{"id":3810,"date":"2018-09-10T20:00:07","date_gmt":"2018-09-11T00:00:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/brackety-ack.pages.roanoke.edu\/?p=3810"},"modified":"2018-09-10T20:00:07","modified_gmt":"2018-09-11T00:00:07","slug":"bowers-im-simply-being-me","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/brackety-ack.com\/?p=3810","title":{"rendered":"Bowers: ‘I’m Simply Being Me!’"},"content":{"rendered":"

Written by Emma Grosskopf<\/em><\/p>\n

Emma Grosskopf<\/strong>:\u00a0Joel Bowers, the man, the myth the legend. You seem to have a pretty unique sense of style. How would you describe that style?<\/span><\/p>\n

Joel Bowers<\/strong>:\u00a0I consider myself to be eclectic. I tend to combine a lot of different styles, and I like to draw from my redneck roots. I can\u2019t afford to have celebrity style, but I definitely admire Lady Gaga and Alexander McQueen.<\/span><\/p>\n

EG<\/strong>:\u00a0Do you consider yourself to be \u201copen\u201d with your sexuality?<\/span><\/p>\n

JB<\/strong>: Oh, very open. I\u2019m not afraid to show who I am. I\u2019m very comfortable with myself, so therefore I don\u2019t need to hide anything. At the same time, I\u2019m not trying to put on a front or, as some people say, \u201cshove it down their throats.\u201d I\u2019m simply being me.<\/span><\/p>\n

EG<\/strong>:\u00a0What kind of atmosphere exists for people on campus that don\u2019t quite fit into the RC \u201cmold?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

JB<\/strong>:\u00a0I have always felt like I fit in, and I know I\u2019m, as previously said, an eclectic person. I know of people who have struggled to fit in here, but those cases seem to be few and far between.<\/span><\/p>\n

EG<\/strong>:\u00a0What do you think is the \u201cnorm\u201d on campus, in general terms?<\/span><\/p>\n

JB<\/strong>:\u00a0Wealthy white people! Vineyard Vines comes to mind. A LOT of Greek paraphernalia. Everybody seems either really short or really tall!<\/span><\/p>\n

EG<\/strong>:\u00a0What role do you think Greek Life plays in the creation of the \u201cnorm\u201d on campus?<\/span><\/p>\n

JB<\/strong>:\u00a0I came to RC with no understanding of the Greek Life, because I just wasn\u2019t interested, and I came in for academics but I soon found out that lots of stuff on campus is very Greek-oriented, so I can see that as being maybe a deterrent from people who might not fit in with the typical frat or sorority image.<\/span><\/p>\n

EG<\/strong>:\u00a0Do you think that your sexual openness affects the way that strangers on campus see you?<\/span><\/p>\n

JB<\/strong>:\u00a0The way I am? Definitely the clothes I wear! I wear shorts that are a lot shorter than the shorts most men here do (I mean, they are women\u2019s shorts!) I notice lots of double takes, but rarely something mean or hateful. That has happened once or twice, but you know, you\u2019re going to get that everywhere in life. Not everyone is always going to like you, so eff them!<\/span><\/p>\n

EG<\/strong>:\u00a0What do you think is the role of hookup apps such as Tinder and Grindr to RC hookup culture?<\/span><\/p>\n

JB<\/strong>: There are many more people on this campus who are on Tinder than Grindr, probably because Grindr is an aggressive app. It\u2019s pretty much 95% hookups, and 5% \u201cother.\u201d People usually gravitate towards tinder if they\u2019re looking for their college fling, and Grindr if they\u2019re looking for a quick fix.<\/span><\/p>\n

EG<\/strong>:\u00a0What do you think is the attitude on campus toward sex in general?<\/span><\/p>\n

JB<\/strong>:\u00a0I think that we are a very sex-positive and promiscuous school, personally. I think that people both express their sexuality. Women are more free to wear what they want, and men to express themselves to a certain degree, although that seems to be lacking a little bit. I do think that it seems like everyone is hooking up with everyone. We\u2019re a tight commune and we like to interbreed. It\u2019s a small campus. <\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Written by Emma Grosskopf Emma Grosskopf:\u00a0Joel Bowers, the man, the myth the legend. You seem to have a pretty unique sense of style. How would you describe that style? Joel Bowers:\u00a0I consider myself to be eclectic. I tend to combine a lot of different styles, and I like to draw from my redneck roots. I…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":3812,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_kad_post_transparent":"","_kad_post_title":"","_kad_post_layout":"","_kad_post_sidebar_id":"","_kad_post_content_style":"","_kad_post_vertical_padding":"","_kad_post_feature":"","_kad_post_feature_position":"","_kad_post_header":false,"_kad_post_footer":false,"_kad_post_classname":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3810","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-lifestyle"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/brackety-ack.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3810","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/brackety-ack.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/brackety-ack.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brackety-ack.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brackety-ack.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3810"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/brackety-ack.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3810\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brackety-ack.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/3812"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/brackety-ack.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3810"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brackety-ack.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3810"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brackety-ack.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3810"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}