-volved on its own. They stopped rely-ing on the government. They hustled on their own. The government was a hindrance, not much of help.”

This generation grew up in a changing economic and information-al reality. In the 1990s, North Koreans gained more information and that allowed them to contradict govern-ment propaganda. The jangmadang generation also came of age at the time of a new information technol-

ogy. Markets created unprecedented access to foreign media consumption.

Lee also spoke about how, in North Korea, the government implements harsh punishments such as forced la-bor, torture, imprisonment and even public executions. He introduced Shin Dong-hyuk, who was born in one of the five prison camps in North Korea. The prison he was in resem-bled Auschwitz.

The other speakers shared how thankful they were today to be liv-ing a life of a dream. It is a 3,000-mile journey for the refugees involved to find total freedom. The whole pro-cess of delivering them to either the United States or South Korea costs $3,000 dollars. Since 2010, LiNK has brought 260 refugees to live a new life. The organization is looking forward to changing the narratives of more North Koreans.

According to Lee, LiNK’s impact does not just settle on one person’s life. The refugees keep in touch with relatives back in China through the satellite system in China and send back word to North Korea. This is some form of communication with the outside world.

Brandeis LinK will have a film screening on a similar topic on Nov. 20.

Although registration for spring 2015 classes is well underway, stu-dents can still take advantage of some of Brandeis’ “Hidden Gems” courses. These classes come from a wide va-riety of departments, and Academic Services selected them ones because they offer small class sizes and the opportunity to have close, personal interactions with Brandeis faculty.

All of these classes are taught by individuals who are passionate about their work and are eager to share their experiences. For example, Pro-fessor Sabine von Mering will be teaching Human/Nature: European Perspectives on Climate Change (GECS 188B). Her inspiration for the course is deeply rooted in her per-sonal history.

“Although I trained to teach Ger-man language and literature, I have been an environmentalist since my teenage years. I grew up on a small island in the North Sea.

“There are no cars on the island and no industry,” von Mering ex-plained.

“I hope students come away from my course empowered to speak about climate change even as non-scientists (but scientists are of course also wel-come!), and that they feel encouraged to do something about this crisis.”

For those scientists-to-be, there

are other “Hidden Gems” that are math- and science-centered. Profes-sor Steven van Hooser will be leading a small, discussion-based class (Sys-tems Neuroscience, NBIO 145B) on, “how neurons work together in cir-cuits and systems to allow perception and behavior.”

According to Hooser, the class, “begin[s] with the visual system, and start[s] by considering the physics of light and the eye as a light detector. We explore experiments and models of how the visual system works at dif-ferent stages. We then explore neural coding, the brain circuits that under-lie navigation, decision making and much more.”

Professor Arthur Holmberg, who will teach Texts and Theory (THA 11B), recounted his fondest memo-ries, which included an experiential learning component.

“Students put on a class project that never fails to astonish me,” Holmberg said.

“This fall they’re doing a clown show, inspired by commedia dell’arte. The show dramatizes student she-nanigans at Brandeis. Renaissance commedia is the basis of our comic tradition.”

Professor Anahi Russo commented on her course, Sexuality and Queer Studies (SQS 6B).

“First, I think that teaching this course is an opportunity to reflect on a phenomena that has been associat-ed with so many negative or extreme-

Seven of 12 members of the Brandeis Chess Club scored victories at the 81st Greater Boston Open last week.

Brandeis student and chess master Misha Vilenchuk ’16 also earned the championship, beating two chess ex-perts and an international master be-fore drawing grandmaster Alexander Ivanov into the final round. Vilen-chuk was crowned the greater Boston chess champion. Chess Club’s wins highlighted the talent of many of the players. Many of these students had never played in a tournament before.

Joe DeFerrari ’18 took second place in the tournament’s lower sec-tion, with Damian Lin ’17, David Matthews ’17 and Kelvin Mei ’18 ty-ing each other for fourth place in the same section. This was these students’ first tournament. Yudong Jiang ’18, also in his first tournament, placed second in the u1600 section, the Open’s third of four sections. Finally, Haotian Wang ’17 took second place in the second most advanced section, the u1900. Vilenchuk held his match-es and wins in the most advanced sec-tion, the Open Section.

The tournament was held in Marl-borough, MA, and consisted of four matches per round, with approxi-mately 120 players from the greater Boston area in attendance.

The victories Chess Club earned got them noticed by many other collegiate and local chess clubs. The Brandeis club has now received invi-tations to play from several of these local clubs, including the Waltham Chess Club. Since their meetings be-gan at the start of this semester, Chess Club’s senior members, including Vi-lenchuk and Maxwell Steinberg ’16, have worked closely with new mem-

bers. They have focused specifically on skills beneficial in tournaments. Chess Club hopes to play at least one tournament per academic semester. They are also taking advantage of a new room on campus, where they are able to accommodate more players, said Vilenchuk.

Some future plans include playing other strong collegiate teams in the Northeast, including Harvard, as well as participating in more state tourna-ments.

Vilenchuk, who has been playing chess for most of his life, told The Brandeis Hoot in an interview that the ultimate goal of Chess Club is to develop the club into a powerful col-legiate team.

“We have a lot of dedicated new members willing to work hard and learn,” Vilenchuk said. He also re-mained humble throughout. “I think [my wins] were mostly luck,” he said with a smile.

This year’s focus on tournaments is a bit of a change for Chess Club. While more advanced players attend-ed tournaments in previous years, 2014 is one of the first years during which the club has focused on devel-oping group strength.

Previous attention was also focused on Sam Shankland ’14, a chess grand-master who recently took home the gold in the international 2014 Chess Olympiad.

New and interested students should not assume that Chess Club is only for advanced players who wish to play professionally, according to Vi-lenchuk.

“Our meetings are very casual and fun; even if you have never played a game, we will teach you and find you someone to play with,” he said.

Brandeis Chess Club meets Thurs-days on the third floor of the Shapiro Campus Center at 6 p.m.

ly positive connotations,” Russo said. “I love the discussions that take

place during the course and that there exists the possibility of speaking in different registers. On [a] voluntary basis, students speak of their percep-tions and experiences. This also offers the opportunity to contrast readings with our lives, and possibly produce new knowledge … and inhabit our bodies and lives from new perspec-tives.”

Of those classes that are brand new, many were intended exclusively for first-years. These First Year Seminars (FYS) can help smooth the transition into Brandeis and allow students to be exposed to Brandeis’ expectations for writing and the communication of ideas.

Featured FYS courses for the up-coming semester run the gamut from Trash (FYS 50B) with Professor Mary Campbell to Exploring Dark Matter and Dark Energy in the New Uni-verse (FYS 71B) with Professor John Wardle.

As Campbell elaborated, “They can only be taken by first-year students. This course was designed for them … [the] courses are designed to appeal widely and aren’t terribly disciplinary, though they can be counted as elec-tives toward a student’s major.”

A complete list of all of next se-mester’s Hidden Gems, along with brief descriptions of the courses, was sent in an email to all students by the Office of Academic Services last week.

Students raise awareness for North Korean refugees Chess Club scores victoryBy Joon Park

Staff By Jess LindeEditor

Spring 2015 offers academic ‘Hidden Gems’

By Hannah Stewart Staff

photo from internet source

photo from internet source

photo from internet source

By Michelle KimEditor

SCRAM combines psychology and art

On Thursday, Nov. 6, the Student Committee for the Rose Art Mu-seum (SCRAM) co-hosted a “Lamp Night/Late Night” event with the Psychology Club. The event, hosted at the Rose, consisted of a discus-sion of artist Magnus Plessen’s work “1914: Magnus Plessen” and was at-tended by a number of respectful and interested students. By the end of the event, all of the chairs were full, and there were another dozen students standing at the back of the room. The exhibit conveys the shock and break-ing of soldiers’ identities by war.

The event was led by psychology graduate student Kenneth Pitts, who talked about PTSD and war’s effect on human psychology. Pitts is a Ph.D. candidate in the Psychology Depart-ment’s Brain, Body and Behavior program. He earned his undergradu-ate degree in biology and psychology from the University of Massachusetts Lowell. As a researcher at Brandeis’ Health Psychology Laboratory, Pitts hopes to apply his work on stress and health to disorders such as PTSD, seasonal affective disorder and major depressive disorder.

According to Clara Gray ’15, presi-dent of the Psychology Club, she and SCRAM President Alex Hall ’15 wanted to co-sponsor an event. Gray, who is a research assistant in the Health Psychology Lab that Pitts works in, thought that Pitts would be an ideal candidate for speaking at Lamp Night/Late Night.

