Break out the thong sandals, oversized aviators and skorts, ladies and gentlemen, it's Spring term and 35 degrees! Now, for those of you who are experiencing your first faux spring in New Hampshire, keep those spirits up. By Dimensions Weekend in mid-April, James Wright makes his annual special collect call to God, and suddenly the grass is green and it is 75 degrees. Just hang in there, because soon enough life will be quite beautiful.
There is one thing, however, that stands between me and a near-perfect Spring term. It is the same thing that stood between me and a less awful Winter term. That thing is the sheer lack of etiquette at Dartmouth College. To be fair, all members of Dartmouth are not guilty. The blame lies solely with the youngest of the bunch: the '90s babies. The JuicyCampus.com users. The Class of 2011.
On Sept. 25, 2007, President James Wright made this statement about the incoming class of 2011: "The Class of 2011 is larger than we intended because more of you wanted to accept our admissions invitation than we had anticipated."
This is exactly the type of rude, inconsiderate behavior that I have witnessed all year from the class of 2011. Hopefully members of the freshman class will read this, realize the crimes they have been committing and change their ways, all in time to salvage my term.
Collis Cafe " Breakfast
Don't get me wrong, I love being social as much as the next guy. However, I also respect the space of others. When there is a lady sitting at a four person table in Collis, no matter how crowded it is, I am not going to plop my stuff down next to her. That lady, by getting there first, has complete control over that table until she decides to leave. It is like the old saying: "Don't pee in the urinal that is right next to another guy peeing in a urinal when there are seventeen urinals to choose from." The personal bubble is a real, scientific thing that people deserve to have.
All that said, there have been multiple times when, sitting by myself, all of a sudden I look up to see two wide-eyed freshmen who have decided to not only sit at my table, but slurp their Italian wedding soups and discuss whether or not it is possible to take a fifth class. One time, it got so bad I actually packed up and left, forfeiting my table to these two 17-year-old hellions. I was ashamed, emasculated and embarrassed, and have never been quite the same.
Collis Cafe " Later That Day
This story is so ridiculous, one might think it were a fib, but nay -- I was actually the victim of this cruel offence. About two in the afternoon after I had been emasculated by the two freshman girls, I went to go check my Blitz on the computers in the Collis television room. As usual, one was broken, but it was my lucky day and one was still working. And to top it all off, I was second in line. My day was definitely looking up.
I instantly tagged the guy in front of me as a freshman, because he typed in his full name to sign on to blitz instead of using a nickname (bahahahahaha). Anyway, after signing in, something comes over him and instead of checking his Blitz, he decides he has to check Facebook instead. To make a long story not as long, here is a list of things "Bill" did before leaving this Blitz terminal:
Signed on to Facebook
Checked his messages
Hid two pokes, but also poked back two people (very interesting...)
Scrolled down to his wall (no one had written on it in two weeks)
Searched a girl named "Sarah"
Saw that they were not friends, but found out he and Sarah had 12 friends in common.
Sent a message to one of their mutual friends asking if it would be weird to friend Sarah
Logs out of Facebook
Leaves Collis
The dumb (amazing?) thing about Bill is that not only did he go to a Blitz terminal and never actually use Blitz, but he also forgot to sign out of his Blitz. Needless to say, he received 2,500 blitzes from his own account with the subject line "Rembert Browne '09 is disappointed in your behavior today." It was the least I could do to reprimand him for his seven-minute Facebook session on a public computer.
Stories like these sound very minor compared to other issues -- the war, looting, polluting -- but with regards to my day-to-day welfare, they are major. If it were just me having issues I would not be writing this, but I have had conversations with many upperclassmen about this growing epidemic of rudeness from our youngest class.
Please, Class of 2011, take this article as constructive criticism. Sure, it is a reflection of your collective character, but I really think that you are not as rude as you appear to be in most public settings. I want all of you to succeed in life, so just know that I write this out of love. Once you get through the disgust, I promise you will find the love. I promise.
Rembert is a staff writer for The Mirror. He abuses Blitz terminal etiquette by daytrading and streaming Whitney Houston videos.
