Original Article: http://dartreview.com/archives/2007/05/14/an_open_letter_to_a_fratboy.php
Monday, May 14, 2007
By Cate Lunt
Dear Fratboy,
Yeah, you’re so dear to me. Yeah, right! (I’m being sarcastic.)
I see you over there, at your table, with your hat turned backwards, cackling to yourself about some mysoginist drivel. I see you drooling with blind rage as you vainly attempt to complete a brain teaser in Highlights for Children. Then, I see you whip out your cell phone and ask daddy to wire you twenty grand. It’s normative and sad, and yet you’re oblivious. This is you: “Duh, duh, duh.”
As a living embodiment of injustice, it’s amazing to me that you haven’t already been thrown onto the compost pile of history, along with foot binding, ritual human sacrifice, and cloche hats. Well, everything happens for a reason. We progressives like to ask a simple question: “Who benefits?” Obviously, you do, simply by existing, but who else?
Well, to begin with, what is a fratboy? (Here, as a comp-lit major, I must put “is” in quotation marks.) Etymologically speaking, the word is derived from two words, “frat” and “boy.” I note with glee that “frat” is a close anagram of “fart,” quite a subversive observation, even if I do say so myself. Allegedly, “frat” is short for “fraternity,” derived from the Greek word “frater,” meaning “brother.” Next, we return to “boy,” which, it must be recognized is gendered perhaps beyond belief. It is perhaps undegenderable; that’s how gendered it is. We notice, with a subversive and radical raise of the eyebrow that “frat” and “boy” are both highly gendered terms, begging the question, “What anxiety is this doubling trying to repress?” Clearly, it is the fear of being a woman, as defined against being a man. When my professor first suggested this to me last year, my little head nearly exploded all over my canvas bag and iBook, and I imagine you are having a similar reaction to such a reading, so let me move on to something else before things get too radical. (Is such a thing possible?)
So, we return more informed to the question of “Who benefits?” Well, that’s obvious. When I was a student at the Dalton School, I unknowingly did the bidding of the patriarchal hegemony with my consumerist tendencies and anything-goes attitude. Until I decided to write Self-Actualization for Tweens, I was, I guess, what you could call a de facto conservative, in that I considered my main job to be centering on myself, with a side interest in inflicting pain on others. In other words, I have an insider’s view of the fratboy mentality.
ExxonMobil, Enron, and those types of corporations are the clear beneficiaries of the fratboy mentality. Still, in the spirit of forgiveness, we progressives must be willing to welcome ex-fratboys into the fold. I have some recommendations for them, and, though they are not sufficient for achieving self-actualization and social justice, they are at least a good beginning.
(a) Get rid of capitalism. The system is broken. We need to radically poeticize our economic system, and, necessarily in doing so, get rid of capitalism. Other kinds of economic systems haven’t really been tried (Stalin, it could be argued, was really the ultimate capitalist—interesting thought) and idealism dicatates that we ditch the dog-eat-dog mentality. Go live on a commune (like I did), eat organic food (like I do), and stage protests on street corners against capitalism (like I’ve done, do, and will do).
(b) Abolish organized religion. Whoa, there! I don’t mean the Eastern religions, which are really more spiritual than religious and allow adherents to relax and do as they please. Instead I single out the really organized religions that are more into judging people. Let’s get rid of them. I have no problem with spirituality: candles, mantras, etc., but the feel-bad vibes emenating from churches, synagogues, and mosques I’d like to sweep away like so many heteronormative cobwebs.
(c) End sizism. Somehow, people with certain body types and so-called facial features enjoy privilege that is no less insidious than those enjoyed by all of us here at Dartmouth, by virtue of our being filthy rich. Stop it!
(d) Immerse your soul in poetry. There’s no better time to become a poet than now o’clock. Poetry is portrayed by the corporate media as somehow difficult or elitist, but anyone can become an amazingly creative poet. It’s easy as pie: my first poems were taken verbatim from my diary and split into lines in random places. Now I’m winning awards up the wazoo.
I can save you from yourself , but only if you’re willing. That’s the sad truth of it.
Excelsior!
Cate Lunt