'I couldn't touch the piano for years': Piano students at Utah State describe a culture of sexism

[no_hypocrisy]

3. I hear you. I graduated in 1979.

The college's tradition of The Ring Game didn't help to make students look like serious scholars. (You get engaged and literally wake up the president of the Senior Class. She then puts up notices that a Ring Game will be held in the Quadrangle at noon. At noon, a mob shows up and on a loop of pink-and-green ribbons, an engagement ring is attached. The ring goes around the circle, each person becoming an amateur gemologist, guessing the carat and the value. Around it goes a second time. A third time, faster and faster it is passed. Finally the "lucky girl" stops the ring, takes out scissors, cuts the ribbons, pops on the ring and "announces" her engagement.

I hated it. On graduation day, I wanted to mock them so badly with a "keyring game" where an ordinary key, painted pink and green on each side would be dangled from a similar circle of ribbon would be passed around, ending when someone cut the ribbon and announced "I'm moving in with Bob!" Never did it.