The Brearley School's December 2013 edition of The Zephyr.

1. THE ZEPHYR
VOLUME LII, NUMBER 5 THE BREARLEY SCHOOL December 2013
Ender’s Game
Amidst the excitement
over the release of Catching
Fire, another recent ly
released science fiction
movie, Ender’s Game, has
been overshadowed. Orson
Scott Card’s 1985 novel
finally makes it to the screen
in a spellbinding adaptation.
The movie is set in the near
future after an alien invasion has left Earth
almost destroyed. 10-year-old Ender Wiggin
is recruited by the military and trained to
become a child soldier and strategist.
Fighting his way through battle school,
Ender, a tactical genius, learns to question
all and trust no one, especially not his
commanders. It is a thought-provoking
book, and an imaginative movie.
However, a heated debate surrounds
the film. Due to the author’s homophobic
opinions, the movie has been boycotted.
Although no offensive material appears in
either the book or the script, which has been
reviewed by the Gay and Lesbian Alliance
Against Defamation and found politically
correct, there have been online petitions
against the movie. They urge the public not
to see the film in forums such as “Skip
Ender’s Game”, which has amassed
thousands of signatures. It is argued that
buying a ticket would be supporting the
author, Orson Scott Card, and his views.
Others claim that the film itself promotes
acceptance, regardless of the author’s
opinions.
Controversial or not, it is a
thoroughly enjoyable movie. Harrison Ford,
Ben Kingsley and Viola Davis deliver
powerful performances as usual, but it is the
younger actors who truly shine–Hailee
Steinfeld and Moises Arias are compelling as
Ender’s Battle School classmates. Yet among
many wonderful performers, Asa Butterfield,
previously the star of Hugo, truly carries the
film. He is Ender, the intelligent and
troubled boy who struggles with tolerance
and empathy, especially when his leaders
demand the opposite.
T h e s t a r - s t u d d e d c a s t a n d
spectacular special effects are only a small
part of the movie’s appeal. The film brings
up ideas relevant to every era: the prevailing
requirements to fit into the mold of society,
the challenge of thinking for oneself, and the
bravery necessary to question authority.
Relevant and captivating, Ender’s
Game should not be missed.
The 2014 Winter Olympics in
Pierre de Coubertin,
the man behind the 1894
revival of the Olympics,
said, “the Olympic Games
are for the world and all
nations must be admitted
to them.” He could not
have predicted how deeply
intertwined the Olympics
would become with world
politics, however. In the past century, the
Olympics have become not just a place for
world-class athletic competition, but a
political arena as
well. Such seems
to be the case with
the 2014 Winter
Olympics, which
will be held in
S o c h i , R u s s i a ,
under the shadow
o f t h e U n i t e d
States’ political
and ideological
c o n f l i c t s wi t h
Russia.
Even after
the dissolution of
the Soviet Union, political tensions between
the United States and Russia have remained
strained. Although Russia is no longer
communist, the two countries are still quite
different ideologically and share a legacy of
mutual distrust that began decades ago.
Russia’s government is democratic by name,
but many accuse it of being corrupt.
Transparency International, a coalition that
aims to prevent global corruption, releases
an annual Corruption Perceptions Index
(CPI) that measures the levels of public
section corruption across the globe on a scale
of 0-100, with zero being the most corrupt.
In 2012, Russia received a score of 28, while
the United States scored a 73. Some people
consider the Russian government to be a
kleptocracy that is
p r i m a r i l y
concerned with
protecting the
e c o n o m i c
interests of its
elite, many of
whom obtained
t h e i r w e a l t h
t h r o u g h
businesses given
to them as gifts
from the Russian
government after the
collapse of the Soviet
Union. Many Americans also question
Russian president Vladimir Putin’s policies
and claim that he has maintained Russia’s
system of corruption. Suspicion of the ex-
Despite Efforts of Artists Worldwide, Graffiti Mecca “5
Pointz” is Whitewashed
In This Issue: Dissecting the Holiday Cookie
p.6
Isabella Altherr
Dallas Buyers Club is a Hit
p.7
Emma Prenn-Vasilakis
BY NINA ZWEIG, XI
SPORTS EDITOR
Putin’s Russia
CONTINUED ON P. 3
In the
early hours
of the mor-n
i n g o n
T u e s d a y ,
November
19th, a team
of painters—
flanked by a
police squad to stifle the
protests of devoted art fans
—whitewashed the facade of
a 200,000 square-foot Long
Island City warehouse,
home to the beloved graffiti
art exhibit, 5 Pointz. The
p a i n t e r s , u n d e r t h e
instruction of developer
Jerry Wolkoff, who owns the
complex, obliterated—
practically overnight—more
than a decade of dynamic,
vibrant murals created by
1500 globally curated
aerosol artists in order to
make way for a highly
controversial $400 million
residential project, The New
York Post reported on
Nove m b e r 1 9t h . T h i s
unexpected whitewash came
at the height of debate over
the fate of the graffiti exhibit
and cemented the victory of
the developer’s demolition
plans despite efforts of local
artists to obtain landmark
status for the warehouse.
The 5 Pointz Aerosol
Art Center , I n c . i s a
privately-owned outdoor
graffiti exhibit which, in
addition to displaying
aerosol art, houses low-rent
BY KATHERINE
MANN, XI
STAFF WRITER
CONTINUED ON P. 4
BY CLAIRE
KOZAK, X
STAFF WRITER
Torch bearers hold their torches during the
Olympic torch relay in Gorno-Altaysk on Monday,
Photo copyright AP Images, 2013

2. 2editorial
The Zephyr
Staff
Tom March
Faculty Advisor
Printed by Jupiter
Communications, INC.
