The Minor’s retirement a major loss, students say

It profiled a traffic cone as a student body president candidate. It got into a Twitter fight with UNC’s Oral Biology program and hit up Wendy’s for a late-night hookup. But “UNC’s only trustworthy news source,” The Minor, is no more.

The group posted to its website Monday that it will stop publishing, stating, “We’re done because things should end when they should end.”

An online publication, The Minor has been publishing since September 2013 and has since satirically covered campus and community events and issues.

In the post, the website’s six writers — Jacob Rosenberg, John Cruickshank, Ross Slaughter, Fedor Kossakovski, Griffin Unger and Erik Schoning — thanked their readers and revealed their identities after remaining anonymous for nearly two years.

“I think the fact that they posted anonymously let them say things everyone else wants to say — kind of point out what we were all thinking,” sophomore Cason Whitcomb said.

Some loyal readers said The Minor’s absence will be hard to fill.

“I’m a little bummed about them stopping,” said junior Will Foos. “I think someone will pop up and try to take their spot, but I don’t think they’ll be as good.”

Junior Jerome Allen was shocked to hear of The Minor’s retirement.

“It’s like hearing Jon Stewart isn’t doing ‘The Daily Show,’” he said. “So sad.”

Allen said the articles resonated with students because they were relatable.

“I liked the one about WXYC trying too hard to be hipster because I’m in WXYC and it was funny to see them call us out.”

Sophomore Jared Williams and freshman Chelsea Fisher both said they read The Minor when it was shared on their Facebook newsfeeds and found the humor refreshing.

“I read an article they wrote about cargo shorts,” Williams said. “It was like, ‘Don’t wear them, they’re terrible,’ and I was like, ‘Yes, yeah, thank you.’”

Fisher said the publication offered a lens into student life that was both entertaining and thought provoking.

“I used to read The Onion and I sort of reference The Minor as the UNC Onion,” she said. “Whenever I read it, it was different.”

In its goodbye article, The Minor thanked its readers and said the group had aimed to make a positive impact on campus.

“We hope that our articles brought joy instead of sadness, we hope we were properly satirical more than mean, and we hope that articles started important discussions,” the post said.

Allen said they did just that.

“I think they do a good job bringing to light issues that are sometimes overlooked on campus,” he said. “They raised questions that are important to talk about.”

arts@dailytarheel.com