University of California Berkeley - Blue and Gold Yearbook (Berkeley, CA)

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HAIEL . Welcome to Berkeley. Now Say you hate me. Say it first and then we can get started. OO lO Tl© Okay. I said, I hate you. IIKJlll . After this perfunctory ritual, we were able to move on to introductions. I ' m Bamboo today, ' he told me, though I ' m sure he ' s well aware that he ' s more commonly known in Berkeley as The Hate Man. This afternoon he was wearing a silky black bra and a stylish pink sweater, and was having some trouble finding a dry place to lay out his blankets, as an unexpected cloudburst had just soaked his bedding. As Berkeley locals go, the Hate Man is probably one of the most visible, and the most well-liked. He can usually be found wherever right-wing religious rhetoric is being spewed, heckling preachers in defense of the rights of believers and non-believers alike. His wit is sharper and weirder than David Letterman ' s, and on a good day he can play to an audience of over 100 ensnared passers-by. So, the obvious question is, why does he want people to say they hate him? I feel it ' s a way of caring when we ' re opposite. It shows me that you ' re willing to say it. If you ' ve already said it once and you get angry with me you ' re more likely to say it again. In saying I hate you, you discover that it is caring, you are caring, and hopefully get into that space of hating. What kind of hate are we talking about here? I distinguish between hostility and hate. Violence is not caring, harsh is not caring. Not FUCK OFF, which invalidates the person, but FUCK YOU. That would be a caring response. Bamboo sees the expression of hate and anger as absolutely necessary in relationships. If I can only be nice to you, he explained, then some of the time it ' s going to be a hoax. My feeling is, the moment of realness is going to erode if I can only say nice things to you. Without this expression of hate, the relationship will become, increasingly hollow, increasingly fraudulent, a mask for tension, hostility, rage. Hate, then, is a way to deal with conflict in a caring way — a direct approach. I ' m not here to please you, I ' m here to run you into the ground. This observation led into a discussion of the inherent duality of relationships and inner balance. There ' s me, there ' s you. Yin and yang battle in the material plane. Between opposites that conflict is going to be tested and resolved with power or with caring. Yin can get yang to care. Here we dove into yet another crucial aspect of this outlook: To the extent that I care about you then I ' m in the Tao; that ' s the doorway to the Tao — caring. I include negative caring as a part of caring. Clearly this philosophy, if adopted by others, could have great social ramifications. So I wondered, does Bamboo hope to encourage others to follow this line of thinking ? From an ego point of view I want everyone to do it, but in a practical way I don ' t care. Since I ' m not you, I don ' t have to wait around for you to go into the Tao. The Christian model is to say we are one, we ' re all in the same boat. The problem with that is that means you are me. That means I can ' t go to Heaven until you feed your cat. Is this why he heckles, over a fundamental difference of opinion? Heckling to me ... A preacher is someone who ' s standing on a box yelling at me, saying that I ' m wrong, saying that I ' m a sinner. You ' re gonna go to Heaven, I ' m gonna go to Hell. That ' s a verbal assault on me. Your heart is clean, mine is a cesspool — to which I say, FUCK YOU. In fairness, Bamboo explained that once a preacher has said I hate you he no longer needs to heckle them Once you say ' I hate you, ' you ' re starting to change, to come down off that milk carton. So what if all the preachers figure this out and he doesn ' t have anyone left to heckle? Not a problem. This signifies a neutralization of that previously charged relationship. Once I ' ve learned that angle of attack (by neutralizing), then I ' m satisfied. by Lara Vinnard 28 PEOPLE • HoteMon

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1) It ' s your final grade that counts. 2) The professor is lousy. 3) You ' re not going to major in this anyway. 4) You hit your plateau. Ba- sically, you ' re too stupid. 5) You don ' t know it now, so you won ' t know it later. 6) The curve will be low. 7) You can always change to P NP. 8) You can always drop the class. 9) You can always take the class over again. 10) Better yet, you can always change schools. PEOPLE • Studying 27

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Tou shall above all things be glad and young. For if you ' re young, whatever life you wear it will become you; and if you are glad whatever ' s living will yourself become. — e.e. cummlngs