Bridgeport, Connecticut
Letter from the Editor:
Chloe
THE ZEPHYR
Chloe Lacour
Editor-in-Chief
Katie Fittinghoff
Managing Editor
Section Editors
Julia Sakowitz
News Editor
Isabella Altherr
Features Editor
Nina Zweig
Sports Editor
Staff Writers
Sara Faruqi
Claire Kozak
Rebecca Magid
Katherine Mann
Saskia Pedersen
Tessa Pelzman
Sara Sakowtiz
Contributing Writers
Michelle Gao
Laura Hausman
Emma Prenn-Vasilakis
Beginning on Tuesday, Dec. 10, 2103, five federal regulatory
agencies are expected to approve the Volcker Rule, an essential
requirement of the 2010 Dodd-Frank Act Wall Street Reform and
Consumer Protection Act, which aims to eliminate the disastrous
banking practices that led to the 2008 financial crash. As reported by
Wallace Turbeville, Senior Fellow at the research and policy institute,
Demos, in his article of Dec. 7, 2103,, the Volcker Rule would primarily
prohibit banks from speculating with their investors’ deposits, which
are backed by the federal government through the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation.
The wave of financial deregulation that began in the 1980s and the repeal of the
Glass-Steagall Act in 1999 allowed commercial banks to combine with investment banks to
speculate with investors’ money as well as to invest their own money in severely
undercapitalized hedge funds. While the Volcker Rule would not forbid these combinations
of commercial and investment banks, it maintains that the purpose of commercial banks is
to facilitate trade for their customers, and not to gamble with investments for the sake of the
bank’s short-term profit. Commercial banks will be permitted to invest only 3% of their
primary reserves in hedge funds: it was excessive investment in hedge funds of their own
making that caused the collapse of Bear Stearns in June 2008, the initial catalyst of the
financial crisis. The 3% limit is designed to prevent “another Bear Stearns” by prohibiting
the over-leveraged bank hedge funds whose eventual bail-out by the banks cause them to go
broke. Perhaps even more importantly, the Volcker Rule will prohibit these banks from
engaging in “proprietary trading,” the practice of betting with federally insured deposits that
is credited by many, including the national organization Americans for Financial Reform in
their 2010 letter to Chairman of the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban
Affairs Christopher Dodd (for whom the Dodd-Frank Act was, in part, named) with causing
the systemically risky, blanket “financialization” of the economy. Thanks to the invention of
new, apparently penalty-free, high-risk “financial instruments,” like the credit-default swap,
the purely speculative trading involved in financialization allowed the banking industry to
earn huge profits—according to Wallace Turbeville, an estimated $685 billion per year—
even as they created the conditions for the greatest international financial crisis since the
Great Depression, and necessitated the bailout of the entire financial sector by the U.S. and
other federal governments worldwide. In addition to banning proprietary trading, the
Volcker Rule bans banks from betting on the failure of their own risky securities, the
especially egregious, enormously profitable practice engaged to an unparalleled degree by
Goldmann Sachs in particular.
In order to go into effect, the Volcker Rule must be approved by the Commodity
Futures Trading Commission, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, the Federal
Reserve, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency and the Securities and Exchange
Commission, according to Ben Protess’ December 3rd article in the New York Times. In spite
of the persistent efforts of Wall Street lobbyists and lawyers to water down and challenge in
court the major provisions of the Rule ever since it was conceived and suggested by former
by Paul Volcker, former Chairman of the Federal Reserve, the final version of the Rule is
now expected to be tough on the banking industry, according to the Dec. 8, 2103 article in
the New York Times by Matthew Goldstein and Ben Protess. Many credit this renewed
tightening of the Rule to Bart Chilton, Commissioner of the Commodity Futures Trading
Commission. As reported by Silia Brush in his November 21, 2013 article in the Washington
Post, Chilton announced on November 21 that, were the Rule voted on that day, he would
not cast the positive vote needed for it to be approved by a majority of the evenly divided,
Democratic and Republican Commissioners of the Commodity Futures Trading
Commission, and, furthermore, that he would step down from the Commission by the end of
the year. Chilton insisted that, as it was then drafted, the Rule would continue to allow
banks to pass off speculative trading as legitimate hedging activity: “there would be no sense
even doing a final rule if what is currently being considered on hedging remains the same”,
because “it opens the door for proprietary speculative bets under the guise of hedging”. The
Volcker Rule has since been revised and strengthened according to Chilton’s requirements,
and he has announced that he will not step down as Commissioner until he has voted on the
stricter set of rules to be released on Dec. 10.
Layout Editors
Jaehee Kim
Lauren Wang

3. THE ZEPHYR3 news
Conflict over Terrorism in China
The 2014 Winter Olympics in Putin’s Russia
KGB Putin comes naturally to many people, and
he has often been accused of acting like a thug.
For example, a businessman named Mikhail
CONTINUED FROM P.1
Khodorkovsky became the wealthiest man in Russia through the
oil business, but after he crossed Putin by speaking out about
Russia’s corruption, the Russian government seized
Khodorkovsky’s company and imprisoned him in 2003 under
Putin’s orders. He has yet to be released from prison. Putin is also
notorious for his anti-gay policies. In June, Putin signed a law that
prohibits the distribution of information promoting same-sex
relationships to minors.
So what does this all mean for the Winter Olympics? Upon
hearing about Putin’s anti-gay legislation, gay rights activists
around the world were outraged and called for a boycott of the
Olympics. Although Putin claimed that Russia would welcome
anyone, regardless of sexual orientation, to come see or participate
in the Olympics, his statements contradicted those of other
government officials who said that the anti-gay propaganda law
would still be enforced.
As the Games approach, gay rights activists are more
concerned than ever about defying Putin’s legislation. Many
people have pressured major Olympic sponsors like Coca-Cola to
retract their support, and a group called Athlete Ally is talking to
several competitors about wearing uniforms with logos that
support gay rights. The anti-gay law has the potential to affect the
Olympics for both athletes and spectators, including foreigners—
anyone who violates the law faces fines, deportation, or even up to
15 days in prison. With tensions running so high, it seems that the
presence of crowds of foreigners at the Olympics could quickly
lead to violence. We’ll have to wait until February to see what
happens, but one thing’s for sure: the Olympics in Russia will lead
to many surprises, and not just those in the competition.
BY NINA ZWEIG, XI
SPORTS EDITOR
On October 28, five
people were killed and 40
injured after an SUV crashed
into China’s Tiananmen
Square. All three people in the car died;
the other two victims were tourists. In the
immediate aftermath, the government
attempted to censor information
regarding the crash, broadcasting only the
vaguest details.
