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Not Suitable for Children

By May 13, 2024 Entertainment

Illustration by Meghan Sim.

On March 17, “Quiet on Set: The Dark Side of Kids TV” premiered on Investigation Discovery. What followed was a social media maelstrom.

“Quiet on Set” is a short docuseries about the Kids’ TV channel  Nickelodeon and the allegations of abuse on the various sets of its shows. The documentary showcases a variety of different cast and crew from Nickelodeon shows discussing their personal experiences on set. It mainly focuses on the allegations of abuse against Dan Schneider, a producer at Nickelodeon, but there are several other alleged abusers discussed in the documentary.

But, the documentary wasn’t, for the most part, saying anything that hadn’t already been said online. There have been dozens of video essays, and even TikToks and Instagram reels about the abusive nature of Nickelodeon years before the documentary even came out.

The two biggest pieces of new information “Quiet on Set” provided were Drake Bell coming forward to discuss the sexual abuse he experienced while working for Nickelodeon as a minor, and two female screenwriters opening up about the discriminatory behavior and pay practices they experienced under Schneider.

So what exactly made “Quiet on Set” into the spectacle that it became?

“Quiet on Set” created the perfect storm of social media engagement. A topic that was already trending given an air of legitimacy because of its release in a documentary format, combined with a new series of different, previously unknown experiences, and bam: social media gold.

But the issue is, this docuseries is about abuse. Specifically, it’s about the abuse of minors on the sets of children’s television — shows that many of us grew up watching. This isn’t really a laughing matter, and the near-constant stream of social media content doesn’t treat the situations brought up in the docuseries with the seriousness that they require. It becomes another way of exploiting the exploitation of these former child stars.

This isn’t a problem specific to “Quiet on Set.” The same thing happened in 2022 when Jennette McCurdy’s memoir “I’m Glad My Mom Died” was released. The memoir focused on McCurdy’s experiences as a child star, and the struggles she faced with the abuse from her mother and others, and on the sets of various projects she worked on.

The memoir became an instant, and lasting, hit. Social media took to it because of how shocking the actress’ life had been behind closed doors.

People clipped chunks of audio from the book and speculated on the meanings of the different passages. McCurdy’s experiences on the sets of both Nickelodeon shows she starred in, “iCarly” and “Sam and Cat,” were some of the most popular sections on social media.

The phenomena around “I’m Glad My Mom Died” and “Quiet on Set,” while not totally terrible, represent a larger issue in the world of social media. Nothing is sacred, and no one is spared.

Yes, a large number of the social media posts were personal reactions or voices of support for the victims of abuse, but a huge part of the conversation around the docuseries was focused on questioning the intentions of some of the victims in sharing their stories, especially parents, who did not go to the police at the time of some of the events that took place.

As a reaction to the series, Schneider made a short apology video where he essentially denied most of the heavier accusations about what he did on set. Schneider aside, other former employees of Nickelodeon came out with their stories about their experiences on set because of the docuseries.

Marc Summers, the host of multiple Nickelodeon shows and appeared briefly in the docuseries, also spoke out against “Quiet on Set.”

“They did a bait and switch on me. They ambushed me. They never told me what this documenting was about […] and so I walked out,” Summers said in an interview on The Elvis Duran Show.

Summers’ personal feelings aside, the point he raises about the ethics of the docuseries is emblematic of the online misrepresentations about the docuseries. “Quiet on Set” is not meant to be a hit piece about Schneider or any of the older cast and crew of Nickelodeon. It clearly makes points about how the sets of these shows were potentially, and at times explicitly, dangerous for children.

However, the misinterpretations of others aren’t the real issue with “Quiet on Set.” The series’ main struggle is that it fails to convey everything that happened both on and off the sets of Nickelodeon shows.

For example, during the filming of “iCarly”, a stunt actor was nearly killed after Schneider insisted on shooting a take of a stunt fall with no cushions or padding for the actor to land on. The take of the stunt actor being injured was used in the final edit of the show and has since become a meme online.

Also on the set of “iCarly,” 17-year-old Mccurdy met 29-year-old Paul Glaser, and the two eventually started dating, including going on a trip together funded by the studio.

Mccurdy also alleged there to be an underaged drinking issue on the set of “Victorious” with the creator of “Victorious” and “iCarly” pressuring the “iCarly” children actors into drinking by comparing them to the “Victorious” cast.

Many of the issues on the set of these shows were left unaddressed in the docuseries, likely due to a lack of witnesses willing to be interviewed.

One of the issues often brought up online is the treatment of Bell in the docuseries. The actor came forward with previously unknown information about the abuse he faced from Brian Peck, a crew member for “All That” and “The Amanda Show.” The segment of the docuseries about Bell is one of the most compelling parts of the series, but it mostly glosses over the actor’s own conviction of child endangerment from 2021.

“Quiet on Set” was released six years after Schneider, the main subject of the series, was fired from Nickelodeon because he “verbally abused colleagues.” But the impression of Schenider’s work is still very much a part of modern culture.

“Danger Force,” the spin-off of Schneider’s show “Henry Danger” only ended in 2024. Additionally, the reboot of “iCarly” concluded in 2023. Schneider shaped Nickelodeon live action shows starting in 1994 with “All That” and continuing for three decades, even past the time he was fired.

There are thousands of videos still being made about various Nickelodeon projects to this day, with some content creators only creating Nickelodeon content.

One YouTuber, Quinton Reviews, makes long-form reviews focused on nostalgic kids’ content, usually heavily layered in memes. His content has breathed a new life into the online discussion around the late 2000s live-action Nickelodeon shows, like “iCarly” and “Victorious.”

Most recently, he uploaded a nearly two-hour-long video titled “We Don’t Talk About Dan Schneider.” As of April 20, this video has 2.6 million views. In it, Quinton discusses the legacy Schneider has left on Nickelodeon.

“Is it just an easier conversation if we blame one semi-retired guy for everything instead of talking about the cultural system that consistently trades in the mental health of children for millions of dollars,” Quinton said, in discussing the way Schneider has become a cultural fall guy for all the problems at Nickelodeon and children’s media in general.

Matt Bennett, one of the former actors of “Victorious,” has found success doing Nickelodeon-themed DJ nights. These “Party 101” events are marketed solely on Nickelodeon nostalgia. He often brings other former Nick stars to these events, much to the excitement of the fans attending.

Bennett posted a response to “Quiet on Set” where he wrote, “Entertainment is important but it’s not as important as the mental and physical health of the people creating it, especially those who aren’t in a position to speak up for themselves. To the people coming to any of my upcoming shows: I’m still dedicated to creating a safe space for you all to have fun.”

Nickelodeon continues to stay relevant whether it be through “Quiet on Set,” YouTube retrospectives, “Party 101,” or Ariana Grande, a former “Victorious” actress.

All this is to say, “Quiet on Set” is one piece of a much larger, louder conversation about child actors, exploitation, abuse, and the Nickelodeon shows three generations have grown up watching. And we can’t look away from it.

