The man behind the e-mail: Reed brings campus together

Princetonians are near booked solid — everyone has their thing and runs with it to the point of exhaustion. In those idle hours between shifts on the production lines, then, our first inclination is to sprawl across a cozy piece of furniture and slip into any number of vegetative states. But like any other economy, if our massive productive output (here in the form of plays, concerts, matches, exhibitions, lectures . . . ) goes unconsumed, the whole system will collapse. To echo Adorno, the kvetchy Andy Rooney of the Frankfurt School: The culture industry demands that leisure time become another kind of job, the job of consumption. While this job is often run through with inanity in adult life ("Wasn't 'Alfie' wonderful?"), the opportunity to consume the creative produce of our often-gifted student body is usually a good thing. And unlike the world at large, this exchange is something that we as a campus community owe to one another.

That is where Justin Reed '05 comes in. For the last four years, Justin has compiled and sent out to the entire student body the "Weekly Events" email which lists all of that week's school-recognized student events.

As campus groups try to accomplish as visible and effective a promotion as possible, this email serves as a guarantee that every single student receives some notice of an event, even if that notice is just a short informational blurb.

More often than not, even as slight a nudge as this is capable of tipping the scales from apathy to interest: the power of advertising. I sat down last Friday with Justin to talk with him about, among other things, his job as Weekly Events mailer:

STREET: How did you get this gig?

JUSTIN REED: I remember Dean Dunne asking me if I wanted to do it . . . Dean Dunne asked me to do it, and Nina Langsam, who was USG President at the time, mentioned my name to him, he asked me if I wanted to do it and I said sure.

S: How was it doing your first Weekly Events email?

JS: A little bit nerve-wracking, because you know it's going out to everyone, the entire school. So you're a little nervous about what to write in the first few sentences. But I've got the hang of it now. I just try not to make spelling mistakes.

S: So what would be the Weekly Events of your day, Friday, Nov. 12? If you were to send out an email about what you were doing today, how would it read?

JR: I'd introduce [myself to] everybody, say welcome, have a great day. I want people to be happy when they read the email. The one thing I know for sure that I'm going to is the soccer game. You can't get any better than NCAA. And then, probably, if I could, I'd like to go to the BAC drama tonight too, but I probably won't get a chance to because of the soccer game.

S: If you could have an ideal Weekly Events, no limits, what would that week involve here at Princeton?

JR: I think it would involve a lot of events where you could have a lot of different types of people. Just diverse, all Princetonians, just have people appreciate the fact that they're Princetonians —

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S: — Bikini Car Wash, maybe?

JR: Bikini Car Wash would sound great...

S: I dunno — or maybe a science project?

JR: It would have to be something that goes down at Terrace or Campus. Nothing better than something happening at Terrace or Campus.

S: I'm a proud Terrace member, but I haven't been to Campus in a while.

JR: You've got to come out to Campus.

S: You're a member there?

JR: I'm the President.

S: Ahh! How is that, by the way?

JR: It's a lot of work but a lot of fun.

S: It's going onwards and upwards over there?

JR: Definitely on the up.

S: Were there ever times when you were discouraged as Weekly Events mailer?

JR: If an event doesn't get put on the list you get a couple of mean emails here and there. You have to deal with those, see if you can send out addendums, try to rectify both parties. But sometimes it just can't happen, so you have to appease that person.

S: What are you thinking of doing after Princeton?

JR: Next year I'll be working at JP Morgan in New York City and after that I'll try to go into financial advice, being a financial advisor.

S: What are you majoring in?

JR: Woody Woo.

S: What are you concentrating on in Woody Woo?

JR: I'm writing my thesis on African-Americans investing in the stock market. The investing gap.

S: As an African-American at Princeton, how do you feel about this school in light of it often being said that this is not the greatest school to be African-American at?

JR: I think that Princeton is definitely making some great strides. Of course there's always more steps that you need to take, but they're making great steps: getting Cornel West and Eddie Glaude, Toni Morrison is here — you can't get any better.

S: Among African-American peers that you talk to, is this feeling, about improvements being made, generally shared?

JR: I think it's generally shared, but you've got two groups: one group that's highly dissatisfied with the University and another group that's more satisfied with the University. I think it has a lot to do with involvement and how people have been treated in certain instances. I'm very aware that there are both parties there. I myself am very happy with the way everything has turned out, I think it's a great place for me. But there are some things I want to see done, and I'm going to do my best to make sure [that it gets done].

S: What would you like to see?

JR: I'd like to see a little more integration for all people. I'd like to see African-Americans be welcome on the whole Street. Sometimes I think that African-Americans are only welcome at certain clubs. Take Campus, for instance: I think that some people would now view Campus as the minority club, when it's truly not — it's just a place where a couple of African-Americans joined and all of a sudden it's an African-American club. Things like that, hearing what people say, I wish that could change.

S: As someone who sees the all of these events and puts them together, someone who sees the shape of cultural production at Princeton, why do you think this lack of integration is happening and is this evident in the events that you promote every week?

JR: I think that there are a large number of events that bring a lot of different kinds of people together. I try to highlight the athletic events because for some reason athletic events seem to make people forget their differences. I think it just takes time and that we are on the right path. I see that some of the more academically-geared events are going in the right direction.

S: What is your larger sense of your position as Weekly Event person, what do you see in the job?

JR: I see it as making people happy. Some people see it as junk mail, some people see it as a great list of events this weekend. I want to see people enjoy themselves here, meet a lot of different people, and have the best Princeton experience that they possibly can.

We can say that there exists an intense politics of student cultural life: Who gets to do what, who sees what, who says what about whom. It is to our great credit that for the most part this intensity does not discourage but instead goads us on. As though listening to the song "Push It To the Limit" from the soundtrack to Scarface on mondo-sized headphones while running along the shoreline, we get out there to build the better mousetraps of our acclaim, every time.

Then again, this might all be a flaming hoop in some sick ringmaster's circus. That is probably right — already distracted in our own plodding, we are set to turn the grindstone of the national mill. Or, more accurately: govern, finance and otherwise own the national mill with an equally undercritical determination.

Justin Reed, Weekly Events mailer, must be commended for trying to make sense of the crushing traffic of our Activity, Production, in a way that fosters whatever communal value there is to be had in it.

As with our nation, what is deeply problematic can at times be undeniably wonderful. The brilliant and committed students behind our campus Events, in the broadest sense of that word, must all in part share Justin's desire that their beneficiaries "have the best Princeton experience that they possibly can." Awwwww.