Pitts was an extremely appropri-ate speaker for this event because

he himself was in the United States Army. “I entered into the Army as a infantry private in April 1989. My first combat experience was in Panama in December 1989 through January 1990. Also, on my first en-listment, I was involved in a training for a number of contingency opera-tions that never happened including hostage rescue missions in South America and in Kuwait during the first Gulf War,” he told SCRAM.

After 9/11, Pitts spent three of the following 10 years overseas and was deployed to Bosnia-Herzegovinia, Kosovo and Afghanistan—the latter in 2011. In October 2012, he retired as a Sergeant Major after 23.5 years of service.

Interestingly, Pitts does not think that military-related suicides result from PTSD. Instead, he believes that the difficulty of fitting back into nor-mal civilian life has a very strong cor-relation to these suicides. “It was like I had left the real world [the military] and entered a cartoon,” he said.

“Stress helps us adapt to the en-vironment we live in. I will use a metaphor: Stress is an elastic band. It stretches out, then relaxes back to its original shape. But if the elastic band is stretched and strained for too long, it is fundamentally changed and does not function as it used to.”

Pitts continued to talk about the physiological aspects of stress and told his audience about the effects of cortisol and adrenaline, which are two hormones that induce the mobi-lization and liberation of energy to help one face challenge.

Because Pitts talked about his own personal experiences, he was able to successfully lead an enticing discussion that was understandable to those who are perhaps did not

know much about physiology and psychology. He told the audience the basic mechanics of depression after returning home from deployment: The absence of high stress and high hormone activity leads to the drop-ping of body system and, eventually, depression.

Everyday, 22 veterans commit sui-

cide because, despite the fact that the elasticity of stress is not returning to normal after coming back home, these veterans are expecting them-selves to feel the same as they did before deployment. “You’re not bro-ken. You only seem broken when you return,” Pitts said.

Simple but successful, the event

was more than a lecture on stress, art and war. There were times when Pitts had to take a slight pause to gather himself because of the emotional and personal value PTSD and war has to him. Although there was not a lot of talk about the Plessen exhibit, Pitt’s stories and explanations were more than sufficient.

By Sabrina PondStaff

In a show of wit and flair, Brandeis’ Hold Thy Peace theater group pre-sented Shakespeare’s “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” in a more modern adaptation of the long-standing comedy. The show was artfully craft-ed and stitched together, aligning all the parts of a production—act-ing, scenery, lighting, costumes and makeup—impeccably. The play was particularly gripping because of the cast’s outstanding talent and comfort performing together, which shone through every moment of the perfor-mance.

It is undeniable that the actors knew precisely how to use the stage to their advantage, and could aptly direct their lines to get the greatest reaction from the audience. The play was riddled with uproarious laugh-ter from the audience throughout the entirety of the performance. “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” was an undeniably solid play because it per-fectly balances humor, romance, sto-ryline and fairy-tale. In some aspects, “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” en-tertained the bright-eyed child inside all of us—it was nearly impossible not to be enchanted by pointy ears and pouches full of glitter. All in all, the many elements of the play came together and made for a great escape from reality.

The play was performed a total of four times over the weekend in the Shapiro Campus Center Theater. The stage’s background scenery was large and intricate. It included a large tree

in the center of several tall, white, Greek columns, all of which had been spray painted with graffiti. Be-cause the set had two stories, it was possible for some actors to use the stage to their advantage to create an altogether more dynamic show.

The cast of “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” featured a shockingly large number of actors who were new to Brandeis’ stage: Riely Allen ’18 as Bottom, Amanda Ehrmann ’18 as Snout, Alex Peters ’18 as Flute, Tova Weinberger ’18 as Hermia, Raphael Stigliano ’18 as Demetrius and Ben Sheinkopf ’18 as Starveling. Overall, they were astoundingly professional and exuded a self-assurance that only strengthened their performances. Their strong presence on the stage made it difficult to deduce that they were first-years, or that they had never performed in a college setting before.

They had discovered their charac-ter in a way that only the most prac-ticed, most respected actors can—and truly became that character. A notable example was first-year Sara Kenney’s performance as Puck, the mischievous and devious fairy. Ken-ney’s ability to manipulate her man-nerisms, gestures and voice to effec-tively deliver lines and interact with other characters was truly uncanny. Even though she was not the center of attention, Kenney knew how to present her character and add an ex-tra layer of complexity to a scene.

The director’s note was especially appropriate considering the wacky, magical nature of the show: “In Midsummer the fringe folks and the oddballs get the last word. The fair-

ies play merry havoc with the stately lovers. The rude mechanicals get the vaunted performance before the Duke. Everyone ends up basically where they started out, with just a little more love to spare.” In such few words, the director captured the enchanted spirit of the play and the bizarre, though absolutely engrossing nature of the show. HTP’s rendition of the comedy did well to shock the play and revive it from its graveyard on the dusty library bookshelf. All it

needed was a group of thoroughly talented Brandeis students to resusci-tate the old, wrinkly pages and liven the old verses.

The play fittingly closed with Puck’s final monologue. The lights had been turned off aside from a sin-gle spotlight, shrouding the stage in complete darkness except for Puck, who stared intently out at the audi-ence. In a voice intended to subdue the audience, Puck’s final remarks solidified the illusion that this was

a real-life fairytale: “That you have but slumber’d here/ While these vi-sions did appear/ And this weak and idle theme/ No more yielding but a dream.” Kenney concludes the play by placing her hand in a tiny pouch and blowing a fist full of fairy dust to the audience. The dust particles re-flected the light from up above, shim-mering a whole spectrum of colors into the first few rows. The effect was complete, and the audience couldn’t help but look on in wonder.

photo from internet sourcehold thy peace Brandeis Shakespeare theater group puts on successful adaptation of A Midsummer Night’s Dream.

kenneth pitts Psychology graduate student gives moving talkphoto from internet source

ARTS, ETC.4 The Brandeis Hoot November 7, 2014

HTP’s ‘Midsummer’ enchants audience

November 7, 2014 The Brandeis Hoot ARTS 5

By Clayre BenzadonStaff

Deptford Goth’s recent marriage inspires ‘Songs’

British experimental pop producer and singer Daniel Woolhouse’s recent marriage became his inspiration for his new album “Songs,” which came out Monday, Nov. 3 under his stage name, Deptford Goth. With songs described as “ethereal, spectral R&B” tunes, artist Daniel Woolhouse hails from Peckham, Southeast London. Woolhouse started fusing his song-writing roots in guitar and piano with a more electronic approach that “sits somewhere between real and the syn-thetic.”

The name and titles of the songs in Deptford Goth’s new album suggest hopefulness. They give off a sense of permanence (as suggested by the title “Relics”), a union (“The Lovers,” “We Symbolise” and “Two Hearts”) and a relationship that circles around (“Cir-cle” and “The Loop”), symbolizing that their marriage is forever. How-ever, the soft and slow electric synths create more of a somber tone.

Even though it clashes with hap-piness that is supposed to come as a result of marriage, the songs aren’t depressing. Rather, they contain many complex layers of sound, voice and meaningful lyrics that serve to reflect the challenges he will have to face when he becomes a parent soon enough:

“I’m a mother, I’m a father/ One position is another/ I’ll be loyal, you’ll

be good/ Holding to each other like we know we should/ We make ba-bies, watch them grow/Teach them what we know and then let them go./ Love your mother, love your fa-ther/ one position is another.” These lyrics demonstrate Deptford Goth’s anxiety about the future of parenting and reminded of his duty of becom-ing a role model to his children. He also says that an integral part of the relationship is being “loyal,” not only to his children but to his partner and maintaining this relationship is what will prove the most successful to their children’s’ growth.

On the other hand, however, Dept-ford Goth realizes that this change is something that he needs in his life and even though there will be chal-lenges, as is characteristic of most transitions, he becomes hopeful to-ward the middle of his tracks. “Here is a place where we can grow our-selves, my love,” he says in “Do Ex-ist,” claiming that this stage in both his and his partner’s life will be an enriching experience that will help them to grow as people.

Additionally, in his song “Two Hearts,” we see this determination again: “Many heads may roll/ But there’s nothing quite like two hearts/ We’ve got these in us/ We’ve got these in us/ Fell a mountain down/ But there’s nothing quite like two hearts/ We’ve got our peace in us.” Even through the difficulties, he has faith that his marriage with his partner and their commitment to each other

will get them through the toughest of obstacles, with their two hearts to-gether as one.

