Current-founder Bari Weiss, CC ’07, writes in the (possibly ill-fated) New York Sun today about the 19 incoming Columbia GS first-years who had previously served in the Armed Forces.
(According to Weiss, GS was created in 1947 partly as a response to the high number of ex-soldiers returning from WWII.)
Weiss spoke to a number of the 19 first-years about the differences between military life and academic life, and reactions range from confident about success (“You sit down next to these girls who are 18 years old and they’ve got plastic jewelry from Claire’s and they’re trying to understand the rise and fall of the USSR. They can do it; but we’ve seen dictators rise and fall”) to thankful for the ability to appreciate the civilian life: “I’m just happy to be alive. I’m ecstatic here.”
11 Comments
@hmm there are also quite a lot of international students in CC who served in the military before coming to Columbia. Singaporeans, Germans, Israelis…Don’t forget that ;)
@Anonymous Lol, wow. That’s some pretty self-righteous shit right there.
I wish these assholes would be a little more Kerouac a little less McCain when it came to discussing their service. But I guess in the modern era we have to reward whiney babies of every kind.
@man. the irony in your post is brilliant
“a little more Kerouac a little less McCain”
haha
@i'm sorry but i’m not sure you know what irony the way you used it in that sentence.
do you perhaps mean ‘humor’ instead? because while irony is a subset of humor, not all humor is ‘irony.’
@random holy shit, get that stick out of your ass.
@holy shit learn some fucking definitions.
@cool article these people sound like a great addition to columbia
you would think that the GI bill would reward them even more if they made it into a Columbia, and especially if they planned to re-enlist eventually
also it would suck if the SUN went out of circulation–not only does their editorial page provide a counterpoint to other papers but they actually do journalism well without falling into the easy trap of sensationalism like a certain paper which rhymes with ‘ny toast’
@EAL Personally, I’d rather bring back the worldly yet conservative reporting of the New York World-Telegram, but that’s just me. Or the original New York Sun, for that matter, which was a literary gem. It would be nice to have a more reasonable intellectual counterpoint to the NYT without having to turn to the rag that is the Post.
@... college is supposed to be about opening new doors. gs is about sealing existing doors shut with debt.
it’s kinda disgraceful if you ask me.
@Non-whiny GS “college is supposed to be about opening new doors. gs is about sealing existing doors shut with debt.”
You whiny little bitch, you. You rack up honorable debt – knowing what you’re getting into – and blame it on a school that took a chance by admitting you. It’s your own damned fault you chose degree studies in something useless.
Idiot. There are so few of your type in GS, but you make so much stupid noise that outsiders think you representative. Leave school and go drive a delivery truck and start paying your debts, you loser.
@the current gi bill is fucking embarrassing