Edgy LC teen inhales nose stud in sleep, dies

*The Backdoor is a “work” of “fiction” and “humor”

By Audrey Barrett

A Lewis & Clark student recently faced the tragic, instant repercussions of disobeying Baby Boomer-era social expectations. In fact, the impulsive nose piercing the student got one Tuesday during her first semester cost her far more than the $15 jewelry and $30 piercing fee — it would cost her life.

Samantha James ’21 inhaled her nose stud last week, resulting in asphyxiation. The symbolic marker of her independence and coolness just was not worth putting her life on the line.

James’ father had told her so from the beginning.  

“I knew that hippie jewelry wouldn’t end up well,” Mr. James said. “My brother and I really thought if we made fun of her ripped jeans enough at family gatherings she would stop this whole ‘express yourself’ kick that all the kids seem to be on.”

The James family smelled trouble when their daughter, who had attended cotillion and everything, wanted to go to a kitschy liberal arts school that didn’t even offer a business degree.

It could even be for the best: it is not like James would ever have gotten a job once potential employers saw that hideous jewel sticking out of her left nostril. A nose piercing is a symbol of all the bad decisions you’ve ever made, a signifier of your affiliation with low-class, marijuana-snorting, sex-crazed life-wasters.

“God wants to weed out the faulty ones,” Mr. James said. “I trust He had a plan for our Samantha, and she strayed from the righteous path. Our family will be purer for this. Call it evolution.”

In light of this moral tragedy, LC Student Health Services has been startled out of hibernation and rich white guys have provided the funds to sponsor a campaign prohibiting students from piercing their noses. From now on, only approved nose rings and studs will be permitted, and absolutely none of those septum ones. Transgressors will receive conversion therapy to enlighten them out of their grunge hippie ways. (Mental health counseling will continue to be virtually absent until the college receives another grant.)

Samantha James will serve as a martyr for the crusade against millennial “trashiness,” encouraging LC students to comply with their parents expectations lest it cost them all potential of worldly success, or even their lives.