THE UNIVERSITY DAILY WASAN
WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 5, 2014
PAGE 4
opinion
TEXT FREE FOR ALL
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Think I'm gonna try to ski down the hill tonight.
Dear admirer, I'm super nerdy.
And thanks ;) Sincerely, the girl
who always does the puzzles
one page over.
I'm a senior in engineering and today was the first day I had a crunchy chicken cheddar wrap. It lived up to its hype.
I like to play Russian roulette with my homework; my chances are pretty good if school is closed tomorrow. If not than I'm screwed and not in a good way.
An epiphany while doing laundry...maybe skanks don't wear a lot of clothes so they can do less laundry..
"This is a gift from past high me to present high me"
Everyone go download Erodr from the App Store. Solid KU community on the app . . .
Have you ever woken up at 5 a.m. and thought you were the only person left? I did, so I woke up my roommate to see if she was a zombie.
How do I puzzle one page over?
Campus looks like Hogwarts in the snow!
Warming up after playing in the snow by getting drunk and eating chicken fingers.
I'm torn. I want today's paper but I don't want to go outside. Choices.
Watching guys shovel while there is still snow falling and feeling so sorry for them .
Now I know how Arendelle felt.
Went sledding and didn't run into a tree. Winning.
Let it snow! Let it snow! And I'll rise like the break of dawn!
When the snow day was announced my scholarship hall cheered so loud that I could hear it outside.
My roommate showed me a picture of campus, pointed at a spot and said "This is where Fraser used to be before the snowstorm."
No school + no work=best day ever.
Watched Lilo and Stitch. It looked so warm there!
CULTURE
'America the Beautiful' commercial creates controversy
Coca-Cola debuted the "It's Beautiful" commercial during the Super Bowl on Sunday. The commercial showed people of different cultures living in America, and singing "America the Beautiful" in different languages, including English.
I felt the commercial highlighted diversity and showed why America is beautiful. However, Twitter and Facebook flooded with offensive remarks after the debut, commenting on how "It's Beautiful" shouldn't be sung in different languages because that's "not American." Several tweets and Facebook posts ended with phrases like #LearnToSpeakEnglish and
SpeakAmerican.
As an Asian-American, I found these outbursts offensive. People need to realize that just because a person may not look "American" or speak English it doesn't make them any less American. Many are overlooking the message of the commercial. It's people singing about how wonderful America is. The people in the commercial love America just as much as the angry social media users do, and the fact that people are freaking out because the song is not sung in English shows pure ignorance by ignoring the message. In 1964, Bob Dylan said, "The times, they are a-changin", and they have
been for a while. We should be embracing diversity, not bashing it down. The diversity in America is one of the most wonderful things about this country—I mean, we're known as the melting pot.
A lot of people tend to forget that, as a nation, we have no official language. Sorry folks, English is not the official language of the United States and it will probably stay that way.
I anger me how intolerant people are of different cultures. I don't look "American," but I was born in this country, as were many others like myself. For someone to say that my family and other families won't be accepted as Americans because they don't speak English as their first language is a bigoted, disturbing thought.
I applaud Coca-Cola for its commercial. I'm sure the company expected backlash, but the fact that it went ahead with it anyway is commendable. We need more commercials like this to educate current and future generations that white is not the only color of skin in the
United States and English is not the only language spoken here.
I will never hide from my culture, and comments like the ones I've seen only make me want to show off my diversity more. I'm blessed to live in a country where there isn't just one skin color or one language. Diversity is a beautiful thing, and if you're not with us, then prepare to be left behind—America is moving on with or without you.
Cecilia Cho is a junior from Overland Park studying journalism.
NATIONAL
Minimum wage increase could strengthen economyv
A particularly
Aparticularly troublesome issue for the public, which has enjoyed substantial attention in the media recently, is the increasing inequality gap between the extremely rich and poor, not just in the United States, but around the world.
A report released two weeks ago by Oxfam International, entitled "Working for the Few," reported that 85 of the world's richest people control more capital than the lowest 3 billion.
Despite the sticker shock of such a figure, some businesses and politicians remain skeptical of the growing issue of economic inequality, even when economists and independent researchers from organizations like Oxfam have proof of a shrinking middle class and a widening gap between the extremely rich and extremely poor. According to an article in the New York Times, the richest five percent of the American population — approximately 15.6 million people — accounted for 38 percent of total domestic consumption in 2012, a 10 percent jump from 1995.
Little can be done about inequality if politicians and policy-makers focus on the validity of statistics rather than addressing the underlying causes. One solution to the growing economic gap, one that President Obama emphasized in his State of the Union address last week, is a national increase in the federal minimum wage.
from the current $7.25 per hour to a more economical $10.10 per hour.
