Many of Richmond’s young adults awoke this morning in a state of total dismay.
Many of Richmond’s young adults awoke this morning in a state of total dismay.
They had all failed to make the list in Style Weekly’s coveted ‘Top 40 Under 40‘ and they were pissed.
The contest, held annually, aims to highlight the best and brightest young people in Richmond who are making waves and changing the city for the better.
For those who thought their hard work had paid off, today was a dark day.
“I’ve been working with this nonprofit for 3 years, and we’ve made, I think, serious impacts,” said Jessica Stearling of The Fan. She runs DataDogs, a local nonprofit aiming to teach pooches data journalism. While her attendance levels are considered high, Stearling admits she has very few success stories.
“Do you know how hard it is to teach a dog to read, let alone scour government databases for improprieties?” she said. “This isn’t easy and I think I deserve some freak’n credit.”
Meanwhile, down at the James River, Rodrigo Garcia was just as angry. He’s been working with low income Southside residents to help turn cigarette butts and beer cans into river filtration systems.
Garcia said he’d had friends and family nominate him – “My grandma filled out the application like 6 times!” he hollered in a phone interview with RVAMag. But, again, he’d had little success with his project.
“Sure, it just looks like a massive pile of smoked cigs and crushed PBR cans,” he said. “But, I mean, I’ve been trying, yea know?”
Jason Roop, editor at Style Weekly, said he receives many many applications from “40 Under 40′ hopefuls, but only 40 people can make the cut.
“We had a guy apply with his project of turning wheel chairs into street-ready modes of transportation using fireworks as a propulsion system,” said Roop. “That idea is not only illegal, its dangerous and we could not possibly endorse such a concept.”
Among other rejected local nominees was Aaron Markson who claimed to have trained the famous Capital Square squirrels to sing “Dixie,” Rob Torrent who said he’d created a “safer” way to produce meth, and Rachael Green who just sent in pictures of her parents naked.
“Seriously folks, who in the hell wants to share naked pictures of their parents?” asked Roop.
But Roop did offer a bit of advice for those hoping to adorn a coveted slot next year: “Stop sending me your mix tapes – we’re not RVAMag and you’re not Drake.”
You can check out all of Style Weekly’s ‘Top 40 under 40’ here and congrats to those who made the cut!
