From exceptionally smelly roommates to the pedobear mascot, there is a plethora of things for a Berkeley freshman to complain about. Although issues such as screeching vegans and alt-right bigots were to be expected, most freshman were unprepared for the shock that is the grueling Cal academia.
Though this year’s freshmen left GBO young and naively optimistic, now ambition and pride have been replaced with despair and intense self-loathing. In fact, the number of students found sobbing in the Evans bathrooms has increased by 270% since the first week of the semester, and a new poll shows that most freshmen have reduced their “hopes and dreams” by half.
Six weeks into the semester, freshman have lowered their standards and are beginning to create realistic academic goals. “C’s get degrees,” admitted freshman Charlie Chen, whose forced smile was obscured by his twitch. “I used to be on top in high school, but now I just strive to get out of bed in the morning,” added Melissa Martinez, a freshman who originally intended to triple major in CS, MCB, and Econ, but has since switched to (“knock on wood!!!”) just Econ.
And she’s not the only one to jump ship. Pre-Med students are flocking to all sorts of humanities majors that will save them years of labor and debt but will leave them jobless, and Pre-Haas students are switching to any major they can that’ll still pay for their privileged lifestyle but probably won’t screw society over as much.
“It’s beautiful to see all these smug students crashing and burning,” reported Ethnic Studies major, Joaquin Jones. “People initially mocked me for my major, and now the tables have turned–they’re all trying to hop aboard this bandwagon.”
As if a Berkeley rite of passage, it seems that all freshmen have officially traded their youthful ignorance for defeatist perspectives. “Honestly, I just hope to survive this first semester,” Martinez sighed bleakly. “With sexual assaults and bomb threats everywhere you turn, it’s a surprise anyone can get to class at all.”
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