Thursday, April 11, 2013

Duke University and the Two-Ply Toilet Paper Syndrome

Quite possibly, almost 3 years ago, I entered Duke as a graduate student with a bit of naïveté.  I assumed that by entering such a highly ranked academic institution, there were certain issues that just would not be part of the cultural make up of the university.  My bit of naïveté is an understatement.  I entered a different world.  Maybe it’s the fact that I am an adult who entered graduate school after 10 years in the work force.  I don’t know.

Thankfully, this world I entered still has hope.  This world is no longer under the oppressive regime of single-ply toilet paper!  Yes, tuition is on the rise, but we no longer must fear sanitary mishaps.  Victory is ours! The voice of the proletariat has been heard! Two-ply toilet paper is here, and it is here to stay at Duke University.[1]

Maybe this two-ply toilet paper can be used to clean up some of the excrement that has happened just in the past year at Duke University.  Obviously, Duke Administrators see no need to take an active stance.  Their pay checks are high enough, why should they be concerned with any issues that student have?  Of course, when Duke Administrators are more concerned with making a name for themselves by building and developing a “Duke” University in China and then seeing it denied by the Beijing Ministry of Education[2] than they are with enhancing the programs they already have in place now, I suppose the petty concerns of students is of little concern.

Since I am on the topic of an Asian Nation and problems, I might as well bring up the Kappa Sigma Fraternity.  In February 2013, they held an “Asian Themed” party that sparked a lot of controversy among Duke students and even made the national news reports.  What a way to stay classy, Duke! The party was filled with overt racist overtones that included an invitation mocking a supposed Asian accent beginning with the words “Herro Nice Duke Peopre” with a cartoon figure of Kim Jong Il as the supposed speaker.  When Duke Administrator Larry Moneta, the Vice President for Student Affairs heard the party was planned, he “heroically” urged the fraternity to cancel the event, but even heroes sometimes fail.  The party went on as scheduled.  Despite the fallout that included a televised protest near Duke Chapel, Moneta decided the proper course of action for the University Administration was to do nothing.  Instead, he determined that dialogue was the answer.[3]  That’s right, Vice President Moneta, sit in your cushy office and let a segment of students be victimized and be made to feel unsafe at a school where they pay as tuition more than the yearly salary of most Americans.  It doesn’t affect you anyway.  I’m sure the two-ply toilet paper will comfort all wounds and make this one disappear eventually.  Let’s just talk about it.  Talking always solves racist based problems.   Let the privileged and racist perpetrators go on and look at their victims in class, on the bus, in the dorms, and in the dining halls and let them keep their deserved place of superiority! They’ve earned it, right?  They are at Duke, after all. 

On the issue of the Asian Themed Party, one of the biggest critics of the Asian Students feeling victimized was The Chronicle, Duke’s Newspaper (and I use that term very lightly), columnist Fedja Pavlovic.  He published a response to the Asian Student Aliance’s (ASA) protest entitled “Shame on You, ASA.”  His basic premise in this op-ed (yes, Fedja, after your “schooling you gave me on Twitter, I do know the difference between an op-ed and a report) was that if French people are not insulted by people dressing as musketeers and Swedes are not insulted by others dressing as Vikings, then the Asian students should just get over their pettiness.[4]  Of course, this person, so versed in critical thinking and rational discourse (a topic I will soon address) should have understood his logical fallacy. We no longer, at least to my knowledge, have musketeers, nor do we have Vikings, but the world still has a sizable Asian population, and it was this population that was being denigrated into objectivity.  This would be comparable to a Duke Athlete wearing a Halloween costume and being photographed in Blackface and then having it put on the team’s website (*shout out to the 2012 Duke Women’s Lacrosse Team).[5] One just does not do such racially insensitive things. 

Ok, let me sound a little “elitist.” I do go to Duke – And their acceptance rate for the incoming undergraduate freshman class was approximately 5.3% or 1705 out of over 32,000 applicants.[6] Shouldn’t such an elite university “just know” certain behaviors are unacceptable?  Shouldn’t the worldview be just a little larger?  I mean I did overhear some undergraduates on the bus excited that one would be spending the summer in Spain while the other would be in France, and they should “totally meet up sometime.”  These are not people who haven’t seen others who are different from themselves.  Maybe the two-ply is not the solution – it won’t clean the messes – maybe it’s the problem – it’s causing this sense of privilege where “the other” doesn’t matter in some people’s minds. Maybe having the luxury of two-ply vs. single-ply toilet paper at “traditional” universities is causing too much comfort that those at Duke are losing their understanding of what the rest of the “single-ply” world endures.