The struggles are also reflected through the artwork of the album. A painting of an incomplete, vague figure reminiscent of a monster is de-picted, with a face but no eyes, ears or mouth. It clasps its white, pale hands together, trying to reconcile its innocence with the conflicts that progressively are making the figure less and less innocent through the experiences that it has already gone through. This is symbolized through the orange and gray colors in the face and inside its body.

The gray that seems to be going through the monster’s body starts to manifest its body, almost taking it over, grabbing on to the left arm to try to pull the character inside of himself as if to get him to look inside himself, reflect upon himself even more and transform him whole.

One of the biggest problems of this album, however, is that the elec-tronic, synth-pop percussion drowns Deptford Goth’s vocals out, almost as if he wasn’t confident even to let his vocals pour out through the emo-tional songs. Lyrically and melodi-cally, “Songs” does an impressive job of creating a mixture between lay-ered sounds and smooth harmonies but this overpowers the lyrics and the meaning of each song, which are difficult to hear with so much other beautifully distracting background musical progressions.

Library Lamentations By Linjie Xu

Frozen Over By Katherine Selector

ARTS RECOMMENDS: Spring 2015Want to take a cool arts related class at Brandeis, but aren’t sure where to start?

Let The Hoot make some suggestions:ANTH 159A—Museums and Public Memory [ss]

Explores the social and political organization of public memory, including museums, cultural villages, and memo-rial sites. Who has the right to determine the content and form of such institutions? Working with local community members, students will develop a collaborative exhibition project.

---ENG 32B—The Black Transnational Romance [hum]

Explores the romance in black diaspora fictions spanning the 20th and 21st centuries, including writers such as McKay, Kincaid and Dangarembga. Theoretical approaches will frame our understandings of the making and un-making of diaspora and genre. Special one-time offering, spring 2015.

---AMST 129A—From American Movie Musicals to Music Videos [ss]

Examines the spectacle of song and dance in movie musicals and music videos, beginning with the earliest talking pictures in the late 1920s and continuing to the present. Particular emphasis will be on technological change, race, gender and the commodification of culture, among other topics.

---FILM 124B—Israeli Documentary Film [ss]

Follows the documentaries in Israel from the founding of the state through the thematic liberalization after 1967 and the creation of radical narrative in the wake of 1973. A further transformation in the 1990s led to very personal stories. Special one-time offering, spring 2015.

---THA 48A—Dramaturgy Practicum

Yields half-course credit. May not be repeated for credit.

A hands-on course providing exposure to and experience in the practical aspects of dramaturgy and dramaturgi-cal research. Under professional direction or supervision, students develop a working knowledge of dramaturgy through either serving as dramaturg or assisting a professional damaturg on a Brandeis Theater Company or Undergraduate Theater Collective production, or as part of a pre-approved project within or outside the university. Students will meet periodically with their advisers to report on their progress.

Class descriptions taken from the course catalog.

Students question six administrative members at round table From ROUND TABLE, page 1

plans to staff and manage the cen-ter.

Later on, a student asked about ef-forts to encourage coordination be-tween various services on campus, noting a petition Brandeis Students Against Sexual Violence sent to ad-ministrators requesting semi-regular meetings between groups. Flagel said that he supports these meetings, but noted it can be difficult to bring about coordination between student groups. He also discussed the task force currently working to analyze the best possible ways to protect students from sexual violence on campus.

Throughout the discussion, a series of concerns were raised regarding public safety. One student noted how

easily anyone can enter campus and its buildings. Touchette explained that people generally feel quite com-fortable at Brandeis, but stressed the need to report any suspicious behav-ior. He also said he is interested in continuing a conversation about re-forming guest policies.

Several questions were also posed on the subject of sustainability, in-cluding the use of disposable plates and silverware at Sherman. The ad-ministrators explained they are wait-ing to replace the broken dishwasher in Sherman until the large-scale ren-ovation of the facility this summer, explaining that the cost of disposable utensils is significantly less than that of a new dishwasher. Another issue was the number of lights left on in empty buildings at night. Gray af-

firmed his commitment to energy conservation and explained his desire to begin a series of sustainability cam-paigns, naming “Turn Off the Lights” as a worthy option.

A few students discussed the small number of gender-neutral facilities. Flagel commented, “What would be enormously helpful is to get togeth-er with a campus map so you could help me understand where the largest problems are … so that we can take a proactive look.” He also stated that gender-neutral housing is something he would like to look further into.

There was also a discussion about tuition, current efforts to manage costs and the process of budgeting university funds.

“It’s the constant push and pull of how can we maintain increases in

tuition as low as we possibly can, at the same time sustain the biggest commitment to financial aid and maintain the level of the student ex-perience that you all have every right to expect,” Flagel said. “The process becomes a balancing act.”

He described the “robust discus-sions” that take place regarding bud-geting. There was also a discussion regarding how to bring increased student participation into these dis-cussions. A student questioned why there is such a small student presence in the budgeting process. Flagel and Lynch replied that there are student representatives at Board of Trustees meetings, whom they encourage to speak up. To this, another student stated that there are only two repre-sentatives for the entire student body,

and that they are not allowed to re-port back on the meetings. Flagel re-sponded, and stated that there is also one representative for the graduate students.

He explained that the Board of Trustees is primarily composed of alumni along with faculty, all “in-dividuals who care deeply” about Brandeis. Lynch also said that in the past, there have been hearings be-tween the budgeting committee and student council, and she hopes to bring back these exchanges in the future. At the close of the discussion, Student Union President Sneha Wa-lia ’15 and Chief of Staff Flora Wang ’15 thanked administers for coming and encouraged students to continue conversations and always make their voices heard on campus.

Brandeis gears up for community kindness By Liya Wizevich &

Charlotte AaronStaff

Thursday, Nov. 13 is Kindness Day at Brandeis. Kindness Day, founded five years ago, is a Brandeis tradition.

Undergraduate organizer Gabby Zilkha ’16 said, “Kindness Day was brought to Brandeis by a faculty member who thought this was a per-fect fit for our school and a great way to bring together staff, faculty and students to unite with a common mission.” Zilkha said the staff who make this day happen range from undergraduates to the Chaplaincy to many other departments across campus. To increase excitement for Kindness Day, a Brandeis Kind-ness Day Facebook page has been

up and running, and students have been chronicling their enthusiasm with posts featuring “#deiskindness.” Every time a student uploads a selfie onto the page, they are entered in a daily raffle for Kindness Day prizes. Anyone who participates in all nine daily competitions is entered in a raf-fle for the Kindness Package.

Additionally, every student who writes a kind comment about a friend on the Brandeis Kindness Day face-book cover photo is entered, along with the friend they wrote about, in a raffle to win a Kindness Day shirt. For example, Zilkha participated in the raffle and wrote, “Nicole Cardona is the true epitome of kindness.”

Kindness Day events will officially start on Tuesday, Nov. 11. when stu-dents will have the opportunity to mail free Kindness Day postcards to

their friends, faculty members and staff members. E-cards will also be available to send to family members and students abroad.

“This year we ordered 4,000 Kind-ness Day postcards. Last year we had 3,500 and we actually ran out,” Zilkha said. Postcards will be available for pick up in Lower Usdan, Sherman, the Shapiro Campus Center and the International Lounge. Specific times at which students can pick up cards are listed on the Kindness Day Face-book page.

Events in preparation for Kind-ness Day will continue throughout the weekend and into next week. Brandeis’ kindness club, the Ripple Effect, is hosting Laughter Yoga on Tuesday, Nov. 11 in the SCC multi-purpose room at 7 p.m.

“I think it’s awesome that Brandeis

has the initiative to have a day dedi-cated to be kind to one another. I also think that generally students are kind to each other on a regular basis, and this is a day that allows me to be ex-tra extra kind to others without being weird,” said Jessica Ortega ’15, a kind-ness catcher.

Zilkha, when asked about her fa-vorite Kindness Day event respond-ed, “We have a bunch of really cool things happening at the International Lounge. It’s like a few community ser-vice projects, celebration events, mu-sic playing and Kindness Day cards.”

Other events happening on Kind-ness Day include Blankets for Cradles to Crayons, where participants can tie no-sew fleece blankets to go to Cra-dles to Crayons, an organization that supports children living in homeless or low-income situations, the Student

Events Stress-Buster, where students can color, decorate their own pillow-case, enjoy a free massage from a pro-fessional, play video games and more and Garden of Kindness, where stu-dents can drink free warm cider and indulge in a chocolate fountain.

