Harvard Works Itself Into a Tizzy over Parody Flyer
Satire is meant to be kind and gentle!
Students in all nine River Houses received sealed invitations under their doors early Friday morning professing to come from "Harvard's Newest Final Club"—with the inflammatory statements that "Jews need not apply" and "Coloreds OK."
The enclosed flyer, bearing a crest of a griffin encircled by a laurel wreath, invited recipients to the first introductory punch event of the purported social club "The Pigeon."
The invitation listed three virtues, each with asterisked notes. The first principle, "Inclusion," came with the footnote, "Jews need not apply." The second, "Diversity," was followed by the words, "Seriously, no fucking Jews. Coloreds OK." And the third, "Love," directed readers to the term "Rophynol"—a misspelled rendering of rohypnol, the date rape drug better known as roofies.
Editor's Note: As of February 29, 2024, commenting privileges on reason.com posts are limited to Reason Plus subscribers. Past commenters are grandfathered in for a temporary period. Subscribe here to preserve your ability to comment. Your Reason Plus subscription also gives you an ad-free version of reason.com, along with full access to the digital edition and archives of Reason magazine. We request that comments be civil and on-topic. We do not moderate or assume any responsibility for comments, which are owned by the readers who post them. Comments do not represent the views of reason.com or Reason Foundation. We reserve the right to delete any comment and ban commenters for any reason at any time. Comments may only be edited within 5 minutes of posting. Report abuses.
Please
to post comments
No mistake, they meant 'Rophynol' -- a Serbian narcotic/nerve gas cocktail applied to open, continually-irritated skin ulcers on the pit of the neck (sometimes located on the sacral area of the lower back) causing frenzied, shamanistic dances and Couric-like grins.