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Cry closets up on college campus

Slingshot Bob said:
The designer and this women seem to think so.
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Well Jeez, if Tucker freaking Carson sees the danger...I guess it should be taken away immediately!

Much ado about nothing. They can just scream out a window instead.
 
JMR said:
Well Jeez, if Tucker freaking Carson sees the danger...I guess it should be taken away immediately!

Much ado about nothing. They can just scream out a window instead.
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If I was there, I would paint snowflake stencils on it.
I see you ignored his guest, my $ is you did not even watch any of it.
 
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PirateMk1 said:
I understand the taking a break part, what I don't understand is the necessity to hide in a glorified closet to do that.
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Sometimes it's nice to have a collective permission/reminder to actually take care of yourself. We glorify all nighters and not sleeping/eating to work. It can take a lot to overcome that expectation.
 
Slingshot Bob said:
Dude, the closet has soft lighting and teddy bears. Next thing it will likely have is a hot chocolate machine. This should be embarrassing for adult students, I could see it in K-5.
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hot chocolate is wonderful the **** is wrong with you?
 
Slingshot Bob said:
Dude, the closet has soft lighting and teddy bears. Next thing it will likely have is a hot chocolate machine. This should be embarrassing for adult students, I could see it in K-5.
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That sounds fantastic what are you talking about?
 
Slingshot Bob said:
Different strokes for different folk. Personally I think a fish tank would be better and not so "ridiculable"

Watching fish lowers blood pressure and tames the savage beast.
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Which is why they are very popular in dentists offices.

Different strokes for different folks??.....that is some real out of date thinking right there.
 
Slingshot Bob said:
Seriously? A crying closet "safe space"? God help us if we get in a real boots on the ground war. In the real word, there are no "crying closets". The state of a "college education" continues to decline.

Did they not realize this entire concept is grounds for merciless ridicule? Snowflake has been a rather overused word lately, but this is tailor made for it.

'Cry Closet' helps college students get through finals week

A student at the University of Utah has crafted the perfect sanctuary for the panicked masses during finals week.
Senior Nemo Miller created a "Cry Closet" that will remain in the library on the Salt Lake City campus until exams are over.
A sign on the door reads "A Safe Place for Stressed Out Students Otherwise known as The Cry Closet."
"This space is meant to provide a place for students studying for finals to take a short 10-minute break," a description on the door read.
Instagram-obsessed drug mule cries as she gets eight years
Five rules of the closet are listed: knock before entering, only one person in the closet at a time, limit your time to 10 minutes, turn lights and timer off before leaving, and use #cryclosetuofu if posting on social media.
Miller, who is currently buried in finals herself, said in a statement that "I am interested in humanity and the inherent complexities of the human condition."


A student at the University of Utah crafted a "Cry Closet" for exam week. (Courtesy University of Utah)
"In my work, I reflect on my experiences and explore what it means to be human," she wrote. "One aspect of humanity that I am currently exploring is connections and missed connections through communication. It’s been interesting to watch the response to this piece about human emotions, and I'm proud to see the power of art in action."

There has been some criticism of the closet, with conservative radio talk show host Joe Walsh, a former congressman, calling the closet "pathetic."
Alternate juror in killer nanny case reflects on horrible trial
"1944: Young Americans storm the beaches at Normandy. 2018: Young Americans need a "cry closet" because they can't handle taking a test. Pathetic. So damn pathetic," he wrote on Twitter.
However, many have praised the "Cry Closet," and some have asked for more on campus.
"The installation, available for use by all students, has sparked dialogue about expressing emotions, particularly those in public spaces," the university said in a statement. "It is an example of how art has the power to catalyze important conversations and engage the public."
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The draft should be only of college students...
 
Your Star said:
As someone currently going through finals and writing papers and dealing with work and a million other commitments. That sounds wonderful. Just a nice place to take a break and breathe for 10 minutes. Sometimes you just gotta get away and take a break. Nothing wrong with that.
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What happened to sitting in the library or on a bench or grass?
 
Your Star said:
As someone currently going through finals and writing papers and dealing with work and a million other commitments. That sounds wonderful. Just a nice place to take a break and breathe for 10 minutes. Sometimes you just gotta get away and take a break. Nothing wrong with that.
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There is a difference between getting away and taking a break and a stupid little box with stuffed animals in it designed for crying.
 
Kal'Stang said:
There is a difference between getting away and taking a break and a stupid little box with stuffed animals in it designed for crying.
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Why the hostility?
 
Part I of III (on account of DP's character constraint)

“Is everyone who lives in Ignorance like you?" asked Milo.
"Much worse," he said longingly. "But I don't live here. I'm from a place very far away called Context.
-- Norton Juster, The Phantom Tollbooth​


Why are people trying so hard to force the "cry closet" into a context that is not the one in which it was created?

