• Join The Fed
• Advertise with The Fed

• About Us
• Contact

In This Issue

• Inside Look at Madrid Train Bombing
• On Keenspace, Funnies Go Super-Mega Sweet
• Stop Aborting Our Lord and Savior!
• The Passion 2: The Resurrection
• A Trip to the Britney Spears Museum
• Mail Order Brides Reviewed
• Letters to the Feditor
• Boccaccio's Decameron Gets Zombie-fied
• Campus Tradition of Blood Wrestling Continues
• Fed Fun Book of Zombie Lore!
• Wacky Fun Skeletons
• Crane Droppings on Sharon
• Marauding Interviewer: Back to the Seventh Grade
• Meta-Marauding Interviewer: Does Kate Eat Babies?
• They Watch

My dearest Kareem,

Your article (Google.com/H.B.Reese), I find it most disturbing, that you would associate my dear father with monkee's-peanut (sic) butter,Rhesus Peanut Butter Cup, thats ludicrous, and you should be hanged in court.

Andrew [editor's note: "Andrew" was CCed a copy of this correspondence], check-up on this loonie-tick, as an expert at Internet Security, crash this women's article about H.B.Reese, as his Grandson, don't let this idiot get away with her article. You don't poke fun at one of the most successful entrepreneur's (1900's), shame on you!!

Yours Truly,

C.Richard Reese, Son of H.B.Reese

Mr. Reese,

I assure you that the proper authorities have been notified of Mr. Kareem's transgression and he is currently awaiting his execution by hanging. In the meantime I'd recommend that you avoid further consumption of the Reese's Lead Paint Chips.

Affectionately Yours,

Mike Ilardi, Feditor-in-Chief

Dear Sir/Madam Editor:
I am writing to encourage you to continue to make fun of everything you can. The Fed ceases to be an uncensored forum if some articles are withheld because they might be racist or fascist or offensive. I have personally been offended time after time by your publication, but I disdain to see you take seriously any of the condemning letters published in the last issue. I agree with Ms. Foxx's demand for "ethical and professional values" in the case of The New York Times or even the Columbia Spectator, but not in the case of The Fed. I would much prefer to see the continuation of the only publication on campus that makes a real effort to overcome racial and other societal boundaries: by simply refusing to bow to those boundaries. Surely it would be a mark of progress for our society if we did not rise up against a few unkind words for the sake of reinforcing a potent and divisive boundary. Perhaps one day we will all laugh at racial stereotypes and the people who actually made and believed them. This is not ignorance, nor is it a call for journals and institutions to pretend racism does not exist. President Bollinger's response, among others, was extremely appropriate in its serious treatment of the situation. But forums like The Fed are also important in a diversified atmosphere dedicated to breaking through those boundaries. Therefore, in a truly American spirit of progress: Keep up the good fun-making!
David Tam, CC '06

Thanks for your response. While we are certainly not about to stop printing offensive humor, the cartoon in question was poorly executed satire and rejection on the grounds of quality during the editorial process is not the same as censorship. So, we're going to keep doing what we do; we're just going to do a better job of it.
Mike Ilardi, Editor-in-Chief

Hi Jamie,
I'm the violin player who met you on the train at 96th St. 2 weeks ago. I gave you some stickers to put up for the anti-war march this weekend. Did you put them up? Do you need more stickers? I have way more than I need. I checked out your newspaper and may want to submit something someday. Give me a call (if indeed I have the right Jamie--your parents are lawyers from Ct.?) and I'll give you more crap to disseminate. Also I'd like to suck on your toes for an extended period of time.
Sincerely,
Jeffrey Ellenberger (212) ***-****

Dearest Jeffrey,
We fully encourage all sketchy guys our editors meet on the subway to track our paper down and e-mail us their (creepy) personal correspondance. In fact, in the future, Jamie, save them the trouble and just give them our e-mail address directly.

To the Editors,
I just received the cartoon you published, and your apology. I applaud your courage in providing your email for responses. I have to say the cartoon was truly shocking and even nauseating, still; it was also illuminating. Racism is bitterly and sickeningly alive in this country, though many young people claim otherwise. I can imagine no more solemn testament to this sad fact than the appearance of such a cartoon in a publication emanating from a premier academic institution. The hardening of hate through bitter humor is age old, but not befitting a country claiming to be the greatest democracy the world has ever known. Surely 600,000 people did not lose their lives in the Civil War for our country to have moved so infinitesimally beyond the inhuman culpability of our white ancestors. "Humor" like this makes me feel terribly ashamed to be associated with white people. There is much work to be done. For what it is worth, I recommend workshops at your campus on the uses and abuses of "humor". Seeking contrition and punishment will be a mistake, for this will harden the hearts of those callow minds that produced the cartoon. Fatuous declamations about racism will not do much either. Nip hate in the bud by extending love, compassion. In a word: TEACH.
Matthew Witt, Ph.D. Assistant Professor,
University of La Verne

[Regarding the article on Prince in issue 17.8]
ARE YOU TELLING ME THESE ARE ALL PRINCE'S WORDS. I DON'T BELIEVE HE WOULD SAY SOME OF THESE THINGS, ESPECIALLY THE CURSE WORDS.
-MICHELLE

Actually Michelle, as sure as God made lower-case text, we made that article up.
Mike Ilardi, Editor-in-Chief