Articles - THE RECORD

True or false: Circle the Correct Letter

In one hand you have a empty can of PBR in the other hand you have a bubblegum wrapper, the decision is on your shoulders: what do you do? Should you put them in the trashcan or in a different receptacle? Should you recycle them or throw them away? What should you do here on the Antioch Campus? RECYCLE! Let it be known that here at Antioch we actually do try to recycle. In most buildings on campus there is some type of recycling bin, whether it takes the form of a cardboard box or an actual recycling (blue) barrel, varies from building to building.

The way that Antioch tries to recycle is by hiring students through Federal Work Study Positions (FWSP). The students who are hired empty recycling bins from buildings around campus into dumpsters around campus that are designated for recycling. The students hired as FWSP recyclers work under Darrell Cook, co-coordinator of recycling Physical Plant. The students combine plastic, aluminum and glass into the same dumpsters here on campus, which are later sorted at the site where they are recycled (in Dayton.) The cardboard and paper recycling are put into dumpsters just for paper materials and are sent to specifi c paper recycling facilities. All of our garbage and trash go to Pinnacle Point, a dump/ recycling facility in the Dayton/New Carlisle area.

The only issue with Antioch’s recycling policy is it depends on the students for recycling to actually take place. If the students do not pick up all the recycling from each building the recycling is thrown out with the trash instead of being recycled.

“It all depends on the students,” says Milt Thompson member of Campus Greening Committee. “Without the students, recycling cannot happen.”

However , 4th year, Anne Fletcher sees a failure to recycle as Antioch’s fault, not the students’, “It’s just an example of institutional neglect of green issues, its not Physical Plant’s fault because they do not have enough staff or money allocated to them to have staff do it. If Antioch really cared about environmental issues, it would be institutional, what can be recycled isn’t even publicized around here.”

Many other schools have institutionalized their recycling that actually works, says Fletcher.

According to Cook, Antioch’s recycling policy is very poor because some people are on the recycling bandwagon while others do not even know there is a recycling bandwagon.

A 1st year, Jane, suggests we let everyone know we recycle here at Antioch. A solution is to simply distinguish garbage cans from recycling cans. Another idea is to put up colorful posters to help alert members of the community about recycling. And maybe the most simple solutions is when you see someone going to throw away a recyclable item, speak up and encourage recycling here in our community, after all we are supposed to care about our environment.

‘Social Networking Websites’ and Antioch College

With the recent popularity of ‘social networking’ websites such as myspace and facebook it’s inevitable that Antioch College communities, including current students as well as alumni have jumped on these sites in an effort network, communicate and socialize. However, you might not find some of these spots unless you know where to look. This article is not meant to be a complete list but rather a sampling of some of the ones I happen to have stumbled across. There are some that have a more interesting story behind them, like Friendster, while others are fairly self-explanatory. Probably the best thing about all these sites is that, at least as far as I can tell, no one ‘official’ from the college is running these virtual entities and thus some of the comments on these sites can get pretty interesting. Note, for many of these you’ll need to create an account to access them. Continue reading ‘Social Networking Websites’ and Antioch College

Nookie with Mimi & Niko

Hi again and welcome! This week I bring you a reprint of my column last term on transgender and genderqueer people and sex. I think this topic is important and I wanted our new community members to have access to this information.

As a self identified genderqueer trans guy this issue is near an dear to my little tranny boi heart. I want to remind everyone that every trans person is different. I cannot represent everybody. I will do my best to provide you an accurate overview and some personal insight. Thanks and enjoy!

So, what do you do when the person you are interested in is trans? Here at Antioch we want to do our best support people’s identities and treat people well. We do our best to not fuck up pronouns, but it’s even more important to hold yourself accountable if you are sleeping with a trans person.

Firsts it’s important to talk about how we ask questions. What is appropriate and inappropriate to ask? Here a few personal examples of bad questions to ask:

How big are your breasts/cock?

So you are really a woman/man, right?

Good questions to ask are:

What pronoun do you prefer?

What do you like in bed?

It’s scary when the other person’s questions are only about your body, not your body AND you. It’s called exoticfication, and it doesn’t feel good. The best thing you can do is treat the person like a person, not a piece of meat. Make sure you are interested in the person, not just the identity.

