editors' note
The following ed notes are from the four editors that will be leaving us after this year. It's been a good run guys! Thanks for all your hard work and dedication.
For the past three years, hardboiled has been my outlet to the issues that affect our community. I have been able to stir up trouble, create dialogue about marginalized issues, and to create more debauchery than any term or research paper ever could. Every time I'm at a community event, and I toss in the casual "I'm with hardboiled," it's awesome to see how many people know about our publication and its mission. It's going to be hard leaving hardboiled behind, but I know that I will be able to take from it all the skills that I have developed and all the friends that I have made. If you end up reading this, and you have years left to go at Cal, I encourage you to be a part of our publication. That and to always remember, Go Bears!
sincerely,
matt hui
managing editor
One thing I've learned in the four years that I've been a Cal student is that a lot of people don't like talking about race. I've heard it framed as a "sensitive" topic or a "tricky" subject ? something that makes many people downright uncomfortable (hello, you, squirming in your seat!). Even better, I've heard the proverbial phrase, "you're playing the race card," if someone even mentions the word "race."
How did talking about race become such a taboo topic? While "race" may be an issue that some people want to "move on" from, have we come to the point where public schools should be barred from teaching students about issues involving race? This is precisely what an Arizona legislator has in mind. Rep. Russell Pearce currently has a senate bill in Arizona that would bar public academic institutions from teaching anything that would "encourage dissent," read: Ethnic Studies. This includes teaching anything that is considered "un-American"-- whatever that means.
There's more. According to a statement in Phoenix, Arizona's East Valley Tribune, the bill would "bar public schools, community colleges and universities from allowing organizations to operate on campus if it is ?based in whole or in part on race-based criteria.'" Hey, hardboiled, that's us!
While Pearce may not have had Asian Americans in mind when crafting the policy, we have to be weary of the fact that if this ridiculous bill were to pass, it would affect everyone fighting for social justice and equity. Now more than ever, we need spaces like hardboiled that provide an outlet for different viewpoints.
I'm certain of this: we've still got a lot of work to do and I hope that hardboiled will be at the front seat.
Much thanks goes out to the hardboiled staff and editors that I've had the honor of working with. To the future of hardboiled, thank you for stepping up and taking on this juggernaut of a publication. hardboiled has been one of the most humbling experiences of my college career and for that, I wouldn't trade it for anything.
much love,
pauline sze
story editor
Okay, I confess. Sometime during the fourth consecutive hour of post-production editing of this issue, I began to hear a tiny voice inside my head. It was my voice actually. But a quieter, cynical, tired, I-have-a-quiz-at-8 am-tomorrow version. "Is all this even making a difference?", the tiny voice asked inside my head.
Dear reader, as you flip through the articles for this issue, be it about the injustices of deportation or racist advertisements, perhaps you'll hear a version of your own tiny cynical voice say, "Boy, these are some hefty problems with no easy solutions". And then you walk away, because that is easy. Here at hardboiled we realize that to expect miraculous solutions because of one article, one issue or eleven years of issues would be to pay undue homage to our own egos. And it isn't about us. It's about the people in these stories. Their voices we have the privilege of sharing.
Is all this even making a difference? I have no idea. But if I knew for certain it did, I'm not sure I would have the same pride and appreciation for hardboiled as I do now. To stare in the face of impossibility, armed by our unapologetic idealism and to say fuck you nay-sayers, we are going to be loud, we are going to try anyway is to me a much worthier act. And for me, undoubtedly worthwhile. My personal mission has been accomplished, I finally said "fuck" in an ed note.
For those who I have had the honor of working with for the past three years, you guys have made a difference in my life in more ways than I ever could have imagined. For your hard work, brilliance and amazing characters I have nothing but the sincerest gratitude. As for those awkwardly charming moments I'll forever remember and miss, well, sometimes words are just not enough.
Thank you all for inspiring me,
lina peng
story editor
Okay, this is probably a little out of the ordinary, but for this ed note, I'm gonna ask that only hardboiled staff reads this. So devoted readers, casual browsers, and folks who picked up a copy thinking this was the Daily Cal, just go ahead and skip past this section and check out the rest of the issue. Oh, and editors too, if y'all could close the door on your way out as well, would be much obliged.
Are they gone? Good. So now, what do you really think about Pauline?
Yeah, that's what I thought. Anyway, what I wanted to talk with y'all about is about what we do. I mean, here in hardboiled, what is it that we do? I know, it's kind of odd addressing this question at the end of the year, after all the rushed deadlines, after all of Lina's awkward jokes, after all of everything we have done to produce these six issues. But grant a graduating senior the chance to wax nostalgic for a moment -- we need to remember our youth too.
I joined hardboiled thinking it was all about the product ? those final twelve pages of journalistic onslaught, railing against the status quo and the powers that be. I wanted to hold the coarse paper, feel the ink smudge slightly under my fingers on every fresh stack of copies. And hardboiled was about that, it was about providing that voice on this campus and in our society that is seldom expressed, rarely addressed.
But there was more. There was everything that went into that product. It was the group of us staffers piecing together that first issue, reviewing each others' articles and layouts during production night, attending the DeCal and doing icebreakers on end 'til it felt like there was an icebox where my heart used to be, it was all of that. After all the rushed deadlines (which I haven't gotten any better at dealing with), after all of Lina's awkward jokes (which haven't exactly fared too well either), after all of everything we did these past two years, it seemed like all of that was as important, was as much a part of what we do, as those six issues a year.
And the point of all this isn't merely to reminisce, but rather that you, the future of hardboiled, are going to be taking up something amazing. Not amazing because of what it means to me or any of the hardboileders before us, but because of what it means to you, because of what it will come to mean to you. The whole thing will be a struggle, lord knows it's going to be a struggle, and you will find yourself questioning what you do, as you always should. But remember why you do this, remember everything that you put into this product. The production nights, the Mafia DeCals, the yelling, the steamy, Romeo-and-Juliet-esque layout/writing relationships. Remember of all of what you do.
Make this yours.
I want to thank and congratulate everybody in hardboiled for the amazing work that you've done this year. I'm constantly impressed by the dedication of our staff, how much work you put into every single issue. Best of luck to next year's staff and core, who I completely believe will only fuel the unstoppable dissent-manufacturing machine that is hardboiled.
always in bold,
brian lau
story editor