Month: February 2013

Caroline Schaeffer

Writer

Best friends have a habit of telling each other everything, but is there ever a time that it’s not necessarily wise to tell a friend absolutely everything? Sometimes people do stupid things. Sometimes these people are your friends. And sometimes, they may not quite remember doing these stupid things and may rely on you to enlighten them a bit. What’s up to you is whether or not you do enlighten them and, personally, I think a lot of that depends on how much “damage control” is needed after the event(s) in question have taken place.

If you or one of your friends has ever had one of those nights where you made a few minor indiscretions along the way, you know that the aftermath can sometimes be a little messy. In these situations, it’s probably wisest to let your friends and anyone else know about whatever your indiscretions were, especially if they have the potential of affecting your daily life or well being.

That being said, not every indiscretion is necessarily the end of the world. Sometimes it makes for an interesting story! But you should also be aware that if telling a friend about an indiscretion will embarrass him or her or hurt his or her feelings, it might be better to just let the issue rest. If telling your friend will do more harm than good, dropping it altogether is probably the best option.

Everybody has done things they’re not proud of before, but that doesn’t necessarily mean it should hang over their heads for the rest of the year. Tell your friends about indiscretions or mistakes only if it serves a higher purpose–not just for the sake of poking fun at their less-than-wise decisions. They are your friends after all, and someday, you might be grateful if they afford you the same sort of leniency.

Colette Brottman
Contributing Writer

I spent my entire summer watching every episode of “Sex and the City,” plus both movies, which turns out to be about 53 hours of one show. Embarrassing. But during those two and a half total days, I watched Carrie Bradshaw fall in and out of love, Miranda have a baby, Charlotte continuously believe in soul mates, and Samantha be Samantha. It was an escape for me, a way to avoid any stress or anxiety.

As I finished the final few episodes (I’m sorry, but the final episodes of the season were horrible–thank goodness for the movie!), I was disappointed and also a little lost on what was next for me. Fortunately, the CW picked up “The Carrie Diaries” which is based off the books, the prequel to Carrie’s take-over of New York City.

“The Carrie Diaries” has already deterred from the books (yes, I read them), but I am sucked in. I look forward to my break on Tuesdays when I can watch the episode from the night before.

Carrie has three best friends: Mouse, Maggie and Walt. Maggie and Walt are dating, Mouse has a long distance boyfriend and Carrie is falling in love with the new boy, Sebastian Kydd. From the first episode, Carrie has faced drama. Her mother recently passed away, so she must deal with her struggling sister Dorrit and overprotective (and confused) father. She has a new dream internship in New York City and meets Larissa, an editor from her dream magazine. Her father bans Carrie’s involvement with Sebastian, Walt is struggling with his sexuality and Maggie hides her secret affair.

“The Carrie Diaries” is incomparable to “Sex and the City.” First off, Carrie doesn’t have a sister or an existent father in “Sex and the City.” Second, many high school life experiences that Carrie mentions in the HBO series don’t happen in the new series.

It is a CW show, the home of “Gossip Girl” and “90210,” so we expect constant drama and crazy fashion, but “The Carrie Diaries” is one of the first shows I have seen where the high school girls look like they are actually in high school and the storyline is more realistic. The fashion is crazy and the music is a total throwback. Maybe I have found my new escape. How could I not love the subtle references to “Sex and the City,” like “maybe one day you’ll end up on the side of a bus” or the classic Carrie mannerisms. I will always root for Aidan, but for the time being, I guess I’ll settle for Sebastian.

El McCabe
Staff Writer

Valentine’s Day is one of the most controversial holidays. It divides students into two distinct camps: those who love the day dedicated to love itself and those who have taken to calling it “Single Awareness Day” and resent its commercialized nature. While I have issues with the commercialized aspects of Valentine’s Day, I do support the love and warm, fuzzy feeling the holiday brings to those of all ages.

In one particular sense I can identify with the Valentine’s Day critics’ perspective. Valentine’s Day is a holiday signified by chocolate, gifts, flowers and other material items that “show” someone how much you care about him/her. But this knowledge makes us wonder, why do these gifts matter so much to us? Just because your significant other buys you the most expensive necklace or some really fancy chocolate, does that mean he or she loves you more than a poor guy who can barely afford to put food on the table for his significant other? In fact, sometimes boyfriends and girlfriends who buy each other the most lavish gifts may just as well be seeing someone on the side and trying to make up for the guilt by spending a ton of money on this day. Not that this is always the case, but nevertheless it highlights how trivial it is to equate material items with large monetary value to how much someone loves and cares about you.

The individuals who often criticize the “Hallmark” holiday often fail to see the potential joy the holiday has for those both in and not in committed relationships. Ever since I was little, my parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles have always encouraged me to celebrate Valentine’s Day. I would look forward to writing out the personalized valentines and receiving chocolate and little gifts from my family because it was such a great feeling seeing all the different kinds of love around me. I was taught that Valentine’s Day is not just a day to remind people that they are single, but instead a day when love could be shared openly and freely without judgment. It is important to remember that love comes in all forms and amounts, and the love a parent has for his or her children should be celebrated just as much as the love a man has for a woman. If society can change the way it perceives love and the holiday itself, I am confident that Valentine’s Day will cease to remain as a reminder of someone’s “single” status on Facebook.

