Word: beasted
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Every summer West Point runs its fresh-faced plebes through a grueling eight-week training program known as Beast Barracks. This year there were some beauties in the Beast: 119 women, the first in the academy's 174-year history, joined 1,480 male plebes in the Long Gray Line...
...particularly awesome beast, at least in Bartram's description: "Behold him rushing from the flags and reeds. His enormous body swells. His plaited tail, brandished high, floats upon the lake. The waters like a cataract descend from his opening jaws. Clouds of smoke issue from his dilated nostrils. The earth trembles with his thunder." Nonetheless, when Bartram's cockleshell of a boat was attacked by a giant alligator on a Florida lake, the naturalist beat at it with a club "until he withdrew sullenly and slowly into the water, looking at me and seeming neither fearful...
Your pictures told the story: the shaved heads, "beast barracks," the cruel faces of the plebes in formation, and the frightened clods being hazed or braced. Militarism, be it American or Prussian, is a stupid, vicious anachronism. Honor code? What honor is there in Balaclava, the Somme, Belsen, Dresden, Hiroshima...
...case in point, which coincidentally is causing a furor this spring, involves Steven Verr, 19, a slight (5 ft. 9 in., 140 Ibs.), mild-mannered fourth classman, or freshman. Verr's troubles began last August while he was attending "Beast Barracks," the summer of rigorous training and hazing given to incoming plebes (a word derived from plebeians). Verr was subjected to a traditional form of harassment: upperclassmen ordered him not to put certain foods on his tray, or made him sit at attention while others ate. After going hungry for two days, Verr had tears in his eyes...
...academy officials are convinced there is no basic flaw in the nature of the cadets who are attracted to West Point. Indeed the quality of the cadet corps is impressive, as is the incoming class of 900 men-and for the first time, nearly 100 women-that will attend Beast Barracks this summer...