In addition to the planned events, there will be “pop-up events” through-out the day. Some of these events in-clude the distribution of free tooth-brushes on the Rabb Steps from the Pre-Dental Society and free art sup-plies at the Rose Art Museum where students can craft their own flowers.

“I hope that students can see Kind-ness Day and the power that small acts of kindness can have on a commu-nity,” said Zilkha. A full list of events and times, as well as e-cards, can be found on the Brandeis Kindness Day Facebook page.

Spike in alcohol-related incidentsBy Victoria Aronson

editor

According to the Brandeis Univer-sity Police Department Media Log, this past weekend alone, BEMCo responded to a total of 10 incidents involving intoxicated students. There were 21 medical emergencies report-ed in the media log release on Nov. 2. Therefore, alcohol-related incidents comprised over 42 percent of the medical emergencies reported. Al-though not included in the media log as a medical emergency, an intoxicat-ed male student was taken into police custody as well.

Responding to the high incidence rate of alcohol-related emergencies, Director of Public Safety Edward Cal-lahan explained, “Halloween fell on a Friday this year, and I believe there were several parties on and off cam-pus that may have attributed to the in-crease in alcohol-related transports.” He reported that it is not uncommon to witness a higher rate of issues par-ticularly when Halloween falls on a Friday or Saturday evening.

On Saturday evening, BEMCo re-sponded to an incident involving an intoxicated male student in the Charles River Area. Taken into police custody due to his refusal to cooper-ate with BEMCo staff, the individual

NEWS6 NEWS The Brandeis Hoot November 7, 2014

in question was then transported to the Waltham Police Department. The Brandeis police media log reports, “Heavily intoxicated male refused to cooperate with BEMCo staff and was placed in protective custody by uni-versity police. Officers transported individual to Waltham Police Dept. CDC notified.”

When asked what circumstances warranted the arrest of the subject, Callahan responded, “The individual in question was belligerent and com-bative, which resulted in a protective custody situation.” He emphasized that the individual was placed in po-lice custody to ensure his own safety.

Seven of the 10 alcohol related med-ical emergencies warranted transpor-tation via ambulance to the hospital. The media report reads, “Call for an intoxicated female. BEMCo dis-patched to Castle along with Univer-sity Police. BEMCo units treat party. Catlado Ambulance ALS # 21 trans-porting to Newton Wellesley Hospital. CDC notified.”

Students are urged to call BEMCo at (781) 736-333 in the case of an alco-hol-related or medical-related emer-gency. In a previous interview with The Brandeis Hoot, Jeffrey Katz ’15, director of BEMCo, emphasized “BE-MCo has worked with the Department of Public Safety to assure that students

who call BEMCo for their medical at-tention or that of a fellow member of the Brandeis community will not get into trouble. There are BUPD officers on almost every BEMCo call, but they are there for the safety of the BEMCo members and the patient(s); not to

discipline students.”When students call BEMCo for

alcohol- or other medical-related in-cidents, a Brandeis police officer is required to arrive at the scene as well. “The police respond to all medical calls on campus for a myriad of rea-

sons, including safety, coordination with city EMS/fire personnel and crowd control.

The police are ultimately respon-sible for the safety of the injured/impaired community member,” said Callahan.

FEATURESFleitman ’17 celebrates a love of language

By Nathan Benjamineditor

Many college students across the country experience difficul-ties finding their passions, and moreover, finding a subject of study to pair along with it. Tali Fleitman ’17 is the exception. With a double major in Health: Science, Society and Policy and Economics, along with a minor in French, Fleitman is also fluent in four different languages.

She was born and raised in Mexico City. With an Israeli mother, Fleitman was exposed to Hebrew by speaking it at home, and Spanish, because it was the language of the city around her. It was in Mexico that Fleitman dis-covered and celebrated her love of soccer.

At age 14, however, she knew that she had to make a choice: either pursue her dream of soc-cer or continue with her studies. With an interest in potentially completing high school in the United States, Fleitman ulti-mately chose the latter. After ap-plying, and later being accepted, to a boarding school in Florida, she began to attend the school in the middle of ninth grade. It was in Florida that Fleitman had her first true exposure to the English language.

“It was really hard for me at first, because coming into school, I didn’t know past basic English. I was placed within an English as a Second Language program, and

Tali Fleitman

“I am very interested in studying languages because I love being able to

communicate with people on a more personal level.”

7 FEATURES. The Brandeis Hoot November 7, 2014

for a month and I was constantly asking people what things meant,” said Fleitman.

While she enjoyed her time in the United States, after complet-ing ninth grade, Fleitman decided to go back to Mexico to live with her family. She ultimately finished her sophomore year in Mexico City. However, upon the year’s end, Fleitman made the deci-sion to spend the summer in Is-rael to visit her family. While the plan was to return to Mexico at the end of the summer, Fleitman decided to stay and live with her grandmother for familial reasons. Attending the American Interna-tional School in Israel, Fleitman discovered her love of French and studied it during her two remain-ing years of high school. Being in Israel during that time was also productive for her, as she was able to take care of her grandmother and continue with her studies.

Coming into Brandeis Univer-sity her first year, however, Fleit-man had no intentions of taking French, and didn’t in her first year. “While I stopped study-ing French completely for a year, in the back of my mind I always knew that I needed to continue. I wanted to improve my language skills in French, to be fluent or at least proficient.”

This need was satisfied when Fleitman attended the French program at the Middlebury Lan-guage Schools in Vermont the following summer. In fact, the immersion environment that this program featured allowed Fleit-man to return to Brandeis speak-

photo by briana mussman

LANGUAGE Tali Fleitman has lived in three countries, and is currently fluent in four different languages.

ing fluent French. “Coming back to Brandeis, I was very motivated to not only continue my studies in French and pursue a minor in the language, but I have also now started studying Chinese at Brandeis.”

When asked where her passion for languages comes from, Fleit-man states, “I am very interested

in studying languages because I love being able to communicate with people on a more personal level. A lot of time, so much in someone’s identity is missed by not understanding a person’s cul-ture or by not having the ability to understand someone express themselves in their native tongue.”

At the moment, Fleitman’s fu-

ture plans include applying her studies at Brandeis and her pas-sion for language in China. She states, “I am very interested in go-ing to China to attempt to under-stand the lack of correlation be-tween the economic growth they have been experiencing and the health care system present within the country.”

ARTS, ETC.November 7, 2014 The Brandeis Hoot 8

Monday night marked Brandeis Beats’ first drum circle of the semes-ter, bringing laughter and excitement to the lively group. Brandeis Beats is a club devoted to making music and involving the community in a peace-ful, relaxing and cooperative activ-ity. First-years and seniors, first-time visitors and long-time members, all kicked off their shoes and took their place in the circle, a perfect place for meeting new people.

After going around and giving just a few short introductions, the group delved into music, choosing their in-struments from the many authentic

instruments available, such as several types and sizes of drums, bells and rattles. With few guidelines or restric-tions imposed, the group was ready to perform. One leader began the music with a single beat, and individuals added themselves in until each par-ticipant had joined in with their own addition. What arose was a true com-munity setting in which all students purged the stresses of a Monday night by playing beautiful instruments straight from Ghana, being urged to hit the drums as hard as possible with as much energy as possible. The purpose of the event was not to show off musical expertise but to exercise a freedom of expression.

This session was led primarily by Jeremy Cohen, who engages Brandeis students in many drumming work-shops throughout the year. His high-energy and passion for drumming

fueled the energy of the group as he welcomed both first-time drummers and those with professional-level skill. Cohen urged the skilled drum-mers to take the lead, while also mak-ing sure to include those who lacked experience but were looking to get in-volved by providing small tricks and tips as he went along with the session. He is founder of ThisWorldMusic, an organization that provides cultural learning opportunities around the world through a shared love of music. Cohen’s experience and expertise in engaging youth was evident at Mon-day’s event.

Although stifled by the university setting and lacking a common com-munity space, the group has in no way been held back. Brandeis Beats has an abundance of instruments for its attendees to choose from, as well as strong ties to other community-

oriented groups on campus. The club has partnered with Waltham Group, for example, to reach out to the greater Waltham community and en-gage its citizens. In addition to their success in creating partnerships, the group was just recently able to secure a permanent space on Monday nights in Gosman, above Linsey Pool. The new space will hopefully allow the group to generate a larger attendance, although the turnout proved quite successful at their first assembly of the semester.

