Allow Me My Indulgence

Being presented with the most controversial semester in school history certainly helps the whole “write about rhetoric” prompt. It’s everywhere – easily found without even trying. It can be read in The Collegian, online blogs, emails from the administration, heard in press conferences, and certainly noticed in town hall meetings.

That being said, with so many options, it becomes easy to pick favorites. Personally, I love when I see and hear thick rhetoric coming from students. In a society that still has a hard time listening to ideas coming from a younger generation than the whomever the authority figure is, it is highly entertaining to see former express themselves.

Our emotions are high, our passion strong, and our convictions very stubborn. We don’t care if we’re “politically correct,” and we don’t care if that grabs attention. And that, sounds like a recipe for something interesting.

This week, that something interesting surfaced on a storefront window; spread quickly by Twitter, the window of the cupcake shop, ndulge on College Ave caught many people’s attention.

picture by @shawnphoto22

The window, which was washed clean a few days later, read “JoePa… a special place in Heaven… PSU Trustees… an eternal place in Hell.” I loved it. A business! Granted, this is in a college town, bustling with emotion, full of people who agree with the message. But the fact remains, that this was something very unconventional and – for lack of a better word – very ballsy.

The employees at ndulge expressed what many are feeling, sure, but the fact that it actually happened and that they were willing to bet these sentiments on their business is something that I find incredible and mind-blowing. I respect it to the utmost, and I even bought a cupcake there that I otherwise wouldn’t have.

In this circumstance I find the rhetoric in the bluntness of this particular message, especially when surrounded by so many other outlets that try to bury similar feelings beneath drastic verbosity.

I often like walking downtown to see the drawings on the storefronts, but so far, I’d say this one takes the cake.