What Phoebe would write if she weren’t leaving

By Phoebe Maltz / June 2, 2005

I’ve been writing What Would Phoebe Do? since my first year, and I think this one here will be the last, unless my post-college career ends up being Freelance Maroon Columnist, in which case I’ll see you all in September. That said, rather than wrapping up, I’m going to provide a glimpse into all the...

It’s no surprise that we beat Harvard

By Phoebe Maltz / May 9, 2005

The Wall Street Journal’s “Opinion Journal” ran a piece on April 29 by Michael Steinberger that brought immense, seemingly inexplicable joy to the U of C community. What did Steinberger write? A defense of of cold winters? Of all-night study spaces? No. What really gets U of C students grinning is a definitive assertion, in...

Among other things, a defense of Broadview

By Phoebe Maltz / April 28, 2005

The buzzwords surrounding culture- or ethnic-themed dormitories are misleading: “multicultural” sounds like a good thing, whereas “segregation,” not so good. A dorm of pride-filled blacks or Latinos is something a college can be proud of; the all-white dorms or frat houses implied by such an arrangement (and yes, all-white housing is the inevitable result of...

Bellow must be remembered and revered

By Phoebe Maltz / April 12, 2005

I went to the University of Chicago for many reasons. I wanted to be forced to learn more math and science than I would voluntarily have subjected myself to at another school. I wanted to make up for the years I spent watching Designing Women and figured that a few years of Aristotle and Adam...

Phoebe would certainly not covenant marry

By Phoebe Maltz / February 22, 2005

“Upgrading their vows to that of a covenant marriage, a legally binding contract available only in Arkansas, Arizona and Louisiana, the Huckabees [the Arkansas governor and his wife] hope to jump-start a conservative movement that has shown little sign of moving in recent years. A covenant marriage commits a couple to counseling before any separation...

U of C: A feminist and post-feminist utopia

By Phoebe Maltz / January 11, 2005

It’s hard to be a girl. Or at least it’s hard to be a girl at the U of C. No, strike that, it’s hard to be a U of C girl looking to snag frat guys predisposed to finding the school’s women “ugly.” Julie Fredrickson’s piece in the Chicago Weekly, “Squirrel Crazy: Being a...

Roth book misused to mourn election

By Phoebe Maltz / November 21, 2004

Rebecca Phillips wrote in last Friday’s Maroon (“America ‘le ridicule,'” 11/11/04): “[D]espite the Kerry-Edwards button defiantly pinned on my winter coat, I knew that it was over. It wouldn’t be until the next day that the French newspapers would go to press with headlines such as ‘4 More Years: What Europe Feared,’ but on the...

Meet the anti-anti-American New Yorker

By Phoebe Maltz / November 5, 2004

Is it possible to be a native New Yorker, one who loves the city, who feels culturally aligned with “blue America,” who reads the Times, who is for gay marriage, who wears a lot of black, who orders espresso drinks with skim milk, who is nevertheless deeply disturbed by the sentiment, common among New Yorkers,...

Jewish-conspiracy theorist surfaces at Duke

By Phoebe Maltz / October 27, 2004

The good life. Most people picture seaside vacations, mojitos served by attractive members of one’s preferred sex, and not having a care (or midterm) in the world. Not so for Philip Kurian, a student at Duke University. No, in Kurian’s eyes, the good life is being Jewish in America. There’s nothing quite like it. “It...

A core problem: science vs. humanities

By Phoebe Maltz / October 2, 2004

We have Hum, not “poetry for physicists”; why, then, do we have “physics for poets”? There’s a flaw in the Core; a tear in the otherwise flawless ozone layer that surrounds the College. I first noticed it a couple years ago, but was reminded of it today while sitting in Phy Sci, attempting to re-learn...

Anglophobia and conformity in the blogosphere

By Phoebe Maltz / September 18, 2004

American political bloggers have a thing for “rather.” Not Dan Rather, but “rather” as in “very.” In spoken American English, I have yet to hear someone say, “I’m rather bored,” or “this is rather cool,” at least in a way that didn’t come across as pompous or forced. But a quick search for the word...

Redline Shuttle debate misses larger issues

By Phoebe Maltz / May 18, 2004

Two principal takes on the new Red Line Shuttle have surfaced in Viewpoints: the shuttle is either a sinister, possibly racist, means of setting the University further apart from the community, or it is an innocuous example of the privilege U of C students may as well accept that they are paying for. Neither acknowledges...

The Matzah Cycle: France, England, etc

By Phoebe Maltz / April 13, 2004

As a child, up until the age of about, let’s say, 19, I was very confused by where matzah came from. I had not bought into the blood-libel rumors. No, I figured it must be made out of matzah meal, mixed with water then baked. But, then, where did matzah meal come from? It must...

