Wonk's Family Claims Child Has Only Solution to World Peace at Thanksgiving Dinner
by Kayleigh Thompson
Wonks all over campus are anxious to get the hell out of dodge this week for the promise of a perfectly seasoned but dry turkey, viral Black Friday fight videos, and the Purina National Dog Show. In the coming days, students will be flocking in droves to fill wonk buses with bulky suitcases, get lost on the metro trying to get to Dulles Airport, and make headlines every 90 seconds as the latest victims to be kicked off of an overbooked United Airlines flight.
But the excitement doesn’t end on campus. In homes everywhere, from Worcester, Massachusetts to Paterson, New Jersey, Wonk Parents are preparing to showcase to their families and the world just how proud they are to have an AU Eagle to call their own. Their children are the future leaders of America, finally giving them an advantage in the Thanksgiving One-Upping Contest.
Expect parents to be busy making daily phone calls, informing relatives how John Augustus Johnson III managed to get time off from his groundbreaking freshman internship on Capitol Hill to come home for Aunt Sue’s cranberry sauce or how Mother in-Law Janet will have nothing to say about Karen’s bad cooking when her beloved Hannah Ann Smith is at the table enlightening her to the truths about the Russian Government.
Little do these wonky parents know, Johnson hasn’t been to World Politics in weeks. He spends his time in various stages of the REM sleep cycle, post-frat party hangover, or despair over his latest loss in Call of Duty. He doesn’t have time to learn the geopolitical implications of climate change-- he’s got his winning streak in Fantasy Football to protect.
And Smith is too busy crying over Harry Styles’s new tour, liking the latest instagram post from @Wonkcat.AU, and subtweeting Wendy’s for free spicy nuggets to worry about Professor Daniel Lin’s plans for a libertarian tax revolution. That microeconomics exam in two weeks? She doesn’t even know her
“I’m so ready for Thanksgiving,” Smith says.“I can finally sleep somewhere that isn’t a health code violation. I plan on doing nothing but going to Wawa and watching vine compilations. If I hear the word geopolitical one time over the break I’ll probably burst into tears.”
Johnson asserts, “My World Politics TA really roasted me on my policy memo. If I'm conscious at all next week, it’ll be to play the Untitled Goose Game or to eat something that’s not from a TDR certified to-go box. The sooner I forget about the conflict in the South China Sea, the better. “
Neither of these students, like many others at AU, are prepared to show off their wonkiness at the dinner table, football watch party, or check-out lines in Walmart. Unfortunately for them, though, many families are primed and prepped to hear how to solve world hunger, who’s winning the next election, and how to combat fake news. For parents, there’s no better time to prove their worth to their families than during the holidays, and what better way to do that than to showcase the successes their children have achieved attending the one and only American University?
To combat the onslaught of parental expectations, Wonks can prepare by brushing up on some doctoral theses discussing the importance of truthful journalism, preparing speeches to promote global trade, or making sure they have at least one story about meeting a famous politician ready to drop during the appetizers. Keeping notes on a phone, watching a news brief, or copying the transcript from a smart podcast to keep on hand for debates over pie are all good strategies to feign a semester’s worth of fifth-most politically active problem solving.
There is hope for a better holiday experience. Trends do indicate that the parental pressure for Thanksgiving glory decreases after the first two years of their children’s time at AU. Feelings of disappointment from their student not being the next Greta Thunberg outweigh any need for one-upping that may take place during the holidays. Once this occurs, students generally have reported being able to scoot by without having to talk about anything that they didn’t learn in Lara Schwartz’s Comparative Politics class.
Underclassmen have been advised by The Rival American to fake it till they make it until the realities of AU’s academic qualities come to surface and their parents enter the phases of grief over spending $60,000 a year on Wonk memorabilia.
Don’t worry, we know you don’t have the answer to world peace.