Since I brought up Chronicle columnist Fedja Pavlovic, in what I find to be a self-promoting act of ego-boosting, he published an op-ed (NOT a report as he so diligently educated me in a Twitter conversation) openly stating, “Teaching theology as an academic discipline is incompatible with the goals of a modern university; furthermore, it is a legacy of the very thing a post-Enlightenment university is meant to abolish.”[7]  Obviously, the two-ply syndrome seems to have gotten to Mr. Pavlovic to make such a bold statement.  I made the following Twitter “tweet” in response to this op-ed piece: 21 Mar ‪@DukeChronicle: Sophomore Fedja Pavlovic presents another bigoted reason ‪@DukeU is not a safe space for many.[8]  After a “conversation,” Mr. Pavlovic challenged me to a one on one theological debate due to my “intellectual superiority.”  I declined for 2 reasons: 1. There cannot be a debate on which one party does not know the subject being debated, and 2. I am a firm believer that one should not “feed the trolls.” 

I let Mr. Pavlovic know that I would not play into his attention seeking behavior and wished him a good night (all of this conversation occurred over Twitter).  He claimed that my view of discourse is flawed as a view as a view of attention seeking behavior.  However, in later tweets, Mr. Pavlovic tweeted to Dr. Richard Dawkins, the American Atheist, and the Huffington Post, that the debate between science and religion has been started at Duke University (with the unspoken subtext and attached article that he started it).[9] I would classify that as attention seeking! I would also call that seeking to make others feel unwelcome.  To further prove my point, the “two-ply” toilet paper syndrome has caused him to feel a little too comfortable and privileged when he tweeted, “tweet in the library, tweet in the lab, tweet in bed. the influx of my thoughts in your daily lives will soon be unbearable ‪#likeaboss”[10]  

At what point was it even debatable to decide which programs and studies a university held as valid? Would it be valid of me to say that since we are in the middle of an economic crisis, and most likely, some Graduates of the Duke Fuqua School of Business were CEO’s at the time of the majority of the drops in the economy that we should drop the School of Business?  That would be ridiculous! Even if they learned flawed logic and put that logic to use and it didn’t work, not many would say that a school of business does not belong at a university.  Why would a Theological School not belong at a University?  Does Mr. Pavlovic even know what theology is? I refuse to make a point-by-point argument (see rule 2 in two paragraphs above about feeding the trolls).  I will however point out that Harvard, Yale, Princeton, and Oxford all have Theological Schools.  I will also refer to the founding of Duke in that prior to the Civil War, then called Trinity College, the university was committed and partially funded by the Methodist Church to provide a free education to Methodist preachers.[11]  When Trinity College changed names to Duke University and moved to Durham largely thanks to the Duke Family, part of their prerogative was to continue to support the Methodist Church through the university.[12]

Mr. Pavlovic seems to have some problems that he needs to address.  I could go on with other serious issues, but due to my Christian beliefs – the same that he finds no place for in a university, I will stop here.  I do not know Mr. Pavlovic personally, and while I disagree with him, I only hope the best for him in life.

Racism is alive and well at “liberal” Duke.  In 2012, an economics professor published a study saying that Black Students are more likely to switch to “less difficult” majors.  Apparently, Dr Peter Arcidiacono ranked different majors in their difficulty and did a study and found that Black students are more likely to major in easier subjects. This sparked outrage among the Black Student Aliance (BSA).[13] I would have to stand with the BSA in this issue! I was a music major in my undergraduate years. This is a subject that Dr. Arcidiacono would consider “easy.”  If 21 credits a semester for 4 years (while receiving only 18 of those FOR credit and not receiving credit for 3 of those credits), 3-6 hours a day in the practice room on an average day in addition to whatever ensemble rehearsals there are on any given day, and the additional non-music required classes, and the papers, compositions, music theory and analysis homework that are all daily requirements is easy, then the concept “easy,” needs to be reevaluated.

There are also anecdotal stories of the two-ply toilet paper going to people’s heads at Duke.  It makes them feel privileged.  I’ve heard Muslim students and faculty say they are looked upon with suspicion and contempt.  Black students say they are eyed with suspicion and treated differently by professors and in campus stores and dining areas.  Any signs of weakness are pounced upon by the “elitists” who know more, and are smarter than everyone else in the classroom (including the professor).  Rather than encouraging a sense of community, the faculty and administration goes out of its way to encourage a sense of competition among the students.  Kill or be killed. 

We ARE Duke, and WE have TWO-PLY toilet paper! But, I’ll bet the basketball team – that is, the MEN’S team has THREE-PLY!



[2] http://dukecheck.com/?p=12154 accessed on April 11, 2013
[8] From my Twitter account at @tomhallberg1
[9] From the Twitter account of Fedja Pavlovic at @fedjapavlovic
[10] Ibid.
[12] Ibid.
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