There are a lot of body considerations when it comes to trans people. It’s important to ask what places are off limits. Some transwomen don’t ever use their biological parts, same with transmen. Some still love to have them touched. Some always wear a dick, some don’t. Everyone is different. It’s also important ask how each body part should be touched. For example:

Only touch me above the nipple line

Don’t cup my breasts

Don’t be afraid, this is so important for a trans person’s comfort. It’s also very SOPP friendly.

A lot of us have different names for our body parts. Here are some examples, at least for the transmasculine spectrum, I have complied from talking with friends:

Man Titties

Man breasts

Man goods

Boy hole (my personal favorite)

Man pussy

For all trans people it’s important to validate their bodies, much like you validate their identity. Treat transwomen’s bodies as female. Treat transmen’s bodies as male. Tell her how hot her curves are, or that she’s got beautiful breasts. When in doubt ask! Yes, it’s intimidating. But I would much rather have that discussion outside the sheets rather than in them.

It’s also useful to reinterpret how you see body parts. Yeah, I may have been born with a cunt and a clit. But it’s my boyhole and cock now. This is how I view my body and expect my partners to respect this. It’s about changing how you see things. These terms may also change with time, so check in.

Another thing to consider is a person level of transition. Hormones change your body a lot and affect your comfort level. In my situation, my girlfriend, Mimi has watched me change in way no one else has or ever be able to. She stands by my side and has to deal with all the changes too. She supports me and encourages me. So please be supportive of your trans fuck buddies or partners. It’s also important that we, as trans people, are supportive of how our partners are feeling about things too. For those of us new to hormones our body is in a constant state of transition. This is an intense thing for all parties involved.

Not to mention a person’s body perception changes a lot. It took me a lot longer to believe I look liked boy than it did for most of the people in my life. It took me forever to get used to Niko and male pronouns. I’ve gone by Nikki and she for 20 years; it’s weird when that shift happens. Amazing but strange. Communication and Support are the two best things you can do to negotiate sex between you and a trans person, as with anyone. Now to my partner, Mimi …..

Hi all and welcome to the partner-portion of Nookie with Niko. My name is Mimi and some of you might remember me from my brief stint as an Antioch Student in Fall ’05. But now on to what we all care about- how to have sex with a trans person.

I think first and foremost, the bottom line is communication. Communication is probably the most overused word in sex advice articles- but it’s true. You should be able to ask your lover what he/she likes and wants, and respect that, regardless of their sex or gender. Of course, if you are sleeping with a partner regularly, over time you will learn what is and isn’t okay, but at first keep it simple and don’t make assumptions (the same could be said for pronoun usage, gender identity, the list goes on and on).

The most valuable thing I’ve learned about sex and bodies is that the fetus starts out in the same form, regardless of its future sex. As the fetus matures, the extra X or Y chromosome takes affect, testosterone and estrogen are added to the mix, and the genitalia begin to develop towards one end of the spectrum. The binary “male” and “female” are actually just the two farthest ends of a spectrum that has many in-betweens.

The point of all this is that a word is only a word. A clit is what happens to the tip of the penis if there’s no Y chromosome in the fetus. Testes are essentially ovaries; there is a female equivalent to the prostate (called Skene’s gland!). What this means is that whatever your trans partner wants his/her genitals called, they will essentially perform the same function. If you can get over the idea that a clit is a clit is a clit, then anything can be what you call it.

Of course, playing with toys can be a great addition to any sex life, and may enhance the idea of “traditional notions” of what a cock is. I’ve compiled a list of Strap-On Blowjob tips from Sex Toys 101: A Playfully Uninhibited Guide, written by Rachel Venning and Claire Cavanah, to get you started.

-Use a realistic cock… For decent dick sucking you need a sexy number with a clearly defined shaft and head and veins and balls if possible.

-Think psychic dick. Although it’s not a flesh and blood penis, your mind can have a hard on that’s as raging as anyone else’s.

-Do it somewhere nasty

-Put on a good visual show. When you’re sucking, remember that your playmate is getting off largely on imagination.