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Slut Saga: Salacious Sexy Sounds

By May 13, 2024 Entertainment, Featured, Literature

 

Illustration by Aditi Singh.

Audio porn, or audio erotica, is exactly what it sounds like: an audio recording that is erotic in nature or contains pornographic material. There are many types of audio porn from stories that narrate a sexual encounter (in either first or third person point-of-view), to masturbation tutorials that instruct and guide the user on how to touch themselves, and even recordings that are simply sounds of people moaning and enjoying sex.

The two most popular apps for audio porn are Dipsea and Quinn. Dipsea is mostly professionally produced recordings, while Quinn is a creator-driven site. Both apps charge a monthly member fee and the price ranges between $5 and $13. Nevertheless, there is also plenty of free audio porn on websites like Reddit and Tumblr.

The strength of audio porn is its versatility. Audio porn can be formatted in so many different ways that there is a type of audio for everyone’s interest and comfort level. There is so much variety in audio porn styles that a person can choose how explicit, intimate, or narrative they want their pornographic material to be. This versatility is innovative because traditional pornography isn’t as flexible in its permutations due to the limitations of the visual medium. Therefore, audio porn is more accessible and welcoming to a wide variety of people with different emotional needs, as well as visual impediments.

Speaking of variety, there is audio porn of every genre and topic. Every imaginable scenario, interest, kink, and location can be found in audio format. Whereas the content of traditional porn is limited by its visuals, audio porn uses a listener’s imagination to construct a scene,  and anything can be imagined.

Visual porn has to invest resources like money and time into costumes, location, props, and actors to create an image for the screen (and more often than not, there aren’t enough resources to make these visuals look good). Audio porn does not have that limitation. Audio porn can place its listener in any location with any partner, allowing for creative storylines to develop with no roadblocks. This gives audio porn the potential to cover even the most niche or imaginative sexual interests.

Tapping into a person’s imagination rather than visuals has other benefits. As mentioned, traditional porn is all about visuals: faces, bodies, genitals, and of course, the infamous cum-shot. These visuals are recorded by a camera, and the viewer can only passively consume the image presented to them. The viewer can not modify or interact with these visuals.

Audio porn, on the other hand, allows engagement with the material. While listening to the recording, a person’s imagination will tailor the image in their head to their hyper-specific desires. A person can picture the scene and the people exactly how they want to. The listener does not have to rely on someone else’s ideal of beauty to be aroused because they are constructing it themselves. This is important because it creates a space for people who are not usually welcome in traditional porn.

Audio porn is inclusive of underrepresented communities such as people of color, disabled people, fat people, trans people, and more — people who struggle to see their bodies being portrayed as sexy without it being fetishized. Audio porn’s lack of visuals creates room for these types of bodies to be placed into the narrative by the listener without relying on a porn executive to do it for them.

Without the visuals, there’s less room for comparison. Traditional porn is unrealistic and often unattainable. The average person does not look like a porn star. Many women do not relate to the visuals of traditional porn because they can’t see themselves reflected in the type of women presented in it, or what the male gaze wants to observe in the sexual encounter.

Traditional porn has been manufactured for decades to cater to male interests, alienating women (and queer people), in the process by shrinking them into objects of male pleasure. The non-visual quality of audio porn reverts these effects — and it’s why 60 percent of people who listen to audio porn are women. Audio porn does not ask women to engage in pre-established notions of beauty to be considered desirable. Women can show up as themselves in these scenes and still receive pleasure.

Traditional porn is fragmentary — only zooming into desirable body parts and climactic moments that communicate an erotic image which often makes people feel dehumanized. Traditional porn does not ask its participants to show up as complete beings, but rather, as a means to the ends of ejaculating. Audio porn does the opposite.

In audio porn, the focus is on the buildup of emotion throughout the experience. There is no image that “proves” arousal was obtained, therefore there is no end goal. The entire recording is the experience that can be felt. Audio porn is more than just the climax. It is about the feelings that lead to orgasm.

Removing visuals creates a more intimate and personal experience. Even a scene that is filmed in a first-person perspective contains distance between the viewer and the material because the viewer is not actually in the scene. Now, a person using their imagination through audio porn is in the scene. The people who make audio porn often lean into this intimate connection by framing their characters as the sexual and/or romantic partner of the audience, so the listener can pretend they are engaging in an emotional relationship in addition to a sexual encounter.

Audio porn for a lot of people is not just about arousal, but feeling wanted, desired, and loved. Content creators will often also add “aftercare” at the end of their recordings (such as the voice asking the audience if they want to cuddle or watch TV together) to further elevate the illusion that their character is emotionally invested in caring for the audience. The people who engage in this type of audio porn seek a profound connection in their fantasy that traditional porn cannot provide.

Audio porn can be an experience that is just as emotionally rewarding and empowering in reclaiming pleasure and love as it is sexually satisfying.

Whatever your sexual interests are, give audio porn a try. It’s discreet with headphones on and perfect for an adventurous mind. You might just open up a whole new erotic experience for yourself.

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Kissing is Gross

By May 12, 2024 Featured, Literature

Illustration by Aditi Singh

I was a kid who yelled “ew!” when their parents kissed. It’s a gross thing, putting your mouth on another mouth to express affection. 

Humans kiss because of nerve endings and the chemicals that get released into our brains. That’s why we do most things involving affection. It makes us happy. That’s why we have such close relationships; that’s why we have sex. These things feel good.

Do you remember in elementary school, everyone wanted to know who you had a crush on? Because you had to have a crush on someone, everyone did. 

Except you. 

But you didn’t want anyone else to know that, so you picked a person of the opposite gender who seemed nice. That was the right thing to do, right? The thing to say to make everyone like you?

Whatever, it was like third grade. No one actually had a crush on anyone; we were in elementary school! It was just fun to ask and then act like it was a big deal. 

When sixth grade rolled around, people had, like, for-real crushes. My friends were talking about boys they wanted to kiss and girls they thought were hot. 

I still thought kissing was gross. When did everyone change their minds?

So I picked a guy. To fit in. I wasn’t friends with him. I didn’t really know anything about him, but he was cute and sweet and included me in conversations on field trips. It felt plausible. 

It was a flawless plan. If anyone asked who I had a crush on, I had an answer. 

But why didn’t I have a crush on anyone? Was I not trying hard enough? Was I broken?

I became fixated on my “crush.” When I passed him in the halls, I’d try to make myself feel what I thought I was supposed to feel.

Eventually, I pavloved myself into actually having an actual crush on him. To this day if I saw him, I think I’d give myself an anxiety attack just by proximity. In the nine years I’ve known him, we’ve exchanged maybe ten words.

The other thing that happened in sixth grade was the “talk.” Why were people so nonchalant about something so horrible and disgusting and gross as sex? I couldn’t understand it, I didn’t want to talk about it, and I didn’t want anything to do with it.

