Scrutiny
Saul Glist
Saul A. Glist '23 hosted a four-hour program themed around music recorded in prisons for his 2018 WHRB radio show.
Music and Justice
As part of the Radcliffe Institute's “Music and Justice” working group, a new semester-long course, Harvard students work with students at the I-Can Academy, an educational program within the jail, to create and perform music.
Volume XXXIII, Issue XVIII November 10, 2022
Dear FM, This weekend, we’ll see a matchup of epic proportions: Harvard versus Yale. Turkeys versus Bulldogs. A $200 resale value versus only the slightest inclination to watch a football game. In this week’s scrut, JFA examines a dispute that’s just as contentious as The Game, albeit a lot less promising for our side: Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard. Through on-the-ground reporting from D.C., a fantastic set of interviews featuring the Jay Caspian Kang, and incisive prose, she challenges us to go beyond the #DefendDiversity slogan to consider the larger, weightier fight for reparations that we will lose when we lose affirmative action. In the meantime, there’s plenty of other drama to go around. MJH questioned Cass Sunstein about Dobbs v. Jackson, dogs vs. cats, and The Crimson vs. a semi-secret Sorrento Square social organization that used to occasionally publish a so-called humor magazine. MEE and KIJT interviewed the teams competing on Hare’s Kitchen, a student cooking competition in Leverett House. WSH researched the Freshman Smoker, a long-running annual social that had to be abolished due to unruliness and disorder. ARZ and SND traced the origins of Harvard’s final clubs, the elite spaces within elite spaces that magnified Harvard’s class divide. But some conflicts turned out to not be so conflicting after all. VX attended a conference on the intersections between science, technology, and society. MLFS and CRR reported on the Quad Lab, a seminar that brings the classroom to Cabot House and weaves together histories of race, class, and gender at Harvard. SB and SEW profiled a 51-year-old DJ at WHRB with a passion for both music and philosophy (and a collection of over 55,000 records!). Finally, MHSH wrote a lovely endpaper about how Multicultural London English enables her to code-switch between different dialects and communities. As always, our FM team was unbeatable this week. Thank you to all the execs, who had me fighting back tears during our last meeting!! To SS, SCS, and MH for wrestling with InDesign and JH for struggling through an hour of podcast name ideation. To JGG, who’s currently battling his inner demons while drafting his first endpaper — if you see him around this week, be sure to ask him how it’s going. And to MVE, for tackling 15 seniors, 21 schmoozes, a 39-item pagemaster, and 3 consecutive essays for class. Speaking of which, if you’ll excuse me, it’s back to Sophia vs. her overdue paper. Go Turkeys, SSL & MVE
Dropping Out and Cashing In: The Rise of DAOHQ
Lucas Chu and Emmet Halm, Harvard drop-outs and founders of crypto startup DAOHQ, see themselves as part of a new vanguard of anti-institutional entrepreneurs. But have they really distanced themselves from the institutions they critique?
Crypto Scrut 5
Kaledora Fontana ‘22 is one of several student entrepreneurs living in a house in Somerville.
Volume XXXIII, Issue XVII November 3, 2022
Dear Reader, Embarrassingly, the number of late issues this semester is high enough that using an excuse as a conceit for my closeout emails is becoming a trope. Instead, I’ve chosen a fresh, guilt-free conceit inspired by the ~crypic~ theme of this issue’s scrut. That’s right: I’ve hidden a secret message in this editor's note. Happy searching. Issue XVII is anchored by a much anticipated scrut by diligent duo TMB and ITM, entitled “Dropping Out and Cashing In: The Rise of DAOHQ.” It chronicles thE story of another duo, Lucas Chu and Emmet Halm, who dropped out of Harvard to found their startup, DAOHQ, which raised $1.3 million in its pre-seed round and counts Mark Cuban among its investors. Lucas and Emmet see themselves as part of a new vanguard of particularly anti-institutional entrepreneurs — but our writers take a critical look at just how far they, and other elite college-adjacent entrepreneurs like them, have really distanced themselves from the institutions they critique. It’s a deeply-reported, Fascinating look into a hugely lucrative subculture — and as billions of dollars pour into the so-called creation of Web3, pointing out its contradictIons couldn’t have higher stakes. SWF talks to Gregory Nagy, who’s been teaching “The Ancient Greek Hero” for nearLy half a century, about Greek mythology and his literal and figurative