(Stolen from dailycal.org)
As Seen From Kansas
FRIDAY,
NOVEMBER 1, 2002
I'm not sure Berkeley residents really get the horror and fear with which conservatives in the United States view Berkeley. There's only one town that's inspired "Nuke Berkeley" T-shirts, after all.
I'm not entirely sure what they think we're like, but I imagine it's something like this: Conservative Nightmare Berkeley.
10 a.m: Shaking the sleep from his soft blue eyes and tossing back his long, curly hippie hair, Johnny Berkeley gently rolls out from under the tangle of 20 naked men and women and several dogs and squirrels that sleep on the bed with him. His hemp water bed sloshes gently, filled to the brim with bong water. Jezebel, one of his bedmates, rolls over and kicks softly, murmuring to herself. Johnny smiles; Jezebel's clearly having that dream where she kicks capitalism to death.
10:30 a.m: Downstairs, Johnny steps carefully around the altar to Satan and veganism on his way to the kitchen. He has a light breakfast of his favorite cereal, Marijuanios, with soy milk and Veggiebacon. Dusting off the communal shower, he takes a quick trip under the hot water, toweling himself off with an American flag. Throwing on a T-shirt and faded jeans, he carefully puts several bumper stickers on his butt before heading out the door to a brand new day.
10:50 a.m: Outside is the usual traffic of protesters making their way to the university. Johnny lets the "Free Gaia!" and "Free Mumia, Hurry!" protests go past and joins up with the "Feminists Against Men" one. At the intersection of Telegraph Avenue and Channing Way, he jumps into the Fair Trade coffee protest and picks up some fresh java they're handing out.
The weather is fair. Mother Sun is partially obscured by the usual low-hanging marijuana smoke clouds. The temperature is a bit cool, but Berkeley city authorities have thoughtfully kept everyone extra toasty by adding some Canadian flags to the American flag bonfires on every corner.
11 a.m: Sproul Plaza is a regular forest of protesters burning effigies of UC Berkeley administrators—plus some real ones. Johnny walks past bustling Castro Hall and the 50-foot golden statue of Mao to his first class. Like every class in Conservative Nightmare Berkeley, it's held outside on the grass, and everyone is topless. The class is America Suckery 110, taught by Cubans, and fulfills the Physics requirement.
Noon: Everyone gets abortions, including the men.
1 p.m: Lunchtime. Johnny meets up with his friends, the only remaining exchange students from the Soviet Union. They chat about the encouraging progress being made in the Berkeley labs. The moral fiber tearer has been proceeding along nicely—so has the time machine/stasis field that will keep Conservative Nightmare Berkeley in 1967 forever.
3 p.m: Done with his biology class— "Don't Eat Animals, Damnit 51,"—Johnny walks down to the BART station to head into San Francisco to work on a class project. Traveling into the Financial District in Conservative Nightmare San Francisco, he spends an hour carefully arranging twigs and leafs around a simple snare. With any luck, this trap will bear fruit with a trapped investor or manager. On the way home, he lures the teenage children of conservatives into orgiastic, five-way, interracial, homosexual sex and brands them with the mark of the beast before departing.
6 p.m: City Council meeting, always attended by every single person in Berkeley. A motion passes to replace representative, constitutional government with mob rule. A bill to take from the rich and give to the poor wins handily. War is declared on 17 corporations, 33 states, the federal government and El Cerrito. Everyone then bicycles off to People's Park for extended tree-hugging and ritualistic sacrifice to pagan gods.
10:30 p.m: Exhausted by his full day, Johnny falls back asleep in Conservative Nightmare Berkeley. Lights gradually die out across the town, and the exhausted residents rest after a long day of destroying moral civilization. Conservative Nightmare Berkeley rests.
Except, of course, for the Berkeley vampires, who rise each night to drink the blood of upper tax brackets.
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