A week later, however, according to
the article “China Links Islamic Terrorist
Group to Tiananment Square Crash” by
the CNN staff on November 1, police
labeled the crash a terrorist attack that
was “organized and premeditated” by the
East Turkistan Islamic Movement (ETIM).
They also revealed that all of the people in
the SUV were from Xinjiang, the western
province where the ETIM is based, and
that they found gas canisters, knives, and
banners with extremist religious slogans
inside the SUV. Five people from Xinjiang
who were suspected of being involved with
the attack were arrested.
The ETIM represents the Uyghurs,
a Turkic-speaking Muslim ethnic group
from Xinjiang, a western Chinese
province. The Uyghurs want independence
f rom C h i n a , a n d c o m p l a i n o f
discrimination and biased treatment.
Trouble in Xinjiang has been brewing for
quite a while. According to the CNN
article, in July 2009, a riot in the regional
capital Urumqi ended up with the Chinese
police getting involved, and ultimately
200 people were killed and 1700
wounded.
The ETIM did not claim
responsibility right away. A month later,
on November 25, a terrorist group called
the Turkistan Islamic Party (TIP) released
a video that claimed responsibility. The
TIP is another name for the ETIM. The
video was posted by the Search for
International Terrorist Entities Institute
(SITE), a website in Maryland that
monitors forums for mentions of jihad.
The leader, Abdullah Mansour, said in
that video, “O Chinese believers, know
that you have been fooling East Turkistan
for the last sixty years, but now they have
been awakened.” He then threatened that
there would be more attacks on China.
However, though the group has
claimed responsibility for the attack, the
details are still far from clear. Some people
doubt that ETIM is strong enough to
organize an attack. Its leader, Abdul Haq,
was killed in a US drone strike last year.
In addition, according to Shannon Tiezzi’s
November 26 article for The Diplomat,
titled “Who Is Fighting China’s War on
Terror?”, the ETIM has not successfully
carried out an attack since 1999, though
they had plans to disrupt the 2008 Beijing
Olympics. In Jonathan Kaiman’s article
“Islamist group claims responsibility for
attack on China’s Tiananmen Square” for
The Guardian on November 25, Nicholas
Bequelin, a researcher at Human Rights
Watch, claimed that the Chinese
government often uses the ETIM as a
scapegoat to “lend international credibility
to its anti-terrorism program.”
These doubts are leading human
rights groups to remain skeptical of
whether the ETIM is actually to blame.
The Uyghurs themselves also believe that
China is using the attack as an excuse to
introduce even harsher policies in
Xinjiang. In an article for the Wall Street
Journal on November 8th titled “Chinese
Attacks Ignite Terrorism Debate,” Josh
Chin quoted Rebiya Kadeer, leader of the
World Ugyhur Congress: “By demonizing
the Uyghur people as terrorists or
criminals, Beijing justifies its crackdowns
on the Ugyhur people.”
The government is certainly doing
that. According to a Times of India article
titled “China calls for international
cooperation to fight terror”, written on
November 25, Foreign Minister Qin Gang
stated that the government considers the
ETIM a major terrorist group and will take
preventive measures. He then criticized
the “double standard” that other countries
seem to hold; he claimed that Western
countries are reluctant to denounce the
attack as terrorism, even in the face of
clear evidence, such as the items in the
SUV. Instead, he said, “We hope relevant
countries can enhance communication
and cooperation in counterterrorism and
maintain peace, stability in the region and
beyond.”
And it is true that China had been
stepping up its counterterrorism program,
even before the Tiananmen Square attack.
According to Tiezzi’s article for The
Diplomat, China has cooperated with
other Asian countries in counterterrorism
training, such as Indonesia, Russia,
Pakistan, and Thailand, for five years. But
now, after being attacked on home soil,
the Chinese will certainly continue to
intensity their efforts to fight terrorism.
BY MICHELLE
GAO, IX
CONTRIBUTING
WRITER

4. 4news THE ZEPHYR
Despite Efforts of Artists Worldwide,
Graffiti Mecca “5 Pointz” is
Whitewashed
studio spaces for
more than 200 local
New Y o r k C i t y
artists, according to
journalist Jen Chung in an October
6th Gothamist article. The complex
was established as the “Phun
Factory” in 1993 as part of a program
to discourage graffiti vandalism by
providing a platform for aerosol
artists to display their work in a
formal showcase. 5 Pointz is not only
the home to local artists, but also an
epicenter of global graffiti culture.
The complex acquired its name to
signify the confluence of New York
City’s five boroughs and over the
past twenty years, has become a
landmark of artistic unity and
cultural pride. 5 Pointz is now
regarded as the world’s premiere
“graffiti Mecca” and the colorful,
vivid murals decorating its exterior
attract artists from across the globe
and reflect perspectives of cultural
significance.
The renown of 5 Pointz
pervades not only the artistic
community but also the cultural
appetite of a mainstream audience.
The exhibition neighbors MoMa PS
1, and attracts New Yorkers and
tourists alike, who can spend hours
gazing at the splendor of the
complex and exploring its lively
depictions. The iconic 5 Pointz
building was featured in the widely
viewed 2013 movie Now You See Me,
and served as the stage for the final
act of the Four Horsemen magic
show.
Three days prior to the
whitewashing of 5 Pointz, on
Saturday, November 16th, hundreds
of graffiti art fans demonstrated
their support for the gallery at the
Save 5 Pointz Rally, The Huffington
Post reported on November 19th.
Although a handful of police officers
were in attendance to maintain
order, the two-hour rally was merely
a nostalgic celebration of and
acquiescent farewell to a pivotal and
meaningful exhibition space.
However, the response of the same
community to the building’s
whitewash was not so docile.