Achilles heels. MEE and THK find out the wholeSome truth behind those “Need a Friend?” posters. AI and URR talk to psychologist Dr. Deirdre Barrett about the weirdness of dreams, and what she makes of it. YAK and JQY discover the secret to happIness with HKS professor Arthur Brooks. SND and EAG talk to a few undergraduates who are having an unconventional Harvard experience — they’re Married! KG and SM keep the Halloween spirit Flowing (even though it’s Christmas season now, obviously) by speaking to the elusive Adams witches. NDC and CJK cover Project No One Leaves, a coalition of HLS students working with local rEsidents on housing-related issues. CDM and MEW get the scoop behind the newly unVeiled portrait in Adams D-hall: an oil painting of Japanese-American Fred Komatsu, painted by alum William Shen. ACO and RR take us down to Harvard’s little-known Recycling and Surplus Center, where the University’s trash gets a secOnd chance. And BYC turns his signature closeup Lens on campus icon Remy the cat in a gorgeous photo essay accompanied by reported captions by SSL. A trio of stellar retrospections this week: NKB and MTB explore the brief, wondrous tenure of Harvard’s VarSity Mandolin Club. SCC takes a deep dive into how disgraced Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes nabbed a spot on HMS’s Board of Fellows. And HD brings to life the rise and fall of The Rag, the radical feminIst magazine you’ve never heard of. AMW and JKW deliver our only levity this week: an iMagined ghost story set in the scariest place of all: the Cabot D-hall. Finally, for this issue’s endpaper, AEP brings us a nuanced reflection on her relationship with Mormonism, and the difficulty of being caught between Family and conviction. As always, plenty of people to thank. To MH, SS, and SCS for glossy designing on top of everything else you do. To JH for podcasting prowess. To SWF for meticulous proofing and for bringing Kong to boost morale. To JGG for somehow proofing our stories before bedtime. To Daylight Savings Time, for the free hour. And to SSL for many, many preschmoozes, and for productive reflection as we prepare to pass the torch. Love, MVE & SSL
Crypto Scrut Cover
Lucas and Emmet's startup, DAOHQ, raised over $1.3 million in its pre-seed fundraising round, and counts Mark Cuban among its investors.
Steven Pinker and the Fight Over Academia’s Future
Public intellectual and Harvard professor Steven A. Pinker believes that academia needs to be saved from itself. He is prepared to do his part.
Volume XXXIII, Issue XVI October 27, 2022
Dear Reader, It’s Halloween, but have no fear — the Steven Pinker scrut is finally here! We can’t wait for you to read REJC and MJH’s wonderful, hard-earned, behemoth scrut that’s been a long (long, long) time coming. In the rest of our frightfully good issue, CRR and MW cover the reopening of Cambridge Queen’s Head pub. JKL and JL report on the new technology the Museum of Comparative Zoology is using to catalog the seven million insects in its collection. YK and TCW visit the Houghton Library’s collection of death masks, which are just as creepy as they sound, and examine the spiritualism of William James. SSG and JGY interview Kim Smith, the woman we have to thank for the re-opening of Barker Cafe. VAK talks to public historian Hannah Scruggs, who researches the enslaved and free Black communities of central Virginia. SSI chats with SSJ about STS. KLM and JKW chronicle a series of inter-House pranks in the early 2000s, which included 250 dead goldfish, dhall restrictions, and a gong. JQY takes us back to a Harvard tradition that was unfortunately abolished for “reasons of liability” — racing down the Charles in makeshift rafts. RHDN explores roller skating, refugee legacy, and transcending the boundaries between self and family in his poignant endpaper. AHL pushes back on the fetishization of female pain after Spotify recommended her the “sad girl starter pack” playlist one too many times. CM writes a love letter to a sexy redhead. Of course, we couldn’t have done it without help from our supernaturally talented staff. HRTW proofed Pinker not one, not two, but three times. SCS drew Pinker not one, not two, but three times. JH and MH kept up the morale at 10:30 maestro, and SS kept up the Derek Bok Choy bit. JGG brought me cookies while I lay supine on the FM couch on Thursday night, editing the scrut. MVE brought me another cookie while I sat hunched over my laptop at Sunday brunch, still editing the scrut. SOMEONE AT CRIMWEEN stole the can of Campbell’s tomato soup that accompanied my Andy Warhol costume, and I was quite peeved. >:( But alas. Have a happy Halloween, and even happier reading! Yours, SSL & MVE