Yet at the same time, I wanted a partner. Not a best friend! I wanted the flirting. I wanted the romance. 

I wanted it desperately. I wanted the connection, to have a person who had my back, and to whom I could tell everything. I wanted a partner I could trust, who loved every part of me, broken bits and all.

But not sex. Sex was still scary and gross.

My first kiss was on the Fourth of July after my sophomore year of high school. For all intents and purposes, it was picture perfect. I had found a new guy; he said I was cute and I was flattered, so when he asked me out I said yes. We were in his truck, post-fireworks. He knew I was weird about physical romance. At 16, I had figured out how to get that into words, even if I couldn’t fully articulate what was going on with me. 

Every time we were about to depart after hanging out, we’d linger in one of our cars. There was that tension I dreamed about having. There was that flirting. I loved it. This particular night, I dropped a boundary.

“I don’t think I would mind kissing, you know,” I said.

“Oh?” he said, “I didn’t know that.”

We sat in silence, staring at the smoke in the sky and at each other before he leaned over and kissed me. 

It was wet. And squishy. I tried to enjoy it.

We kissed a couple more times before I got out of his car, climbed into mine, and drove home. I was reeling. I couldn’t stop feeling his mouth on mine. I hated it. 

The kiss was an inciting incident. Why did it feel terrible? Why was it so gross? Was it just kissing? Or was all of intimacy like this? Over the years I fooled myself into thinking that my disgust at sex was a trivial pre-teen reaction. I’d grow into it. If I ever actually had sex, some magical switch would flip in my brain, and I’d enjoy it. Intimacy only seemed gross and scary.

I don’t remember enjoying most of my adolescent intimacy. I was confused and sad about why I felt the way I did. 

There was some intimacy I enjoyed with First-Kiss guy. Cuddles and forehead kisses. In between making out, we’d just lie together. Sometimes I would almost fall asleep on his chest. I remember thinking, “This is it. This is all I need. I could stay here forever.”

After I broke up with First-Kiss Guy, I stopped dating for a while. I stumbled upon this thing called “asexuality,” a sexual identity where an individual doesn’t feel sexual attraction towards other people. 

I was incredulous. That was a thing? It couldn’t be real. 

Then I downloaded Tumblr. I found a community of memes and text posts, jokes about asexual garlic bread and cake and dragons. It was very much real. I think it was December of junior year when I actually read the words for the first time: “You don’t have to have sex.”

It was groundbreaking. So many problems in my life were suddenly solved. I didn’t have to have sex. No one was forcing me to. Maybe I could even meet another asexual person. We could be romantic together. No sexual anything. It felt too good to be true.

Then romance struck again. At midnight in a car in a Holiday Gas Station parking lot, my friend Torii told me he loved me. We started dating the same night and have been dating long-distance for almost a year now since we left for college.

At first, I wasn’t sure it was such a good idea. We walked around in the dark for the better part of an hour while I deliberated. 

What made this different from my last relationship? I didn’t want to be in a relationship going into college, so why would I start dating Torii? But who was I closer with than Torii? Who was more supportive and caring for me than Torii? Why shouldn’t we at least try it for a while, even if college ruins it? 

So I said yes, I’ll be your partner.

Torii is smarter than I am, and funnier. He’s always been so good at making me laugh. I value the time Torii spends with me. He reciprocates and values my opinions and thoughts.

That summer we explored intimacy our way. We got Taco Bell and saw movies, we cried in parking lots. Of course we cuddled. I was comfortable with cuddling, it was the type of intimacy I knew I wanted out of a partner. 

Then we kissed. Not on the mouth, not at first, just little pecks on cheeks and foreheads. (I still prefer forehead kisses to all kisses. They’re so pure in affection.) 

We were about a month into the relationship before we really kissed. I knew he wanted to, and I wanted to make him happy. I wanted to know if it was as bad as I remembered. I wanted to know if I was really … broken.

It took a ridiculous amount of courage. In the end, I stared at his face for a full 30 seconds before leaning in. It was still wet, but it wasn’t unpleasant. I kind of wanted to do it again.

And there went all my boundaries. 

It was quite slow-going at first, but as I started to enjoy more things, we tried more things. We had sex for the first time a couple months ago. 

But wait a minute, reader, I hear you saying, what was all that you were writing about hating sex and thinking it was gross and not wanting anything to do with it? What happened to all those feelings?

Dear reader, I could not tell you. All I can say is that I met someone. I love him with everything I have, and I shall continue to do so. He makes me happy, and we have fun. 

I’m still not sexually attracted to him. That’s what asexual means, by the way — lack of sexual attraction. Not lack of sex. Or lack of intimacy. 

Some asexuals don’t have sex. They don’t want to, or they’re repulsed by it like I was. That’s okay.

Some asexuals, like me, do have sex. They do it for their partners and because they don’t mind it, or they do it because they enjoy it. Having sex is not the same as sexual attraction. You can have sex with someone you aren’t sexually attracted to. You can be asexual and still have sex.

I’m not sexually attracted to Torii. I think he’s the most gorgeous person I’ve ever seen, and I’m ridiculously romantically attracted to him. But not sexually. 

Even though I identify as asexual, I think sex is fun. It’s about pleasure, and it’s about intimacy. Torii once told me that he thinks of sex more as a form of affection, not an act. It’s about more than just getting off, it’s about human interaction and the connection people form when they have sex. 

I’m still not a big fan of French kissing, and sometimes my germaphobe tendencies get in the way of intimacy. I’ve had several breakdowns about not being a “real asexual,” and feeling like I’m a clown masquerading around with the label. But that’s all it is, a label. It’s a label for me to identify with and to use as I choose. It’s not there to limit me. 

Asexuality is intentionally an umbrella term — there are dozens of kinds of asexuals. Sublabels like gray asexual (one who experiences sexual attraction, but in an abnormal way), demisexual (one who does not experience sexual attraction unless there is a previous strong emotional bond), apothisexual (one who does not experience sexual attraction and is replused by sexual acts), and more, were created to denote the specific way individuals experience sexual attraction. There is no wrong way to go about being asexual. 

When I was first figuring out how I felt in relation to sex and sexual attraction, the label was helpful because it gave a name to what I was feeling. It described how I felt different from other people, and it led me to a supportive community of people that felt the same.

The people in that community made me feel validated during a period of uncertainty. They made sure that I knew I wasn’t broken — just different. Just asexual. Later, when I questioned my use of the label, those same people stood behind me.

I am an asexual who fucks. It doesn’t make me any less valid, or any less part of the community. It doesn’t define what I can or can’t do with my partner. It’s just a label. One that guided me through my struggles with sexual attraction when I felt broken and confused, and one that I still identify with now, even if I don’t “fit” the conventional criteria.