Developer and owner of the 5 Pointz
facility, Jerry Wolkoff, insisted in a
statement to The Wall Street
Journal on November 20th that after
the New York City Council approved
the construction of two new high
rises, he “hired a crew to paint over
the art because [it would have been]
torture for [both himself] and the
artists to watch the street art come
down a s t h e b u i l d i n g w a s
demolished.” Art fans, though, did
not share this view, deeming the
timing of Wolkoff’s whitewash
suspect. They expressed their
immediate outrage at the jarring and
unceremonious destruction of the art
and their long-term frustration with
the inevitable gentrification of the
once affordable neighborhood. Some
even referred to Wolkoff as “the
Madoff of graffiti art” according to a
November 21st Huffington Post
article, “Artists Bid Sad Farewell to 5
Pointz.” Marie Cecil Flaguel, a
volunteer curator for 5 Pointz, also
condemned Wolkoff as “the biggest
vandal of all” and called upon artists
to hold him liable for the damages of
t h e d e s t royed a r t . For t h e
particularly ardent supporters of 5
Pointz, who had been petitioning for
weeks to the Brooklyn Federal Court
to obtain landmark status for the
complex, all remaining hope of
salvaging the building was lost with
the destruction of the artwork on its
façade.
Other fans expressed their
outrage more aggressively still. The
morning after the warehouse’s
exterior was painted over, the NYPD
reported that six aerosol art fans
were arrested for allegedly tagging
the warehouse and surrounding
buildings with graffiti and markers,
which were promptly painted over.
Most have responded more
peacefully to the whitewash, though,
immediately organizing a vigil to
mourn the loss of such a significant
and pivotal epicenter of worldwide
graffiti culture.
Despite the loss of the
platform which 5 Pointz provided,
graffiti is, at its purest form, a visual
crime o f an indivi d u a l and
resourceful nature. Although the
graffiti community will lament the
demise of 5 Pointz, the graffiti
culture itself will persist unscathed
and continue to flourish—with or
without formal exhibition spaces.
CONTINUED FROM P.1
BY KATHERINE
MANN, XI
STAFF WRITER
Green Taxis Hit
the Streets
After
years of back
and forth, first
with the City
Council and
then with the
s t a t e l e g i s -
l a t u r e , t h e
B l o o m b e r g
a d m i n i s t r a t i o n f i n a l l y
launched the “green” taxicab
program in the summer of
2013. Called “green” taxis for
their granny smith-green tint,
these new cabs target the four
outer boroughs and upper
Manhattan–all of which are
areas that are currently
underserved by the yellow cab
industry.
Prior to the intro-duction
of green taxis, hailing
a cab in an outer borough
neighborhood was nearly
unfathomable. To put it
simply, yellow cab drivers do
not leave Manhattan if they
do not have to do so.
Although one might believe
that an expensive cab ride
from the Upper East Side to
Flushing, Queens would be an
enticing opportunity for a cab
driver, it is actually quite the
opposite: once the cab driver
has dropped off his or her
customer at the destination in
Queens, it is extremely
unlikely that the driver will
immediately find another
customer. On the other hand,
if the cab driver stays in
Manhattan, he or she is
almost guaranteed to find a
customer within seconds of
making a drop off. Mayor
Bloomberg hoped that by
initiating a taxi system
designed to operate solely in
t h e f o u r a n d a h a l f
underserved boroughs, he
would give New Yorkers the
ability to hail cabs easily in all
parts of New York City.
Green taxis are not
only hailed off the streets, but
they also operate as livery
cabs that a customer can
contact to prearrange a ride.
The idea of green taxis
initially stirred opposition
among members of the City
Council, who believed that
because of their dual roles,
green taxis could potentially
r i v a l the yel low ones .
Currently, yellow cabs can
only make street pickups;
they cannot prearrange
m e e t i n g p o i n t s w i t h
customers.
Since the program’s
launch in August, many outer
borough commuters have
discovered that green taxis,
while useful for travel within
a s ing l e b o r ough, a r e
inconvenient for travel to the
areas of Manhattan below
96th street on the east side
and 110th street on the west
side, where green taxi drivers
are not authorized to make
pick-ups. Many green taxi
drivers simply decline to take
a passenger into the city, even
though it is against the law to
refuse a ride, because they
will be unable to pick up
anyone there to pay for the
trip back. As a result, while a
yellow taxi driver could
theoretically make two fares
by picking up a passenger in
Midtown and dropping them
off in Brooklyn, and then
picking up another passenger
to cover the ride back, a green
taxi driver could not do the
same. The double standard
between green and yellow
taxicabs renders the green
t a x i system inherently
ineffective.
As it stands, the two
taxicab systems do not work
together. The systems operate
under the assumption that
the New Yorkers who live in
the city will stay in the city all
day and use the yellow taxis
and that the New Yorkers
who do not live in Manhattan
will not go into Manhattan
and will therefore be able to
use the green taxis. While the
green taxi system eases the
transportation needs of some
New Yorkers whose travels fit
the system’s requirements,
the green taxi initiative
simply does not suit the
realities of the majority of
New Yorkers who travel in
and out of Manhattan each
day.
BY SARA
FARUQI, XI
STAFF WRITER

5. Are Violent Video Games Detrimental to Children’s Mental Health?
Children in most circumstances are sponges for
learning. Tucked between a cushion and a mysterious
world, one might find a child flipping the sticky pages
of a picture book, hypnotized by its primary colors
and block-print shapes. Another might learn of
mustier times from the wrinkly lips of elders; tales of
sepia-toned travels and crumbling letters can bring a
story from the past back to life. Video games tell the
story of the future—fantasies of power and mass destruction become
reality when gaming kids grow up and find themselves deprived of five
extra lives.
Violence in the media has always sold with kids. Where else,
besides in the imaginary world of a video game, can they defeat the
bad guy, save the girl, and win the prize with no more than the click of
a button a few hundred times? Executives of the video game industry
scheme to lure kids with the promise of victory and millions of points.
Childhood experience affects us deeply. Even without
remembering whether Charlie ate milk or dark chocolate, whether
Charlotte had three or four hundred children, or whether there were
two blue fish or one red fish, we remember what we felt while reading
those books—we experience those same emotions, older. If Island of
Bill de Blasio ably ascended the steps to the
shimmering podium at the Park Slope Armory and
traipsed across to clasp his iconic son, Dante, in a
firm embrace of zeal on November 3rd once de
Blasio’s victory became statistically evident. As Mr.
de Blasio emitted a sigh of relief (no doubt) and triumphantly
dispensed statement of thanks to his supporters, I cannot help but
wonder whether Mr. de Blasio thought:
“Do I even know the people who elected me?”
