If I had to guess the three most commonly broken laws by Dartmouth students, I would guess underage drinking, marijuana use and indecent exposure. While the first two are common at any institution of higher education, I really think that there is something about Dartmouth that makes its students want to take their clothes off.
"I assume it's because we're one of the most primitive of the Ivy League [schools], so it took us a long time to find clothing," Luke Peters '13 said.
Peters has both streaked on campus and completed the Ledyard Challenge, which consists of taking one's clothes off, swimming across the Connecticut River to Vermont, then running across the bridge back to New Hampshire. We are a school where not only does such a challenge exist, but it is also commonly undertaken. We consider it unusual if someone's never had an exam that's been streaked. New Hampshire law, specifically Section 1 of Chapter 645 of Title LXII Criminal Code states, "A person is guilty of a misdemeanor if such person fornicates, exposes his or her genitals or performs any other act of gross lewdness under circumstances which he or she should know will likely cause affront or alarm." As a relatively conservative girl now almost halfway through her junior year, nakedness at this institution no longer affronts or alarms me.
Casual public nudity is basically a rite of passage of the Dartmouth experience. If anything other than hilarious, that scene from "Old School" when a naked Will Ferrell yells, "We're going streaking!" and then proceeds to do so (alone) is a reminder that college is a time to get crazy and take your clothes off while you are young and spry, rather than waiting until you're middle-aged and gravity has taken its toll.
Dartmouth's proclivity for nudity is both perpetuated and inspired by the many of our time-honored "traditions" for example, the Dartmouth Seven, the collective name for seven public campus locations where students are dared to have sex before graduation. If you haven't heard about it, maybe you should pick up literally any old issue of The Mirror, because chances are, someone mentioned it in an article. Another tradition, the Blue Light Challenge, involves running to every blue light on campus while naked, simultaneously calling and avoiding Safety and Security (few are known to have completed it). Of course, streaking exams during which candy-throwing is much appreciated but not required and the Ledyard Challenge are two other well-known activities Dartmouth students enjoy doing in the buff.
Though many will shed their inhibitions and take part in one or more of these challenges before graduating, some students have gone above and beyond with regard to the streaking culture. Sandi Caalim '13, for example, said she has streaked 50 exams. This fall, she broke a personal record for most exams streaked during one term, with a total of 13.
Another student, a '12 female who asked to remain anonymous due to the illegality of stripping in New Hampshire, said she has streaked 23 exams, and completed the Ledyard Challenge about eight times.
"And I've never gotten poison ivy," she said.
In addition to the Ledyard Challenge, which he completed while the sun was still out on a spring evening, Peters has also streaked his share of finals, as well as "slow streaked" FFB and Novack.
"I've also been known to walk into rooms where serious meetings are supposed to happen, as a debriefing, if you will," he said.
Students often break laws such as indecent exposure for the rush that often comes with doing something forbidden.
"The exhilaration and your adrenaline are just pumping because you don't know what's going to happen," Caalim said. "Every class is different, every professor's different."
Her freshman spring, a professor chased her and her fellow streakers into the bathroom where they had left their coats.
"It was weird because she was staring at us naked and asked for our IDs, but nothing ever happened," Caalim said.
Peters insisted, however, that indecent exposure is not at all a sexual experience.
"I feel like I'm really in control of the situation," Peters said of being naked in public. "I feel both supported and unsupported at the same time. I don't get a boner or anything, if that's what you're asking."
Caalim emphasized that streaking is about more than the silliness and the adrenaline.
"It gets people to come back to Earth and think, This is just an exam, we'll be okay,'" she said.
She also enjoys streaking more when she convinces friends who have never done it to join her.
"It makes me happy to make them realize that they can love their body and have fun with it," she said.
Peters also agreed that streaking is an incredibly liberating experience.
"It's just my way of letting the man know he can't keep me constrained with his fabrics and fine textiles," Peters said. "I'm also too poor to see a dermatologist, so I figure if people see [anything] they will let me know."
And for all you potential streakers out there, Caalim has a blitz list that she utilizes to coordinate her exam-streaking schedule. She has even streaked one of her own exams, using the bathroom as a changing room and coming back to finish the test, acting in the vein of Peters' advice: "If in doubt, hang it out."
