Arts and Culture

Shared Secrets in the EMU Ballroom

-Jessica Ridgway

By 5:30 p.m., a huge line of students stood waiting on the upper floor of the EMU. The line started at the base of the grand stairs and wrapped back towards the ticket office. By 6:30 p.m. the end of the line was parallel with the beginning. What was so exciting last Tuesday evening that had a plethora of students, faculty, and community members coming together in simultaneous anticipation?

The answer is Frank Warren, the founder of the ongoing community art project and website, PostSecret. And I will shamelessly admit that I was one of those eager people waiting to meet and hear from the man that changes lives.

Warren started PostSecret on a whim in 2005. He handed out blank postcards addressed to his mailbox to strangers on the street. The postcards read: “You are invited to anonymously contribute a secret to a group art project. Your secret can be regret, fear, betrayal, desire, confession or childhood humiliation. Reveal anything—as long as it is true and you have never shared it with anyone.”

Warren’s spontaneous project exploded from that moment, and he now has millions of postcard secrets. Each Sunday he posts about 20 postcards on the PostSecret website; if PostSecret were a religion, I would consider myself a practicing follower. The website has created an entire “PostSecret community” where individuals can come together to discuss the secrets—giving hope and inspiration to those with more somber secrets, and allowing people to realize they’re not the only ones with silly confessions, like peeing in the shower.

The lecture took place in the EMU ballroom and was packed from front to back. The audience was majority female with a few males present, either there by choice or dragged along by a significant other. I took a seat towards the back and wiggled back-and-forth in my seat, impatiently waiting for his appearance.

He took his place on stage, opened up his lecture with a basic introduction and shared a few postcard samples—both silly and sentimental. And while the audience cooed and the girl next to me wiped tears from her eyes, I sat in silent disappointment. I had already heard this lecture, practically word-for-word, from Frank Warren’s TED Talk.

But, the experience was still delightful because Warren (despite his practiced lecture) still personalized it for the Eugene audience. He discussed how PostSecret has donated large sums of money to Hopeline, a non-profit suicide prevention organization, and announced Active Voice, the new campus organization educating others about mental illness and suicide prevention. He also introduced an Oregon alum, Robert Fogarty, who started an inspirational website like PostSecret called Dear World.

The lecture closed with audience members stepping up to microphones and sharing their personal secrets. Some secrets were funny childhood stories, but others were deeper, heartbreaking confessions that took a lot of courage to reveal to a ballroom full of strangers.

The most pivotal moment for me, as a passionate PostSecret fan, was uncovering Warren’s secrets. I now feel more connected to this inspiring man who taught me not to hide from my past, but to welcome my struggles as blessings in disguise.

Flux Playlist: Get Pumped!

-Flux Blog Staff

It’s finally here. The one week of the term that we dread above all others: dead week. With the winter term finally coming to an end, it can be easy for students to get sidetracked with plans on how they will spend their Spring breaks. But before we can sell back our books and work on our tans, we must survive the deadlines and finals that come along with dead week. We here at the Flux blog understand it can sometimes be hard to find motivation to study when promises of sunny weather are just around the corner, so we thought we would put a playlist to get people pumped up and motivate them through the next couple of weeks. So grab your books, find a nice spot in the library and check out our pump up playlist!


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Mike

  • Purexed -P.O.S.
  • Blue Orchid -The White Stripes
  • POWER -Kanye West

Diana

  • You and I -Medina (Deadmau5 Remix)
  • House Party -Meek Mill ft. Young Chris
  • We R Who We R -Ke$ha

Sam

  • We Will Rock You -Queen
  • When They Come for Me -Linkin Park
  • Click Click Boom -Saliva

Whitney

  • Superbad -James Brown
  • Fancy -Drake ft. Swizz Beats
  • Can’t Tell Me Nothing -Kanye West

Jessica

  • Hell’s Bells -AC/DC
  • Howlin’ for You -The Black Keys
  • Shutterbug -Big Boi ft. Cutty

Callie

  • Viva la Vida -Coldplay
  • Don’t Stop Believin’ -Journey
  • Waking Up in Vegas -Katy Perry

Tamara

  • Cinema -Benny Benassi (Skrillex Remix)
  • Sunshine -David Guetta
  • Jump on Stage -Girl Talk

Coffee with Karen Karbo

-Elliott Kennedy

“If a subject is really good, it has a sticky factor,” says Karen Karbo, smacking her hands together and wrapping her ring-clad fingers together, making her red beaded bracelet clatter. “You think about it and you can’t stop thinking about it. If you’re really a writer, that’s what you do and who you are.”

The New York Times notable author untangles her fingers to reach for her frothy latte. Vero Espresso House is buzzing with the sounds of clinking mugs and tapping keyboards, but I can still her softly murmur “Mmmm,” with the first sip of steaming coffee.

The California-native first studied journalism at the University of Southern California—but only briefly. One piece of criticism showed her that the fact-based world of news was not well-suited to her writing style.

“I had written something where I described a lady as having a ‘really bad haircut.’ My professor said that was too much editorializing,” says Karbo. “I argued that it wasn’t editorializing and it really was just a bad haircut, but he didn’t go for it.”

After changing her major several more times, Karbo graduated with a double Bachelor’s in English and biology. Drawing heavily on her college years for inspiration, Karbo published her first book in 1990.

Trespassers Welcome Here was inspired by Karbo’s time working in the Russian department at USC. Her second book, The Diamond Lane, hints at personal details, such as her Master’s in film and cinema studies. Karbo’s third book and only memoir, The Stuff of Life, chronicles her relationship with her father during the last few months of his life.

“Reliving [his death] wasn’t a great time,” Karbo says. “If it’s emotionally resonant, our natural instinct is to push it away. But that’s the gold, the meat, the passion.”