Behind all the appearances, behind the pristinely worded
campaign statements, behind the innumerable megabytes of data, are
the little-known interns. The existence of a campaign intern is
composed of three primary activities: entering intrusive data into
computers, attempting to entertain conversation with New Yorkers
through phone calls, and that which I call the “woodpecker.” Though
all of the duties of a canvasser provide for entertainment and help to
develop our “ubiquity” as we encroach on the lives of New Yorkers by
every imaginable means, it is this third activity that encapsulates the
experience of working on a campaign.
‘“Woodpecking,” more commonly known as canvassing,
involves traveling from floor to floor and from door to door of an
assigned portion of New York City, scouring every crevice of the city
for potential democratic supporters. Receiving one’s location
assignment is the most daunting part of all: I know that canvassing
has begun when I see interns congregated around folders, feverishly
peering over the shoulder of their supervisors, irritably frowning at
their iPhone map application, or covertly giving their canvassing
partner a high five out of a relief at having been assigned a familiar
area.
Success in canvassing is an art that I will never master,
because it requires a perfect equilibrium between geographical
knowledge, sheer speed, and reckless zeal. The delight in canvassing
comes from the accidental that lurks in every street corner of New
York City. Several experiences that I have had while canvassing
illuminate the electrifying glory of New York.
On my first day of canvassing, I walked into Christine Quinn’s
mayoral campaign office headquarters. I was admittedly rather proud
of myself for being “politically active”; I was unaware that thousands
THE ZEPHYR5
the Blue Dolphins connected us to the natural world, what does Mortal
Kombat II teach but how to aim a gun?
There are debates about whether violent video games leave a
significant impression on the human character. There are so many
kids who enjoy the excitement of video games, the challenge and the
illusion of danger, and yet still grow up to be pacifists. It’s more
difficult to forget the murders, suicides and shootings that stem, in
part, from addiction to video games. N.R. Kleinfeld, R. Rivera and S.
Kovaleski reported for The New York Times in March 2013 that Adam
Lanza, the shooter at the Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre last
December, was obsessed with warfare-like video games. Though
violent media cannot be the only factor in committing a heinous crime,
there is an unnerving trend among perpetrators of brutality.
How can a parent denounce guns as “morally evil”, only to buy
Call of Duty for their nine-year-old son on their way home from work?
How can the American government, spending millions on veteran
affairs, allow an industry that churns out the message “war is a game”
to teach potentially dangerous lessons to impressionable children?
How can the American people spend millions on psychiatric medicine
when psychologists have proved that violent video games biologically
trigger aggressive behaviors? How can we encourage people to be
emphatic when video games only desensitize? No more contradictions.
of other high schoolers had already committed themselves to political
volunteerism months ago. An 18-year-old campaign coordinator dealt
me a manila folder with the word “Woodside” scrawled on the front,
filled with approximately 200 sheets of paper. On each sheet of paper
were about 15 addresses for potential voters to contact. I exited the
subway and realized I knew nothing whatsoever about the
neighborhood. I groped at the 200 sheets of data that, liberated from
the manila folder, formed a miniature tornado around me and my
iced coffee. As I attempted to navigate the newfound neighborhood, I
found my day was eventful in more ways than one. Two times, I
accidentally barged in on a half-naked, beer-slurping man. Three
times, I staggered back to the familiar Dunkin Donuts to croak out my
order for another dose of caffeine. On infinite occasions, I knocked on
doors of houses that were (as I retrospectively acknowledge) quite
obviously empty, and created personalized pieces of campaign
literature to slide demurely under the door of the absent contact.
On subsequent canvassing trips, it was not my geographical
oblivion that provided for the entertainment, but rather the constant
occurrence of the unexpected. One pleasant(ly scorching) day in mid-
July, I was canvassing in Astoria, Queens. By and by, I approached a
spindly dark green building, which was enveloped in several odd
staircases and banisters. I somehow did not consider it odd that
numerous signs along the staircases instructed me to remove my
shoes. I groped for my vibrating phone to answer my supervisor’s call
as I ascended the final flight of stairs, and lifted my foot for what I
thought would be a final stair, when I found none. Instead, I found
that I had walked directly into the middle of a Buddhist prayer
session. I gasped as I beheld the 150 gleaming, shaved heads of
Buddhist monks who were in the middle of prayer. The prayer leader
looked at me quizzically. Stammering an apology, I darted down the
staircases, only to be greeted by a towering, salivating bulldog. The
bulldog barreled toward me, straining frighteningly against the metal
chain that bound the dog to the deteriorating banister. After
contorting myself to avoid the gleaming teeth of the dog, I darted out
of the building and into the Dunkin Donuts that served as my refuge.
The conclusion is self-evident: what are the odds of barging
into a Buddhist prayer session while leaping away from the gnashing
teeth of a raging bulldog? In New York, they’re a lot higher than you
might expect.
BY LAURA
HAUSMAN, XI
CONTRIBUTING
WRITER
features
The Mental and Physical Sojourn of a Canvasser
BY TESSA
PELZMAN, X
STAFF WRITER

6. 6features THE ZEPHYR
Dissecting the Holiday
Cookie
The holiday season can provide so much
baking inspiration, with ginger and nutmeg,
peppermint and chocolate, and buttery
goodness coming together at the same dessert
table. However, the typical tree-trimming
party deserts can offer endless woes in the
form of brick-like fruitcakes and overly sweet
frosting that turns ones mouth green from food
coloring. And the worst annual offender is the
chalky, cardboard cutout Christmas cookie.