Aliza Gans ’15, club founder and president, was among those gathered Monday night. Like Cohen, her en-ergy and enthusiasm sparked creativ-ity and passion in the drum circle. She arrived with snacks and eager to meet the new members. Gans started the group with some background ex-perience in drum circles and a vision

for what she wanted to create here at Brandeis. She explained that her in-spiration came from a summer of at-tending drum circles in Central Park and even joining in to accompany the other drummers. She founded the group with an emphasis on both music and community. Her passion for the music is clear in the efforts she has made in creating the club.

This truly unique club welcomes all skill levels and ages to participate, and hosts a variety of events that stu-dents may attend. In partnerships with other groups on campus, there is a strong element of community and community service in addition to practicing and enjoying music. Regu-lar meetings are Monday nights from 7:30 to 9:00 p.m. Musical expertise is welcomed but not required. If inter-ested in attending future meetings or events, contact Aliza Gans.

This week, The Decemberists re-leased their first new single in almost four years. “Make You Better” is the first track to be released off of their upcoming album, to be titled “What a Terrible World, What a Beautiful World.” The album is set to be re-leased mid-January 2015.

For long-time Decemberists fans, “Make You Better” provides a sigh of relief and happiness as the band seems to have abandoned the coun-try-inspired twang that their last full album “The King is Dead” carried.

The song starts off with a simple guitar and lead singer Colin Meloy, soon breaking out into the full band—fiddle, piano, bass and all. “I want you, thin fingers, I wanted you, thin fingernails,” Meloy begins. The song has all of the detailed charm of any Decemberists classic, though definitely in a more mature fashion. Lyric fanatics still see Meloy’s sig-nature wordplay with lines utilizing

“twinges” and “tattletales” and a “per-fect paramour.” What listeners may (or may not) miss, however, are the dead babies, pirates and gadabouts of The Decemberists past.

The band seems to realize that they’re growing up, as the chorus of the new single declares, “But we’re not so starry eyed anymore.” And it just might be true. Having been on hiatus for the past few years, members of The Decemberists have continued to experiment out in the world. While Colin Meloy attempted to find suc-cess flying solo, fellow band members Chris Funk, Nate Query and Jenny Conlee built up their other band, Black Prairie. Once a side project, Black Prairie officially legitimized themselves with their third full-length album “Fortune,” released earlier this year. After only releasing their first album in 2010, Black Prai-rie took advantage of the time off of being The Decemberists. Now, having played at gigs as big as Newport Folk Festival and written a soundtrack for Jon Mooallem’s book “Wild Ones,” Black Prairie is on the map.

As his bandmates delved deeper

into the music world in the past four years, band leader Colin Meloy ex-plored a different creative world, writ-ing a series of children’s books. “Wild-wood” came out in 2011 and was a New York Times Bestseller. Meloy has released two subsequent novels in the series since then, including “Under Wildwood” and “Wildwood Impe-rium.”

After spending some time apart, though, it is nice to see the gang back together again and coming out with music that is a little wiser, but still as personal and catchy as their old classics. Fans will be happy looking through the track titles of the album, even though they can’t listen yet. Even the names of the songs echo a more sophisticated version of The Decemberists’ flair. From “The Singer Addresses His Audience,” to “Anti-Summersong,” each of the 14 tracks has a hint of charm and is begging to be listened to.

“Make You Better” is available on iTunes, with “What a Terrible World, What a Beautiful World” available for pre-order. The band will be on tour in Europe starting in February 2015.

By Emma KahnSpecial to the Hoot

By Theresa GaffneyEditor

photos from internet source

The Decemberists get better in ‘Make You Better’

the decemberists ‘Make You Better’ predicts sucess for up-coming album.

photos by sharon cai/the hootbrandeis beats Students enjoy themsevels at first drum circle of the semester

Kickoff event for Brandeis Beats engages students

THIS WEEK IN PHOTOS9 The Brandeis Hoot November 7, 2014

rain Fall brings rain to the Brandeis Campus

photo by karen caldwell/the hoot

photo by karen caldwell/the hoot

photos by marian siljeholm/the hoot

gun violence Paula Doress-Worters and Linda Bond speak on gun violence and feminism at the Womens Studies Research Center.

sunshine Sun shines through the trees

lecture On Monday Nov. 3, multiple people spoke at the 30th Anniversary Joshua A. Guberman Lecture.

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“To acquire wisdom, one must observe.”Editor-in-ChiefDana Trismen

Senior Managing EditorVictoria Aronson

Managing EditorsTheresa GaffneyAndrew Elmers

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Website EditorsZak Kolar

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University administrators and the Student Union recently hosted a roundtable discussion for the Brandeis

community to address various issues, ranging from tuition to campus sustainability, in a free and open setting.

While the event was an honest effort by the Student Union to alleviate student concerns, the answers provided by the administration were unfortunately vague and eerily similar to responses given in the past, while other answers were just confusing.

For example, one student brought up the use of paper products in Sherman. The reason administration gave for this centered around the broken dishwasher in Sherman and the determination that buying disposable paper products was more cost effective than buying a new dishwasher. The administration plans to replace the dishwasher over the summer. However, this is not the first time that the dish-

washer has broken—paper and plastic products were used for extensive periods of time last year as well. As well, waiting until the summer to fix a problem that is causing considerable waste every day is not an effective solution.

It becomes increasingly difficult to hold faith in the claims made by administration when it seems that time and time again, these claims are not fulfilled. Students need more than a corporate promise to fix our problems; we need real action.

The administration is usually capable of giving a well-worded response when students voice their concerns. Yet it often takes a signifi-cant period of time for the Brandeis admin-istration to follow up on its statements and to invoke some sort of action that could provide a meaningful change in the lives of students.

Too many topics covered at the round table discussion are issues that have been rehashed multiple times on the Brandeis campus. From

the need to create a sustainable campus to providing students the safety and security they deserve with more robust sexual violence prevention and services, the administration continues to fail in taking the necessary rapid action. While it is true that there have been improvements in terms of sexual violence services, in the form of the Rape Crisis Center, these changes only occurred after many repeated student requests, demonstrations and a petition.

These roundtable discussions have the potential to create a productive dialogue between students and administration. However, it needs to be a conversation between students and administration on how to make proactive decisions and more legitimate plans. For now, while democratic and admirable, the round-table discussions are merely an accessory to help the administration brush off concerns for a later date.

Administration can offer more than just lip service

EDITORIALS10 The Brandeis Hoot November 7, 2014

STAFFCharlotte Aaron, Clayre Benzadon, Ethan Ber-

celi, Rachel Bossuk, Robin Briendel, Sharon Cai, Karen Caldwell, Shikha Chandarana, Rachel

Dobkin, Curtis Zunyu He, Kevin Healey, Shayna Korol, Carter Kunkle, Joe Lanoie, Nabi Menai,

Monique J Menezes, Joon Park, Lisa Petrie, Alli-son Plotnik, Sabrina Pond, Emily Scharf, Marian Siljeholm, Emily Smith, Naomi Soman, Hannah Stewart, Vardges Tserunyan, Joe Vigil, Michael Wang, Sophia Warren, Shreyas Warrier, Liya

Wizevich, Ludi Yang

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SPORTSNovember 7, 2014 SPORTS 11

The Tri-Match Senior Day of vol-leyball began with heavyweight op-ponent Babson Beavers, who hold the title of No. 1 team in the confer-ence. After a cheering start in the first set as the Judges dropped the ham-mer with 25-21, the game turned out to be a turnaround for the Beavers as they spared the Judges no chance of comeback by finishing the game with three straight wins with scores of 25-20, 25-18 and 25-13. The Judges would go into the next combat with a 7-21 record while Babson rose to 23-8 overall and 9-1 for conference games.

The fighting effort from the Judges was quite impressive in the first three sets, especially in the first set, which they managed to win. The Judges had 14 kills with a 37.9 percent hitting percentage and only three errors for the whole set. The clutch play came when the score stopped at 16-14, as players Maddie Engler ’16 and Lia Goldberg ’18 formed a solid fortress above the net to successfully hold off the Beavers’ defense and to make two key blocks. Five straight points were gained with such defensive effort, and the big lead in the late game at the end left the No. 1 seed in the con-ference a huge upset.

“We started off very strong. We’ve been playing more positive. It’s get-ting so much better after the season about being positive. And that’s a huge goal for us,” said Julie Kim ’18

Judges fall short at Babson’s turnaround

By Sarah Jousseteditor

The Brandeis volleyball team fin-ished strong this past Saturday with a 3-1 win on senior night against Eastern Connecticut State University. The Judges buzzed with emotion and excitement for their final home game of the season in which they honored the hard work of their four senior members. The team honored Elsie Bernaiche, Carly Gutner-Davis, Liz Hood and Shemira Pennyman before their final game.

