Aw, Brain, No

So from then on whenever one of us called something problematic, he would make us talk it out until we could name the “bad” thing we were hinting at. In this particular class, 7/10 it was some type of oppression, and the remainder was like, “I’m uncomfortable because this is very new/confusing/pushing boundaries that made me feel safe.”

Once we stopped calling things “problematic” and stopping at that, class got way more interesting and... we all had to say, like, “that’s racist” or “that’s misogynistic” or “ew capitalism gross” out loud, which a lot of us had never done in a classroom before. Or we had to be like, “Uhhh... I’m not sure what’s so bad?” and confront our own beliefs and that was maybe even more useful.

Residents had serious concerns about the project. While companies often win major tax breaks by promising jobs and economic stimulation, data centers bring few permanent jobs and can drain municipal water resources, drive up electric bills, rob cities of tax revenues, and cause damaging noise, light, and air pollution. Already, Wisconsin residents have seen some of these impacts at data center sites in Port Washington and Beaver Dam. Residents in Port Washington have complained about the disruption caused by around-the-clock construction at the new data center. Families near the construction in Beaver Dam have reported that their wells have run dry.

Although the Menomonie City Council voted to annex and rezone the land for the data center in early September [2025], pressure from local campaigners was so great that Mayor Randy Knaack announced at a Sept. 22 city council meeting that he had notified Balloonist that the city would not be moving forward with a development agreement. More good news came in January when the Menomonie City Council voted unanimously to place additional regulations on data center projects.

I don't have any experience with the weirder corners of university campuses – my work in that particular job just never happened to take me there. I did, however, once have to do a cable trace in the basement of a former Christian elementary school. It had haphazardly been subdivided into numerous tiny rooms, some as little as ten feet across, with no central hallways or apparent floor plan. Every single room was, for reasons that were and remain unclear to me, full of broken kitchen appliances. One room in particular contained an enormous industrial freezer unit that was larger in its smallest dimension than any of the doors leading to it. Was it delivered in pieces and assembled on site? Did they build the room around it? That one still bothers me a little bit.

So from then on whenever one of us called something problematic, he would make us talk it out until we could name the “bad” thing we were hinting at. In this particular class, 7/10 it was some type of oppression, and the remainder was like, “I’m uncomfortable because this is very new/confusing/pushing boundaries that made me feel safe.”

Once we stopped calling things “problematic” and stopping at that, class got way more interesting and... we all had to say, like, “that’s racist” or “that’s misogynistic” or “ew capitalism gross” out loud, which a lot of us had never done in a classroom before. Or we had to be like, “Uhhh... I’m not sure what’s so bad?” and confront our own beliefs and that was maybe even more useful.

The reason was that, if you get pantsed, and you weren't in on the joke / it wasn't planned, that's a massive breakdown in respect and discipline, and you have to make an example of that kid (generally by wrestling them, and in serious cases, taking away candy privileges). But getting pranked is still a bad look, and makes it seem cool to rebel against your authority.

However, if you get pantsed, and you are in on the joke, everyone has a good laugh, including you, and no one was actually rebelling. It both makes you look like a cool authority figure and makes the person doing it look like they're the sort of person in cahoots with counselors. Then, if there's a behavioral issue, you can have that quiet conversation later, away from an audience.

And since those underwear are so culturally specific as punchlines in a pantsing gag that the only plausible reason to be wearing them is if you're in on a slapstick act, you can retroactively Shanghai any would-be prankster into looking like they did it with your consent and planning, which not only keeps you from indignity, it makes sure that they're rewarded by laughter and attention for looking like they're cooperating with the staff, encouraging that in the future and bringing them in from the outside of the social-reward structure you're trying to set up, where it's cool too be wacky but responsible.

That preparation effort paid off maybe four times across three years, but it was completely worth it.