BY ISABELLA
ALTHERR, XI
FEATURES
Perhaps only topped by a badly made “Bouche de
Noël” (a good one can be fabulous; unfortunately they are made
all too often merely for visual pleasure and not for anything
more substantial), the bad christmas cookie has some important
characteristics. First, it is crumbly, perhaps overly dense, feeling
neither crispy with white sugar nor chewy with brown sugar, but
sandy with bleached white flour. Second, the offending pastry is
tasteless; a sugar cookie does not naturally lack flavor, but
tastes buttery and warm. Tastelessness and textural problems
are mainly found in store bought cookie platters. Home bakers
know that cookies can be delicious and easy to make and the
best present for a party host.
There are many variations on the cookie, and a great
many of them are associated with Christmas (or other winter
holidays.) With German Spice Cookies (Pfeffernusse),
Gingerbread Men, Hazelnut Cookies, Chocolate Peppermint,
Gingersnaps and Springerle, why stick to just sugar cookies?
And even those can be spruced up a bit. One of the most
important things to remember when making cookies is to take
the mass of the dry ingredients, probably flour. Because
different brands of flour can have different protein percentages
and therefore different density, measuring flour by volume is
extremely risky, and can result in an overly dry cookie.
Another important tip to remember during cookie
creation is to chill the dough. For many cookie recipes, leaving
the completed dough in the fridge from an hour to overnight
improves the final result by allowing the strands of gluten to
relax, and the dry ingredients (sugar and flour) to absorb the
liquids (usually eggs, and whatever extracts might be added to
get a firmer dough and a better final consistency). This was first
revealed to me in the July 9, 2008 New York Times article
“Perfection? It’s Warm and Has a Secret” by David Leite, where
it was applied to chocolate chip cookies. The process is effective
for many different types of cookie, however, from chewy to
crunchy. For chewy cookies, however, there is a little-known
secret: cornstarch. Because it provides substance without
adding gluten strands, a single teaspoon of cornstarch can make
an infallibly chewy cookie, even if the outside is nicely crispy.
I asked several people about preferences, and found that
people expect a holiday cookie to have flavors like ginger,
nutmeg, and citrus. If a sugar cookie is your preferred style,
these are very easy to add to the recipe. After weighing the flour,
take out a tablespoon or so and substitute in spices such as
ground cinnamon, nutmeg, or ginger to your liking. To add in
citrus, try processing about one or two teaspoons of lemon zest
with the sugar called for in a recipe, or using lemon juice in a
royal icing recipe.
There is also a wealth of online material; Lillie at
buttermeupbrooklyn.com has beautiful and delicious seasonal
recipes, including maple gingersnaps and a plethora of
snickerdoodles. Saveur.com also has recipes of cookies from
around the globe, and Baking Illustrated’s chocolate cookie
recipe is always a show stopper. Whatever you choose to create
this winter, go beyond the usual realm of sugar cookies, and
throw some spices into the bowl.
The Highs and Lows of
Monopoly is
beloved by families
around the world.
The rotund and
m u s t a c h e d
Monopoly man is a
recognizable and
cherished symbol of
childhood. Th i s
Thanksgiving, my
f a m i l y , a s w e d o e v e r y
Thanksgiving, played a massive
game of Monopoly. Each property
has a special significance to
different people; I have always
loved the light blue properties
( O r i e n t a l , Ve r m o n t , a n d
Connecticut Avenues) and always
harbored a theory that the cheapest
properties on the board (Baltic and
Mediterranean Avenues) will
somehow secretly win the game for
whoever buys them because if one
puts hotels on both properties one
can get a tidy sum of money if an
opponent lands on them. Everyone
seems to have a theory about how
to tip the game in their favor and
win. But what is so enticing about
Monopoly? Why do we keep
playing a game that was invented
one hundred and ten years ago?
Monopoly has received its
share of criticism. For example, my
sister refuses to play the game,
even though it is a family tradition,
because she resents the capitalistic
values that she thinks the board
game celebrates. The entire game is
centered upon money and
imaginary properties; the goal is to
get the most money, the most
properties, and, finally, to bankrupt
one’s opponents and win the game.
One game of Monopoly can last for
days and days o f ru t h l e s s
bargaining and trading often
ending in shouting matches or
tears, a sad, quiet defeat, or an
exhilarating victory. Ironically,
Monopoly was created in 1903 by
Lizzie Maggie, a suffragette, poet,
and opponent of ruthless capitalists
such as John D. Rockefeller,
Andrew Carnegie, and J.P. Morgan.
She called it the Landlord’s Game.
According to Mary Pilon, a
journalist for The New York Times,
in an article she wrote on August
24, 2013, Maggi e “clever ly
designed two sets of rules: one in
which the object was to get rich
quick, the other as an anti-monopoly
game in which all
players benefited from wealth
created. Historical evidence
suggests that the more vice-laden
monopolist game resonated with
earlier players.” Atlantic City
Quakers modified the board
created by Maggie to the version
that we are familiar with today.
A c c o r d i n g t o P o l i n ’ s
aforementioned article, “The
Quakers’ Atlantic City board serves
as an odd reflection of the city’s
overlooked cartography. [For
example,] the cheapest properties
on the board, were largely black
neighborhoods in Atlantic City.” It
was this version of the game that
the Parker Brothers, a board game
company, mass marketed in 1935.
Monopoly is like a small
microcosm of our American
capitalist society, except we all
begin the game with the same
amount of opportunities and
money . I n 2012 P a u l P i f f
performed a social experiment to
observe how wealth affected the
attitude of the rich player against
the poor player and visa versa in
the hopes of observing of how
money changes people’s treatment
of one another. However, Piff
modified the game so that one of
the players would get $200 every
time they passed GO and start off
with $2,000. The other player was
given $1,000 at the beginning of
the game, collected only $100 when
they passed GO and were only
allowed to roll one dice. It was
found that people who became
wealthy when playing Monopoly
displayed more aggressive and
competitive traits. Piff’s study was
meant to apply Monopoly to
American L i f e , one player
beginning with fewer opportunities
for monetary success ends up at the
mercy of the richer player both
monetarily and socially.
Mono p o l y i s s u c h an
integral part of our culture and
upbringing, even though our
success in Monopoly is based not
just on strategy, but also on luck.