Let's get one thing straight. The so-called "cry closet" is a fine arts major's, Nemo Miller, allegorical piece; it was created to complete an assignment in a fine art woodworking course, not an engineering, interior design, or architecture program course. That contextual difference makes all the difference in the world as goes evaluating Miller's closet.
  • Fine art is first and foremost about allegorical/analogical abstraction and representation or commentary, though the object can be functional.
  • Applied art is about making "pretty" something that is first and foremost functional and will be used thus, thought the piece may also be allegorical/analogical or editorial.
I realize certain works appear to sit at the boundary of those two genres, so I'll try to explain the subtlety that places Miller's closet as fine art and not as applied art.

  • Creator's purpose: Miller tells us her purpose is editorial. "I am interested in humanity and the inherent complexities of the human condition." .... "In my work, I reflect on my experiences and explore what it means to be human." She didn't set out to build a closet that is artful; she set out to build a piece that remarks upon an aspect of the human condition as she sees it. Unlike an interior designer, Miller did not set out to create a "pretty" closet.
  • Form: It's described and seen as a closet, not as an armoire, cabinet or other structure that, unlike closests, can stand literally on their own. A closet is a small space demarcated by a door; absent the door, one has a niche, corner or alcove, but not a closet. Knowing that closets do not exist as integral structures unto themselves -- they need "help" from another structure in order to exist as closets -- tells one the cry closet is editorial first and only incidentally functional (freestanding), and that only by dint of executional constraints. Had she created, say, a "cry chair," or "cry couch," her piece would have then been applied art. What about if it were a "cry cabinet." To be sure, the freestanding aspect would blur the distinction between abstraction and application, but there'd still be an aspect that'd push it to the editorial side: cadavers go in cabinets, but living people don't.
Given the above one can understand Miller's piece as she conceived it. That does not preclude or delegitimize viewers of the piece drawing from it their own allegorical/editorial meaning; however, in doing that, viewers must be mindful not to ascribe to the artist their own inferred meaning of the piece, particularly when the artist has articulated the meaning/message s/he saw and saw fit to share with "the world." That mindfulness seems missing in much of the maligning commentary about Miller's piece. Indeed, I don't think I've yet seen anyone remark upon it as would an art historian, as a piece of art and not as a functional object that's artistically presented.
 
Slingshot Bob said:
Different strokes for different folk. Personally I think a fish tank would be better and not so "ridiculable"

Watching fish lowers blood pressure and tames the savage beast.
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Why limit yourself from doing something because it could be ridiculed? Seems silly.
 
Part II of III

Slingshot Bob said:
Did they not realize this entire concept is grounds for merciless ridicule? Snowflake has been a rather overused word lately, but this is tailor made for it.
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It's hard to say what the school's/library's management thought of the piece. I suspect that what they were thinking about was the allegorical/editorial merit of the piece more so than about whether installing it would attract ridicule to themselves. If they did think about the scorn they might receive, they likely figured it would be puerile and or no real matter anyway. Have any school administrators responded to criticism of their decision to install the piece? If so, what is the nature of their remarks? Were I the school's/library's administrator responding, I'd remark thus:

  • Ad hominem scorn of the decision to install the piece --> I wouldn't defend the decision because I don't have to; it was a decision we/the school management, not someone else, get to make. I might share what we thought of the piece itself. If I responded at all to such comments, it'd be to say "you just keep thinking that...." As one great applied artist put it, "I don't care what you think of me for I don't think of you at all."
  • Criticism of the piece itself, its meaning, its execution, the editorial statement it makes --> Recognizing that art critique can be positive and negative, but all of it indicates the piece in question has earned someone's notice, I'd thank folks for being moved enough to think about it and share their thoughts.

    While it is better to be loved than hated, it is also far better to be hated than ignored.
    - Viet Thanh Nguyen, The Sympathizer

Slingshot Bob said:
"The installation, available for use by all students, has sparked dialogue about expressing emotions, particularly those in public spaces," the university said in a statement. "It is an example of how art has the power to catalyze important conversations and engage the public."
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I can get with that notion. It seems then that the university's administration was thinking not about the chiding they'd attract, but about the piece and its value for fomenting consideration.​

Slingshot Bob said:
Senior Nemo Miller created a "Cry Closet" that will remain in the library on the Salt Lake City campus until exams are over....Miller, who is currently buried in finals herself, said in a statement that "I am interested in humanity and the inherent complexities of the human condition." .... "In my work, I reflect on my experiences and explore what it means to be human," she wrote. "One aspect of humanity that I am currently exploring is connections and missed connections through communication. It’s been interesting to watch the response to this piece about human emotions, and I'm proud to see the power of art in action."
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Considering the cry closet in terms of Miller's conception of it, it's not at all hard to comprehend. I think we all have at a time retreated from or cried over the corporeal concerns, from constraints, calumny and challenges that confound our contentment. In terms of connectedness, one might consider the conciliatory outcome of crying as contrasted with that of convoking counsel, of commiserating with a close compatriot. They are different courses for achieving catharsis, but one mode communicates openly and thus creates increased communion and builds comradery, whereas the other is covert, cloistered. Of course neither tack is consistently and incontrovertibly correct. There's a time and place for each.