Yet, it is safe to say that this shift in perspective cannot happen overnight. There is far too much cynicism and contempt regarding the holiday to be completely done away with, but I can assure those who resent Valentine’s Day that changing their perspective will benefit them in the long run. Yes, in a perfect world people should be able to express their love any day of the year, but truthfully it is not always the easiest thing to express how you are feeling out of the blue. Even though Valentine’s Day is over for this year, it’s never too early to start getting excited about spreading the love next year!

Riley Schwengel
Writer

The all-nighter is one of college’s most famous rituals. It begins with a student realizing they are underprepared for an exam and ends with a sleep deprived scholar groggily tidying up their floor littered with energy drinks and notes. At every exam I take, it seems that there is always a group of people complaining, but in some ways bragging, about the amount of time they spent studying and about how little sleep they got the night before. Students seem to get a weird pleasure in comparing hours spent awake, desperately cramming information into their heads; it’s the college equivalent of comparing battle scars and wounds from fights past.

What many students do not realize is that the all-nighter is actually extremely damaging to one’s study efforts. Instead of dedicating one’s night to studying, it would be far more advantageous to just go to bed and get a good night’s sleep.

When the brain makes a memory, it first encodes the information as a short-term memory, which is useful for everyday tasks but not for exam studying. Memories that need to be remembered at a later time are encoded as long-term memories in a process called  “consolidation.” Studies have shown that consolidation occurs at a much faster rate when one is sleeping. Simple experiments have been conducted in which participants learn information and then must take a test on that information, but one group of subjects is allowed to sleep before the test while another is not. The group that sleeps always does better in every experiment conducted. When a student stays up all night repeating information over and over again, much of that information is not actually being processed by the brain and is instead soon lost with all the other short term memories.

Students should really try to avoid all-nighters whenever possible. If you find yourself cramming for an exam, it’s probably better to just stop and sleep. The brain will better consolidate whatever you have already learned, and whatever you would have studied in the early morning hours may not have been stored anyway.

Chronic all-nighter-ers have often complained that they don’t want to endure the torturous ritual but that they have no choice because there is just too much material to go over. To this I offer a simple solution, start studying earlier and partition the work. If you have four chapters to study and four days to do it, study a chapter a day. This is the method I personally use when I have an upcoming exam. While I may have to start studying earlier, I have less work per day. This keeps me sane and lets me get a good night sleep every night. To this day, I’ve never done an all-nighter and never plan to. In the few times when staying up late would have been an option, I always opted for sleep and it always worked out for the best. So the next time you are up late with an exam the next day, don’t spend the entire night fretting and worrying, just go to bed and let your brain do its job.

Justin Marinelli
Senior Writer

Recently, the decision was made to allow women into full-fledged combat roles within the military. I am definitely in the camp of allowing anyone willing to serve to enter combat, but the way we’re going about it is wrong in my opinion. In our haste to reach “equality” we are bastardizing the very notion of a truly equal fighting force.

The history of women in combat seems to go as far back as combat itself. A quick read through the history books will fill your mind with tales of Joan of Arc, female soviet snipers of WWII such as Lyudmila Pavlichenko (300+ confirmed kills) and my personal favorite, Boudicca. Despite the bemoans of those who claim that women are unsuited for combat, there is enough evidence in the historical record that women can be just as efficient fighters as men.

This leads to the problem we have now. The physical standards for men and women in the army are different. Women who wish to join the Navy can get away with doing 11 percent fewer sit-ups, 53 percent fewer push-ups, and having 27 percent slower run times than men. There have been uproars in the Air Force in which female pilots were able to pass aptitude tests with scores that would have disqualified male pilots on the spot. This is unacceptable. While it is a noble goal to want to make our armed forces open to everyone, it is a short-sighted and ill-advised move to have double standards.

This is a disservice to every American in uniform, especially the women. By lowering standards, you allow for unqualified people, people who have no business being in combat, to enter our military ranks and reduce the efficiency of our fighting forces. Even in the age of airplanes and drones, war is still a highly physical affair. The average marine walks for miles and miles while weighed down with 100 pounds of gear. You need to be strong, have great endurance and be psychologically capable of holding yourself together if you’re fulfilling a combat role in which your job is to kill or be killed.

There are certain types of missions in which you need female soldiers. In Iraq and Afghanistan, it’s not uncommon for women and men to have separate parts of the households, and if you’re going to be walking into the female part of the household, it better not be with male soldiers unless your aim is to make everyone upset and have the civilian population feel hostile towards you. To be sending in unprepared and unqualified soldiers to such an environment where there is a risk of hostile action is not only blatantly idiotic, but downright disrespectful to the people you’re sending in.