As the 2023 U.S. Open, played  in New York City, New York,  comes to a close, a reigning champion is juxtaposed against younger names entering the top, indicating change in the centuries-old ‘jeu de paume.’ The men’s singles final between Novak Djokovic, ranked first in the world by the Association of Tennis Professionals, and Daniil Medvedev, ranked third, resulted in Djokovic continuing his reign at number one. 

The three-set match was intense, with the 36 year-old Serbian player coming out on top in spite of physical struggles. In his post-match interview, he insisted that as long as he is playing high-level tennis and winning high-profile tournaments, he does not want to leave the sport. This win marks his 24th Grand Slam title, but some fans have grown tired of the player’s arrogant verbiage and overall attitude off the court.

Regardless of players like Djokovic refusing to give up their crown, some well-known, young names have made their way into the conversations of tennis fans and have become household names in a sport long characterized by famous, older players. Coco Gauff, ranked sixth in the world by the Association of Tennis Professionals, won the women’s singles final, her first Grand Slam title. At just 19 years old, she impressed fans with a remarkable come-back after losing the first set to Aryna Sabalenka, ranked first, by a score of six to two. The Belarusian player fell behind in the following two sets, leaving room for Gauff to win. Gauff’s rank is now expected to rise to a career high of number three in the world.            

As Gauff accepted her three million dollar check, she thanked tennis icon and activist Billie Jean King for her efforts in fighting for equal pay in men’s and women’s tennis. Because of King, exactly 50 years prior to Gauff’s win, the U.S. Open became the first major tournament to award equal pay for the title. Gauff undeniably made history with this win, being the youngest player to win the US Open since Serena Williams in 1999. Age has become more relevant than ever in the sport. Fans, and critics alike, contend that tennis is becoming a ‘Gen-Z’ sport.

Carlos Alcaraz Garfia, ranked number two in the world by the Association of Tennis Professionals, is a prospect for this new age of players. Though his performance in the 2023 U.S. Open left him eliminated in the semi-final match by opponent Medvedev, he has quickly become well-known since he turned pro in 2018. With two Grand Slam titles under his belt at the age of 20, his high energy and youthful vitality appeals widely to fans. Their cheers were answered when he became the first teenager to be ranked number one in the world. Ben Shelton, a 20 year-old who played at University of Florida last year, is the youngest American player since Michael Chang in 1992 to reach the U.S. Open semi-finals. Peyton Stearns, 21 years-old, who played at University of Texas-Austin, made the round of 16. Both players won NCAA singles titles in 2022 and are now making tremendous waves on the tour. 

Some older players, however, did manage to emerge victorious from the 2023 U.S. Open finals. Rajeev Ram, a 39 year-old player from the United States, and Joe Salisbury from Great Britain, won their third straight U.S. Open doubles title, after struggling to win matches all year. The women’s doubles final between 12th seed Laura Siegemund and Vera Zvonareva, former champions, and 16th seed Gabriela Dabrowski and Erin Routliffe, resulted in Dabrowski and Routliffe cinching the win in a remarkable upset. 

The 2023 U.S. Open was full of surprising wins, expected outcomes and exciting change for the sport. This year’s tournament will likely bring about a modern wave of players, most of whom are rather young and newer to the world of pro tennis. As the year goes on, tennis fans must wait and see what the upcoming year has to offer for the sport and its growth.

To most onlookers, it may seem easy to be the opinionated and outspoken character in a group. This individual stands out from the crowd, their voice tends to be heard and they are
generally well-liked. 

However, one notable struggle with being the “opinionated” one is that sometimes, you
simply have no opinions. This phenomenon always seems to occur when you most need to be opinionated. 

One might be an editor of the Opinions section of the Technique, for example, and when in need of writing an article, all personal opinions suddenly escape you. 

Another might be when two of your friends are arguing about a seemingly unnecessary topic and they look to you to take a side. You neither want to get involved nor take a side, yet you must have an opinion; you are opinionated about everything after all!