Slingshot Bob: I figured since you seem by your thread title to appreciate alliteration, so I chose to compose my piece-specific commentary so as to accord to you a small homage via a little c-riff of my own.​


Slingshot Bob said:
There has been some criticism of the closet, with conservative radio talk show host Joe Walsh, a former congressman, calling the closet "pathetic." .... Alternate juror in killer nanny case reflects on horrible trial: "1944: Young Americans storm the beaches at Normandy. 2018: Young Americans need a "cry closet" because they can't handle taking a test. Pathetic. So damn pathetic," he wrote on Twitter.
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Well, perhaps young Americans are thus needy. The existential state of that need is precisely the metaphor Miller's materially manifests via her closet. Her closet makes tangible, animates, if you will, a thought shared by many. That's what artists do. That, as described in Part I of my remarks, is what fine art, as contrasted with applied art, is first and foremost about.
 
Part III of III

Slingshot Bob said:
However, many have praised the "Cry Closet," and some have asked for more on campus.
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Well, as an artwork, I don't personally see the point of there being more than one. There is only one "Persistence of Time." There is only one "Expansion."

Persistence of Time, Salvador Dali

the-persistence-of-memory-1931.jpg!Large.jpg


Expansion, Paige Bradley

amazing-sculptures-4-57baeebfe5f1e__880.jpg


I think actually asking for more of the be implemented on campus is manifests mental moribundity for it shows the requester as either (1) having totally missed the metaphorical point of the thing, or (2) ignorant that wanting one for the sake of sobbing in it is to tacitly declare oneself among the segment of society the closet chides for their childishness. Then again, maybe all they see is a quiet space.

God forfend the folks using it aren't also gay..... (LOL)
 
Your Star said:
Why the hostility?
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There is no hostility in that post. :shrug:

But there is hostility towards this idea of a cry box. Its stupid as all hell. All that it does is encourage childish behavior. There are far more effective adult ways to relieve stress. Ways that don't encourage remaining a child mentally. A college student is supposed to be an adult. Not a child that needs to go to his/her room to cry because mommy or daddy is being too hard on em.
 
Xelor said:
Part III of III


Well, as an artwork, I don't personally see the point of there being more than one. There is only one "Persistence of Time." There is only one "Expansion."

Persistence of Time, Salvador Dali

the-persistence-of-memory-1931.jpg!Large.jpg


Expansion, Paige Bradley

amazing-sculptures-4-57baeebfe5f1e__880.jpg


I think actually asking for more of the be implemented on campus is manifests mental moribundity for it shows the requester as either (1) having totally missed the metaphorical point of the thing, or (2) ignorant that wanting one for the sake of sobbing in it is to tacitly declare oneself among the segment of society the closet chides for their childishness. Then again, maybe all they see is a quiet space.

God forfend the folks using it aren't also gay..... (LOL)
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I am getting ready for sleepy time, maybe my post were not clear, most of what you just said I posted was not my words.
 
Slingshot Bob said:
I am getting ready for sleepy time, maybe my post were not clear, most of what you just said I posted was not my words.
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Okay.

I realize you were quoting others, but you did put them in your post. Insofar as you know, as I do, that the remarks to which I responded aren't yours, you know too, then, that my comments about them are directed not at you. You just happen to be the OP-er; thus your post is the one I quote (that is, using the quote functionality of the forum).

I'm not the sort who shoots the messenger, though it may be that others of that nature.
 
Kal'Stang said:
There is no hostility in that post. :shrug:

But there is hostility towards this idea of a cry box. Its stupid as all hell. All that it does is encourage childish behavior. There are far more effective adult ways to relieve stress. Ways that don't encourage remaining a child mentally. A college student is supposed to be an adult. Not a child that needs to go to his/her room to cry because mommy or daddy is being too hard on em.
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Why is it stupid? What makes a way to relive stress adult? If it provides help to someone and helps them achieve their goals why should it be frowned upon?

Why do people feel the need to police other people's coping mechanisms?
 
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