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M and I

By May 12, 2024 Featured, Literature

Illustration by Fah Prayottavekit

 

Fragment – 1 – Ejaculation

“What kind of person is M?” This is the question I have asked myself many times since I have known him. Sometimes he starts to teach me mathematical theories when we are in bed. I couldn’t forget that one day when he pulled out of me and started to calculate a lab result when I had almost reached my orgasm. He did that because an idea came to him about his research and he thought he must solve it ASAP. In M’s opinion, an orgasm means the moment when all his calculations are neat and accurate. I was left on the bed with my ejaculation, but at that moment I thought he was perfect.

 

Fragment – 2 – Bereft

Yesterday M hugged me in the middle of the night when he finished playing a game with one of our friends. I felt his hug in my dream and heard him speak, “I’m sorry if I woke you up” in my left ear. Today I won’t have it until midnight, and tomorrow, I still have to get up early. “We all have to be back because we are people and we have to work. We are not cats.” I combed the hair of my cat, who slept on my knees yesterday and said to M, “So you must go back to Wisconsin and continue on with what you have to do tomorrow.”

If you once had something that you feel is important in one moment, it is very hard to imagine the time without it by your side. I believe this is a moment of “bereft.” 

 

Fragment – 3 – How to Talk

I think both M and I should learn how to talk.

Our conversations are usually very distinct. If I let him know I want to call him tonight, M would answer, “I don’t wanna ruin my entire week,” instead of saying directly “No, my heart beats 120 times per minute because I’m so nervous about talking to you. Under that condition, I cannot work at all, but can only dream about you.” And every single time when I try to tell a truth or my real feelings, I add “Can I say this to you? ”

I asked M, “Will you be regretful after I die? Since you will never have a chance to talk with me anymore, and you will never learn how to talk to me. ”

M says, “To be honest, I think that should be the end of your story if you want to write a story between us.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean after you die, I will regret not always telling you directly what I think and how I feel. But I won’t know my own feelings until that moment.”

“See? When I raise the topic of death, you tell me your feelings in a direct way. ”

M stops a second and then I hear a bunch of laughter from the other side of the phone. “You always break my rules.”

 

Fragment – 4 – Markers 

The weirdest thing in my life is that I never feel that I am in love with someone at the same time he is in love with me, but mostly at the time he is away. Those two days, every single time I walked from my bedroom toward the kitchen, I felt a significant, unfamiliar ache between my legs. When I tried to pull my hair to the back and unexpectedly touched my earlobe, I felt a sudden, unobservable swelling. I could not even see the redness in the mirror. 

M explains his opinion to me in another way, “I don’t wanna hurt you so I’ll never leave any markers on your body.” 

However, he still destroys me but in a very decent way: I cannot stop thinking about the days you are here, M. I check my Facebook and Discord perhaps 30 times a day, reading every single word at least three times, and even in my dreams I see myself seeing you in my voice channel, playing games with our friends. At the moment I try to jump in the voice channel, you immediately mute yourself, telling people your mother called. I never see replies in my direct messages, so I throw my keyboard madly from my desk. I wake up from the nightmare of destroying my keyboard and my sound equipment, so I jump up from my bed to check it. But I totally forget I’ve turned off my Discord on my computer to avoid seeing ‘new messages’ because I’m afraid to see ‘no messages.’ 

And when I turned on Discord, I couldn’t spell words correctly. I just spelled ‘image’ wrong. That’s all your fault.”

 

Fragment -5 – Friends with Benefits

Sometimes I’m jealous of those who can always focus on their studies or work. We have 24 hours each day, and our workload is more than 24 hours. I guess that’s one of the reasons why M doesn’t want to be in a relationship with another person, because the other person definitely will take much of his time away from his research. 

“If I note down all the dialogues we have, I’ve successfully written a book. ” I rotate my pen between my fingers and say this through the phone.

“Fair enough.” It seems that M is crazy with some of his data and never listens to me carefully.

“I hope you will remember that we had this conversation when you read my book after it is published. ”

Neither M nor I told our friends that we are already involved in a romantic relationship. How we describe this to our friends is very difficult — starting from where, and how? 

Should we say M is dating someone who already has a boyfriend just because he sexually matches with this girl, wonderfully? Or, that I am having sex with other people to kindle new ideas for writing stories? Or, M cannot find a regular girlfriend because they all think he is a weird nerd. 

I don’t want to become the gossip among my friends. We decide to not let other people see our relationship. Instead, I make up a story about us — a story where we are just friends. 

I’m not lying, we are friends with benefits.

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Letter from the Editor

By May 12, 2024 Featured, Literature

Illustration by Meghan Sim

 

April is National Poetry Month, and this year for our April edition at F Newsmagazine, the editorial team thought it would be a wonderful idea to publish and celebrate poetry by SAIC students. 

In the pages of the Literature section you will find a list of open mic nights where you can go to engage in the Chicago poetry community and perform or workshop poetry of your own, followed by the curated poetry of SAIC students.

This edition contains a variety of different types of poetry including ars poeticas, poems about poetry itself, and poems in both verse and prose discussing a variety of topics and a variety of life’s questions. Many of these poems concentrate on poetry’s ability to heal the world around us. 

With the state of the world being what it is, it can be difficult to feel light when global conflicts are so heavy. When I began the curation of this section I ruminated for a long time on poetry’s place amidst violence and difficult times. Maybe you, like me, are touched or moved in some way by poems —by popular authors or even just on your friends’ Instagram stories— that bring you peace or inspire action in these times.

I have long been a fan of poetry. I hope you enjoy the poems featured in this section and that they bring you what you need.

 

Sincerely,

Katie MacLauchlan

Literature editor

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The anatomy of Chicago’s student newsrooms

By and May 11, 2024 Featured, News

The lack of diversity in student newsrooms is a national problem. Like other professional news publications, student newspapers across the country are often led by white students, while the representation of Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) student journalists is minimal.

At the Daily Northwestern, Northwestern University’s student-run newspaper, it took 140 years for a Black woman to lead the publication. A 2021 study also found that of the 73 editors-in-chief at award-winning college newsrooms in the spring 2021 semester, less than 6 percent were Black and about 10 percent were Latinx — significantly lower than their representation in the college population. Our own newsmagazine at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, F Newsmagazine, suffered from a lack of representation because at one point there wasn’t a single Black student on the editorial staff. 

Recognizing the importance of diverse newsrooms in student newspapers, F Newsmagazine is highlighting the state of diversity at five Chicago-based student news publications: F Newsmagazine (SAIC), The Daily Northwestern (Northwestern University), The Loyola Phoenix (Loyola University Chicago), The Independent (Northeastern Illinois University) and the Chicago Maroon (University of Chicago). (F Newsmagazine reached out to all student publications at Chicago-based colleges. Only the staff of Loyola and The Independent responded and shared their data with us, while for the Maroon and The Daily, we used the data publicly available on their websites).

Newsroom diversity makes a difference. Student newsrooms should reflect the ever-growing diversity of the student body. F strongly believes in this. We hope this information will give readers a sense of how diverse their student newspapers are and how the publication can improve to bring in more diverse voices.

