By Shawn Bakken, Staff Bearer
* This column may offend some people. I recommend you suck it up and deal. The world isn’t going to bow to your personal preferences. And don’t waste your time bitching to me. If you can’t take a joke, I don’t want to have anything to do with you. Or your mother. She was great last night, you know…
Q: I like to wear a dress around campus in order to get people to ask questions about gender roles. How come they never ask me anything, just comment behind my back that I’m probably gay?
A: Kenyon students were usually raised by good parents who told their kids, “Don’t talk to strangers.” And for good reason: strangers are the ones more likely to grab you and try and stuff you in a sack with seven rabid wombats, tying it shut, answering your youthful shrieks of terror with dark, evil laughter, then squeezing the sack into the back seat of a Volkswagen and going off-roading for five hours before dumping your unconscious body in front of a gas station in the middle of Duluth, Minnesota… um, not that this has happened to me before or anything.
But the point is, people have it in their heads to avoid freaky people because they’re dangerous. If they ask you a question, you could respond in a calm, reasonable tone, but you could just as easily take offense at having your fashion sense questioned and try to burn down their apartment at 4:30 in the morning. So it’s best for them to ask parties who aren’t you and try to find out the truth. If they can’t do that, well, that’s what speculation is all about.
And you’re in denial about your latent homosexuality.
Q: I’m tired of walking through the Great Hall and having people stare at me all the time. I just can’t handle being objectified like that. Enclosed are some personal photographs—you can see the problem. What should I do? Shawn?
A: Huh? Oh yeah, question. Sorry, I got distracted by the pictures. Say, isn’t it illegal to have these developed in Ohio? Okay, okay, that’s right, I’m supposed to be answering questions.
There are a couple solutions, really, some of which have been addressed and some of which are dumb. Stupid solutions include rotating tables to block off the middle of the Great Hall and creating a serious fire hazard, comparing this situation to the civil rights movement of the 60’s to try and guilt people into accepting a crappy solution, and walking through Upper Dempsey.
No, wait, that’s one of the good ones. We have other dining halls here for people to use for a bunch of reasons—avoiding objectification seems like as good of one as any. You could also opt to start wearing clothes… baggy clothes! Start wearing baggy clothes! Or maybe you could carry a slingshot, so anyone who tries to leer at you the wrong way for more than, say, three seconds loses an eye. Tell you what, why don’t you come over to my place? You can tell me all about it while I provide you with a soothing back rub and then whatever happens, happens. We’ll fix your problem by being too… occupied… to attend meals in Pierce. Now that’s a solution.
Q: Why is there such a negative attitude on this campus about fraternities?
A: Because they suck.
