2008 Woodie Awards
Tangents and Tirades
Issue date: 10/12/06 Section: Commentary
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Is 'David' too risque for students?
A controversy has been sparked in the wealthy suburban area of Dallas, Texas after an art teacher led her fifth grade students through a local museum. The controversy is focused on the fact that some of the students saw classical nude statues as the group moved through the museum. As a result of a complaint from one of the parents, the teacher, Sydney McGee, has had her pay suspended since Sept. 22. This complaint is puzzling, since the field trip tour planned by McGee deliberately steered past any nude art-work, and at most the route through the museum only lead past various classical pieces. Of course, this complaint is on shaky ground to begin with, and clearly displays the misguided and puritanical outlook which equates a simple and unprovocative nude sculpture with shameless and degrading pornography. If anyone has trouble distinguishing the two, then self control and basic reasoning is seriously lacking. Without a doubt, McGee is owed her salary and an apology in reparation for the severely misguided complaint.
- Andrew Sparks '09 Source: New York Times
Me and the Mosque
On Monday, October 23, 2006 at 4:30pm in Feinstein 400, come check out the documentary "Me and the Mosque". The documentary examines the historical role of women in Islam and the difficulty some Muslim women have in gaining access to the mosque. Dr. Charlotte O'Kelly, Professor of Sociology and Acting Director of the Women's Studies Program will be leading a discussion after the film.
-Laura Bedrossian '07
MTV killed the good musicians.
In my opinion, much of what is popular in the music industry that is played on the radio today is pretty bad. With the exception of Gnarls Barkley's "Crazy", I cannot think of a single song I've heard on the radio over the past 10 months that was remotely worth listening to and wouldn't end up being plugged by another Carson Daly clone. Too many people have forgotten what quality music sounds like and form their musical taste based on what others tell them to like. Stations like MTV and MTV-2 that were at one time revolutionary music resources. Unfortunately, both channels have more or less stopped showing music videos altogether, opting to play Laguna Beach and Wild Boyz reruns every hour, on the hour instead. Luckily, there's MTV-U to turn to, but it's not much of a resource for anyone who isn't in college. I still don't know how people got conned into buying Lindsay Lohan and Ashlee Simpson's albums, but I guess when it gets shoved down your throat from every media source it's easy to get brainwashed. There have been a handful of great new bands over the past year that were overlooked by a lot of people and didn't get the recognition they deserved. It's hard to say why that is, but all I know is that I can't stand most of the new music that has been force-fed to me over the past 10 years, sosomething has got to change before all hope for good music is lost.
-Aiden Redmond '08
A controversy has been sparked in the wealthy suburban area of Dallas, Texas after an art teacher led her fifth grade students through a local museum. The controversy is focused on the fact that some of the students saw classical nude statues as the group moved through the museum. As a result of a complaint from one of the parents, the teacher, Sydney McGee, has had her pay suspended since Sept. 22. This complaint is puzzling, since the field trip tour planned by McGee deliberately steered past any nude art-work, and at most the route through the museum only lead past various classical pieces. Of course, this complaint is on shaky ground to begin with, and clearly displays the misguided and puritanical outlook which equates a simple and unprovocative nude sculpture with shameless and degrading pornography. If anyone has trouble distinguishing the two, then self control and basic reasoning is seriously lacking. Without a doubt, McGee is owed her salary and an apology in reparation for the severely misguided complaint.
- Andrew Sparks '09 Source: New York Times
Me and the Mosque
On Monday, October 23, 2006 at 4:30pm in Feinstein 400, come check out the documentary "Me and the Mosque". The documentary examines the historical role of women in Islam and the difficulty some Muslim women have in gaining access to the mosque. Dr. Charlotte O'Kelly, Professor of Sociology and Acting Director of the Women's Studies Program will be leading a discussion after the film.
-Laura Bedrossian '07
MTV killed the good musicians.
In my opinion, much of what is popular in the music industry that is played on the radio today is pretty bad. With the exception of Gnarls Barkley's "Crazy", I cannot think of a single song I've heard on the radio over the past 10 months that was remotely worth listening to and wouldn't end up being plugged by another Carson Daly clone. Too many people have forgotten what quality music sounds like and form their musical taste based on what others tell them to like. Stations like MTV and MTV-2 that were at one time revolutionary music resources. Unfortunately, both channels have more or less stopped showing music videos altogether, opting to play Laguna Beach and Wild Boyz reruns every hour, on the hour instead. Luckily, there's MTV-U to turn to, but it's not much of a resource for anyone who isn't in college. I still don't know how people got conned into buying Lindsay Lohan and Ashlee Simpson's albums, but I guess when it gets shoved down your throat from every media source it's easy to get brainwashed. There have been a handful of great new bands over the past year that were overlooked by a lot of people and didn't get the recognition they deserved. It's hard to say why that is, but all I know is that I can't stand most of the new music that has been force-fed to me over the past 10 years, sosomething has got to change before all hope for good music is lost.
-Aiden Redmond '08