The Deserted Bandwagon

Author: MATT KUNZWEILER

MCAB, we delegated to you an important responsibility - and you shamelessly went ahead and organized a spring concert that will utterly fail to celebrate the values that characterize Middlebury College.

We students demand a performance that will salute our time-honored principles: diligence, sportsmanship, honesty, sobriety, nutrition, hygiene, punctuality and cross-country skiing. That's what we're all about. That's what we cherish. And we expect our visiting musicians to reflect and reinforce our level-headed convictions.

Consider for a moment Naughty by Nature's track record: Were you aware that MCs Treach and Vinnie were arrested in 1997 for illegal weapons possession? How are they going to set a good example for our impressionable students? Additionally, some of their lyrics go so far as to incite violence in their listeners. MCAB, do you wish to see students "knuckle-up" at NBN's behest and participate in an all-out melee? Is this what you want - to imperil our values?

The concert's headliner, Jurassic 5, is no better. They brazenly speak of "puffin cold spliffs" in one of their songs. If you consult the College handbook, you'll find that Middlebury does not approve of narcotics use. What if we trusting and good-natured Middlebury students unsuspectingly take the advice of these hip hoppers and are coerced into experimenting with "cold spliffs"? Personally, I can't imagine. But I do know this: without such harmful advice, it would never occur to students to ingest psychotropics during a musical event. MCAB, if I get high during the concert, I'm holding you responsible.

(As for Rahzel: his talented beat-boxing will only encourage untalented a cappella beat-boxers to reach for their dreams - which would be obnoxious.)

But the more I think about it, the more I realize MCAB is totally "down" with hip hop and its morally unsound messages. This is demonstrated by MCAB's slang-savvy emails which invariably conclude by saying: "Peace out players, one love, holla, shazaam - MCAB out." Sometimes their e-mails even rhyme.

And in the March 30 issue of The Middlebury Campus, a front page headline testified to the fact that the College Activities Board is already in bed with hip hop's brand of moral corruption: "MCAB boasts unprecedented spring concert." Boasts, did you say? Boasting, let me remind you, is an indulgent act of bravado - which is so hip hop.

And the real tragedy isn't the concert itself - but that all the students will edit their Facebook profiles the next day, and post photos of themselves posing next to strung-out rappers at the Marriot afterparty. So we'll be reminded of this shameful event over and over and over again.

Look, I'm not saying that these hip hop artists aren't accomplished in their field, or that certain correctional facilities wouldn't enjoy their music. I'm just saying that we should've just booked Jack Johnson and ordered him to play a one-hour set consisting exclusively of the songs he wrote for the new "Curious George" motion picture soundtrack, which would have guaranteed innocent and melodious fun for all… then again, Middlebury doesn't approve of curiosity per se - unless it is directed towards academic pursuits in the form of inquisitiveness…and we certainly don't approve of Curious George's behavior on that novelty t-shirt where he appears to have uncorked a jar of ether. So scratch Johnson.