The perils of being moderate

By Phoebe Maltz / February 27, 2004

I’d like to say I’m voting for Bush. I was going to, really, I was planning on it, I got ridiculed for it, and now I have to take it all back. I am again a good Democrat, like when the teenaged son of a liberal New York family in Woody Allen’s Everyone Says I...

A teeny bopper’s guide to the primaries

By Phoebe Maltz / January 30, 2004

Disillusioned by a blur of Democrats? Look again—there are some crucial differences among the candidates. Seriously, take a close look. As of this evening, the candidates are, in order of teeny-bopper acceptability: John Edwards, Wesley Clark, Howard Dean, Joe Lieberman, John Kerry, Al Sharpton, and Dennis Kucinich. They may all think similar or different enough...

Fashion experts debate Ugg boots craze

By Phoebe Maltz / January 12, 2004

As sort of a “welcome back” surprise for the whopping 1 per cent of Chicago students interested in fashion and gratuitous name-dropping, I have set up a point-counterpoint between Prudence Plain, the editor of Misguidedly Self-Confident Woman, a therapeutic and reassuring publication for the less-than-elegant, and Elle Superior, the style director of So Very Now,...

Liberty, justice, and hair products for all

By Phoebe Maltz / June 27, 2003

This week has been a good one for the gay and gay-ish. Not only has the Supreme Court ordered police across the nation to stop breaking into any well-decorated home they are referred to, but The New York Times reports that it has officially become acceptable for straight men to run around giving every impression...

GOP on campus, NYT warns

By Phoebe Maltz / May 30, 2003

The New York Times’s decision to feature college Republicans in its magazine (“The Young Hipublicans,” by John Colapinto) is sure to elicit two responses. Liberal readers will read curiously to see what those misguided youths are up to, as though the article were an expose on sexually active 13-year-olds. Meanwhile, more conservative folk will have...

Politicians’ comments not as offensive as they seem

By Phoebe Maltz / May 2, 2003

Sometimes, politicians put their feet in their mouths, outraging some while forcing all who back them to frantically come up with excuses. These excuses have a tendency to sound weak, causing us to lose still more confidence in our government. For this reason, I’ve decided to reassure the American public, clarifying what politicians meant to...

A Response to Matt Tievsky

By Phoebe Maltz / March 11, 2003

When the Maroon wrote a staff editorial last Tuesday calling for the University to punish hate speech and action, I do not believe that the intent was to claim that the University should punish all speech that anyone could find offensive. There is a difference between being offended and being afraid; speech that causes the...

Left-right spectrum incorrect

By Phoebe Maltz / March 7, 2003

It is often the case that students here who oppose Taco Bell are also opposed to the war with Iraq and are in favor of less stringent drug laws, while those who want to attack Iraq also oppose gay marriage and high taxes. While there are certainly some students who fit into neither category, this...

On cowboys and Republicans

By Phoebe Maltz / March 4, 2003

This is not debatable: at least in the United States, the left is better dressed than the right. On the left, there are actors and urbanites, French expatriates and young people. On the right, there is an array of less hip types sporting shoulder pads and high-waisted khakis. For every college kid looking perfectly disheveled,...

Professors and the student press

By Phoebe Maltz / February 18, 2003

Professors who write letters and op-eds in student papers are assets to them for the same reason that their presence poses a problem. Professors writing for student press often have valuable inputs that are useful in getting more ideas out and thus should under no circumstances be banned from student press. However, when a professor...

On freedom and meritocracy

By Phoebe Maltz / January 31, 2003

There are two stances that you are likely to hear on affirmative action at selective universities. The first is that it is flawed but necessary. The second is that it has the right goal but is the wrong method for achieving it. When debating the two, few people think to examine why affirmative action is...

The new college application

By Phoebe Maltz / January 21, 2003

At the highly selective college that I am going to found, I will work hard to create a flawless admissions process. I will grapple with how to promote diversity while avoiding punishing those who are white or non-diverse minorities. I will see to it that I promote geographic diversity while assuring that students from non-boonie...

Cafe Unintelligentsia opens

By Phoebe Maltz / January 10, 2003

Espresso-based beverages, while often referred to as yuppie or gourmet, are marketed in a way that is neither. I defy anyone to find a latte, cappuccino, or macchiato being sold in a place devoid of any decorations evoking an intellectual or literary world. From the swirly words on the walls of Starbucks to the English...

What Would Phoebe Do?