The team rallied around the en-ergy associated with the seniors’ last game and pulled out a win for the senior players. The Judges started with an early 4-0 lead but lost it when the Warriors racked up six straight points. The set was close, flipping back and forth until Brandeis pulled away to secure a win of 25-20.

The second set followed a similar pattern with the Judges coming from behind at the end. However, the War-riors at first came out strong, captur-ing the lead from the Judges until Brandeis could pull ahead to secure the set at the end. Keeping the set interesting, the Warriors managed to make it a close score of 25-21, with the Judges coming out on top.

The Warriors took an early lead again in the third set, but the Judges couldn’t come back this time. The team grasped at straws in their effort to come back against ECSU, even at one point calling a timeout to break up the Warriors’ rhythm. However,

of the team’s extraordinary energy at the beginning of the match.

However, the Beavers suddenly be-came much more ferocious in the sec-ond set. The Judges weren’t ready for the adjustment when they found their strategy in offense no longer worked out and their defense was punctured by the high intensity of the Beavers’ strikes. The opponent was no longer surprised by the decoy plays from Carly Gutner Davis ’15 in the front

and their serves had much higher quality than the first set to diminish error.

“They did move some of their play-ers around. They did add some new players. They did change their lineup. They have a lot of strong players. They just came back harder. I felt in the first game they weren’t playing to their fullest,” said Kim on the halt of the Judges’ momentum in the second set. But shortly after, the team actually

hung on and the players tried their best to get themselves a comeback.

Engler was assigned to be the front hitter while Davis was put in the back to facilitate defense. The new lineup regained the impetus the team pre-sented in the first set and created a huge comeback wave as the score was suddenly changed to 18 to 21. How-ever, the Beavers fully utilized the time out to again pull themselves to-gether and to finally secure their lead

to the end of the second set.The third set started off evenly

between the two teams with points scored back and forth. The Brandeis players pushed themselves to the limit, as Amanda Nguyen ’18 finished several incredibly deep digs to save the team. Blocks also became an ef-fective weapon again to keep the team from getting far behind. Kim was quite satisfied with the Judges’ per-formance on defense: “I thought our defense is actually pretty good today. We have some strong blocks up there. Our middles worked very hard to de-fend and take some space away for our defense. I think defensewise, we just need to go out there and play our games because we have the ability in us to do well.”

But the Beavers never lowered their intensity as their energy gradu-ally outlasted the Judges. Five straight points for Beavers after an 8-10 score gained them a safe lead to eventually win another set. And then the Judges weren’t able to rediscover their win-ning momentum as they fell short at the last set by 13-25.

Despite a tough loss, the Judges truly fought hard against the strong opponent. Kim felt positive about the team’s future: “Right now our objec-tive is to push harder on finishing games. We are going back and forth with points. We just need to push a bit harder to get amount of points that we need.” Hopefully, this defeat along with other losses during this tough season could enrich the team’s experience to knit the players and the new head Coach Vaccari more firmly for the future seasons.

By Curtis Zunyu HeStaff

brandeis battles The women’s volleyball team kept the game close in saturday’s loss to Babson college

the Judges’ efforts weren’t enough, and the Warriors took the set 25-16.

The last set followed the pattern of the game, with the Judges playing catch up. The Warriors took the lead and held it, with a score of 20-15. Then the Judges rallied to come with-in two points of ECSU. The Judges called a timeout to collect themselves and then came back onto the court full force. The Judges took the lead and held it to come out with a 26-24 win for the set and a 3-1 win for the match.

The Judges recorded a .085 kill percentage for the match, which was boosted by Jessie Moore ’18. Moore lead the team with 19 kills, Maddie Engeler ’16 followed up with 10 kills, Shemira Pennyman ’15 with five kills, Jessica Kaufman ’17 with four kills, Carly Gutner-Davis ’15 with two and Elsie Bernaiche ’15 with one kill for the match. Julie Kim ’18 recorded 33 assists for the match, while libero Bernaiche contributed 30 digs.

The Judges end their home season with a record of 8-21.

The Brandeis men’s and women’s soccer teams were on the road this past weekend with games against the University of Chicago.

Men’s soccer suffered its second loss of the season against the Univer-sity of Chicago. The Judges lost 1-0, dropping to 16-2 for the season and 4-2 in the UAA conference. Men’s soccer outshot their opponent 13-5, but couldn’t capture the win. The only goal in the game came in the 76th minute by the Maroons. The Univer-sity of Chicago passed Brandeis and is

now first place in the conference with the win, and could clinch the titlewith just a win next weekend at NYU and a UC tie. However, if Brandeis wins this weekend it will tie the program record for wins in the regular season with 17 wins on the season. The wom-en’s soccer team was also defeated this weekend by the University of Chicago in a 2-0 loss. The Judges fell to 12-4-1, and 2-3-1 in the UAA conference. The Judges fought an evenly matched game, with 12 shots attempted by both teams. Both the men’s and wom-en’s soccer teams look to bounce back this Saturday, Nov. 8 against New York University.

Soccer teams suffer losses at hands of UChicago

photo from internet sourcesenior night win The Judges volleyball team won their final home game of their season against Eastern Connecticut State

photo from internet sourcesoocer deafeated by uchicago Both the men’s and women’s soccer teams suffered losses.

photo from internet source

By Sarah JoussetEditor

Volleyball finishes strong at home

OPINIONSNovember 7, 2014 The Brandeis Hoot 12

Early registration: students need not worry

By Sophie Warrenspecial to the hoot

I am a hipster. Or I would be a hipster if hip-sters defined themselves as hipsters anymore, but they don’t. So maybe I’m not a hipster after all? Is this the hipster paradox? The point re-mains: My thick-rimmed lens of the world and social media looks favorably on the sarcastic posts and ironic uses of hashtags against any other conventional mode of sharing informa-

By Andrew ElmersEditor

See CLASSES page 14

Early registration for next semester has start-ed, and as always, students have been stressing about making it into the more popular classes or trying to figure out which classes they will actu-ally take. With students sneaking out of class at their appointment times and the general angst in the air about needing consent codes from professors, early registration has certainly con-sumed campus life. And of course, the academic advisors have been busy helping students figure out their schedules. The drop-in appointments have filled rapidly and if you try to schedule an appointment with your academic advisor, you’ll find that they’re completely booked for the week.

Of course, students are bound to agonize over their courses for the spring, especially if they are still undecided on their major and want to figure out how to fulfill all of the requirements, both the general university requirements and for a future major. Yet we always seem to over-stress when it comes to registration in a way that’s pretty unnecessary. It’s perfectly reason-able to worry about making it into a class if you have a later appointment time, but to be unsure of what classes to take to begin with seems ludi-crous to me.

Talking to friends and classmates, it seems like some are just completely undecided on what classes to take for the next semester and elect to visit their academic advisors to help plan out their schedule. The benefits of this, however, remain unclear. Whenever I have met with an academic advisor, while not for picking classes, the experience mostly revolves around the advi-sor listing out policies for a question I have that can easily be found on the school’s website. I al-

photo from internet source

tion. However, when I logged onto Facebook for

the first time on Election Day, at 7:53 p.m., I found a flood of coinciding statuses that read “[Name] at voting in The 2014 U.S. Election” with a collective link to “Find out where to vote and see what’s on your ballot.” What had been going on all day via Facebook? The hipster-not-hipster in me was appalled. Here we had a clearly mainstream approach to letting people know about your personal choices on Election Day. So obvious, utterly cliche and, dare I say,

tacky. I scrolled through my homepage and mulled it over. The eclectic array of voters on my screen was astounding. It was energizing, to my complete bafflement. Voting is powerful. I love voting. As a woman, my demographic has been able to do so for fewer than 100 years in this country. I cannot help but feel it symbol-izes the equality we feel as a nation for each of its members to be represented: one person, one vote.

This being said, it is so easy for me to say this. As a white woman attending a relatively liberal

photo from internet source

Social media valuable on Election Day

ways leave wondering if it was even necessary for me to waste my, as well as the advisor’s, time. Though I mostly visit to just hear an authorita-tive voice give me a definite answer, the process of picking classes seems a bit too imaginative to warrant seeking help from an advisor.

I’m not trying to discredit the academic advi-sors at all; they are all extremely helpful, kind and knowledgable people who are sincerely try-ing their best to aid students. Yet I don’t think they can be much of a help to students as they pick classes beyond explaining to them the uni-versity requirements that, as I said before, can easily be found online. Picking classes is a com-pletely preference-based process, based on what times you want to have class, what professors you want and what actual subjects you want to study. There isn’t that much advice that can be given from someone you might have only met a few times before.

