Chris Banyas
Editor-in-Chief
The system has failed.
How do you react to those words?
Systems of living, systems of power, systems of government, systems of academics, biological systems, astral systems, economic systems, mechanical systems, and many more make up and influence the ways in which we live and die as these systems systematically fall prey to entropy, disorder, and finally chaos.
“A child’s reaction to this type of calamity is twofold and extreme. Not knowing how deeply, powerfully, life drops anchor into its vast sources of recuperation, he is bound to envisage, at once, the very worst; yet at the same time, because of his inability to imagine death, the worst remains totally unreal to him. Gerard went on repeating: “Paul’s dying; Paul’s going to die”’ but he did not believe it. Paul’s death would be part of the dream, a dream of snow, of journeying forever.”
Viewing life as eternally lying on my back, gazing into the firmament while snowflakes too heavy to stay aloft descend, land and begin to melt away on my face is very appealing, and honestly makes as much existential sense to me as any other explanation, I think I’ve come to the conclusion that the Earth is not a cold, dead place, however it is populated entirely by children.
Children you say?
The concepts of maturity and adulthood are merely constructs to ease the complexities of day-to-day living, what could be called a system.
Do you remember the first time you realized adults are just grotesquely malformed and misshapen children? Perhaps it was the first time you heard an adult utter something that you immediately realized was patently ridiculous, or some behavior equally as infantile.
Yet all of the power over all of the people ends up in the hands of these children.
What do they do with it?
All too often explosions of groupthink, gang-violence and mob mentality react so strongly to new and dangerous ideas that they are crushed instead of given a chance to take root and bloom.
“The rock struck Piggy a glancing blow from chin to knee: the conch exploded into a thousand white fragments and ceased to exist. Piggy, saying nothing, with no time for even a grunt, traveled through the air sideways from the rock, turning over as he went. Piggy fell 40 feet and landed on his back across the square red rock in the sea. His head opened and stuff came out and turned red. Piggy’s arms and legs twitched a bit, like a pig’s after it has been killed.”
The thing about destructive behavior is, it is in our nature as animals, as beasts retreating from the fire-wielding Neanderthal, we recoil from frightening ideas, and sometimes attack them in efforts to reduce their influence upon us, to reduce the fear they inflict upon us.
As long as there are record keepers among us who maintain ledgers of these ideas, why they disappeared, how they died, and what they were about, all is not lost.
Living in an imaginary world is far easier than the realities lurking just outside your windows. Human beings are, in my estimation, irrational beasts, and not rational animals like the man said, having an infinite capacity to inflict pain and suffering upon others.
But this is counterbalanced by my observation of true human kindness that cannot exist in the animal world.
There can be no good without evil, no light without darkness, no vanilla without chocolate, no hate without love, no beauty without ugliness, no compassion without derision.
Living within the confines of an existence based entirely upon dualities is difficult, yet reassuringly simple.
I have strongly advocated the addition of a mandatory one day a week for personal self-loathing as I think it would go a long way toward realigning people’s perceptions.
Though as a friend of mine pointed out, if we have a self-loathing day, we would need to dedicate a day to self-adoration.
Ugggh. I guess we could do that.
I’ve made my stance on many things that go on around this campus abundantly clear, and I think that the broad strokes of the above reduction of human existence apply here as well.
STEM programs are growing all the time, while the arts suffer in the corner of the basement like a beaten dog.
And I get why this happens. People are much more comfortable with the scientific systems involved in STEM than they are in the meters of poetry, the lyrics of song, the steps to dances and the notes of an aria.
Art frightens people.
And it should.
The pre-programmed paths of circuit boards, electron orbits, and cell composition have little capacity to break out of their moulds, but works of art have the capability to affect us viscerally and profoundly.
Here’s something for you to ponder: would you choose to be blind or deaf? And you must choose one.
I choose to be blind every time. Life to me would not be worth living if I could not hear the voices of my loved ones, music, and the sounds of nature.
So while I do find it repulsive how the arts are treated in the university systems of today, the fact of the matter is that they still exist.
The fact of the matter is that while the gears of the machine grind the bones of the fallen to money dust which is then snorted back into the gaping nostril to refuel the engine, there are bastions of wonderful things happening all the time, all around us.
Are there problems with funding and the arts? Sure, but we also have a world-class venue which is readily available to students.
Are there problems with international student programs? Sure there are, but the diversity that they bring to our campus and area are invaluable, and for the most part the diverse communities get along extremely well.
Are there problems with the leadership of ISU? Sure there are, but as of the writing of this message no roving death squads have knocked down my door. And as unhappy as all of my analogies probably make those who occupy the keep atop the mount, they haven’t cut the power to this office yet.
Are there problems with teacher and student retention? Absolutely, but some of the best teachers I have had in my time at ISU have been new replacements for professors who have left and the diverse student body that attends ISU because of its convenience and location have been no end of inspiration.
Searching for hope in utter darkness is a lot easier if you occasionally bump into someone else, and whether you believe it or not, there are other people out there, fumbling just like you, looking for someone to connect with.
It’s almost time for me to pass the conch to someone else, but we still have some time left.
“Ralph wept for the end of innocence, the darkness of man’s heart, and the fall through the air of the true, wise friend called Piggy.”
