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Raising his hand to defend the gender wage-gap, David Bloch ’17, thought of by his classmates as a bit of an asshole, is in fact Satan, the Lord of Darkness. The Devil has reportedly been living as Bloch and arguing on behalf of himself for many years.
“Just to play devil’s advocate for a second,” said Bloch, his breath like sulfur and eyes burning orange. “What if employers are just paying people for the value they add to the company and men just add more value? That only makes sense.”
Bell had quite the journey before he ended up in a Brown University seminar. “There I was, bored down in Hell," explained Bloch, who could have been lying but it would’ve been impossible to tell. "I heard a kid advocating for me in a classroom. He was definitely making some crazy, irresponsible points, but it wasn’t as controversial and stirring as I’d like, so I shape-shifted, popped up to earth, and started advocating for myself. Never let anyone do anything on your behalf that you can do better.”
David’s classmates have certainly noticed some of his stranger behavior. Michael Rodgers ’17 recalls weeping with fear after David raised a shocking and horrifying counterpoint about affirmative action in class. “I had never thought of something so dark, so evil in my entire life,” remembers Michael, noting that the arguments were convincing only if you took stock in a bleak and pessimistic worldview. “David stood up that day and rocked me to my core.”
“Sometimes during our quizzes, I’ll look back at David’s desk and he will be engulfed in red hot flames as he struggles to work around what he calls the teacher’s inherent bias," adds David’s friend, Daniel Hopkins ’17. “Those moments are pretty shocking.”
David’s professors also expressed concern. English Professor Marcia Johnson admits that David often frightens her with his comments in class. “At points,” notes Johnson, “he will lick his lips with his forked, blood-red tongue and do a feverish dance after he shares a particularly offensive comment…that’s when I get truly scared. But, at the end of the day, tension in the classroom is good, even if it makes people scared for their lives.”
Michael and David’s other close friends agree with the sentiments of their teacher. “Yes, he scares us and gives us nightmares,” confirms Michael, “but it’s important to hear all frightful sides to a discussion, and our intramural baseball team needs him at third base.”