(Editor’s note: The data presented comes from primary and secondary sources and may not be exact for the current staff demographics of these publications.)

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Ballet Review: The Many Almosts of the Joffrey’s ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’

By May 10, 2024 Arts & Culture, Entertainment

The Joffrey Ballet’s “A Midsummer Night’s Dream’ (2024)

Surely by now  you’ve seen signs up and down State Street for the Joffrey Ballet’s 2024 spring showing of “A Midsummer Night’s Dream.” And like me, you might’ve been tempted to see it.

Given my extremely positive experience with their Fall production of “Frankenstein,” I figured this Spring’s show would be no different, and yet my takeaway can be condensed down to one thought: Where’s Puck?!

As it turns out, it is not a retelling of William Shakespeare’s famous play, but rather a loosely narrative story surrounding Midsommer, the Swedish festival, which takes place in the form of a dream, presumably at night ; thus making the component parts of the title technically correct. 

This title confusion took longer to realize than I would care to admit, in part because the ballet, like Shakespeare’s play, also begins with a wedding-like scene. The opening scene, however, isn’t a wedding but a celebration of Midsummer. Between the coordinated suits, photographer, and champagne popping, could you really blame me for the misunderstanding?

The arc of the play’s story is divided into two sections which reflect the experience of a dream and a nightmare, respectively. 

The first half opens with the protagonist of the story, played by Dylan Gutierrez — who also starred as Frankenstein’s Monster in Joffrey’s production last fall — awaking in bed and being led behind the curtain of the main stage by his partner, played by Victoria Jaiani. Following this is an incredibly impressive hay-filled scene as the rest of the company performs a high-energy synchronized romp through the hay as they push it across the stage to fill it in its entirety.

From there, the tone softens with the effect of light rain falling. As the two lovers dance together a third figure emerges, Swedish singer Anna von Hausswolff, dressed in white. She sings a beautiful siren-like song, and though the words of the song clearly weren’t the focus of its inclusion, the lyrics broadly repeat “How long?” and other allusions to the dream the story is framed within. 

This was not Hausswolff’s only appearance. She pops in four or five times throughout the performance, with the same song. While her presence is wonderful, the long-winded nature of the song coupled with its repetition does get a bit monotonous. 

Nevertheless, from there the story transitions into the celebration of Midsommer proper in a surprisingly contemporary setting. Centered around a maypole, the rest of the company is dressed in modern suits and other business formal attire. 

People are lounging about: tanning, a group behind them is setting up a frame tent, and an unrelated pair of lovers steal away a private moment underneath a flagpole bearing the Swedish flag. 

A series of ballet scenes centered around the various activities the party indulges in for the festival follows, including an excellently choreographed dance around the maypole. This section is a highlight of the show as everyone was in harmony and created a genuinely compelling performance.

Yet immediately after  that high point was an exceedingly uncomfortable, far too drawn-out sequence in which the entire company filed into the very edge of the stage and stood shoulder to shoulder, spanned across the entirety of the front edge of the stage. Then they did, well, nothing.

The obligatory awkward laughter from the crowd began about thirty seconds in, then died down, and repeated on and on like ouroboros eating itself. There was a shared feeling that maybe we were meant to give a cue that the performers could move on, but no matter how many rounds of polite laughter happened, the actors were unchanging. After three real-life painful minutes, one character announced, “a toast!” 

This would have hopefully offered a respite from this eye contact-based purgatory, but it didn’t. They passed wine glasses, drank from them, and then, to my horror, resumed their staring. It was in moments like these that I missed Puck the most.

I cannot recount how long the scene went on, but it finally ended with a dining sequence that closed act one. In these dining scenes, there was surprisingly more talking. Characters yelled out, “wine!” Or, “pasta!” with seemingly no rhyme or reason. This thoroughly confused me, not only because it breaks one of the fundamental principles of ballet — no talking — but also because it added no value to the performance.

The Joffrey Ballet performed a brilliant rendition of Mary Shelley’s “Frankenstein” without a single word, so why in this performance, which is far less story-based, does anything need to be said at all? 

Nevertheless, act two begins with a much darker tone as the story shifts from dream to nightmare. The beginning section of this act was, in my opinion, the best sequence in the entire ballet.

The protagonist is seated downstage on his bed, and the table from the previous scene had been lifted up twenty feet in the air to create a slide shape which gives the scene a tense, illogical framing. The lights on the stage are in sync with the orchestra, which plays a fast rhythmic beat that rises to a crescendo, at which point the lights go out before coming back on a few seconds later when the beat begins again. 

Within the time it took for the music to rise, the actors form short vignettes of nightmarish terror-inducing scenes as the protagonist can only look on and cower from his bed. 

These vignettes repeat for a dozen or more small scenes that depict women crying, headless figures, fanatic dancing, and so on. The heavy, dominating soundtrack of the entire segment coupled with the brief scenes of bizarre snapshots truly creates a nightmarish, ever-changing emotion within this section.

As these scenes continue to play on, they build upon each other until all the various characters are assembled in one giant shot, posed for a picture against a backdrop of a huge mackerel. The photographer, from act one snaps a photo of the menagerie and then is silently wheeled off  the stage, rigid and unchanging in their posture. 

It’s a beautifully eerie high point. 

Unfortunately, the show then slips from that high and never seems to return to quite the same level. From then on, Hausswolff once again comes in multiple times to sing a reminder that it’s all a dream, one way the ballet fully discards the guise that it’s about Midsommer at all. The whole company is stripped to only nude-colored undergarments, and any remnant of the festival theming is replaced instead by a sign in the corner that reads “theater dream” in all capital lettering.

The rest of the dances are more standard nonlinear interpretive ballet and continue to peteron until the end of the show, which repeated the same opening with the protagonist waking up in bed and being led behind a curtain. 

Every aspect of the ballet is well executed, but it doesn’t build one cohesive experience. The singer’s voice has a beautiful siren-like quality to it, but she sings the same song four or five times to remind the audience that this is a dream. The dancing is perfectly choreographed and incredibly captivating. (especially in the festival section of the first act and the opening scene of the second act) but it doesn’t tie together to form any kind of story or deeper meaning beyond the theme of a dream. 

Not to mention the complete bait-and-switch when one thinks about the title versus the performance itself. It may be that I’m harping on it too much, but why name your interpretive, loosely linear ballet after one of Shakespeare’s most famous plays when literally any other name was available to you? I feel that I wouldn’t have been so critical of the performance had I gone in with the proper expectations and yet in lieu of seeing a ballet adaption of the play, I got, well, that. 

The entire ballet seems to be comprised of almosts. It’s almost a story, except it completely discards any form of plot from the actual play once it passes the dinner table scene. It’s almost a classic ballet, except for random moments of dialogue which were more jarring than anything. It’s almost        Midsommer themed, except for the second act which barring the first sequence completely abandons any theme at all. 