Many opponents to the increase, especially small business owners, argue that an increase would unfairly increase small businesses' expenditures in the forms of wages and benefits, thus decreasing their ability to operate under tighter budgets in a market already dominated by national chains and superstores.
Their concerns have merit, but many businesses have overlooked the repercussions that an increasingly polarized buying public could have for smaller businesses. According to the New York Times, sales for stores and restaurants like Nordstrom's and Red Lobster—generally considered "middle-class" businesses—have sagged in recent years, mostly due to decreasing buying power for much of the middle class because of stagnant, or even decreasing, wages.
While the middle-range stores are floundering, economists have noted increased sales for businesses at opposing ends of the economic spectrum. Sales in luxury brands and stores have increased alongside lower-tier brands and stores while the middle sags, leading economists to speculate on a new, polarized public interested
less in living beyond its means and focused more on "getting by."
The projections of many economists may be frightening to owners of small businesses, but an even more polarized economy may help small businesses retain, at least for a while, their customers seeking affordable products rather than expensive ones. The increased minimum wage would also help millions of workers in every demographic group increase their buying power, thus potentially putting more dollars back into the economy and diluting the percentage of domestic consumption made up by the richer five percent.
INTERNATIONAL
Whether the increase will fix the widening economic gap in America is uncertain, but chances are it's better than continuing down the path America has been traveling in recent years. In a letter released by the Economic Policy Institute shortly before the State of the Union, 600 economists asked President Obama and members of Congress to enact a gradual increase in the minimum wage to $10.10 by 2016. Whether Congress acts is up to its members, but when 600 leading economists agree that an increase would help the American economy, conventional wisdom tells Congress to take their advice. As the past six years have proved, few things of this nature are ever this certain.
Rob Pyatt is a junior from St. Joseph, Mo., studying journalism
Culture shock inevitable changes global perceptions
On my first day studying abroad in Costa Rica over winter break, one embarrassingly trivial thought kept poking its way into the forefront of my mind: "This isn't America."
For someone generally proud of my intellect and handle on language, it was a little disheartening that all I could fixate on was the literal foreignness of a foreign country. Perhaps I overestimated my 'worldliness,' which apparently is not equivalent to the amount of World Market scarves I own or the number of Planet Earth documentaries I've seen.
The Delta plane ride and hotel stay gave little indication of the not-so-earth shattering revelation in store for me, with their neatly-formatted English labels and nearly accent-less hosts. It wasn't until I was in the midst of the central market in San Jose that I fell off of my cultural high-horse, hard. Watching the genuinely friendly interactions between leisurely passersby and taking in the modest, low buildings set against mountains, which seemed to ignore the concept of 'horizon' in a shade of green more complicated than I knew possible, the only words I could grab hold of to sum it up were: "This isn't America."
Perhaps I was so stunned by such an obvious statement because it was my first trip outside the U.S. Maybe I was simply unaccustomed to a place without streets lined by luxury car dealerships and cluttered with "What can you do for me?" mentalities. Or, perhaps, I had duped myself with a lifetime of living through screens, thinking that because I had soaked up artistic camera angles of cathedrals and read
By Erin Calhoun
opinion@kansan.com
biographies and testimonials about foreign places, surely I wasn't naively close minded. But therein lies my problem: a foundation built on virtual networks and experiences filtered through the lens of others. It is the paradox of being well-read or well studied—to adhere firmly to perceptions that aren't your own, to root your beliefs (perhaps subconsciously) in the template of other people's opinions. All too often we consider ourselves experts or conspiracy theorists after watching a particularly riveting Netflix documentary. We grow desensitized to beautiful and repulsive things by stockpiling images we've only virtually inserted ourselves into. While in my time abroad I had been searching for an epiphany with more apparent depth than "This isn't America," my revelation was deceptive in its simplicity. I was humbled by how little life I have lived, belittled by the mountains and volcanoes, and made aware of how to seek my own truth—sans technological intervention or embedded superiorities. Although I hope you find something more eloquent than "This isn't America," and for the sake of your Chipotle fund I'm sure it's not necessary to go overseas, I invite you to put aside your preconceptions, even the ones you believe are unbiased and well-founded, and take in the world around you with no lens but your own.
Erin Calhoun is a ophonore from Naperville, Ill., studying Pre-Medicine
I want to go to Tonic and wear yoga pants and just get my work out on the dance floor.
@KansanOpinion sleep, eat, sleep,
eat, netflix, sleep! #GoingHard
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THE EDITORIAL BOARD
Members of the Kansas Editorial Board are Katie Kutiek, Allison Koen, Lauren Armendariz, Anna Wnner, Sean Powers and Kolby Bots.
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