Humor Magazine Prints First Issue

A fledgling campus publication is hoping to give Harvard students looking for a laugh yet another option.

Satire V (Veritas) written backwards), published Friday and distributed to many dorms, pokes fun at Harvard with eight pages of mock news stories.

Ari Z. Weisbard '02, the publication's editor-in-chief, said Satire V fills a void left by other campus humor magazines.

"We found that current publications on campus didn't really appeal to all students. We wanted something that was neither low-brow nor difficult to relate to," Weisbard said.

Specifically, Weisbard said he believes the Demon uses "lowbrow, sex-based humor" while the Lampoon is no longer widely read by the Harvard population.

However, Weisbard said he sees room for all three publications on-campus. Satire V uses "a different medium--fake news--and is a direct way to address social issues that need to be discussed at Harvard," he said.

The first issue of the publication included headlines like, "Harvard to be granted Most Favored Nation trade status" and "Ad Board members replaced by Care Bears."

Students who saw a copy of Satire V reacted favorably to the issue.

"It made me laugh," said Andrew P. Nikonchuk '02. "It was nice to see some fresh humor."

Drawing further distinctions between Satire V and the other two humor magazines, Weisbard said the staffs of other humor publications consist of "mostly white men."

"We have a diverse cast of women and different races and sexual orientations," he said.

First-years fill the great majority of Satire V's editorial positions, although four of the articles in the issue were written by upperclass students.

Satire V, which the editors plan to publish monthly, is not yet officially recognized by the College, but Weisbard said he expects that it will be shortly.