Hearing the story of Karbo and her father, I remember something else Karbo had said earlier: Find where you intersect with the story. Abandoning my organized line of questioning and closing my notebook, I asked, “How did you deal with it?” And then I shared my own story.

My father died at the age of 60, killed suddenly by a small glitch in his otherwise healthy heart. Her father died at the age of 75 of lung cancer, brought on by years of chronic smoking. Our stories seemed similar in so many ways, and there in a small college town on an ordinary rainy day, we intersected.

“I wrote,” she says, answering my question.

And for the past eight years, Karbo has been writing up a storm, publishing six books and planning a seventh. The Minerva Clark three-part children’s series was written expressly for her daughter, Fiona. Most recently, Karbo has been writing a “Kick Ass Women” series, which includes biographies about Katherine Hepburn, Georgia O’Keefe, and Coco Chanel.

“I chose these women because of their complete faith in their own instincts,” Karbo says. “There was no self-doubt or second-guessing—not to say there weren’t mistakes. But they never betrayed themselves in hard times.”

From the Pacific Southwest to the Great Northwest: The Story of UC Eugene

-Jamie Hershman

The University of Oregon, also known as UC Eugene, has a large California population. But what is the lure of this rainy campus when California  has beautiful, sunny skies to offer?

I am one of those students who wanted a “change of scenery.” Born and raised in Southern California, I had a choice: University of California at Santa Barbara (UCSB) or University of Oregon. Everyone thought I was crazy when I made my final decision to attend the UO, but I knew it was right. The lure? I honestly am not quite sure.

When people ask why I chose Oregon, I don’t really have an answer. My immediate response: “When I visited the campus, I just fell in love.” And those who I’m talking to just nod their heads and smile, reminiscing on their first visit to the beautiful Ivy League style the campus resembles.

But there is much more than just the campus that lured me here. Maybe it was the amazing journalism school that UO has to offer. Or who can forget the (almost) unbeatable football team and school spirit parading around campus?

With many Californians flocking to Oregon, UO has stepped up its standard for admittance. One of the reasons I applied to UO was the fact that as a high school student with above a 3.0 GPA and having passed over 15 college prep high school classes, I was automatically accepted without having to write an essay. But as of 2012, that rule has been cut and all students must now submit an essay to even be considered for admittance. The new standards put University of Oregon on a higher standard for academics, and thus have even more eyes and ears interested in our outstanding campus.

With so many factors playing into the transfer between west coast states, there’s still that one question that stumps all who don’t attend UO. Why would people trade in the California sun for the Oregon rain? I’m still stumped on that one, even though I’m one of those students. Really, it’s all of the other aspects that make UO so amazing that all us Californians would trade in some warm weather for just a little bit of rain.

The Fashion String: American Apparel Advertising

-Tamara Feingold

Last week, my friends and I were walking down E 13th Ave. when we decided to look around American Apparel. Three of us had no money to spare, as usual, so we waited for the lucky one to try on her armful of sheer tanks as we lingered in the severely white box of a store.

One of my friends was standing next a particularly lifelike, yet spindly mannequin wearing oversized glasses and a trademark American Apparel bow hair clip. I snapped a picture on my iPhone to accompany my latest Tweet, and immediately one of the dainty employees rushed across the store.

“Excuse me, we don’t allow anyone to take pictures in here,” she said. “I know it’s kind of weird, it’s just a rule we have.”

I apologized and she lingered for a bit (possibly expecting me to delete the picture), before walking away dejectedly when I pocketed the phone. “I wonder what they’re trying to hide,” my friend laughed out as we left the store.

I got to thinking. American Apparel, famous for its extensive combinations of spandex and cotton in bright and sometimes metallic colors, has a controversial business strategy. The most public of which is its advertising.

The Guardian named American Apparel the brand Label of the Year in 2008. “It is flagrantly exclusive in marketing its wares to the superyoung and supercool,” says the Guardian article. “Its advertising campaign is a series of bald, starkly lit, un-retouched pictures of pretty boys and girls, contorted into positions that suggest yoga and outlandish sex.”

This isn’t an exaggeration; most of the ads feature sprawling half-naked people wearing only the featured piece of clothing. A recent ad on the back cover of Vice magazine introduces The Four-Way Stretch High-Waisted Zipper Pant with a traditionally un-airbrushed looking model posing on a couch in an amateur-porn-ish manner.

Worry not, though. The ad promotes American Apparel’s “Made in USA – Sweatshop Free” promise among details of vertically integrated manufacturing and environmentally friendly factories.

The doorway at our UO campus store sits between life-size white paintings of leotard-clad women. Everything about the store screams seduction; the company has even had a few messy sexual harassment lawsuits filed against it (none of which have been proven).

Somehow, claiming to be a responsible company while running the most provocative mainstream advertising in today’s society makes American Apparel this brilliantly disturbing brand that I can’t decide whether to love or hate. Is it refreshingly shocking or is it taking part in the age-old “sex sells” trend?

Either way, the company’s advertising seems to be working. Maybe the solid-color clothes within the secretive walls of American Apparel just prove too tempting to college students with their eyes on the edgiest trends. Or maybe they feel good supporting a company that’s doing something different despite some criticism and disgust.

Either way, I have to agree with Polly Vernon of The Guardian writing about Dov Charney, the founder and CEO of American Apparel: “Dov Charney, a man whose joint obsession with decent business ethics and sex, [is] as controversial as he is successful.”

For now I have to say, live on American Apparel, with your semi-secretive ways and your inappropriate advertising. I hope to one day own some of your high-wasted tribal print skirts and velvet tube dresses, but from now I’ll admire your curiosities from afar.

Follow Tamara at @tamfeingold