The Northern Plight

ELLIOT PARK, MINNEAPOLIS- That one kid who everyone is secretly jealous of was caught stealing a scarf from an undercover police officer Friday. Onlookers watched in horror as their stylistic hero, Kenny Malcolm, was forced into the back of a Minneapolis Police Department squad car. “I always wondered where his unique style came from,” one astonished NCU student commented, “but I never expected this. I just figured he knew someone who worked at Savers on Lake St.”

Police have been investigating numerous unprovoked attacks on the homeless in and around the Elliot Park neighborhood for the last 4 months. Malcolm was finally caught after an undercover sting operation profiled his preferred targets as mid to late 50’s homeless smokers wearing multiple layers of clothing. After 2 weeks of undercover scrounging, begging, bench sleeping, newspaper comforting, and shelter finding, MPD Lt. Barry McNamara finally got what he had been waiting for when he was jumped by the wiry kleptomaniac.

“I saw him coming and just kept pretending to sleep, when that vagrant went for my scarf I just slapped the cuffs on him. Game Over. It was a little less dramatic then I had expected.” McNamara explained.

Malcolm had been the apple of everyone’s eye at NCU all semester for his seemingly “cutting edge, retro sense of style” and unique combinations of tight pants, and old timey sweaters and stocking caps. Malcolm was unemployed and had no steady income, and a few of his fellow students had suspicions as to how he was affording all of his trendy outfits. “His family was never very wealthy, and he relied heavy on financial aid and scholarships to pay for tuition.” Malcolm’s best friend and roommate explains, “He would never wear an outfit more than one time. He knew he had a public to keep happy.”

Malcolm remains unavailable for comment. His mother and father issued a public statement earlier this morning explaining that they brought him up on a healthy dose of tolerance for the homeless. As a sign of good faith they are also petitioning to make February National Homeless History Month.

-Schroeder “The Integrity Corroder” Bernstein

Early Saturday morning local resident of 5E Carlson, Daniel Grassmen was confronted by his roommate and floor Discipleship Leader (DL) about why he was out so late. The DL, Jason Emory, had been awoken by the creaky door belonging to the room both students share. Reports say that once Emory noticed it was over two hours past curfew he inquired to Grassmen’s previous whereabouts and specific company. Emory told The Northern Plight that Grassmen said he was in the floor’s private devotional room located opposite the elevators, praying for his aunt who had been diagnosed with lung cancer.

Emory initially noted that it took Grassmen a few seconds to spit out a response to his line of questioning but simply ignored it due to the originality and serious nature of his pathologically untruthful roommate. A later investigation dug up evidence that Grassmen was in fact hiding in the southernmost stairwell in the Christian Life Center adjacent to the gymnasium. Forensics found a blonde strand of hair that proved Grassmen was not alone but had a female companion who eats healthy and washes, rinses, and repeats daily.

A week after the incident The Northern Plight caught up with Grassmen outside of Clay Commons. When asked about how he felt about all the evidence stacking up against his alibi he seemingly came clean. “Alright, so I wasn’t where I said I was. Who cares? I wasn’t having sex, smoking, drinking, dancing, gambling, doing drugs, swearing, looking at porn, voting demoncrat or being gay! Me and Melody were just talking about how awesome it would be to go help children born into brothels in India. The time flew by, I didn’t even realize it was 3AM.” Grassmen continues. “But I think I am going to marry that girl. Jason wouldn’t have understood, he’s on that DL powertrip where he feels the need to report anything and everything he finds out.”

Grassmen went on to beg The Northern Plight to change his name and floor for the article and to not rat him out because that in his words, “totally not what Jesus would do.” So from now on he will be referred to as Douchy McFirepants. So even though McFirepants escaped judgment and punishment this time, if he keeps up in his untruthiness one day it will get the best of him. McFirepants should also note that even though this Melody girl seems to be perfect for him, he will realize one day that a girl that will keep him up past curfew is a girl that has no respect for authority. And a girl that has no respect for authority is the type of girl that will dump you for that lame basketball player that still pops his collar up or the tight pants wearing emo whose hawk and swoop is way too cool even for someone as high and mighty as himself.

-Bernstein

front page:

SENIOR GIVES UP GIVING UP THINGS FOR LENT

local:

NCU STUDENT MISTAKES BASS DRUM BEAT FOR HOLY SPIRIT

sports:

INTRAMURAL BASKETBALL MORE EXCITING THAN EXTRAMURAL BASKETBALL

arts & entertainment:

DEMON POSSESSED ACTOR WINS TONY AWARD FOR ROLE IN NCU’S “SCREWTAPE LETTERS”

lifestyles:

ULTRA CONSERVATIVE, HOME SCHOOLED, FAT KID DIDN’T WANT YOU AS A ROOMMATE ANYWAY

technology:

NEW CANDLE WARMER WARMS HEARTS, CANDLES

opinion:

“MORE PEOPLE WOULD BE CHRISTIANS IF JESUS COULD HAVE BEEN MORE LIKE JUSTIN TIMBERLAKE” -Tiffany Lebowitz

Hello my friends.

For the first time on this blog, I write not as a humorist but as a fellow student. Like many of you, I was surprised, offended, and largely disappointed yesterday when I found out about the audit that occurred after chapel. (A chapel audit being the “check-out” list that was compiled after the service to be compared to the “check-in” at the beginning, designed to catch those students who checked in without actually attending chapel).