By Phoebe Maltz / November 22, 2002

Left and right, Republican and Green, green and blue—today’s political landscape is one of contradiction, if not outright disagreement, if not, dare I say it, blatant refusal of all to conform to one ideology. This horrifies me to no end. Where do I stand in all this turmoil? To answer that question, I have formed...

What Would Phoebe Do?

By Phoebe Maltz / November 15, 2002

Recently, The Criterion put on its back cover a list of the prep-school graduating class to which each of its contributors belongs, along with the words, “Some of my best friends went to public school.” To what end? The Criterion’s prep-school listing demonstrates the desire to regress back to high school that some students, who...

What Would Phoebe Do?

By Phoebe Maltz / October 25, 2002

In French class, we are currently discussing how, in 16th-century literature, pure love, involving only the heart (coeur) is contrasted with sinful, impure love involving the body (corps). So, you’ve got coeur and corps, but here at the U of C we have something else, a different kind of devotion—the Core. The love involving the...

Giving the U of C some advice

By Phoebe Maltz / October 18, 2002

According to The New York Times, sex columns are big (no pun intended) on American college campuses. The U of C, as of the last time I read one of its papers, does not have such a column. If this school did have one, it could be uncommon, like its application, and offer uncommon advice....

Keep church and state separate

By Phoebe Maltz / August 9, 2002

On many issues, I infuriate my liberal friends, some of whom live in co-ops or communes. I believe Israel ought to continue doing what it’s doing, perhaps a little more. I do not think bisexuality makes a person inherently interesting. I eat red meat without any sense of guilt. However, I am infuriated in turn...

Showdown: Co-op versus co-op

By Phoebe Maltz / August 2, 2002

No fewer than four of my friends from high school are or soon will be living in co-ops next year at their respective colleges. From what I understand, a co-op is a communal living environment where the baked goods are vegan, the coffee must be fair trade, and the food is organic. They refuse all...

In the news recently…

By Phoebe Maltz / May 7, 2002

What Would Phoebe Do? The News Edition, by Phoebe Maltz News Part 1: La France Jacques Chirac would eat no gras; his wife would eat no lean. French politics is a wonderful thing. My only complaint about the recent elections is that Le Pen’s name sounds anglicized, something a conservative French politician might want to...

What would Phoebe do

By Phoebe Maltz / April 19, 2002

What Would Phoebe Do by Phoebe Maltz The Hell edition It only took three installments of “What Would Phoebe Do? (WWPD?)” for me to learn that I am, in fact, going to hell. Danielle Stella wrote a response to my last column in Tuesday’s MAROON, stating that accepting Jesus Christ is the difference between heaven...

So-called “ex-gay” causes controversy

By Phoebe Maltz / April 12, 2002

The “ex-gay” who gave a talk entitled “Homosexuality-Biology or Choice?” Tuesday night at Ida Noyes had the misfortune of being conservative to the point of nuttiness and inaccurate to the point of being laughable in front of an audience for whom scientific accuracy and open-mindedness (if not a degree of self-righteousness) appeared to be the...

An ode to an English prince

By Phoebe Maltz / March 1, 2002

Prince Harry In Two Acts Act I. Phoebe’s Apology of Prince Harry Nothing unites a country better than royal debauchery gone bad. The solidarity a nation feels when its inbred elite take up self-destructive behaviors is unparalleled. The patriotism that floods a people when its 12-toed top guns start cutting their snuff with other stuff...

The science of fromage

By Phoebe Maltz / February 22, 2002

I have a dilemma. I’ve enjoyed my first year here so far, but I dread having to take science at some point before graduating. This is why I am proposing an independent-study science class of my own design, one that will allow me to fulfill both Core requirements and my deepest desires, many of which...

Puddle spotted near Ida Noyes

By Phoebe Maltz / February 12, 2002

On Sunday night, a large, icy puddle was seen on a diagonal path near Ida Noyes Hall. This puddle extended from one side of the path nearly all the way to the other, forcing pedestrians to seek out a small, dry area between the edge of the puddle and the edge of the path. “I...

Where you learn to be a deity

By Phoebe Maltz / February 1, 2002

Dear Aspiring Deity, Thank you for expressing interest in the Divinity School. We hope you find that our program suits your interests as a budding deity. Enjoy! Purpose: The Divinity School is devoted to its mission, which is to educate and send out into the world a top-notch set of gods, year after year. We...

CAPS plan doesn’t help much

By Phoebe Maltz / January 29, 2002

I recently read a passage in a booklet from CAPS outlining the “four-year career plan” that students should follow in college. At the end of your four years here, if you follow the instructions, you will not only graduate — you will also have the career of your dreams, admission to the graduate school of...