We keep returning to Monopoly
because it allows to live a more
perfect American Dream: in the
game, we all begin with the same
opportunities. It would seem, in
the end, that Americans are
married to Monopoly because of
the similarities between it and the
capitalist system that characterizes
our society.
BY REBECCA
MAGID, XI
STAFF WRITER
Monopoly

7. Fashion for the People, Not for Mannequins
It used to
be rare to see
M a t t h e w
McConaughey
performing in
anything besides a romantic
comedy. He stripped in Magic
Mike and, arguably, in most of
his other movies. Recently,
McConaughey’s career took a
turn with movies like The
Lincoln Lawyer, Mud, and
Killer Joe; all three went beyond
light comedy. In what seems to
be an attempt to prove himself
as an actor, McConaughey has
begun taking on challenging,
dynamic, and controversial
roles. His latest triumph, Dallas
Buyers Club, opens the door for
him to an Academy Award
nomination, and to even more
impressive future projects.
McConaughey assisted in
the production process of the
m o v i e ; h e wo r k e d a n d
succeeded in putting together
the movie’s production team
and financing. McConaughey
did the unexpected and lost 47
pounds to play an HIV patient,
Ron Woodroof. In preparing for
the role, he visited the real
Woo d r o o f ’ s f a m i l y a n d
researched the character’s
background. Woodroof is one of
McConaghey’s’ grittiest roles
yet; a drug addict and a
homophobe struggling with
HIV.
McConaughey portrays
Woodroof, a Texas rodeo
cowboy in the 1980s who is
diagnosed with HIV and given
thirty days to live. He is
prescribed the only legal HIV
treatment drug in the United
States and nearly dies. To keep
himself alive, he smuggles anti-retroviral
medications that have
not been FDA approved from
foreign countries. He forms the
“Dallas Buyers Club”, and
provides paying members with
treatments for HIV.
In an interesting casting
twist, Jared Leto plays Rayon,
another HIV patient and
Woodroof’s transsexual partner
in the business. Leto hadn’t
made a movie in five years and
dropped down to 114 pounds to
play the role. Both men pushed
themselves to the limit to
prepare for their roles physically
and mentally, and their efforts
are evident in the outcome. The
movie revolves around the
rough comedy of Woodroof and
Rayon, and their doctor, Dr. Eve
Saks, played by Jennifer Garner.
Both McConaughey and Leto
were intoxicating on screen and
while Garner’s performance was
perfectly fine, she was clearly
outshone by her co-stars, the
major presences on screen.
THE ZEPHYR 7
The movie’s true genius
lies in Woodroof’s character. He
takes illegal drugs, expresses
blatant homophobia, and breaks
the law, yet this seemingly
depraved man works to save
lives. Ethical questions arise
when one contemplates the
character, who blurs the
boundaries between “good” and
“bad.” Woodroof exemplifies the
existence of a gray area; doing
“bad” things does not make a
“bad” person. The movie was a
risk for both McConaghay and
Leto and in my opinion, their
risks deserve reward. I hope to
see the actors this awards
season, and I look forward to
this remarkable effort getting
the respect and recognition it
deserves. Matthew McCon-aughey’s
career has truly been
transformed and I applaud him
for pushing his own boundaries
as an actor.
Fashion is a form of
self-expression. I myself am
less interested in individual
pieces and more in the
ensemble—the way an outfit
works to redefine and re-imagine
the person who wears
it. I love the stories that
clothes can tell.
Last week, I visited the Brooklyn
Musuem’s exhibit “The Fashion World of
Jean Paul Gaultier: From the Sidewalk to
the Catwalk.” As I discovered in the
exhibition, Jean Paul Gautlier operates the
same way. Gautlier is not a designer whose
primary focus lies on the clothes, but on
their wearer. He seeks to have men and
women, mostly women, wear his clothes
who are three-dimensional, both physically
and mentally. Often, designers, and the
fashion industry in general, attempt to
invent a culture of conformity. They chose
models that look the same–from their skin
color to their body shape to their walking
style. The models are living dolls, all
dressed the same, meant to have no
personality. Super-model Karlie Kloss has
said that among one of the greatest
problems she faces during fashion weeks is
that designers will refuse to cast her
because she is too well known, and her
personality, her humanity, might take away
from their clothing.
This is an idea that Gautlier
completely rebuffs. He prizes the animate
qualities of his models. He often chooses
women to walk in his runway shoes who are
not models, because he wants real women,
not dolls. Thus, his “models” are much more
diverse in terms of age, height, skin tone
and even weight than most fashion shows.
In his shows and even in the museum’s
show Gautlier has a large number of women
of color as models and mannequins. A
prejudice against women of color as models
is prevalent in the fashion industry, but not
in Gautlier’s shows. Gautlier includes
everyone—he has used models ranging from
women in their 60’s to punk street girls
from London to Beth Ditto, the curvaceous
signer of the band Gossip. He wants his
models to have personalities, to be alive.
This belief is manifested even in the
museum’s show, wher e even the
mannequins had faces projected onto them
which spoke to the audience. The
mannequins were wearing the clothes, not
the other way around.
His designs and his choice of models
reflect a strong interest in diversity and in
humanity. In his designs Gautlier seeks to
underscore and accentuate the human body.
He pays particular attention to its shape.
His designs often feature extreme shoulder
pads and cone bras. He attempts to add
more depth to the human figure. Many of
his designs contain references to the human
anatomy. Many of his dresses contain
plastered-on nipples, cut-outs to make the
top look like ribs and sewn-on hearts where
the heart is.
His work also reflects a keen interest
in the division between female and male
sexuality and body. While Gautlier often
plays up female curves, he does not support
the typical dress codes for men and women.
It is quite common for fashion designers to
bring androgyny into their collections, but
when they do, it almost always manifests
itself in giving women clothes originally
designed for men. Gautlier takes androgyny
in the other direction by giving the cone
bras to men as well. In fact the poster for
the exhibition depicts Gautlier in a cone bra
dress. Gautlier is well known as the inventor
of the “man-skirt”. His greatest muse is
Madonna, who summarizes everything
Gautlier stands for. She wears feminine
corsets under men’s suits. She celebrates
her curves and femininity while also
boasting an muscular body, showing that
women can be just as strong as men. She
defies gender norms and demonstrates the
theatricality that Gautlier prizes. She is the
same as Gautlier to the respect that, the
image she creates and her look are often
more prized than her individual pieces of
work.