The worst part is when people look to you for advice on being outspoken. They always wonder how you manage it or how you can sustain being so talkative and friendly for such a long duration of time. Of course, there is no real answer to this, especially if you do not truly feel like
an extroverted person. 

You might awkwardly respond with a comment about how you’ve just naturally always been like this, or it’s a behavior you can just flip on or off when necessary. There is also an expectation that extroverted people always have something to say or have an explicit opinion on every matter. This is a tiring expectation because anyone has quiet moments or quiet days where they are not in the mood to gab and chatter incessantly, regardless of their personality type. 

For someone like myself, however, it is an immense effort. With topics like politics, world affairs or issues within Tech, I, like many of my peers, have innumerable opinions that are relatively unchangeable. However, being outspoken or outwardly friendly constantly is something of an energy drainer. It is a facade that is upheld in order to maintain one’s own social status even when they are not feeling their best.

While study after study depicts introverts to be more likely to have depression, external factors such as being a student, home environments or other personal issues can result in an offset of this skew. A study published in the 2017 edition of “The Medical-Surgical Journal” denotes that among a sample of nursing students, approximately 60% of students exhibiting depression had typically extroverted personalities as compared to 40% of introverts exhibiting depression. 

During the Covid-19 pandemic, extroverts were disproportionately affected by mental health issues; according to a 2021 article published by The Guardian, people who are open and exhibit extroverted personalities experienced higher deterioration of mental health as compared to their introverted counterparts. 

Society sometimes forgets that extroverted and talkative people are humans too. Being extroverted and being outspoken can be exclusive of one another, and some individuals who exhibit such characteristics may also need peace and quiet. 

The image that seemingly extroverted people put on when in public may be a reflection of their insecurities or a persona they take on when in social situations. It is not fully fair to expect them to be “on” at all times or, on the other hand, to see their opinionated nature as “too much” without understanding them intrinsically. 

Of course, not everyone will get along with certain personalities. However, the next time you are having a chat with a talkative person, it may help to remember that the happy-go-lucky persona is most likely not the entirety of who they are.

With the day of love passing by just this past week, it is only fitting that we talk about the strongest feeling of all: hate. As a society, hate saturates our sentiments, actions and words. We hate certain foods (and rightfully so if we are talking about olives!). 

We hate certain people, whether that be people that have wronged us,  just an irrational distaste or celebrities. We hate our classes, our apartments and even sometimes our family members.

In fact, some of the most watched television shows, like Netflix’s “Emily in Paris”, are also some of the most heavily criticized shows online. 

Why do so many people spend hours and hours consuming shows, movies and other media that they hate so profoundly? Biologically speaking, being a hater makes people feel good.

According to clinical psychologist JR Ilagan via VICE, strong emotional responses such as hate elicit the secretion of neurotransmitters in our brains. This phenomenon can be almost addicting to experience because it feels like a form of emotional release.

Many of us have a tendency to pent up our emotions. Sometimes, crying or feeling sad feels too intense or an unnecessary waste of emotional energy. 

Hatred and its association with dislike, however, feel more productive. It is also less affiliated with embarrassment or publicity. As horrible as it may be, nobody judges a hater for wanting attention, but the same cannot be said for other emotions.

Humans are innately voyeuristic. We are social animals and like to share our lives with those around us, from personal opinions to relationships. However, on that same note, we also like to perceive those around us. We cannot help but assess and judge people as we perceive them.

Everyone dislikes that one person who writes terrible poetry and then posts it on all her accounts to flaunt her writing expertise. On Valentine’s Day, many people were irritated by the cringy couples’ posts and the sappy captions.Yet, as much as we may complain about how gross and terrible and uninteresting these individuals may be, we refuse to take steps to alter our consumption of them. 

We do not unfollow the cringy accounts or stop watching terrible television shows. In fact, we probably could not stop ourselves regardless. Hating is also the foundation for bonding with peers. 

