SIPA BUILDING — Following student feedback from the first weeks of class, Columbia College Student Council voted unanimously that Aaron Rappaport, GS ‘22, displayed the kind of confidence in his Intro to Shakespeare seminar that could only come from having killed a man in the heat of combat.
“When I saw the skull tattoo on Aaron’s massive forearm on the first day of class,” said classmate Mary Hubbell, BC ‘19, “I knew two things. One; he was gonna talk, a lot. Two; he had watched the spark of life leave a man’s eyes on the battlefield.”
Rappaport, 35, who claims to have been honorably discharged from the U.S. Marine Corps, first gained attention with his response to the professor’s softball question “What does theatre mean to you?” Despite having never seen a play, Rappaport spent the next 5 minutes talking about that one time Larry the Cable Guy performed for his platoon.
“From day one Aaron made it clear he was not the kind of guy who second guesses himself,” said classmate Timothy Warburg, CC’19. “And from the way he interrupted the professor repeatedly, I could tell that he had, on multiple occasions, slipped a knife into another man’s neck without remorse.”
“He may even have killed a civilian or two,” added Warburg.
Other students in the class voiced similar impressions of Rappaport. “I’m usually pretty talkative in a small lecture like that,” said Rachel Smithson BC’21, “but his wartime confidence makes it really hard to get a word in, so I just sit and hope he doesn’t snap at a truck going by.”
Students were shocked when, during a 5-minute bathroom break, Rappaport allegedly pulled out his vape pen and began to use it in the middle of the classroom.
“Only somebody who’s called in an airstrike on a small village would have the balls to do that,” said Smithson.
A Federalist reporter interviewed other MilVet students from GS and discovered that none were familiar with Rappoport, his platoon, or his years of service.
“It could be that he never served and has never seen combat,” said Columbia MilVets Director of Communications Andrew Plácido, GS’21. “He’s probably just an asshole.”
