Go back to your own stupid residential college

By David Wertime

Certain cheers and phrases are a vital part of any Yalie's vernacular. Some celebrate and glorify our school: "For God, for Country, and for Yale" or "Harvard Sucks." Others are more divisive, like "JE Sux." Ironically, while the latter illustrates our considerable self-hatred, it's also the best way to identify a genuine Yale student. In theory, fellow Yalie Mr. Burns over at Citibank will hire you on the spot and even light your celebratory Cuban; in reality, he'll send you packing the moment he finds out your sorry ass was in Trumbull.

No one can deny that a sense of competitiveness pervades our school. If a normal person ever enrolled at Yale, he would almost certainly sit back, turn on the TV, pop open a Corona, and thank God that he can cruise by with a 1.7 GPA and still get a cushy job after graduation. But somehow, this ostensibly easy formula for success has gone horribly wrong. Everywhere I go, I see people kissing up to professors and packing full bookbags. Students are curious, ambitious, even self-improving. This must not go on.

Although I might vote for eliminating the academic side of Yale, there is a more subtle solution. No, it does not entail removing Origins from Broadway. It involves the complete demolition of our residential college system.

One thing is certain: the Yale student body is an eclectic collection of personalities. But this diversity means nothing when a glorified dorm system creates impassible divides out of the very differences we should be bridging. Everyone knows Calhoun is for the really rich, really smart kids. Go inside the courtyard sometime and look at the imposing Gothic architecture—nothing could be more off-putting or more pretentious. Conversely, Trumbull is home to all of the poorer and less intellectually advantaged souls. Its stuffy quarters and lack of a discernible courtyard are clearly attempts to hinder any mass uprisings. And what of Branford? Bad things happen when dormitories are centered around an eye-popping phallic symbol.

Whether the personalities create the college or the college creates the personalities, clearly residential colleges have separated Yalies into 12 convenient categories. Granted, this creates a veritable smorgasbord of stereotypes; we swing by Silliman for flaky freshmen and dip into JE for crunchy psuedo-activists. But like tostada and spring roll night at Commons, none of these options distinguishes itself as even remotely attractive.

Even as a nerd, I enjoy hanging out with Morse's dumb jocks and pseudo-artistes, although this activity does offer its traumas. Recently, I watched helplessly as several drunken athletes beat up a visiting TDer and took his lunch money despite his desperate cries. But like any other anti-socialite at this school, I feel totally out of my element as soon as I leave my beloved residential college. Ezra Stiles, like Harvard is just a sick inversion of a once-stable reality. Pierson forces me to forego the English language and rely on a relatively simple pattern of grunts and clicks.

If a brawny posse is one of the benefits of residential college life, then a general lack of respect is one of the drawbacks. Not only are we taught to loathe and disrespect members of other colleges through cutthroat competitions for the Tyng and Green Cups, but we are belittled within our own ranks. As freshmen, we are sequestered in a "special" quad, goaded into taking interminable introductory English courses, and thrust into the care of freshman counselors who are just looking to get some play. When we move into our colleges as sophomores we again must play the role of new kids, enduring the requisite wedgies and wet-willies. Indeed, our college experience is half-completed by the time we get to hit on hot underclassmen in earnest. And by then, we're too busy feeling bitter toward the world to take advantage of susceptible youngsters. Especially the ones in Davenport. Yeech!

Like any self-respecting community, Yale has its problems—but attracting smart and competitive undergraduates is not one of them. The problem arises when we take all of that nasty, cutthroat energy that we've been taught is necessary for success, and turn it inward. The residential college system is understandable to the extent that it encourages us to better ourselves; unlike Joe Blow and his Corona-sipping self, we must learn to bear the crushing weight of our own apparent excellence. We should all pat each other on the back and enjoy using the Yale name to impress grown-ups at cocktail parties. Why waste these four years of precious ignorance and self-absorption? Once we get out of here, there are no guarantees—only a few Cuban cigars for those who know how to work the system. And don't even bother calling Fidel if you're in Trumbull.

David Wertime is a sophomore in Morse.

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