Most of us are guilty of making a new class friend by hating on the professor’s lecture style or complaining about the workload. Many of us here at Tech have made at least a new acquaintance by bonding over our qualms with the administration or the school infrastructure. 

Hate feeds into our social nature; we could not survive without it. Hate is the substratum for holding public figures accountable for their actions and words, entertainment and everyday life.

However, there is no denying the dangers of far-reaching hatred. In a more serious context, true hate should have no place in the modern world. It exacerbates oppression and makes life dangerous for people of color, the LGBTQ+ community and other minorities every single day.

But frivolous hate for frivolous items and reasons is deeply engrained into our social and interpersonal connections. Social media serves as a platform for perceiving one another and allows us to quickly express thoughts on the newest media, news or celebrity gossip.

That said, will we still continue to watch “The Bachelor” every week with our close friend, criticize and ridicule both the bachelor himself and the contestants and enjoy it thoroughly? Will we make fun of the “pick me” people’s comments on Instagram posts and giggle with our best friends? 

And most notable of all, are there still people out there watching the new seasons of “Riverdale”? Unfortunately, the answer to all of these is absolutely.

There are a few days in the year that are simply miserable for single people. One of these dreaded days is Oct. 3, and it’s not just because it’s midway through Libra season. Oct. 3 is National Boyfriend Day, a fact that is both difficult to ignore and avoid if you make the major blunder of mistakenly opening any social media app on the day of. Instagram stories are chock full of adorable GIFs and photos of couples staying in doing face masks, out at fancy dinners or interlocking pinky fingers on their inevitable and unoriginal, albeit sweet, Sky View Atlanta dates. Valentine’s Day is no different. 

Whether you have a partner or not, tapping through the incessant flow of more and more of the same quickly gets tiresome. In retaliation, one might even choose to go on a rant about the capitalist implications of the big day of love.  

Another might complain that nobody wants to see people’s posts anyways, and if they were really happy and secure, they would not post at all! But jealousy aside, why does this relationship flaunting feel so odd at times? 

We all feel inclined to show the world our relationship status. After all, we are social creatures. The answer is simple; it feels performative.

If you think back to your childhood, you can surely think of a relationship that you idolized. Perhaps it was Beyoncé and Jay-Z (Pre-“Lemonade” era, of course). Or Jennifer Lopez and Ben Affleck, who recently rekindled their romance. Perhaps you craved stability and obsessed over Neil Patrick Harris and his partner, David Burtka. 

No matter what, celebrity relationships have always broken the news. Little occurrences are exaggerated into explosive articles, cheating scandals sit atop headlines and Hollywood relationships are ridiculed. This ridicule likely stems from the consistent failure of A-list relationships. The public eye is often the notable culprit of this phenomenon. While we may lament (or celebrate) our relative anonymity, social media has changed our perception of the average peer. In the modern era of relationships, are we so secluded from the public eye?

The main purpose of social media is to flaunt your experiences, clothes, money, looks and lifestyle. Students studying abroad post their nights out clubbing in Europe, the fine dining food they sampled in New York City for spring break and the designer boots their partners bought for them.

Posting significant others on social media is no different. Every individual is perceived and judged through their social media. Having a bigger or smaller following does not alter the extent of your perception. Information spreads through gossip and casual conversation. You posted your new partner on Instagram? 

Within hours, your closest friends are commenting “So adorable!” on your post and your not-so-close friends are blowing up your direct messages: “When did this happen?” Social media breaks anonymity, especially when posting fuel for gossip. Anyone can pretend like they do not expect this to happen, but every post is released onto the Internet cultivated to garner the perception you want. 

We perform for those around us, and dramatic, flowery and highly publicized couples’ posts are just examples of the performative nature of media. This isn’t all to communicate a cynical, anti-romantic take on love and relationships. Posting one’s significant other is not the equivalent of a shallow partnership or an invaluable connection. 

The appeal of posting cute photos is undeniable; who would not want to show off their loving partner? Nonetheless, there is no denying that when posting one’s partner, at least a part of them is doing it for everyone else. 