All in all, the show was almost great. 

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Students Protest President Elissa Tenny’s Goodbye Party in Wake of Arrests at Pro-Palestine Encampment

By May 10, 2024 Featured, SAIC

Student protestors are kept behind security ropes as they protest Elissa Tenny’s goodbye party. Photo by Sidne K. Gard.

On May 10, if you were near the School of the Art Institute of Chicago’s MacLean building elevators around 6 P.M., you would’ve heard drumming and chanting reverberating up through the elevator shaft. 

Dozens of student protesters were in the building’s lobby protesting the outgoing SAIC President Elissa Tenny, criticizing her for her response to the 68 protestors arrested on May 4 for joining a nationwide student protest through encampments in support of Gaza. As part of this criticism, students continue to demand that SAIC be transparent about and divest any money going towards supporting Israel, including SAIC’s ties to the Crown family.

Tenny was inside the MacLean Ballroom celebrating her goodbye party. Tenny is retiring after 14 years working at SAIC and 45 years working in education. 

The protestors were not allowed into the Ballroom, but given the volume of their cries, it is very likely they could be heard throughout the goodbye party. 

Notably, this protest occurred directly inside SAIC’s property, as opposed to the May 4 encampments in the Art Institute’s garden.

SAIC security guards sectioned off ropes to keep the protesters in one area of the lobby and allow a path for other students and SAIC community members to get through. In doing so, the security packed in the student protesters much tighter than they would’ve been otherwise. Additionally, security waved photographers who stepped outside the ropes. 

Despite security’s directing of the crowd, the lobby was full of students. Many students held bright green signs reading “Disclose Investment” in large capital letters and in smaller text, “Free Palestine” and “All empires will fall.” 

The protestors filled the MacLean lobby, chanting “Let them in” to a clapping beat as they were kept out of the Ballroom. Photo by Sidne K. Gard

The various chants and demands were rhythmic, often using clapping and drumming on trash cans with water bottles to hold a beat. 

A common motif of the protest was referring to Elissa Tenny as “E.T.” This included the chant, “E. T. go home!” — a reference to the famous line “E. T. phone home” from the 1982 movie “E.T, the Extra Terrestrial.” There were homemade signs and t-shirts that depicted E. T. from the film with Elissa Tenny’s hair photoshopped onto the alien and the same slogan printed across the bottom in block letters. 

The People’s Art Institute, the student collective who organized the May 4 encampment, arranged the goodbye party protest. They posted on Instagram the same day as the party, writing, “Join us to celebrate the retirement of our dear President Elissa Tenny. We wish her the best as she moves on supporting other Imperalist, capitalist institutions and continues to suppress pro-Palestinian voices.”

The Instagram post also parodied much of the rhetoric the school uses to talk about Tenny being the first female president of SAIC, calling Tenny the “1st SAIC woman president to call the cops on her students” and “the 1st SAIC woman president to threaten the future of all student protest with disciplinary action.” 

The initial post got over 700 likes and the video The People’s Art Institute later posted of the protest afterward, as of writing, has over 500 likes. 

“So she chose to leave behind a legacy of calling the SWAT team on her students … wooow,” wrote one commenter on The People’s Art Institute’s video of the protest. 

The People’s Art Institute declined to comment when F Newsmagazine reached out to them.  

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Celebrating National Poetry Month

By , , , , , , and May 7, 2024 Uncategorized

Illustration by Shina Kang

 

Content note: Some of these poems contain depictions of war and violence that may be distressing to some students. 

 

If a Poem

 

Pearls on a string

Process of refinement

Ode in a bottle

Pen and paper

A dream, a passion

Where reality is suspended

 

Megan Shi

 

__________________

 

Ars Poeticks

 

The helix’s course, slower than kaleidoscopic winds

even the interludes cannot assume one form

the heart unfolding upon itself as a change of cloth

four with one hidden is its own arithmetic.

The Sun’s scornful shadow. The saplings assemble

for the final revealing of the variegated. Cobalt

vista: magnanimities for the agile devices

a device: a distinctive blueprint for novelty.

 

Kaiylah O’Quinn

 

__________________

 

Inertia of Rest

 

There’s only the two of us

everyone else is from here

it must have been a misspelling

a disarrangement of numbers

 

Walking in a fleece foot-cover

living on a rubber duck boat

singing the blues we ask ourselves

do you mind coming back down?

kill that bird that holds you

aim at it with your feather arrow and be home

 

There’s almost the two of us

your eyes weren’t empathic when

you read the first chapter, the first verse, the first cry

there was once the two of us

and there’s still the two of us

unwillingly in the poem, unless you leave.

but the poem didn’t leave you

 

You’re there in it

and we know because you’ve kept waiting

wondering if there’s a reward

at the end of this. There’s none

 

You may call this a surrealist poem

tell yourself the reward is in witnessing the vague beauty

of a life falling tangent to a political uprising or a heartbreak

never not being tangent

but that’s not the intention either

 

All I mean is to see how much a brain-in-love will endure

in hope to make art of sense or sense of art

 

You and me have always been different

I and you not so different because I know the blues

I knew it when I believed the rest of the world wasn’t real

and saw something in fake vacation posters

 

There’s three of us now

you, me and the poem

sometimes a poem chooses to have a mind of her own

and that’s silence.

But it’s in control now. I’m here and I choose humming.

Denial is only a song playing in the speakers over my head.

 

It could be only one of us

because your and my mind in this moment are one

for this millisecond or some more seconds

to exist in one line, in one alphabet, one poem,

to know each other as letters on a page.

Until the page remains or until

we drift and are equidistant again

 

Khytul Qazi

 

__________________

 

Carson was Wrong 

Inspired by “Always Have a Joyful Mind” by Nin Andrews and “On Orchids” by Anne Carson

 

I do not understand poetry. 

I am not a poet, and therefore, I do not understand the intricacies of verse, meter, pause, and line. When I read poetry, I feel it in my heart, not my head. It’s a tingly feeling—one that says, “this is saying something,” but I do not know what is being said. 

I am not a poet…or a florist. In the same way I do not understand poetry, I do not understand orchids. But he does. 

Every time I see an orchid, I send him a picture of it. Today, it is the poem “On Orchids” by Anne Carson. His response? Anne Carson does not know about orchids. Her analogy in the poem is challenging, as the nature of orchid rooting isn’t the same as other plants, and fragrance among orchids is often the exception rather than the rule. 

He goes on about how orchids are epiphytic—they grow on other plants, clinging to them like vines. He shares how to pot them; how to fertilize them; how they grow upside-down; how the circulating fog of the rainforest nourishes them…and suddenly, this is me. I am an orchid. 

I drink from his words like a thirsty plant. Bloom into the happiest version of myself at his touch. When I love him, I feel it in my heart, not my head. It’s a pounding feeling that transcends any logic.

…like poetry. 

