The University of Maine’s chapter of It’s On Us, a group dedicated to combating sexual assault, organized an event to help students relieve stress. It involved writing negative memories of events or people on a plate and then smashing the plate as a way to release emotions.
Immediately, energy enters the room. There is a table of snacks lined up on one side of the room next to a speaker bumping some classic pop music. An entire table has been removed to make way for an open area of the room as inviting as a dance floor.
People sit all around. Most congregate by the large open windows in the North Pod of the Union, some around the snack table and a few not here for the event line the edges of the room writing, texting and eating.
Suddenly a cracking sound fills the room along with sharp, delicate sprinkling noises. A group of people on the carpet are hammering away at their plates— the first of the night. Everyone’s attention is taken, a few people begin to applaud.
A man enters the room as this is happening, taking off his headphones with an expression of slight concern. What I assume to be one of the facilitators of the event skips over to him, “Do you want to smash a plate?” she asks.
“I was just eating dinner, saw rice krispie treats, and came over spontaneously,” said student Jason Durocher. During our conversation, the sound of chaotic smashing continues from the other side of the room and the music keeps playing.
“I came because my friend is working the event,” Isabella Sanchez, another student, told me. The row of those affiliated with It’s On Us stand with inviting poses on the wall-side of the snack table.
It’s On Us is a national group fighting sexual assault on college campuses. The UMaine branch of this group claims on their instagram that they are “Building a campus culture where care and consent come first.” On Monday, they hosted Smash (H)it, an event where students could come to alleviate stress in their lives by symbolically smashing plates with their issues written on them.
“I think it’s definitely going to be therapeutic,” Durocher said. While he did not know the story behind this event, part of the beauty of hosting a night like this is that no one is asking each other what they are smashing. People were mostly engaged in lively conversations full of laughter and smiles despite the fact that they were smashing the things that had been bothering them most. One flyer for the event put it well in calling it “a night of letting go.”
“This is really unique, I haven’t seen an event like this before on campus,” Sanchez said. Not many events are as active and engaging to the participants as this one was. Especially lending to the fact that most people came and went, it really felt like a space to come be, not an event to go to.
As the time passes, some people are clearly staying, crowding around in certain areas and remaining in conversation long after their plates have been smashed. Others seem to have come just for the snacks or rage-relief, exiting right after they dispose of their trash.
