Can You Still Have Fun at Stanford?

Since 2013, Stanford has been consistently ranked first by students and parents as “America’s Dream School.” However, in the past decade, Stanford’s administration has systematically destroyed the wild and experimental campus life that made Stanford so desirable. The new social order – defined by unmarked houses with names like “550,” “680,” and “675” – offers a peek into the bureaucrat’s vision for America. Stanford is just one example of a broader movement that sees joy as inherently unequal and dangerous, or at least unnecessary. How can we fight back against the demonization of spontaneity? Is fun dead, or can the war on fun be a call to arms?

Speaker

Ginevra Davis is correspondent for Palladium magazine. She studied Symbolic Systems at Stanford. On campus, she was the culture editor for the Stanford Review and a co-founder of Crypto @ Stanford, a student-run blog that documented Stanford's emerging crypto community. She writes about technology, culture, and generational change.

Respondent

Cola Buskirk researches the history of technological breakthroughs for Protocol Labs. At Stanford she studied history and classics, as well as wrote and edited for the Stanford Review. She is currently making a documentary on the Stanford Marriage Pact.

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This event has been made possible by a generous grant from the Apgar Foundation.