I want to be remembered, not for my bad poems, but for being in love.

 

Sisel Gelman

 

 

My Graying Hair Doesn’t Make Sense To Me, Nor Does Time

 

My love—

Today I found a third gray hair in my bangs. It made me think of the time, years ago, when I found a gray hair in your curls. The night was young, and I held the talisman tightly between my index finger and my thumb. This would be the closest I’d get to seeing you age, and we both knew it.

You pulled me up gently from my knees. You held me, and my youth, tight between your

strong arms. I wept silent silver tears and begged you to stay a little longer—to stay until I got old.

You refused.

Now I carry my heavy age on my forehead, and your absence like a pebble in my shoe. I

find the urge to rip my graying hair intertwined with the love of the memory of you.

 

Sisel Gelman

 

__________________

 

Bet on the Muse

 

Sometimes all you have is the long shot

the perimeter of a perspective

a view that widens around you and narrows

so precisely at a point

(directly in front of you)

where focus converts to a natural feeling, breathing and sweating in public,

then

you can square up to face the distance.

 

Maya Odim 

 

__________________

 

Sky Migrations

 

Every time I trek through an airport, no matter the city, I call the boy who I grew out of girlhood with in New Orleans. Siblings not by blood or circumstance, but of inside jokes and matching Christmas Eve tattoos. He doesn’t hang up until I’ve boarded the plane. We both migrated far from Louisiana, growing into new bodies and cities. 

 

When my plane reaches Chicago Midway, he texts me a photo of a duck he saw on his walk home in Canada because “you landed, and ducks do that too.” 

 

Sidne K. Gard

 

__________________

 

Live in your bubble.

 

Go on, live in your little bubble. Shield your eyes from the hands reaching out to you. Cover your ears so you can’t hear their screams. Turn off the news. Turn off the news and live in your bubble where innocent people aren’t being murdered. But know that your silence is deafening. It echoes through my brain and I will not forget. But go on, live in your bubble. 

But I refuse to live in a bubble—and I’m so, so angry. I can’t stand that more people aren’t angry. This constant weight on my chest and the pressure to be doing more is so overwhelming. But regardless, I feel like I should be doing more. I can’t take this- the weight of the grief I feel. 

But you don’t get it, do you? Because you’re in your bubble. You don’t get that I can’t stop. I can’t give up because I’d rather feel this angry than feel happy right now. You don’t get that I have a responsibility to do what is right, and what’s right is to fight for justice. It’s not like I want this responsibility. It’s just that it follows me, no matter what I do or where I go. I’m so, so angry. And I’m tired. And I’m so tired of being angry. I’m also angry that I’m tired. But one thing is for sure, I can’t stop being angry. There’s too much to be angry about to possibly stop. I don’t get how you’re not more angry. It rumbles through my veins. There’s a pit in my stomach. There’s this constant pressure that I’ve been feeling… to do more, to yell louder, to write more, to be better. 

But I feel like everyone is living in their own little bubble. And I’m the only one that is sane. That’s the only possible explanation. 

Israa Darwich 

 

__________________

 

crimson winged finch 

i’ve witnessed with disconnection 

base human empathy with no personal tie 

then a songbird landed on my pallet 

and tracked paint all over my canvas 

i want to show you my homeland 

named for the groundwater that the olive trees dance in 

i listen to her sing and sing 

my heart bursting at the seams 

and as she goes her way 

i thank her for her music 

 

today i ask hermes what news he holds 

and he hands me a little red feather, darkened from his tears 

they saw heaven on earth and felt no peace 

they saw heaven on earth and decided that 

their hell was more important 

than heaven on earth 

 

i place the little songbird feather behind my ear and listen for her song every night

 

Castor Santee

 

 

hermes azaiza

 

wild footed wild eyed messenger

whose youth never wanes

bears the weight of every toppled stone

and broken doll

and ash filled tea cup

that his cousin Eris leaves in her path

 

tonight when he lays his head on his coat

(the one his father blessed before his flight)

beside a blood flecked witness

he will sleep with his eyes open

his pen moving

his clock ticking

and wake even heavier than yesterday

 

his war lorn brother helps him strap on his kevlar

perhaps today will bring a still sky

something he’s said every morning

before leaving for his duties

 

a still sky,

hermes thinks,

is a sky with no fire

and a place to close your eyes

 

Castor Santee

 

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People’s Art Institute issues statement on police arrests of protesters

By May 6, 2024 Featured, Letters

On May 4, 68 protesters were arrested by the Chicago Police Department after students at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago set up their encampment, the People’s Art Institute, in support of nationwide campus protests against the ongoing genocide of the Palestinian people.

All of the protesters have since been released.

Here’s a statement released by the People’s Art Institute and its organizers on their Instagram page, detailing their experience of what happened that day and how they were treated by the administration and CPD.

The People’s Art Institute, constituted by SAIC students, announced our encampment situated in the AIC’s North Garden, on Saturday morning, May 4, at 11:30 A.M.

The goals of the encampment were clear: to stand in solidarity with the Palestinian people and to demand SAIC and AIC divest from entities profiting off of the occupation and genocide in Palestine.

Students began setting up and by 12:05 P.M., CPD was onsite and an arrest warning was issued. CPD started kettling protestors on the sidewalk at the corner of Monroe and Michigan and removed them from the North side of the garden with extreme force. As of this writing, the Civilian Office of Police Accountability is investigating CPD use of excessive force. 

At around 2:00 P.M., SAIC Provost and Senior Vice President of Academic Affairs Martin Berger began discussions with PAI liaisons, who voiced the encampment’s demands of disclosure and divestment in the genocide. Berger proposed that students in the encampment could temporarily avoid police confrontation and continue administrative negotiations if we moved to the front of the 280 building on Columbus Drive by 6:00 A.M. PAI liaisons requested this be pushed to 10:00 A.M., to which Berger said he would consider. The liaisons emphasized that The People’s Art Institute is a non-hierarchical, democratic community, and asked for time to make this decision collectively without the immediate threat of police violence. To be clear, the liaisons did not at any point reject an offer from the administration. They only requested changes to be considered.

At 3:30 P.M., liaisons gathered with those in the garden to discuss the information in a community forum. Around 30 minutes later, the PAI liaisons were suddenly informed that not only was the 10:00 A.M. timeline declined, but also that the 6:00 A.M. offer was rescinded entirely. Also at 3:30 P.M., according to CPD official media, AIC requested for CPD to enter the garden and arrest those in the garden while we were waiting for a response from Berger. At 4:00 P.M., Berger informed us that CPD and SWAT were coming to make arrests.

After violently breaking apart a chain of protestors in front of the gates, SWAT and police entered the encampment and began their violent mass arrest. Arrestees have reported a range of brutal treatment from CPD/SWAT: being slammed onto the ground, hit, kneeled and stepped on, dragged, aggressively grabbed, and elbowed. Many of those arrested were injured, and two arrested students needed to be taken to the ER. 68 PAI protestors were arrested and the encampment was cleared out, ultimately leading to its termination at around 5:00 P.M. The majority of those arrested were SAIC students.