While not actually being present—nor being checked in—I nonetheless felt disrespected and a little ashamed of my school for such a petty act. What disappointed me even more was the attitudes I picked up on of many other students who talked about the audit, not in terms of it’s childishness or futility, but in terms of whether or not they got caught, or why they should have to go to chapel in the first place.

I will not say much about the morality of “slashing and dashing” or “who should or shouldn’t have gotten caught.”—such topics belong in another article. Instead, I only want to discuss the abject failure of North Central in creating a healthy chapel culture (as evidenced most effectively by a very unhealthy chapel audit), and why students have every right to feel cheated, patronized, and belittled by these recent actions.

The primary failure of the North Central chapel program is the lack of a positive chapel environment to which students actually want to attend. While I do believe programming has a big part to play in this problem (the humorous idiosycrasies of chapel culture are well documented on this blog) I think the bulk of the issue rests with us, the students. Simply put, we view chapel as something we have to do—a chore. Such an attitude is very evident even in our language (we don’t get to go chapel we have to go to chapel). Such a sour view of something inevitably creates a negative environment fueled by criticism. The results are:

1) students who don’t want to go chapel, so they don’t, and get fined for it,
2) students who don’t want to go to chapel, so they don’t, but sign in so they wont get fined, or
3) students who don’t want to go to chapel, but do go because they feel guilty, and spend the whole time sitting there thinking about how much they don’t want to go to chapel.

I would argue that such attitudes are unhealthy and cannot improve when ignored but only spread.

But while the issue rests with the students, I believe the institution is at fault for creating this culture with us via their policies. Even their language promotes negativity towards chapel (imagine what a change it would be to measure attendance by something positive like chapel goes and not chapel skips). The more the institution reinforces the idea of the necessity of our presence at chapel, it is inevitable that the student body will connotate the chapel as a place we have to instead of get to go to.

The time, energy, and resources wasted in order to conduct yesterday’s hopelessly arbitrary chapel audit is prime evidence for North Central’s failure to provide students with the necessary positive reinforcement to attend chapel.

Any psychology professor worth his books will tell you that negative reinforcement (even towards positive behavior) may be effective in the short term, but over the long term can create serious health problems in an individual. Likewise, any sociologist or historian could list off the failures of governments and institutions throughout history who repeatedly utilized “obey us or else” tactics.

Were it up to me, chapel would be 3 times per week and optional. Such a policy would guarantee a quality, celebratory program that was attended only by the people that really wanted to be there. But it is not up to me. And while I’ve had these thoughts for a long time, I’ve never had a proper platform to voice them, nor known an appropriate action to take to bring change. However, thanks to the Northern Plight, I know have both.

Should I ever be in another chapel service again that conducts an audit, I will not participate. This is not because I wish to “fight the system” or start some adolescent revolution. I simply refuse to continue to participate in a chapel policy system that inevitably creates cynicism and negativity on our campus.

It occurs to me now that if enough of you joined me in boycotting the chapel audit, we might taint their numbers enough to make their records unusable, but sabotage isn’t really my ultimate aim. I wont participate, even if I’m the only person who walks out those doors without giving my name for the second time. They can fine me if they wish, but that will only provide me with the opportunity to meet with someone in the institution to lodge a complaint and voice my opinion. I’m sorry, but these attitudes—and tactics that promote them—do not belong on our college campus.

 Thank you for your time, and as always, be awesome.

Woodward

by a Student Development Official

“Alright fellow Christians, it’s that time of year. The Student Development Department has run out of productive things to do so we are re-initiating random Chapel audits! We will finally get the best of you slash and dashers, beep and sleepers or whatever you call yourselves these days. You can’t run, you can’t hide, you can’t play dumb anymore. We’ve got more undercover spies then ever before.

I know what your thinking. You think you can just waltz into our esteemed offices and throw down one of your patented excuses. For example; “I had a job interview at 11:30″, “I went to the bathroom and had diarrhea and didn’t get out until all the sign out people had left”, or “I was up at the alter praying for like an hour after chapel”. The time has come to swallow your pride and own up to your sins.

For the last few years we have simply made the culprits pay a fine but this year we are going to use you against your own people. For every chapel skipper you name you get 10$ credited to your school account and for every ten you get a free NCU spirit ring that retails for 9.99$ at the NCU Bookstore. So not only will you be helping out your fellow classmates by uncovering their hidden sinful nature you will also be supporting the good ‘ole NCU!

We are also going to implement a random lottery for those who do stay throughout the entire duration of chapel. The daily winners will receive one free milkshake coupon to be redeemed at the deli. Good luck! We are also in the process of designing a mandatory chapel uniform with everyones name and student ID number on the back. You must wear these t-shirts everyday to chapel and if you try to leave early our motion sensor camera will take a snapshot of your shirt and retribution will be ours. I almost talked my superiors into installing seat belts into all the seats in the chapel that can only be unlocked by staff members, but something about not being able to escape in case of a fire benched that scheme.

Regardless, I hope you take fair warning that if you try to cheat the system you will be caught. We’ve spent over $35,000 and countless man hours to make sure of that. You can never outrun big brother, we’re always one step ahead. Oh and God bless.”