Strong, burly, commanding and unfaithful: all characteristics of the classic “family man.” The character depicted in literature and media throughout history remains unchanged and consistent. 

The dependable father figure comes in different forms but at the core, is the same person. 

The “family man” tends to care for his family and puts them above all. He usually works hard and quantifies his self-worth and pride using his career and ability to do unnecessary manual labor. This character derives itself from gender roles dating from before 1900. 

The man was the head of the household and held all power in a household dynamic. This is reflected in the characterization of male figures in many television shows, movies and books, even in contemporary media. These heteronormative “dudes” are inescapable in any media. 

In Arthur Miller’s “Death of a Salesman,” Willy Loman laments his inadequacies in his workplace and issues with his family. He begins to cheat on his wife and all his problems come to a head, driving him to suicide. 

He is an example of a “failure” in this trope but an applicable character all the same as he functions on the same principles. His sense of self-worth and his mental health were obliterated by his work failures and family issues. Without those successes, he felt his life held no value. 

The television show “Bones” exhibits similar phenomena. The main male lead, FBI Special Agent Seeley Booth incessantly emphasizes his masculinity and heterosexuality. 

He immediately shoots down any parallels made between him and femininity, and his religious and military backgrounds are used as grounds to explain his insistence. This follows the same pattern of the “family man” with Booth being a father and family-oriented individual. He, while never unfaithful to his partners, is commanding, strong and emotionally unavailable. He almost seems to fear being perceived outside of his notion of a “man.”

This “family man” idea extends even as far as well-known celebrities and figures in internet media and music. 

An example of this is Adam Levine, lead  singer of Maroon 5, also known as the band whose music plays at Target.

His visage depended on him being a family-focused person, who puts his wife and daughter first. His whole “schtick” was being an easily digestible household name. 

Then, news breaks that he cheated on his wife. 

Another similar instance is with Ned Fulmer, formerly of The Try Guys, a YouTube-famous group with a wide-reaching platform. His entire internet persona was sculpted around the fact that he “loves his wife!” 

Then, videos emerge of him fraternizing inappropriately with an employee and eventually, news of his affair goes viral. 

These are the “family men” in the flesh (or through a computer screen, naturally). 

Their public identities center on their families and yet, their actions contradict this. The concept of the unfaithful husband is no surprise to viewers and consumers of mass media in today’s digitally connected world. 

The general sentiment of “I’m not even surprised” floods social media in response to such events. However, is it okay to normalize these concepts just because they are common?

Common and acceptable are not the same, though the lines often blur. 

With the “family man” being portrayed in all facets of media and literature consumption, it is hard to delineate the issues with the trope. 

However, the intrinsic issues lying within the “family man” concept make for a need to break out of the status quo. 

The idea that someone who identifies as a man cannot exhibit conventionally accepted qualities of femininity and emotionality is deeply antiquated. 

Though male portrayals of the “family man” have steered away from this convention, such as with Phil Dunphy of “Modern Family,” it is time to abolish the tiresome, dated trope altogether.

With his round body, balding head, spectacles and two mustaches, Hercule Poirot holds a pivotal role in Agatha Christie’s anthology. 

With his comic nature and quirky persona, Poirot has a special place in Christie fans’ hearts. 

However, one thing is very notable throughout the entire Poirot series: Poirot experiences zero plot development. 

In “Mrs. McGinty’s Dead,” Poirot laments his boredom with retirement and harps on the importance of delicious food, which puts a smile on the reader’s face. 

But this is minimally different from “Death on the Nile” or “The Murder of Roger Ackroyd” where he insists upon his retired nature and tries to avoid crime, to no avail. 

This is a widely experienced sentiment for critics of Poirot. They feel that he needed more depth and to develop as a character over the course of the series. 

While those criticisms are valid, they are wholly incorrect. Poirot is simply a placeholder; a means to an end.

Poirot’s character is simple. He is a retired, but a highly acclaimed detective from Belgium who lacks humility (rightly so) and stumbles upon crime wherever he goes. 