-Use your hand to push the base of the dick into the blowjob receiver’s pelvis

-If you can deep throat, do it

-Treat the dildo like a real penis

-If you like using condoms… show-off that safe sex trick in which you roll the condom off with your mouth

-A finger in the ass is a potentially mind blowing complement for receivers of any gender

@THE THEATER – “The Science Of Sleep”

w /F/ Stop Fitzgerald
directed by Michel Gondry
starring Gael Garcia Bernal & Charlotte Gainsbourg

Stephane is an artist/inventor living in his mother’s apartment (the first they’ve seen each other since his father’s death) and works in a calendar assembly studio, which isn’t quite the artistic avenue he believed he was going down. Gondry continues the recent tradition of the “boy meets girl but the boy’s kinda crazy�? plot, but Sleep doesn’t touch on any of the clichés of a traditional love story, no matter how close it gets.

This movies’ strong suite (because it is also Gondry’s) are the beautiful and stunning animated sequences. In a way Gondry is Stephane, because all the illusions, which he invokes in his dreams and realities, are merely what Gondry does throughout the whole film. The dream sequences are among the best cinematic representations of dreams I have ever seen, and the widespread use of stop-motion and other film animation styles are tasteful and elegant.

As I said before, Stephane moves home for a job, which isn’t what he expected, and certainly not the arena for his creative outlook. It is impossible for him to communicate his ideas because 1. His coworkers don’t care, and 2. He speaks terrible French. This second point also brings up one drawback of the film, which Stephane brings up himself, that being spoken to/at in several languages makes him “feel schizophrenic�? (the film is set in France, Stephane lived in Mexico, but everyone can speak English).

Anyway, Stephane moves into his mother’s apartment in a building she owns, staying in his childhood room, untouched since he left with his dad. This room is what you’d expect from someone enamored with the idea of sleep and dreams. He has a very specific routine which he goes through before the light goes out, maybe its because he’s in his childhood room that he checks the closets for ghosts, but I can’t explain the full suite laying across the floor (though the mallet and pulley light switch is very Pee-Wee-esque). Stephanie, the new next-door neighbor, is also creative and she and Stephane make great plans for a film about a forest in a boat (which Gondry ends up actually making in the conclusion).

So the films progresses with a pattern of clichés gone horribly wrong (in the characters actions, not the film). Stephane, perhaps because his only release for his creative drive is Stephanie, and because he is confined to his childhood surroundings, becomes increasingly erratic and immature. His dreams become nightmares featuring his loathsome office mates holding him back from his desires, which is his reality at the time, as well. The TV show of his dreams is no longer his, and once the lists of guests are under his control, they don’t want any part of it. But believe me, there’s still a happy ending.

@THE CINEMA – “The Departed”

w/ Peter H. Zimbicki & Devin Ross

Here it is boys and girls, the movie review of the week with special guest reviewer: Devin “Human Candle�? Ross. This week, we headed over to the Beavercreek Theater and checked out Martin Scorsese’s latest talkie starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Matt Damon, Jack Nicholson, Mark Wahlberg, Vera Farmiga, Anthony Anderson, Alec Baldwin, and Martin Sheen…a lota hotties. This movie had a bunch of cops and a bunch of gangsters. They all wanted to know about each other, spies are involved. About twenty people get shot in the head and it’s messy. Review done.

Ok so but really, we didn’t know what to expect out of this flick. We knew that this would be a movie about things, but what things, we were unsure. In any event The Departed was quite a movie. Out of all of the movies we’ve seen for Antioch, I could easily say that this was the best of them. The story is that Jack Nicholson raises Matt Damon to be a snitch in the Massachusetts State Police. Leonardo DiCaprio is a rich kid who wants to be a Statie and ends up becoming an undercover agent for them. Then throughout the film, the two snitch back and forth, ruining each others stuff until they figure out about the other one and hilarity ensues.

You should see this if you wanna see a lot of the hotties with their special Irish ascents, bein’ tough. Leo took a lot of pills and punched things because he was upset on the inside, Devin liked that. Only one woman was allowed in this movie.

As usual, I’d like to throw out a quick ‘Thanks’ to Mr. Timothy Hoelle, general manager over at the Regal Cinemas Hollywood 20 off of 675. Mr. Hoelle’s theater was in pristine condition and the sweet smell of cheesy nachos and ever so soft pretzels floated through their professionally chilled movie theater. If ever you feel the need to have your mind expanded through a quality film and a genuine movie going experience head on down to the Hollywood 20, grab a refreshing soda and get really for a great ride.