From the NYTimes article:
So graduation is tomorrow. But they were wearing caps and gowns in today’s photo and Emma had a white and a blue cord around her neck. Anyone know what they symbolize? They must be some kind of honor.
As for the name problem, it could have been the usual graduation snafu. My D2’s name was butchered and they forgot to mention her summa cum laude status, and my MIL went nuts and tried to go on stage and make them redo it! It took 3 of us to talk her down.
In some ways Emma’s mattress contributed to a very new and difficult conversation. You may not find it “good” art, but it has certainly been provocative. Look how many threads we have devoted to her.
And her 15 minutes of fame will end.
Someone’s been busy preparing the campus for graduation:
http://gothamist.com/2015/05/20/columbia_rape_protest_posters.php
"Early this morning, an anonymous person or persons put up posters around Columbia University—in the 116th Street subway station, outside of Tom’s Restaurant, on stoplights and construction walls—emblazoned with the image of student Emma Sulkowicz and her now-iconic mattress. Since September 2014, Sulkowicz has been dragging the mattress around campus as a protest against the school’s handling of her rape allegations against another student. (That student, Paul Nungesser, has since sued the university.) This morning’s posters accuse Sulkowicz of making it all up, dismissing her as “Pretty Little Liar” with the caption “Emma Sulkowitz” [sic] and “RapeHoax.” "
Maybe not so fast, someone put up a bunch of anti-Emma and anti-Lena Dunham signs in NYC around Columbia last night and the woman that follow Jezebel are screaming and tearing their hair out. Columbia should have just stopped this mattress thing before it ever got started. At a very minimum security should have taken away the mattress yesterday. You’d have to be stupid to not know that carting that thing to the ceremony was not only in bad taste, but would leave some people very hurt and offended that the ceremony was being treated like her private circus.
I was bemused that the article referred to those posters as a “stunt.” Maybe they’re part of somebody’s art project.
I am amused (not bemused) because the accused’s response and the associated evidence made public make me doubt her accusation… and her “art” project may be appropriate because the word “art” (same root as “artifice,” “artificial”) means “false.” By calling it (and getting it approved as) as “art” project, the implication is that it is fiction.
To be perfectly clear, I do not doubt that most rape accusations are honest on the part of the accuser. But given what evidence the accused here has produced in rebuttal, it seems correct in this case that they found her accusations less than persuasive.
The posters either say “pretty little liar” with the image and name of Emma S., or “big fat liar” with the image and name of Lena Dunham. Sounds like an enlightened male art project? Not so much.
If it is an art project, by using their actual names and faces they could get into more legal trouble than Emma could. But I don’t suppose anyone is going to take credit for this although there are rumors about the graffiti artist Sabo.
The Jezebel crowd will justify condemning this while at the same time approving those who publicly posted Nongesser’s name around campus as a “serial rapist.”
Personally, I don’t find either persuasive as “art.”
In the absence of the Lena Dunham posters I would have said the posters were “fair and square” in the arena of freedom of expression. But then they go and do something stupid like bringing women’s weight into the issue. So now they lose the support of women who may have in fact agreed with them and most likely the support of any over weight people as well. These guys can’t win for losing.
I’m sorry, calling a guy a rapist is “fair and square” but saying a woman is fat is out of bounds? Really?
No, I said the Sulkowicz posters would have been “fair and square” in the absence of the Dunham posters. Why go and bring a woman’s weight into a controversy dealing with rape? It was a tactical error on their part and they most likely lost support because of it.
Lena Dunham wrote a book accusing a fellow student of rape, and including enough detail to easily identify that student. When it became obvious that “Barry” did not in fact rape her, she stonewalled for awhile and then said the name Barry was a pseudonym.
Again, to equate calling someone fat with accusing someone of rape is incomprehensible to me.
Sexist language and body shaming (and the awful photo of Lena with her tongue out) detract from the message that the posters are trying for. Can you not see that?
So protest the rape allegation that “Barry” contends is false. Label her with an adjective that has some connection to the false allegation . What does her weight have to do with the issue?
My point really is that it was an unintelligent move which will work against them. That and not understanding that without a permit those posters were not going to last 10 minutes in NYC.
I am saying that trying to draw an equivalence between body shaming or using an “awful” picture with accusing someone of being a rapist is in fact a forceful and elegant way of making the exact point, which is that there is a vicious double standard at work here. In much the same way that the quick disappearance of the posters will draw a very stark contrast to Ms. Sulkowicz carrying her mattress all over the place and across the stage at Class Day, even though that was a supposedly prohibited activity.
And since when is “Big Fat Liar” sexist?
I figured they got Pretty Little Liar from the teen tv show and Big Fat Liar from the teen movie.
So you are reducing the whole issue down to a “tit for tat” name calling. You accuse me of rape and I respond with “you lie and you are fat.” Why not just stick to the issue at hand?
Look, they now will have the wrath of all hollywood actresses descending upon them. Bottom line is it was an unintelligent plan of action.
Big Fat Liar, applied to a woman and immediately matched and contrasted with Pretty Little Liar. Do I really have to explain how that is sexist?
And yes, they are phrases that exist in our culture but they were deliberately chosen, and the effect detracts from the lying message because it starts bringing up all the typical BS body shaming and beauty shaming that women are subjected to.
What if they had reversed the phrases? Lena is the pretty little liar and Emma is the big fat liar. That would imply to me that they thought Emma’s lie was bigger.
Doing it the way they did points to nothing but body and beauty shaming.