His peculiar quirks and remarks become familiar and endearing to the reader. You can’t help but be amused by him! 

His character does have flaws, however. His inner mindsets and prejudices, which are reflective of the time, are very noticeable in Christie’s early works and trickle down throughout her entire oeuvre. In “Cards on the Table,” Poirot is disturbed by the victim, Mr. Shaitana, prior to his death due to his “foreign” nature. 

The novel does not describe much about his actual personality but specifies his ethnic ambiguity and his “otherworldliness,” which reads as racial bias and prejudice. 

This aspect of Poirot’s character is surprising and contradictory because he often experiences prejudices and stereotyping himself, as a Belgian who speaks French. English individuals often look down on him or are mistrustful of him as he conducts his investigations. 

This is demonstrative of Christie’s oversight and privilege as a white woman in 20th century England. She cannot understand the strife of people of color, but is able to sympathize with a rich, white man who simply happens to be a non-British man in England.

Irrefutably, Christie’s characters (Poirot especially) lack depth, but that is part of their appeal. The novels are fun, commitment-free reads that are entertaining and enthralling.

The books do not connect in plot, and while Poirot does analyze the psychology of his subjects, his own psychology is not discussed in depth. Poirot is quite literally a means to an end; he is a way for Christie to keep the reader in suspense, describe the clues and reveal the murderer(s) at the end. 

The consistent format but unique plots are part of the allure of Christie’s famous murder mysteries.

The BBC miniseries, “Poirot,” is very contrary to this idea.

The episodes attempt to provide the viewer with insight into Poirot’s mind. 

The “Murder on the Orient Express” episode attempts to use Poirot’s religious background to make him question his choices regarding the end culprit. It focuses on his morality and insistence on finding the truth.

These themes are present in the novel, but the series episode alters the plot slightly and loses focus on the actual crime/plot to develop Poirot’s character. 

While it is a unique take on Christie’s “protagonist,” the series has a peculiar, deeply serious energy that is absent in the novels, taking away from the series’ enjoyability.

Hercule Poirot is a classic, famed individual whose characteristics are distinctive and perfect for the purpose he has in Christie’s Poirot library. 

He does not require depth because, in reality, his opinions and thoughts hold no value. Readers simply want to find out what happened and why; Poirot provides that and a few chuckles along the way.

The internet is filled with faceless entities: unknown people commenting on the lives of others, putting their opinions out into the world, judging those around them and so much more. 

Social media and the Internet enable us to stay connected. We can keep up with our old friends from high school or stay in touch with family that lives thousands of miles away. 

There is no question that our presence in society is known to the Internet and can be followed by others, though all they might find is gym bros posing in front of the mirror and study abroad updates from Italy. 

However, since we were young, it has always been drilled into our minds to be careful what we post on the Internet, to be wary of the information and content found on the internet, etc. 

So, what are the implications of our Internet presences? Is there any true value in Internet anonymity in the age of public Instagram and Twitter accounts?

The importance and value of Internet privacy is something that has been widely debated in recent years. Frankly speaking, even if your face is not plastered across the Internet, Americans as a whole do lack Internet privacy. 

The United States’ Patriot Act gives a lot more power to the government to enact surveillance on individuals within the country, whether that be access to calls, third party-held records and much more. 

Companies like Google hold extensive information about their users, from their emails and correspondences to guessing their ages, education or marital status based on recent searches. You can even see what Google has guessed about you through their website, which simply asks you to log into your Gmail. 

Without me giving Google the explicit information, it was able to figure out my spoken languages, age, marital status and that I’m in college from my searches alone. It found what kind of TV shows I like to watch and the fact that I like sneakers. 

Ads have become more and more specialized as Google and other sites sell information to advertisers. While it is easy to allow fear-mongering to push us into an all-encompassing suspicion of the Internet, this type of privacy is hard to control, especially without legislation in place.

