When rockets fired from the Gaza Strip hit Tel Aviv for the first time since 1991, I was studying at an army preparato- ry program in one of the city’s southernmost neighborhoods.
Since the beginning of time, editors at The Nassau Weekly have taken their pens to each other’s Common Application Essays. And yes, The Nassau Weekly has been around since the beginning of time. Here, in the billionth incarnation of this … Read More
For a person with dietary restrictions, food in America is like a dense minefield of things he or she cannot eat. Meat and cheese are everywhere, sneakily stuck in the most unsuspecting locations.
Flanked by two shaven-headed handlers, Martin Brodeur sat at a rickety wooden table that looked slightly too small to be comfortable in a bookstore that has long since been put out business. Outside the store, devoted fans lined up for yards, standing in concentric loops in an adjacent strip mall, chattering excitedly or fidgeting with their fans’ jerseys—this was before smartphones dulled the pain of waiting on a line.
A recent editorial in Princeton University’s most conservative publication, the Daily Princetonian, predictably dismisses all of the demands made by the Black Justice League during the recent protests against racism on campus. But what is surprising, not to mention embarrassing for the University, is the anti-intellectualism expressed by the editorial board members.
While for some students, the middle of junior year marks the beginning (or a continuation) of a cushy and well-heeled existence, for others it is the moment when downward mobility becomes a reality.
We cannot presume that Rick Ross is a mastermind, a genius or even sober. We cannot attest to his level of education, his employment history, or his net-worth. We have no idea where he came from: he claims to be Mohammed, the son of Moses, and the reincarnation of Haile Selassie. But, as he tells us on his latest album: none of that matters.
The word “basic” was dead by the time Kreayshawn said it in 2011: “Gucci Gucci, Louis Louis, Fendi Fendi, Prada / Basic bitches wear that shit so I don’t even bother.” But in the word’s afterlife, “basic” has ceased to apply just to “basic bitches” and now affixes itself to all sorts of actions, objects and people.
A man may take to drink,” wrote George Orwell, “because he feels himself to be a failure, and then fail all the more completely because he drinks. It is rather the same thing that is happening to the English language. It becomes ugly and inaccurate because our thoughts are foolish, but the slovenliness of our language makes it easier for us to have foolish thoughts.” Unfortunately, the Daily Princeton is like the man who rushes the growler a few too many times.
