On douchebaggery and the like

Danil Rudoy ’11 is from Moscow, Russia

The problem of douchebaggery at Middlebury College, a proud educational institution with a long history full of copious resonant episodes, is something that, despite its obvious relevance, has not yet been addressed on the pages of this periodical. Your humble servant would not undertake the hard and ultimately pointless task of bringing this issue up either, but the events that took place this semester make it impossible for him to be silent any longer. Of course, idealistic as he is, he does not expect that every schlub going to our college suddenly becomes enlightened with some cosmic shine, reevaluates his life and begins his next day with the first step toward becoming a worthy person. But shouldn’t the freedom of speech that is said to thrive in this country be taken advantage of at least once in four years?

So, douchebaggery. You all know what it means, right? I am talking about a behavioral pattern, passed genetically from one generation of uncultivated brats to another, that makes the one locked in it commit deeds you deem rude, offensive and inconsiderate. It often involves undesired penetration of your private space, which occurs, for instance, when a tipsy freshman bumps into you on the stairs, making you spill the water you are holding all over your coat, looks at you in the way he would look at the janitor cleaning his dad’s office and walks away silently; or when a hungover sophomore who must have poured the last load of his brains into the toilet (which he did not flush) this very morning, snatches the chair from your table, totally disregarding the fact that there is another plate in front of you that belongs to your lunch companion who had the audacity to use this chair for their own purposes before leaving for a moment to get another cup of invigorating cafeteria coffee.
I am sure I do not have to continue with examples: each one of you has a whole bunch of your own, be it what you suffered yourselves or inflicted upon others. What worries me, though, is that in the last three months I witnessed more such episodes than in the entire preceding three years. Am I being so incredibly unlucky this fall, or did the infamous economic crisis of 2008 hit our cozy community harder than our leaders like to acknowledge? We have already accepted the drastic and irreversible decline of the quality of the dining hall food; we have already taught ourselves that the phrase “comprehensive fee” does not include having phones in our rooms; we have already learned how to get all our finals done in one week, but is it still not enough to compensate for the fireworks of the Winter Carnival?

Of course, I have no idea what guidelines were given to the admissions office in the last couple of years, but it seems that the change from being “need blind” to “need aware” meant more to our community than it should have. “If we must have more un-scholarshipped kids at this place to keep it going, we’ll do it, then,” some of us cried enthusiastically two years ago. Well, there is certainly some sense to that. It is true that a rich heir, sufficiently buttered up with the pleasures of the Winter Term, will be willing to donate to their alma mater some of his money to decrease the amount of taxes and to have his name engraved in stone somewhere other than in his bedroom. But, dear administration, don’t you want our highly selective Middlebury to finally have a truly notable alumnus, someone whose name would be known all around the world, and not for the heroic increase on the initial investment, but for a scientific breakthrough or a genius work of art? If so, you know what to do. If no… well, I can be but glad that my time here is almost through, because if the things keep going this way, the Middlebury College will be sucked into the bog of impermeable mediocrity very, very fast.
Let this prophecy never come true, and let us all be as worthy of the name “human” as we must be. Amen.