Snevets is an anti-bird establishment and it has to change. We’ve all seen The Birds, chasing people on Palmer Lawn and flying into windows. You might have thought to yourself, ‘god these birds are annoying!’ But my stance is that we humans are the nuisance, not our feathered colleagues. Let me start my case with the most obvious guests, the geese of Palmer lawn. While clearly opinionated, they have an understandable side to this debate that deserves to be heard. They are, as I mentioned, guests on our campus, whom we should be honored to host. These airborne migrants have flown thousands of miles (probably) to alight on our fields. They give us the opportunity to take part in their stories in exchange for one simple thing, respect, and yet even this we fall short of. Instead of showing hospitality, we chase, shout at, and harass the geese of Palmer Lawn. Some goose haters might argue that geese have bad attitudes and deserve this negative attention, however this is just another hateful stereotype pinned on geese by the anti-bird smear campaign. I will concur that these geese are strong-willed, but I find their confidence inspiring, not threatening. Geese achieve what we all aspire to but rarely achieve: to do as we intend and assert healthy boundaries. But us students with our fragile identities and threatened worldviews see the silent power of geese and must tear it down out of repressed jealousy. And yes, geese do hold their ground but get over it. Even if that ground is the middle of the pathway separating you from your dorm. You’re not upset at the inconvenience, you’re just upset that you didn’t think to claim that sidewalk first.
Conjecture aside, I myself witnessed a feathered hate crime that took place just last fall. It was a beautiful sunny day. People were outside, cohabitating with geese as we should, when one student decided that they had had enough and began, in an unprovoked manner, harassing an unassuming goose. The student held their hand out expecting the goose to want to be pet like some common domesticated animal. The goose, rightfully offended, moved away and tried to continue on with its day, but the person refused to quit, continuously moving closer with the same offensive out-stretched hand. The goose became more and more distressed, eventually being forced to flee the scene, terrified for its safety. Of course, the event was reported to the proper authorities but was quickly dismissed due to the unfortunate fact that hate crimes against birds are yet to be recognized by our legal system here at Stevens.
The next major group affected by the anti-bird movement are small birds. Avid readers of The St*te may recall this particular issue being discussed by a fellow bird activist in the article “Are birds hitting the skybridge of the Gateway Academic Complex?,” but I will recap for those unfamiliar. Small bird discrimination goes far beyond stigmas, it is quite literally built into the school itself. It is a well known fact that small birds have difficulty distinguishing windows from clear airspace. This has led many to advocate for pro-bird architecture, including matte finishes and large decals to create a safer world for our tiny aviators. Snevets, however, disregarded the needs of small birds in their building designs and installed large glass bridges like those seen in the Gateway Academic Complex, Kidde Hall, Morton Hall, and the new University Center Complex. These bridges are a clear intrusion (get it?) into otherwise safe airspace for these poor innocent birds. If you ask me, these bridges cannot be excused as a mistake made from a lack of knowledge on bird accessibility issues, this was an aggressive move to repress small birds and keep them out of campus spaces. It is particularly interesting that the most lethal of the campus bridges happen to be the two most recently constructed, Gateway and the towers. While, from personal observation, the rates of casualties for the bridges at Kidde and Morton are comparable to those occurring with any other vertical surface, the glass-encased bridges at Gateway and the towers have sent the small bird mortality rate through the roof. The switch to hostile bird architecture seemingly coincides with the switch from our previous mascot Rodo, the pro-bird duck, to our current mascot Attila, the duck elitist.
This brings me to my final point, that this problem goes all the way to the top, Attila himself. A self-proclaimed hater of all other birds. Our very own mascot, who is meant to give the school a bird-friendly appearance, is poisoning us with duck elitism. Ducks have been placed on a pedestal and sold to us as the only acceptable birds to enter our “inclusive campus environment.” In the springtime, you may notice families of ducks waddling around campus without fear of the harassment that geese face. This is because the duck propaganda is ingrained into our campus culture by our model, motivator, and icon, Attila the Duck. Attila has instilled the message that ducks are the perfectly engineered animal, with their ability to fly, swim, and walk. But what about the geese? Swans? Other waterfowl? And, come on, we’re seriously overselling the walking and flying abilities of ducks. We all know swimming is their only strong suit, respectfully.
Let me be clear, I am not arguing for the oppression of ducks. Rather, I argue that we should respect all of our flying counterparts equally. We as a community need to stand up against our speciesist campus culture that enforces duck elitism and protect the needs of all our feathered friends, whether they want to claim Palmer Lawn as their own or fly into stationary objects.
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