Maybe my wariness of seeking help from an advisor is a result of my disaster of a high school guidance counselor. A man on the verge of re-tirement, he would take a two-hour lunch and was never be able to sit and talk with a student when they needed to, something that grew ex-tremely frustrating when it came time to apply for colleges. Personally, I wound up taking the same class twice, even though I passed it the first time, due to a mistake by my guidance counsel-or. I wound up having to make sure my business was taken care of when it came time to register for classes or applying to colleges, because I sim-ply couldn’t trust my guidance counselor to do his job. As a result, I became pretty independent with all these tasks.

That has since transferred over into my col-lege experience, as I have found it much sim

university, I have access to polling stations and the knowledge and Internet access to obtain an absentee ballot. I feel free to express my opinion and empowered to seek changes to our govern-ment because while this system doesn’t always work for me, it does not work obviously against me either. Biased media sources and political figures who run on platforms that their voting history does not justify do not warrant trust. They do not engender belief in a system that aims to make our lives better or easier. As I’ve heard countless times before, “What is it good for?” Yet where voter ID laws, long lines and lack of education remain reasons that there is not equality in practice, every time we push to share this importance we prove that we know voting must one day fix this inequality.

In this high-tech age, the way to mobilize the masses could very well be to tell them the mun-dane activities, truths and beliefs of your life. We’ve been doing so since middle school, or whenever you first made a Facebook or Twitter account. Although an extraordinarily imperfect system, with the outdated electoral college and conspicuous means of funding, politics are the empowerment vehicles of our country. Voting is the federal right we, citizens of the United States, are granted.

Preliminary reports seem to have proven on many accounts that this Facebook link and tag chain made a difference in these midterm elec-tions. And although midterm elections seem to have, in numerous ways, bolstered the set struc-tures of new and increased federal gridlock and set the groundwork for increasingly devastating reproductive rights legislation, the ways we em-power one another still matters.

The actual non-hipster-hipster in me had a change of heart and realized that this is what social media is for. What was happening before me—the sharing of individual people voting—was a stumbling into a brewing revolution. Here was a movement, one our generation un-derstood. People weren’t preaching their belief in the importance of voting but rather their actual stance on the issues or candidates. They weren’t marching or handing out pamphlets or other forms of literature. Their form of social influence was, although subtle, much more ef-fective in action. They were telling their story, then letting us all decide for ourselves.

November 7, 2014 The Brandeis Hoot OPINIONS 13

Yik Yak’s potential for cyberbullying problematic

By Zach Phil SchwartzStaff

One of the single best ways to destroy cam-pus unity is to incite mistrust among peers. And Yik Yak, the anonymous social media app that operates almost like a geographical Twitter for college campuses, can do just that. It has the capacity to spur cyberbullying and other situa-tions that have negative implications.

If you have a smartphone that can run the app and something you just can’t wait to say to the Brandeis, Bentley and Lasell campuses (we get their “Yaks” and they get ours), you’re in luck. If you wanted to say something that you just wouldn’t when your name was attached to it, you could. This includes hilarious jokes, not so-hilarious jokes, questionable statements and in-appropriate statements, among others. Included in the others are statements that are mean, de-rogatory, hurtful and wrong. Enter cyberbully-ing.

The power of anonymity that comes with sit-ting behind a computer or smartphone screen has been associated with rampant cyberbullying for years now, since before the advent of main-stream social media. One could theoretically sit behind a computer screen and emotionally torture someone, and the victim would never find out the perpetrator’s identity. The same perpetrator could also sit behind their expen-sive smartphone saying hateful things, without having to worry about their reputation. I would love to say that nobody at the three schools our Yik Yak interacts with thinks this way, but that would be false. There are always going to be people who hide hateful thoughts behind good reputation, people who would be eager to say harmful things anonymously. It’s a way of re-lease. This release makes the app an outlet for hatred and cyberbullying.

Of course, it isn’t Yik Yak’s fault that some us-ers are just born nasty or are having bad days,

By Kevin HealeyStaff

See YIKYAK, page 15

Term limits needed for

public office

BranVan should invest in professional drivers

Two weeks ago, a woman was riding her bike at the corner of Harvard and Main Street in Waltham at around 7 p.m. She was riding along the sidewalk approaching the intersec-tion, when a BranVan approached on the al-ternate street. Making a tight curve, the van departed from its lane and hit her, trapping her underneath the hood until the fire department showed up to rescue her. Her bicycle was totally destroyed, and though the woman suffered no life-threatening injuries, she did suffer a trau-matic brain injury.

Let me start by stating that all of us love the BranVan. It can transport those of us who don’t have cars off campus, provide a ride when al-cohol makes driving or walking impossible or even just bring us from the Village to Rabb if walking up the hill is too much effort. The sys-tem allows greater mobility and ease of access on campus, and many feel they couldn’t live without that. Well, as long as the system func-tions, people love it. The vans do have a tenden-cy to run late, miss stops … and sometimes hit people. Though serious failures of policy such as accidents are rare, every day, minor errors are made and mistakes occur. These failures are, by and large, attributable to the hiring of student drivers for the system. We need to do something about those hiring practices to avoid the failures of the status quo.

I understand why the BranVan hires student drivers: cheap, easy access to labor. Student drivers can generally be paid less than profes-sionals, and with federal work study, the gov-ernment often offsets the cost of their wages. In addition, it’s easier to train and manage your employees when they all live within 15 minutes of your office. I’ll admit these benefits are sig-nificant, but the hiring of student drivers has also led to many of the harms associated with

Some sad news came across the airwaves last week when former Boston mayor Thomas Menino passed away from cancer. The city’s longest serving mayor, Menino was one of the great American politicians and led Boston into the 21st century like no one else could. He led the city through one of its greatest tragedies, the Marathon bombings of 2013, and invoked the spirit of “Boston Strong” through his words and leadership afterwards.

Yet one of the few knocks you could make on Menino was how he continued to run for mayor although he claimed at the beginning of his ad-ministration he would only run for two terms. He eventually served five. With the recent mid-term elections, certainly terms are on the minds of many, as long-running incumbents continue to win elections based solely on name recogni-tion and local network that aids them tremen-dously in reassuring their elections. People like Mitch McConnell, the Republican Senator from Kentucky, continue to run for office and win, although they’ve grown disillusioned with and disinterested in the actual problems facing their constituents. It also prevents new ideas that a 72-year-old man would never agree with from reaching the Senate floor and keeps the country behind.

McConnell, the butt of many of Jon Stewart’s jokes, just won his sixth term as a U.S. senator and doesn’t seem to be on the verge of retire-ment anytime soon, nor does it seem like he is ever in danger of losing his seat. The process of democracy is thus severely corrupted when senators and representatives are allowed to keep running. Voters grow disillusioned with the process and won’t show up to the polls when they know the same candidate will win each election, and the actual candidate is never actu-ally accountable for his voting record or deci-sions in office.

For Congress, there should absolutely be term limits on offices so that at least some new ideas are brought into the halls of the Capitol every 10 years or so, and that the senators and rep-resentatives actually do their jobs and try to invoke change through their position of power. There’s a reason why term limits exist in the first place—so that those in charge don’t gain too much power and change the course of the country. This is what we risk when we let people like Mitch McConnell, or Nancy Pelosi, who has served as a representative from California for 13 two-year terms, continue seeking office. Former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg changed the city’s constitution to allow himself to run for a third term in 2009, which he won, completely making a mockery of the democratic process. The same, tired faces get the check mark on John King’s big board on election night, and it’s a discredit to our country to let it happen.

Although we might lose out on actually de-cent and positive politicians like Menino by imposing term limits for both federal and state offices, there are simply too many bad seeds to not do it. For every Menino in public office, there’s at least 20 McConnells or Pelosis who are essentially keeping the country in gridlock. And it’s not like a politician like Menino would be prevented from still being in the public eye and doing just as much good as he did from the mayor’s office. In fact, he might have been more apt to take on new causes and spend more time on them without having to keep the formalities of his office if he wasn’t allowed to continue run-ning for mayor. It is the incumbents we need to weed out of office. They simply have too much power and security in their jobs to actually be productive, and term limits are the simplest way to clear the garden.

