Ami and I were chatting as we were shopping at Stop and Shop for our salmon dinner components. Ami noted that whenever we have a war on something like the war on drugs, the war on terror and we decide to call it a war it really isn’t a war. But when we have a real war where people fight against an enemy with borders and weapons the politicians don’t call it a war. We call real wars conflicts and operations. Now there is a new war in Boston that I feel close to. It is the war on red plastic cups.

As I was heading towards the elevator to the meeting today at VMS I looked down to see MIT's newspaper, The Tech. The top said "Patriots Win the Super Bowl" so I took a look at it. In the left hand column they flashed a headline story with AEPi listed in the headline. I looked down to find "Police Broke Up AEPi Party, Found Alcohol" was a lead story. (I would link to it but I don't have it electronically yet - It was in the Globe written by Suzanne Smalley and should be in The Tech archives shortly). Apparently the Boston Police department has been asked to crack down on drunken students due to the incident with the Emerson student Victoria Snelgrove who they shot and killed with riot control bullets during an inappropriate celebration by drunken college students who mistook themselves for elderly citizens who hadn't seen a world series win since 1918 when the Sox beat the Yankees for the ALCS in Kenmore square. It also may go back to when a Northeastern student died during a celebration when the Patriots won their first Super Bowl and could go back to when an MIT student died of an alcohol overdose a few years prior.

The new plan to cut down on such incidents is called Operation Student Shield. This plan involves looking for students on Bay State road drinking from red plastic cups and carrying cases of beer. On Friday night the first group of people to get stung by the prohibition style witch-hunt was a small Jewish fraternity that when I went there sported the highest GPA of any independent living group on campus and was also full of very nerdy folks. The police saw some people drinking outside from the tell tale red plastic cups and when they went to the door found more suspicious people drinking from the same red plastic cups.

The reported news contained what appears to be what I would expect to see in a Vatican newspaper.

"When the detectives entered the basement they saw about 40 young men and women, many of whom were drinking from red plastic cups and appeared to be underage."

Now first of all I lived at 165 Bay State Rd. where this occurred and the basement is a small room no bigger than my living room. In it is a bar that we built like most fraternity members do accompanied by a stereo system. A group of 40 people would be normal for a Friday night and would barely constitute a party. A party would be held in the main house at 155 Bay State Road that has a full brownstone floor with grand fireplaces and three rooms to party in. What the police must have found was just a bunch of students relaxing and drinking on a Friday night. In the case of responsibility AEPi did get in trouble once a few years ago when an underaged drinker was feeling sick and appeared to be passed out. Rather than rushing her out of the house to avoid liability the leadership at AEPi took responsibility and called an ambulance and the police to help her to safety. This is the responsible thing to do and not something to be punished for. The result was that the fraternity was punished in various ways for having an alcohol violation. What is important? Student safety. How do we get it? Make the students afraid to ask for help from the police.

"Boston Police called MIT police to help inspect the fraternity house where
officers found a bar containing dozens of bottles of rum, vodka, and other
liquors, as well as three Bud Light containers holding about five gallons of
beer apiece."

Why did the Boston Police trying to crack down on problems at riots after sporting events caused predominantly by BU, Emerson, and Northeastern students raid a nerdy Jewish MIT fraternity? Why did they need to have support from the MIT police to search the house? My guess is that this wasn’t a completely random event where the Boston Police found people drinking out of red plastic cups. I think they were looking to go after an MIT fraternity because they wanted to show they were doing something but didn’t want to draw the heat and wrath of the student populations from the real Boston schools. So they picked an MIT frat. I don’t think there was intent to target a specific ethnic group. That would just be a shit storm so I doubt it.

"Near the bar, detectives also found evidence of the drinking game beer pong.
Boyle said. There, several pitchers of beer and plastic cups filled with beer
littered a table top."

I have to laugh at the word detectives in this context. How much detective training did they have to go through at detective school where they were probably playing beer pong at the same age as everyone else, before they could develop the skills to identify the key evidence needed to indict people for playing beer pong. The notion of beer pong as a crime is ridiculous. I took a photo of some of my depraved 28-31 year old friends playing beer pong before the Snow Ball at Jeff’s house. Is beer pong now a violent practice similar to cock fighting and child pornography that must be stopped at any cost? Do I need to worry about protecting the identities of these lawless characters that I know? I have to wonder why the Police don’t go door to door from one fraternity to the next on Friday nights to see who is playing this game and drinking. My guess is that 9 out of 10 ILGs are playing beer pong somewhere every Friday night and that the one that isn’t is on a field trip playing beer pong at another ILG for the night.

"Detectives also found an industrial sized vacuum cleaner blocking one fire exit
and another exit that was locked."

So now that these detectives were let loose in the building with a warrant to review the source of the red plastic cups they also decided to investigate the suspicious fire exit violations. I lived at 165 Bay State Road and if there was a locked exit it was probably a good thing. My bike was stolen out of the basement one day so it would make sense to lock the doors. Also, what does it mean that a fire exit was blocked by a vacuum cleaner. I can't imagine how the police plan to use this in court. This is obviously a group of criminals that need to be evicted. They own a vacuum cleaner that is so large that it blocks exits.

"Boyle said it was issued a licensed-premise violation and representatives will
have to appear in court for serving alcohol to minors, keeping and exposing
alcohol, a locked fire exit, and a blocked fire exit. Boyle said criminal
complaints against the keepers of the fraternity house will be sought in Roxbury
District Court this week."

Remind me what country are we living in? Where and how do we vote these idiots out of office? Why are they harassing the nerdy MIT kids who spent their whole childhood hiding in fear of the cool kids who were smoking pot and drinking all week and finally are getting a brief chance to bud into social human beings. The police intend to take these kids to court and hold them on these bogus charges of keeping and exposing alcohol, locked fire exits, and blocking fire exits. I find it hard to express my extreme disappointment with the Boston Police's solution to their own ineptitude. Go pick on the BU and Emerson students. Go fight crime somewhere.

I have a whole bunch of red plastic cups in my cupboard from drinking for six hours before and after Patriots games where it is apparently considered custom for 60,000 people all driving cars to and from the stadium to get totally blitzed. I am considering switching to blue cups. The cops might like those better.