Leadership at SAIC and AIC have since released statements claiming they acted against us in the name of safety with no mention of the reasons for our encampment: to stand against the genocide in Palestine and to demand disclosure and divestment from entities involved in the genocide. To hypocritically invoke “safety” while calling for the brutalization of student protestors and profiting off of Crown family weapons manufacturing money is shameful. We reject the AIC’s terms and we reject their false narrative about our Palestine solidarity encampment.

We want to emphasize that as the AIC sent SWAT forces to brutalize protestors taking a stand for Palestine, people in Rafah are currently being bombed by Israel while also receiving evacuation orders that threaten an imminent, lethal attack. We greatly appreciate those who contributed to jail support with their presence and monetary donations. It enabled us to greet our arrested community members with care, and we now ask that you redirect that care directly to those in Gaza by donating to evacuation aid @operationolivebranch

Long Live The People’s Art Institute. 

This is only the beginning. 

Here’s a statement released by President Elissa Tenny and Provost and Senior Vice President of Academic Affairs, Martin Berger about the protests and the arrest.

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SAIC students arrested after encampment at AIC

By May 4, 2024 Featured, SAIC

School of the Art Institute of Chicago students who set up camps at the North Garden of the Art Institute of Chicago to join the nationwide college protests in solidarity with Palestine yesterday were arrested by the Chicago Police Department.

On Saturday morning, the students announced the encampment on their Instagram page, calling it THE PEOPLE’S Art Institute.

Some of the demands of the students included “divestment from all entities and individuals financially supporting the Zionist occupation of Palestine” and “acknowledge the ongoing massacre of Palestinians in Gaza”.

Within hours of their protest, CPD showed up and after some hours, the police started arresting the students who were in the encampment area.

F Newsmagazine is still waiting for a statement from the organizers of the protest. According to an Instagram post from the organizers, several protesters have been released, though not everyone is out.

This is the first time CPD has executed this level of mass arrest since the pro-Palestine protests encampments began in Chicago. Around 2,300 people have been arrested at pro-Palestinian protests on at least 49 college campuses across the country over the last two weeks.

The Art Institute of Chicago issued the following full statement about the protests:

The Art Institute of Chicago respects a group’s right to peacefully protest without harming staff and visitors. Today, a group of individuals, including some SAIC students, began a protest in the museum’s North Garden, and as it progressed, protesters surrounded and shoved a security officer and stole their keys to the museum, blocked emergency exits, and barricaded gates. The protest also began to escalate on Michigan Avenue outside of the museum. Because our priority is the safety of our employees, our visitors, and our collection, protesters were offered an alternative location to continue their protest on campus that would be safer for all involved, and they did not accept that relocation offer. During multiple rounds of negotiations, SAIC student protesters were promised amnesty from academic sanction and trespassing charges if they agreed to relocate. The School also agreed to meet with a student group to discuss their demands. After approximately five hours, an agreement could not be reached. The Chicago Police Department ended the protest in the safest way possible, and we estimate that approximately 50 people were arrested.

This is a developing story.

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Have I Seen This Before?

By May 2, 2024 Featured, Literature

Illustration by Fah Prayottavekit

 

Your friends point at the nearest clock, eyes wide, “It’s 11:11!” Each part of the room becomes suspiciously capable of turning your life into every Hollywood romance your mind can fathom. 

Quickly our thoughts become centered on love: “When will it arrive?” “How much longer will it take?” “Who will it be?” The world is now illuminated and everything hidden can be seen. 

Discerning symbols is our mind’s favorite pastime.  How can we assist it in filtering which symbols are the ones worth seeking? 

Your friend’s auspicious announcement may just feel like another honking horn in traffic, but what makes it so prompting? 

Understanding what makes our mind drawn to “seeking symbols” relates directly to how we wish to connect to our experiences. 

We want to make the experience more “real” by  noticing symbols. Doing so aids our mind in marking — in real time — our experiences. 

Our world becomes more personal. We are emotional beings, and those emotions can now hold a tangible meaning through numerology, tarot and more popular cheap spirituality common to our society. 

We attribute the fluttery feeling of admiration to seeing the numbers 11:11 to  remember the emotions that made us feel happy or seen.

 With enough time, this repetitious cycle of seeking becomes the process for creating symbols. Emotions warp into  symbols, and they are then capitalized for emotional gain. 

Symbols are commercialized frivolously, and our culture has become obsessed with them. It’s capitalism! 11:11 has cultivated a sense of  unreal wonder. 

This is the down-effect of capitalizing spiritual symbols, and explains why your friend’s 11:11 exclamation can begin to feel cliché. An initial feeling for a symbol is depleted, because of capitalism’s excessive appropriation. 

Depleted symbols can make us dull. Our attention is capital. Media outlets will utilize mystical symbols in hopes of catching more attention to their content. 

This is cheapening mysticism. Hashtags and Instagram spirituality assist in the process too. They cause the symbols to quickly lose their meaning over time. 

Capitalizing on spirituality also diminishes its effectiveness in our lives when it’s meant to serve as an outlet from the burdens of a material reality. It also keeps us trapped in our mundane daily routines, and away from the mystical, imaginative side of us.  

The essence of symbols is what gives them their unique charge and meaning, and the moment symbols reach media outlets, their essence can be misinterpreted and tainted.

The 11:11 symbol has morphed into the term “twin-flame,” causing every spiritual Instagram user to search the room for their soulmate. 

A twin flame is thought to be an individual who comes into your life and mirrors the other half of who you are as a spiritual entity. The reflection can vary amongst people. 

Most individuals  have different opinions on the meaning of the term due to their experiences and its integration into capitalism, but it is meant to distinguish relationships that have lasting emotional and intimate impact on you. 

Of course, most relationships we experience impact us in some way, but a twin flame is meant to symbolize someone you were meant to encounter: at the exact time, place and state of mind you were in, so they say. 

 Netflix shows  like “Escaping Twin Flames,” the plethora of Instagram tarot readers, and obsession with astrology charts show how spiritual symbols are becoming excessive within our capitalist culture.

Consider how our worlds can “reflect” to us what is familiar. People share our interests and we follow them on Instagram or X (formally known as twitter).

Their symbols and ours become intertwined. It can feel like your favorite influencer is another version of yourself with the exact emotional experiences as you. 

Our minds, upon consistent repetition of these cues, will then create them as “shared symbols,” or “spiritual messages.” People also refer to this phenomenon as being a part of the collective. Suddenly there is a reference bank of symbols where meaning can be. How can we participate in spirituality within this culture of capitalism and social media?

It’s important to consider keeping what we notice to ourselves, or limiting it to verbal exchanges amongst friends and close loved ones. This is how we can maintain the initial splendor and keep our spirituality sacred.

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