This phenomenon functions a lot differently when it comes to social media. Social media apps like Tik Tok and YouTube have created a far-reaching platform for users, many of which hail from younger generations, to make and spread their content.

This content has become very personal as well. Creators share their experiences with mental health and addiction, their relationships, their families and even their sex lives; information that would otherwise be unquestionably private. 

This type of “fame” has become wholly more accessible and commonplace than just a few years ago. On Instagram, users post the places they have been, their friends and their families. On Twitter, users tweet their deepest thoughts and their most controversial opinions. 

Our intrinsic minds and thought processes have been slashed open and splayed out for everyone to see. When Minecraft streamer Dream recently revealed his face to his fans after years of anonymity, the Internet was shocked. 

From creating memes of his face to bullying and criticism, Dream’s anonymity loss may have resulted in some solid PR, but at the cost of his privacy. His face is now out there for all his fans to see, and the Internet has been cruel, albeit entertaining, in discussing the reveal.

Internet anonymity is one of those issues that kind of stays in the eye of the beholder. 

You can be a cynic and believe that it doesn’t truly matter what you post since we lack privacy so acutely in the first place. 

On the other hand, our faces — our visual identities — are something we can control the spread of. While the Internet is a handy tool to stalk your ex after a few years, Internet safety is important, even if we can’t always control what happens afterward.

​​As you walk around the white-brick-walled local elementary school in your area and glance at the administrators marching around with their keys jingling, the flyers wilting off bulletin boards and the exhausted teachers lecturing students, only one word comes to mind: flawed. With the current state of the education system, classrooms are crowded, teachers are overworked and the administration breathes down teachers’ neck, watching their every move. While there are many merits to a public education, in recent days — along with the current political climate — more and more flaws in the system are being uncovered and remain unchanged.

Money makes the world go round, and that does not exclude the education system. One of the biggest issues that schools face is the lack of funding. It is worth noting that generally, more money is allocated for more affluent districts, even within a single county. The more affluent school districts tend to be higher achieving and have ample tutoring, better teachers and better salaries. This only perpetuates a negative feedback loop of poorer students going to schools with less money and less resources, which leads to lower scores. Standardized exams are also made by companies such as Pearson, who base exams very directly off their expensive textbooks. This only furthers this phenomenon: if schools cannot afford the big three textbook makers, their students are destined to score lower on exams. 

Another critique of the modern education system is that the education model no longer meets the needs of students. It does not meet the needs of the modern world, and students are learning information that becomes more and more outdated by the year. High schoolers are taught advanced physics and mathematics, which comes in handy for a few years in college, but economics classes are notably absent of tax education or other life skills. Worse, some Republican lawmakers are trying to limit the discussion of important and useful topics even further. Georgia’s Governor Brian Kemp recently signed several education bills to control what can be taught in classrooms. Some important examples of those banned “divisive topics” are race and racism, which are pivotal for accurate discussion of United States and world history. Limiting these topics is a means of oppressing the truth and limiting knowledge and education of students throughout Georgia.

Overcrowding is another unaddressed problem in the public school system. More and more students are being added into classrooms and there are fewer teachers. Stuffing 40 or 50 students in a classroom meant for only 30 makes educators have a very difficult time teaching effectively. It is difficult for a teacher to address all the different types of learners in the room and make sure all the kids are up to par with their knowledge and schoolwork. Further, it’s tough for educators to discipline and control that many students to foster and environment conducive to learning.

If there was a simple solution to remedy the flaws in the education system, it likely would have been enacted already. However, a lot of the responsibility lies with legislators and other elected officials. They must be willing to allocate fair funding to all school districts and allow for the reduction of loads on educators. Even more importantly, these leaders must understand the impact of studying topics like racism in the context of history and not try to oppress the knowledge of students for their own personal gain. There is no denying that the situation is dire — the problems discussed are only the tip of the iceberg. However, if teachers, policymakers and other administrators pay attention to the issues that are so obviously highlighted for them, there is the chance that we can pave the way to a better educational future.