Cornell Takes Top Honors in Motto Contest, Douchebaggery

by Andrew Nusca | August 9, 2007 at 9:17 pm

Cornell Takes Top Honors in Motto Contest, DouchebaggeryA good motto is like a one-night stand. Immediate, satisfying, and best explained in the least amount of words possible ("Yeah?" "Yeah."). We here at IvyGate love 'em, as indicated by our own sitting on top of this page. But it's hard to match up to Motto Magazine ("Purpose, passion and profit," in case you're wondering), which is an entire glossy dedicated to the craft that was originally started by two Wall Street Journal alums.

Just yesterday, this incredibly niche magazine released its first annual Top 10 Motto List, and higher education was the target. The best? Our good friends in Ithaca, of course, with the sage, hallucinatory words of "I would found an institution where any person can find instruction in any study." Apparently, no points for brevity (or sobriety) were given. Not to be forgotten, rounding out the Top Ten were Brown (No. 2), Penn (No. 5) and Dartmouth (No. 7), with Harvard and Yale receiving Honorable Mentions for probably the first time in their little academic careers.

The top editors of Motto Mag are Northwestern and Vandy alums, so no apparent swing there, but no word on the rest of the staff and how that may have influenced the final list (clearly, some vendettas against Columbia and Princeton, the only two of the Ancient Eight to leave without recognition). But we here at IvyGate feel the list is suspect, since no explanation behind the choices is given.

But wait! The neutral Ithaca Journal's got an answer:

The beauty of Cornell's motto is that it captures an aspiration that transcends the generations, and every Cornelian believes they have experienced it," said Tommy Bruce, vice president of communications for Cornell.

Uh, OK. So we at IvyGate are taking matters into our own hands in protest of this bizarre list and polling the people, not the editors: What's the worst motto in the League?


Choose wisely, grasshoppers. -- ANDREW NUSCA

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16 Responses to “Cornell Takes Top Honors in Motto Contest, Douchebaggery”

  1. Joe Says:
    August 9th, 2007 at 10:59 pm

    Vox clamantis in deserto is more appropriately translated as a voice cries out in the wilderness

  2. cornell, Says:
    August 10th, 2007 at 12:03 am

    why is your motto the only one in English only?

  3. sam Says:
    August 10th, 2007 at 12:07 am

    joe: incorrect…”clamantis” is a genitive participle. the best translation is: “a voice of one crying out in the wilderness.”

  4. this Says:
    August 10th, 2007 at 12:07 am

    seems like the stupidest magazine ever. and how is dartmouth number 7? i mean john the baptist is cool and all, but an obscure bible quote that makes it seem like you will be molested in the wilderness of hanover. come on. there are many better mottos out there so that three ivy league ones appear in the top ten. and cornell’s is plain stupid.

  5. yeah Says:
    August 10th, 2007 at 1:34 am

    this magazine looks like a joke anyway. i mean, i can’t really say i’ve ever picked it up, but judging from the horribly-formatted PDF with the uncreative Times New Roman font, i wouldn’t take these guys as gospel.

    ironically, i would choose cornell’s motto as the worst of the ivy league, not because it’s not in latin (although that’s one reason the other seven siblings can pick on poor cornell) but because it’s just too damn long.

  6. yale '10 Says:
    August 10th, 2007 at 2:40 am

    please stop publishing shit that no one cares about.

    motto magazine’s attempt at humor throughout the brief pdf were pathetic at best. and (yes, i am offended by this) their best attempt at characterizing “famous alumni” from yale was offering dick cheney who (wow, what does alumnus mean again?) DIDN’T GRADUATE.

    i could write a better review of school mottos in under an hour.

  7. Keggy Says:
    August 10th, 2007 at 3:08 am

    Joe Malchow would now.

  8. crap Says:
    August 10th, 2007 at 3:23 am

    Dammit I can’t spell.

  9. dues Says:
    August 10th, 2007 at 8:28 am

    @cornell,:
    Ezra Cornell realized that in America, people speak English. It kind of goes with the idea that Cornell said “fuck you” to most of the traditions of European schools, such as not letting women learn things, which were so lovingly embraced by the rest of America’s top schools back then.
    Lately Cornell has been using an abbreviated version of the motto, “Any person, any study,” as a way to describe their “mission.”

  10. Derrida (with a nod at Sartre) Says:
    August 10th, 2007 at 9:21 am

    There seems to be an epistemological divide, here. Harvard and Yale’s slogans reveal an attachment to the old, Platonist, transcendent conceptions of truth and enlightenment. Dartmouth’s lonely voice, recognizing its solitude in a deserted metaphysics, more accurately reflects humanity’s existential dilemma.

  11. Deride-ah Says:
    August 10th, 2007 at 12:03 pm

    Derrida’s nod makes me hate everyone and everything. How transcendent!

  12. Derridos Says:
    August 10th, 2007 at 12:36 pm

    Now with more cheese!

  13. Stanford 2009 Says:
    August 10th, 2007 at 1:01 pm

    The winds of freedom blow!

  14. Joe Malchow Says:
    August 10th, 2007 at 1:08 pm

    I am rotund!

  15. Columbia '09 Says:
    August 10th, 2007 at 3:37 pm

    In MY light, I see light!

  16. Princeton Says:
    August 10th, 2007 at 4:34 pm

    Dei sub numine viget

    God went to Princeton