BY SASKIA
PEDERSEN, XI
STAFF WRITER
BY EMMA PRENN-VASILAKIS,
XII
CONTRIBUTING
WRITER
Dallas Buyers Club is a Hit
reviews

8. THE ZEPHYR reviews
BY KATIE FITINGHOFF, XI
MANAGING EDITOR
Two Books to Share Your Winter With
The Family Fang, by Kevin
Wilson
Close your eyes and
imagine yourself dying. Think of
the numbness as it creeps up
your legs, your shallow breathing,
the slow fade to black before your
heart stops beating altogether.
This is the thought process Annie
and Buster Fang, also known as
Child A and Child B, go through
every time they’re about to
participate in their parents’
performance pieces.
A n n i e a n d
Buster ’ s parents,
Camille and Caleb
Fang, are renowned
conceptual artists.
With the help of their
two children, they
create chaos from
peace, the extra-ordinary
from the
ordinary. In one
iconic Fang piece,
titled “The Sound and
The Fury,” Annie and
Buster, barely into
their teens, stage a
performance in a
local mall in order to
raise money for their ill (and
fake) dog, singing songs with
titles like “Kill All Parents”. As a
crowd gathers around them,
equally curious, sympathetic, and
disturbed, their father, disguised
and hiding in the back, heckles,
“You’re terrible!” And before the
next word falls from Annie’s lips,
the crowd is split in two between
cries of “Keep playing, children,”
and “Don’t quit your day job,” on
the verge of a melee over these
two children and their ailing dog.
These are the kind of
memories Annie looks back on
twenty years later, now a famous
actress on the way down from her
fifteen minutes in the spotlight.
As she struggles to move out from
under her parents’ shadow and
divorce herself from her chaotic
childhood, she finds herself
lapsing back into memories of
creating pandemoniac art with
her family. Buster goes through
the same process, rifling through
the various vignettes of his past
as he tries to write another novel
in the face of his most recent flop.
When both are brought back to
their family home after each
experiencing their own personal
catastrophe, Buster and Annie
are forced to confront the messy,
constantly-shifting world their
parent s have c reated f o r
themselves and avoid getting
sucked back into the
family business.
The Family Fang, by
Kevin Wilson, is a
work that explores
the impact of growing
up in an atmosphere
of intentional chaos.
Annie and Buster are
taught that they have
to be willing to do
anything for their
parents’ art, that they
should take pride and
pleasure in sub-v
e r t i n g s o c i e t a l
conve n t i o n s and
“giving the world the
chaos it deserves,” as
Caleb Fang so proudly asserts.
But being constantly beguiled by
their parents’ havoc with little or
no explanation, warning, or care,
takes a toll, and all too soon they
both become disillusioned by
their parents’ proclaimed
“genius.”
W i l s o n i n v e r t s t h e
traditional family dynamic to
create a story that is entirely
unique and strikingly familiar at
the same time. Though most
people’s childhoods do not
include compulsory public
performances that were designed
to subvert social norms, Annie
and Buster’s relationship with
their parents is relatable to
anyone who has had to face the
harsh reality of growing up.
Witty, funny, and heartbreaking
in perfectly-measured doses, The
Family Fang examines parent-child
relationships with humor
and heart.
Let’s Explore Diabetes with
Owls, by David Sedaris
Although it’s never
explicitly stated, David
Sedaris’s newest collection of
essays, Let’s Explore Diabetes
with Owls, concerns love. As
he discusses his childhood
desire of getting his father’s
attention during sw im meets
and later, writes about
purchasing a
Valentine’s Day
gift for his
boyfriend in a
taxidermy
shop, a com-mon
thread
appears in his
work. Whether
he is writing
about learning
to love yourself,
trying to love
your family,
being in love
with your
significant
other, the
absence of love,
or simply
feeling love for
the crazy world
around you, Sedaris always
approaches it with wit and
wisdom.
In the collection, his
best works are the ones told
from Sedaris’s own wonder-fully
satirical point-of-view.
One of his strongest pieces,
“Loggerheads,” discusses the
struggles of childhood
alienation in terms of his
penchant for accidentally
killing the wild animals he
adopts as “pets”. As he delves
deeper and d eeper into his
old memories, Sedaris finds
meaning and resonance in
even the most arbitrary
occurrences. His ruminations
on the process of going to a
doctor in America, where any
concern is met with a series
of tests, versus going to a
doctor in France, where
worries are met with, “It’ll go
away,” remind us that
sometimes the simplest
answers are the most
reassuring.
His less appealing
w orks are the ones in which
he strays away from his own
perspective. These pieces,
written more as monologues
than as per-sonal
essays,
are told by
people Sedaris
seems least
likely to as-sociate
with;
homophobes,
catty house-wives,
and
conservative
bible-thumpers
each get their
turn in the
spotlight. In
one of his most
radical (and off-putting)
pieces
titled “I Break
for Traditional
Marriage,” a
man shoots his
wife and kids after finding
out gay marriage was
legalized, because, as he
explains, “if homosexuality is
no longer a sin, then who’s to
say that murder is?” Though
these pieces do provide
something for the reader to
mull over, his targets seem
too easy to ridicule. These
pieces are nowhere near as
enjoyable as those in
Sedaris’s own voice.
Let’s Explore Diabetes
with Owls reminds us that
although the world can be
crazy, absurd, and
inexplicable at times, there’s
always a meaningful lesson to
be learned. Sedaris’s wit and
good humor bring heart to
even the worst of stories, and
the reader always comes out
of it feeling a little better
about the world around them.
8
“As he delves
deeper and
deeper into his
old memories,
Sedaris finds
meaning and
resonance in
even the most
arbitrary
occurrences.”
“The Family
Fang is a work
that explores
the impact of
growing up in
an
atmosphere
of intentional
chaos.”