HomeschoolrsRUs
05-20-2005, 09:40 PM
Campus Scenes
Commencement Gags
By David Holman (editor@theamericanprowler.org)
Published 5/20/2005 12:05:38 AM
Friends, family, distinguished guests, faculty, and the class of 2005, it's that time of year again. Every May and June, we celebrate graduates' accomplishments, however spectacular, middling, or unspeakable.
At some point in the history of academia, alas, we deemed a diploma, a hearty handshake from the dean, and a hug from mom and dad horribly insufficient compensation for four years of work and tuition payments. Nor would remarks by the class president, the dean, and the college president suffice. To augment such meager offerings, great universities invite our nation's learned scholars, pretty faces, do-gooders, and idiot savants to offer our young people their wit and wisdom. Maybe the idea is to entertain them one last time.
There are three types of graduation speakers. The truly wise stick to cliches about a bright future, "staying true," or crossing the threshold of life. Graduates and parents are bored, but the speaker escapes embarrassment-free. The somewhat clever speakers who address the graduates and the topic of graduation joke about cliched graduation speeches, and then give a slight variation of the three or four cliched graduation speeches. In addition to bored, the gathered are a little annoyed. Yet major gaffes are avoided.
The third category is something else altogether. These speakers are Very Important People, Big Names in their respective fields. Since they're always being fawned over, they assume graduates will find them irresistible too. People so enthralled with themselves share a remarkable blindness to their failed brilliance, especially when given a microphone and captive audience. So, for your edification, here's a sampling of some of the gifts America's VIPs have foisted upon this spring's graduating classes.
The rest of this article found here: The American Spectator (http://www.spectator.org/dsp_article.asp?art_id=8195)
A very interesting, noteworthy quote:
"We begin with the most newsworthy, Indra Nooyi, the Indian-American president of PepsiCo. . . . Using her hand as a model of world politics (with each finger representing a leading continent), she said of the United States (http://www.pepsico.com/Speech-ColumbiaBusinessSchool.pdf):
"This analogy of the five fingers as the five major continents leaves the long, middle finger for North America, and, in particular, The United States. As the longest of the fingers, it really stands out. The middle finger anchors every function that the hand performs and is the key to all of the fingers working together efficiently and effectively. This is a really good thing, and has given the U.S. a leg-up in global business since the end of World War I.
However, if used inappropriately -- just like the U.S. itself -- the middle finger can convey a negative message and get us in trouble. You know what I'm talking about. In fact, I suspect you're hoping that I'll demonstrate what I mean. And trust me, I'm not looking for volunteers to model.
Discretion being the better part of valor... I think I'll pass."
Commencement Gags
By David Holman (editor@theamericanprowler.org)
Published 5/20/2005 12:05:38 AM
Friends, family, distinguished guests, faculty, and the class of 2005, it's that time of year again. Every May and June, we celebrate graduates' accomplishments, however spectacular, middling, or unspeakable.
At some point in the history of academia, alas, we deemed a diploma, a hearty handshake from the dean, and a hug from mom and dad horribly insufficient compensation for four years of work and tuition payments. Nor would remarks by the class president, the dean, and the college president suffice. To augment such meager offerings, great universities invite our nation's learned scholars, pretty faces, do-gooders, and idiot savants to offer our young people their wit and wisdom. Maybe the idea is to entertain them one last time.
There are three types of graduation speakers. The truly wise stick to cliches about a bright future, "staying true," or crossing the threshold of life. Graduates and parents are bored, but the speaker escapes embarrassment-free. The somewhat clever speakers who address the graduates and the topic of graduation joke about cliched graduation speeches, and then give a slight variation of the three or four cliched graduation speeches. In addition to bored, the gathered are a little annoyed. Yet major gaffes are avoided.
The third category is something else altogether. These speakers are Very Important People, Big Names in their respective fields. Since they're always being fawned over, they assume graduates will find them irresistible too. People so enthralled with themselves share a remarkable blindness to their failed brilliance, especially when given a microphone and captive audience. So, for your edification, here's a sampling of some of the gifts America's VIPs have foisted upon this spring's graduating classes.
The rest of this article found here: The American Spectator (http://www.spectator.org/dsp_article.asp?art_id=8195)
A very interesting, noteworthy quote:
"We begin with the most newsworthy, Indra Nooyi, the Indian-American president of PepsiCo. . . . Using her hand as a model of world politics (with each finger representing a leading continent), she said of the United States (http://www.pepsico.com/Speech-ColumbiaBusinessSchool.pdf):
"This analogy of the five fingers as the five major continents leaves the long, middle finger for North America, and, in particular, The United States. As the longest of the fingers, it really stands out. The middle finger anchors every function that the hand performs and is the key to all of the fingers working together efficiently and effectively. This is a really good thing, and has given the U.S. a leg-up in global business since the end of World War I.
However, if used inappropriately -- just like the U.S. itself -- the middle finger can convey a negative message and get us in trouble. You know what I'm talking about. In fact, I suspect you're hoping that I'll demonstrate what I mean. And trust me, I'm not looking for volunteers to model.
Discretion being the better part of valor... I think I'll pass."