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Sunday, Oct 4, 2026

Opinion


The Setonian

The Squawk Box: 10 Things I Wish I Knew As An Underclassman

  1. It takes patience to live in Middlebury for four years. It’s also worth it. 2. The harder you try to get laid, the less you’ll get laid. 3. People who act like they’re better are afraid that they’re not. 4. Needing a big party to have a fun weekend will frequently disappoint. 5. ...


The Setonian

The Passion Question

Three and a half weeks. With less than a month left of my college career, I have yet to solidify a real plan for after May 26. Right now, I’m set to live the post-grad dream on my couch with my newly printed diploma in Columbus, Ohio. Having always had a plan of action, I am growing increasingly concerned ...


The Setonian

Deconstructing the Pipeline Construction

The current debate about the potential expansion of a natural gas pipeline through Vermont to Ticonderoga, N.Y. highlights a seemingly rare instance of conflict between the surrounding community and the College. While the state of Vermont has banned fracking and public opposition to the construction ...


The Setonian

Voices Against the Addison County Natural Gas Project

We are a coalition of Middlebury College staff, faculty and students who stand in opposition to the Addison County Natural Gas project. The project will transport fracked gas from Alberta and continue Vermont and Middlebury College’s dependency on fossil fuels for the next half-century. We demand ...


The Setonian

What Abortion Has Taught Me About the Nature of Evil

Growing up in the 1990s, my understanding of evil was based mainly on Disney movies. The nemeses in those films all recognized that they were up to no good, yet pressed on anyway. It was as if they relished the opportunity to be wicked and would never consider turning back, and they kept this love for ...


The Setonian

We Fell for Liddell

The SGA campaign season is an exciting time for us as members of the current SGA Senate to reflect back on our year, engage with students on the issues that matter and offer competing solutions on how to make Middlebury a better place. We know first hand the power and importance of the SGA as a formal ...


The Setonian

Staying Well Through Living Hell

As we near the end of the semester, when assignments abound and professors squeeze in those last 250 pages of reading, it is as important as ever to operate with your well-being in mind. Eating well, exercising, sleeping and even having some fun will go a long way in how you appreciate the end of the ...


The Setonian

Ding, Dong, the Witch is Dead

There is a lot to be said about respecting the dead. There is also a lot to be said about how much so many people hated the late Baroness Thatcher. Following the UK’s first and thus far only female prime minister’s death, columnists and intellectuals across England raged war over whether or not ...


The Setonian

XL Pipeline Revisited

Environmentalists across North America have recently become infatuated with the XL Keystone Pipeline System. The current proposals will expand the pipeline system to provide oil from Alberta, Canada to Texas. What many environmental groups protesting this pipeline fail to comprehend is that the oil ...


The Setonian

'Reason' and What Sustainability Teaches

As the Campus’s editorial staff pointed out last week, on April 3 the National Association of Scholars released a report titled “What Does Bowdoin Teach?” Authored by Peter Wood and Michael Toscano, and funded by Tom Klingenstein (a Williams College alumnus), the report attempts to systematically ...


The Setonian

Middlebury Finds a New Pipeline to Protest

A natural gas pipeline runs through my neighborhood in western New York. The only reason I know that is because, curious about the orange markers sticking out of the ground at a golf course we sometimes play at, I decided to check them out. There’s no obtrusive pipe sticking out of the ground. The ...


The Setonian

Why I'm Doing 'Relay For Life' This Year

For three years, I ignored Relay for Life — I never had change to give them when they asked for money, April is a busy time of year to do very much except homework and cancer is scary to think about. Plus, everyone in my family was healthy, so why worry? The big purple cake in Proctor was always a ...


The Setonian

Endorsing Rachel Liddell for SGA President

With the elections for SGA president approaching, the Campus met last Sunday with this year’s trio of candidates, Rachel Liddell ’15, Killian Naylor ’14 and Nathan LaBarba ’14. More so than perhaps any year in recent memory, all three are superbly qualified and, unsurprisingly, all of the candidates ...


The Setonian

Why Peace Matters

  “I told you,” Columbia Professor Joseph Massad said at his lecture about Zionism, Palestinians and Israel last week, “I was not interested in building peace.” After a speech full of mischaracterizations, out-of-context quotations and utter lies, Dr. Massad finally explicitly asserted his ...


The Setonian

Innovation in Our Education

Grant Nishioka '13 is from Wayland, Mass. As liberal arts students, we’ve learned a lot. We’re able to contrast the behavior of international markets with that of individuals. We can use exponential functions to better comprehend musical scales. If we really wanted, we could even delineate Plato’s ...


The Setonian

The Unpopular Opinion

I have an issue with you, Middlebury College. Enough is enough; I am calling you out. Your general intolerance and lack of discussion has reached a point I can no longer abide. It’s high time somebody looked out for the little guy, the underdog, the minority. The philosophy you constantly dismiss ...


The Setonian

Putting Our Money Where Our Mouths Are

Stu Fram '13 is from Waterbury, Vt. Middlebury is on track to achieve carbon neutrality by 2016, an accomplishment whose imminent realization can be ascribed to the administration’s commitment to environmental leadership, to the tireless work of the Sustainability Integration Office and most importantly, ...


The Setonian

The Real Victims of American Immigration

“We cannot be the anti-illegal immigration party. We have to be the pro-legal immigration party,” Marco Rubio emphasized to fellow Republicans at a 2011 rally. “We have to be a party that advocates for a legal immigration system that’s ... good for America and honors our tradition both as a ...


The Setonian

Learning the Wrong Lessons from Tragedy

It’s easy to think that the world is falling apart and closing in upon us. We hear of the threats from North Korea or bombs in downtown Boston and ask ourselves what the world has come to and how we can stop it. If the post-9/11 era can be defined by a feeling, it’s the feeling of vulnerability. ...


The Setonian

(Positive) Sex Talk

I am almost 22 years old and last week at the Gensler Symposium I was shown, for the first time in my life, how to use a female condom. (And, for that matter, a male condom as well.) I have attended five different schools, three public and two private (including Middlebury), have open, supportive parents ...