Downtempo electronica genre / SUN 10-15-23 / Kid often nicknamed Trey / Final opponent in many a video game / Two inside an ellipse / Hot sauce with a reduplicative name / Game popular in Brooklyn streets / Mazatlan moolah / Civil rights activist Sylvia who was a awarded a Presidential Medal of Freedom

Sylvia Mendez (born June 7, 1936) is an American civil rights activist and retired nurse. At age eight, she played an instrumental role in the Mendez v. Westminster case, the landmark desegregation case of 1946. The case successfully ended de jure segregation in California and paved the way for integration and the American civil rights movement.

Mendez grew up during a time when most southern and southwestern schools were segregated. In the case of California, Hispanics were not allowed to attend schools that were designated for "Whites" only and were sent to the so-called "Mexican schools." Mendez was denied enrollment to a "Whites" only school, an event which prompted her parents to take action and together organized various sectors of the Hispanic community who filed a lawsuit in the local federal court. The success of their action, of which Sylvia was the principal catalyst, would eventually bring to an end the era of segregated education.

She was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the United States' highest civilian honor, by President Obama in 2011. (wikipedia)

I'm writing this just after coming back from my wife's birthday dinner and so I'm very full and a *little* on the alcoholic side of things so I'm gonna make this shortish. Possibly. Or else I'm going to ramble on about doughnuts, let's find out! First of all, I'm finding the long-ass "doughnut" spelling ... weird. I think I've just seen DONUT too many times in crosswords, and also Dunkin', before it was just Dunkin', was Dunkin' DONUTS, not Dunkin' la-di-dah we-make-our-doughnuts-with-actual-dough DOUGHNUTS, so the shorter spelling is much more familiar to me, the longer much more pretentious. No idea why they went with the longer spelling here (where the word appears over and over and over again, in every clue). If only for space-/ink-saving, you'd think they'd've opted for the shorter spelling. But no, it's dough dough dough a million times dough. 'S weird. 

As for the picture-grid, shrug. Yes, that is a vaguely circular thing you've got going there. I guess you kind of needed the visual element, given that the actual content of the theme is pretty tepid. But the resulting super-segmented grid, where section after section is accessible to adjacent sections only by one-square-wide access points, was not exactly pleasant to make my way through. Like a disappointing donut, nice to look at, less nice to experience. The whole conceit here, where the clues are all things one might say about doughnuts, felt very strained, and the results just weren't punchy at all. "I declare this doughnut to be truly tasty!" is a CAKE STAND? A "stand" you've taken about a "cake" doughnut? Saying that a donut is tasty does not qualify as a stand any more than saying the sky is blue does. A stand is an intervention in a controversy. "Donut tastes good" is not an intervention in anything. Further, there's nothing particularly CAKE-y about tasting good. Most donuts taste good. Most donuts would also taste good dipped in milk. "This doughnut would be great dipped in milk!" sounds at least as much like a PLAIN TRUTH as it does like an OLD-FASHIONED IDEA. It even sounds a bit like a FROSTED TIP. The answers just aren't well-differentiated from one another, and almost none of them really land with the force, surprise, and keen wordplay, to say nothing of humor, that one would like to see, ideally, in a wacky theme answer. The clue writing here just isn't strong, and it has to be strong, because the entire weight of the theme is resting on it. Besides the picture-grid, all thematic interest lies in those clues, and today, they're just too tepid, as are the theme answers themselves. I usually love donuts, but these donuts left me COLD (60A: One way to have something down).

There were two semi-toughish parts of the grid today. The first was in the NE, where I had MENDEZ / ZIPS BY as MENDER / RIPS BY (!?), and where STOOPBALL had me wondering "????" (I had STICKBALL) (17D: Game popular in Brooklyn streets). I'd never heard of Sylvia MENDEZ (despite her being associated with a landmark civil rights case (see "Word of the Day," above)), and when RIPS by was the first the first thing that occurred to me at 43A: Blows past, I rationalized MENDER as a new name, thinking "well, yes, it's an odd name, but I've also never heard of this person, so why shouldn't it be a name I've never seen. This is probably the only famous MENDER." But no, she ended up having a much more ordinary last name. The other sticky part of the grid, for me, came in the western and southwestern parts of the do(ugh)nut. Could never tell my FOCI from my LOCI (55D: Two inside an ellipse), and even though I guessed FOCI at first, I also guessed FRET at first for 55A: Stew (FUME). Then there was UHH, which could easily have been UMM (79A: "Lemme think ..."), and then the very tough clue on HALT (80D: Pull up)."Pull up" could go a million ways, and I could've guessed all day and not gotten to HALT. Hurray for crosses! No other problems. Really hated NO-RUN, as that is not a thing anyone says re: baseball games (106A: Like a baseball shutout). Even the phrase "baseball shutout" sets my teeth on edge. NO-RUN is just bad fill, no way around it, no way to rescue it. Also bad, but apparently undying, is UNPC. Quit trying to rationalize your offensiveness by blaming the offended. "PC" was always right-wing racist / sexist / homophobic defensiveness and self-justification. You can keep telling yourself that you're (boldly!) "not PC," but deep down you must know that means you're probably mostly just a run-of-the-mill asshole, right? Right? Right. (note: "PC" discourse has largely been superseded by the equally stupid "Woke" discourse, so can we retire UNPC on the basis of its being dated!? Whatever it takes ...)

I loved TRIPHOP, a truly original answer (98A: Downtempo electronica genre). I especially love it over SIREN, a cool musical 1-2. The clue on CANOPY BED is a bit of a groaner, but I have to admit that it works well (18D: What has good coverage for retirement?). Surface meaning is solid, and solidly misleading, with the double wordplay (on both "coverage" and "retirement"). ASTAIRE isn't that exciting on its own, but the clue is a fantastic bit of trivia (21A: About whom an early critic said "Can't act, can't sing. Balding. Can dance a little"). Especially appropriate, then, that ASTAIRE sits underneath STARDOM today. HORNS IN ON is colorful and interesting (75A: Interrupts when it's not one's place to do so). I like the symmetricality of PIRI PIRI (19A: Hot sauce with a reduplicative name) and OTTERPOP (122A: Frozen treat named for a playful animal)—do OTTERPOPs come in PIRI PIRI flavor? They should. I think they just come in "blue" and "green" and other color-based flavors. I honestly haven't had one since I was 10. But if they came in PIRI PIRI, I might consider it. They should also consider a TRIPHOP OTTERPOP. I don't know what flavor that would be. Just sounds cool. Time for bed. See you later. Enjoy your Sunday.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld

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