By Andrew ElmersEditor

See BRANVAN, page 15

photo from internet source

graphic by linjie Xu/the hoot

photo from internet source

14 OPINIONS The Brandeis Hoot November 7, 2014

Advisors unable to provide help for picking classesCLASSES, from page 12

pler to just browse the course list and map out my schedule myself in-stead of worrying about trying to make an appointment with my advi-sor. Plus, I like to think I am pretty much on top of all the different re-quirements I have to fill before I look to graduate—something I expect all students to be able to accomplish. There’s no real need to seek the help of an advisor when it is simply your choice on whatever classes you take.

Instead, students should seek advice from their friends on what classes to take and what professors are good and which ones are bad when it comes time to register. They should also be proactive in reaching out to the pro-fessors that are teaching the courses to ask any questions about what the class expectations are, something an academic advisor wouldn’t be able to answer. Beyond that, there are plenty of other resources available to stu-dents when it comes to picking class-es. Roosevelt Fellows, actual students who have been through the stress of enrolling in classes on sage, offer the same advice that academic advisors do, but just from a student perspec-tive. Faculty advisors are also much more helpful, especially as you try to pick classes to complete your major or minor in order to best prepare your-self to utilize your degree in the field you studied after graduating. UDRs for each department are always an email away from answering whatever questions you might have.

The university is great at providing resources to aid students in coordinat-ing their time through college, and its great to be able to utilize them. But

we’re also adults and have to realize that these resources aren’t always go-ing to be there after we leave Brandeis, so it’s time to start taking personal responsibility and making decisions

on our own. Picking four classes for a semester is not that difficult a task that we need someone to hold our hand. There won’t be that sort of ad-vice when we make it out into the real

world for when we go to buy a house or car. Sure, there are real estate agents and car salesmen whose job it is to facilitate the sale, but they are sales-people at heart and aren’t looking out

for your best interests and can ulti-mately screw you over. Picking classes is probably the least stressful thing we do as students, particularly compara-tively to actually taking the classes.

photo from internet source

November 7, 2014 The Brandeis Hoot OPINIONS15

whatever the situation may be. The app’s rules proclaim a zero-tolerance stance on cyberbullying. In fact, the app does have in place a “down-vote system” that operates to keep nega-tive comments at bay. Users can up-vote or down-vote Yaks they like and do not like, respectively. Once a Yak reaches a certain down-vote thresh-old, it is deleted. However, this does not stop the hate from occurring.

There are still a certain number of users who read the harmful Yak be-fore it is deleted. By that time, anyone could have taken a screenshot of the post, and we can only speculate what could happen thereafter. Within the first five minutes of my research of Yik Yak, I had taken three screen-shots of posts that were so vulgar that I couldn’t include them in this piece. Toned down significantly, they ranged from posts insulting our university in general to insulting an unnamed TA to insulting an entire race of people. Let me reiterate that I found this all within five minutes, not having known anything about the app when I first opened it.

Yik Yak has the potential to go horribly wrong, which is why it is la-beled for the use of college students. Nevertheless, the service cannot stop all high school students from gain-ing access. In the past, high school students have issued bomb threats to their schools anonymously, causing panic and chaos. Although the service can trace who sent such Yaks, it can-not stop the havoc that students can cause.

Many high schools and even some colleges have asked for a ban of Yik Yak on their grounds.

Cyberbullying is a very powerful thing, and it can cause tragic respons-es in victims. Yes, everyone has a right to free speech, but how free can free

speech get before it gets people hurt? A fine line exists here, and I believe that one can make a valid argument for free speech in favor of Yik Yak but not if lives are potentially at stake.

In a perfect world, where there is never any malice intended, Yik Yak’s premise is harmless. However, we don’t live in a perfect world. Not by a long shot. And as long as we do not

live in a perfect world, this fast-paced Twitter-style, anonymous app has the potential to cause harm. It just isn’t something conducive to a positive environment for Brandeis students.

Why should we endorse something so counterproductive to becoming a uni-fied campus? It’s just not worth it. Let’s do the community a favor and ignore Yik Yak.

Ignorance of Yik Yak can be blissYIKYAK, from page 13

Student drivers present unneccessary hazards

operating the BranVan.I don’t know about anyone else,

but if I were an insurance company,

my absolute nightmare would be a partially trained college student driv-ing a giant van full of drunk people around a traffic-filled city at 2 in the morning. Though I’m not aware of

the actual insurance premiums paid by the BranVan, I would assume the costs are steep for them. The neces-sity to spend so much money on in-surance, in fact, probably negates any

actual economic benefit of hiring stu-dents. Most likely, it would actually save money if we hired professional drivers.

At this point, I’m sure there are

those of you out there who think I’m attacking students themselves, that I’m saying they must be bad driv-ers or lazy or something along those lines. Though there exists a number of bad drivers on our campus, and lazy students as well, they aren’t any more than in the general population. The problem with having students drive a van is that most students sim-ply do not have enough experience to adequately drive a large van. Drivers ages 16-20 are already the highest risk for insurance companies. In addition, driving a van is much more difficult than driving a car, and even with some amount of van training, it still requires large amounts of practice to become a good van driver. With our current training system, there isn’t enough time in the program for peo-ple to prepare themselves for driving a van. Even with adequate amounts of training, it is not possible for people to become comfortable driving a van in a few weeks. There is no reason-able way for someone to quickly ob-tain van driving skills: It can only be learned over time. And without these skills, the BranVan will never be as ef-fective as it could be.

This is ultimately the reason for hir-ing professionals instead of students to drive the BranVan. The reason be-hind the failure of the BranVan system is not that our students are a bad driv-ers, but that they cannot possibly have enough experience to drive well. The missed stops, late vans and casualties are not the result of laziness but lack of experience. The BranVan needs to reform its hiring practices before the next accident is even worse.

photo from internet source

graphic by katherine selector/the hoot

BRANVAN, from page 13

ARTS, ETC.16 The Brandeis Hoot November 7, 2014

Brandeis Ensemble Theatre’s ‘Lost Girls‘ debuts

Unsatisfied by the situation, Dan-iela decides to find an escape from their purgatory, uniting the group under a banner for the first time. This move forward also allows the five women to reveal and confront how they got where they are in the first place. “Lost Girls” is ambitious, to say the least, in the same way that any piece of narrative dealing with themes of sexual violence is. Be-ing that these are themes that affect a huge percentage of women every hour of every day, and they are often

presented or fictionalized with a seri-ous lack of sensitivity in our society and culture, it is incredibly difficult to portray these themes adequately. “Lost Girls” chooses to go the hard route, with the obvious intention of forcing its audience to confront graphic portrayals of trauma in order to fully recognize how traumatic the issues are. The play does this without much subtlety, with characters often screaming out their dark past to the heavens and the audience.

Unfortunately, the characters do not have much depth to them be-sides their specific traumas, leading to a series of scenes that serve only to push forward the feeling of be-ing trapped—made palpable by the sparsely decorated set and minimal

staging—and not giving any sense of who these women are. The cast does well with their roles, especially in the most emotional scenes, but the roles themselves never become much more than generic victims representative of news headlines. Having Sylvia Plath as a character creates a strange base for the story, only because Plath and her work are so synonymous with the idea of the “troubled” young woman. Parts of the play seem to try to ret-roactively treat the depression that plagued Plath while she was alive but do not actually add to the story or the characters.

The message of “Lost Girls” is por-trayed most efficiently by its mini-malist set design, which consists of a set of black boxes on stage and a

ramp into the audience used peri-odically by the cast. Clever lighting fades split up the scenes and allow breathing room for the heavy themes in the story. However, there are a lot of sound effects, including wind, screams and music, that trample over the dialogue and make story points hard to hear. Considering that much of the storytelling relies on sounds and lighting (as opposed to a lavish set) and is dialogue-based, this creat-ed gaps in the rhythm of the play. But because the dialogue so frequently and overbearingly pushed its themes of being against misogyny, not much was missed in the grand scheme of “Lost Girls.”

Nothing about “Lost Girls” is at all subtle or understated in its approach,

which in the end hurts the play, con-sidering the themes and situations it attempts to address. Because the characters are defined solely by the traumas they have suffered, and the play promotes the idea of harsh, trig-gering confrontation as a method of healing, the nuance and real-life im-plications of the issues is largely lost. Very serious situations are simplified and cheapened in ways that almost devalue them, especially in the pro-duction’s unearned downer ending, ways that one would expect to see in bad dramatic television. The play is ambitious in its taking on the bur-den of portraying many of the most serious issues in society today, but it is ultimately crushed underneath that weight.

photos by sharon cai/the hootlost girls Original play does not live up to expectations.

From ARTS, page 1