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MONDAY, JANUARY 20, 2014
PAGE 4A
opinion
TEXT FREE FOR ALL
Commercials for the clap on light system keep coming on, and all I can think of is how awkward that would get during sex
nu union, stop tying to make "The U" happen! It's not going to happen!
Somehow my parents have been oblivious to the fact that I've been pantless 50 percent of break
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I just commented out loud about how attractive this guy is. I wish I had a self-destruct button.
The hate for Smart was real, and I couldn't be more pleased.
Just saw a girl quickly pull into a parking spot, climb onto the hood of her car, and take selfies. I'm as confused as you.
Home, home on the court. Where Naadir and 'Drew Wiggins play. Where Selden Junior, Andrew White the third and Perry Ellis keep dunking all game.
If you have not been to a Women's basketball game in the Phog, you are missing some good basketball
Currently typing this to get the person reading my phone over my shoulder to stop.
Visitor center buses are why I have trust issues
I found four pickles instead of two on my Chick-fil-a today. Truly blessed.
If you could post the required text-book before the first day of class, that would be great.
I didn't know it was possible you could black out on wine.
What if there was a 50/50 chance of you actually dying when you said "I'm dying"? Watch out, white girls.
"Flop on Wayne. Flop on Garth." - Marcus Smart
CAREER
I hate when each bathroom stall has something horribly wrong with it so you have to choose which standard to sacrifice.
Remember that time K-state fans had a "You're not in Kansas anymore" sign?
Sometimes when I climb the hill I pretend I'm a mountain explorer.
Saw a girl wearing a hat at a children's preschool that said "Good girls go to heaven, lesbians go down." Welcome back to LFK!
Sorry Marcus Smart, only Tyler Self can do back flips in Allen Fieldhouse! #BackFlipDump
Authenticity should trump prestigious job opportunities
I was sitting in my bathtub last night browsing the internet, as per my usual post-work routine, when I came across an article that both intrigued and annoyed me. The article shouted, "Don't let your kids graduate with these majors!" Great advice, right? As I was reading, I got so worked up the words for this piece began spilling out of my brain. But I was tired, so while the words kept spilling out, they were going nowhere, instead splashing in the tub and sinking down the drain.
You see, I'm 23, which is old in college years. I don't have the energy that I used to. After taking a full-time job over breaks, my life has become a monotonous interchange of peaks and valleys. Except the peaks are being rushed, and the valleys are being tired. I'm
constantly in a rush to get to work,to get home,to get to bed and I'm constantly tired in between. And constantly unhappy.
Nobody should tell you what to do with your life, and if they do you shouldn't listen. The problem is that you and your parents don't have the same outlook on success. As a kid, your idea of success is happiness, whatever that may be. Maybe it's painting or filmmaking or working at an accounting firm - hey bruh, do you. But for your parents, success is a totally different story. Success as a parent means raising a kid, who goes to college, secures a stable job and becomes a generally productive member of society. No parent wants to be shouldered with the guilt (or judgment from neighbors) that their child grew up
By Preston Bukaty
opinion@kansan.com
to be a stripper, starving artist or street musician. It's not something to brag about to their co-workers.
Consider my story: for 23 years I've followed the advice of my parents to pursue a career in law. It's not that they rammed the idea down my throat, but they suggested it and I was too lazy to try anything else. Currently that's what I'm doing, and I can tell it's just not my passion. I'm bored every day. You don't want to be bored every day of your life.
I'm sure most of you are thinking, "Just quit." If only it were that easy. It only took one idea to start down the road that I'm on, but the road has evolved. Going into law was only my parents' idea at
first, but like anything young and fertile, the idea grew. My parents planted the seed. My grandparents watered it. My aunts and uncles gave it sunlight and fresh air. Soon my friends were involved, throwing in Miracle-Gro and manure alongside career counselors and professional advice-givers. The road I started down has become a huge hill. Turning around would take effort. And I'm tired. Too tired to write, and certainly too tired to trudge back up that hill to start down a different career path.
My point here is to develop yourself this semester, especially if it's your last one at the University. Take classes that interest you. Get involved with activities you truly like. Do what you want to do, because it's what you want to do. Don't take someone's advice
simply because it'll increase your salary or your chance of employment after graduation. That sappy, "Do what you love" stuff is true, because you'll be doing it every day. Forever. Until you die.
College is the time to follow your dreams, if only to see where they go. Not every one grows up wanting to be an accountant or medical equipment salesman or PR coordinator. As a kid, I wanted to be a fireman. That idea was dumb, because that's severe dangerous and I hate sweating, but compared to what I'm doing now, I'd take a stab at it. I still might be rushed, and I'd definitely be tired. But maybe I'd be happy, and I could live with that.
Preston Bukaty is from Overland Park and is a JD candidate in the School of Law.
RELIGION
Asking the right questions to accept different faiths
During breaks, I occasionally end up going back to church with my family as an act of good will. It's always an awkward experience but, thankfully, only rarely confrontational. Once, a woman came up to me and told me how worried she was about my salvation because I had rejected Jesus Christ — somehow she had gotten wind that I was a Muslim now. I was completely caught off guard. I didn't know what to say, but as I walked away I went through all the argument-inducing things I could have said to her in response. I wanted to go back there and yell, "Who are you to say who's going to Hell and who's going to Heaven?"
With social media, it's even easier to take shots at one another. Our Facebook walls can be inundated with arguments over evolution, science versus faith, abortion and same-sex marriage. We can even find ourselves confronting criticism about aspects of our personal lives that we chose to make public. It's easy to get angry, yell at one another and unfriend one another. It's not about talking to another human being but rather about defending and opposing, who's right and who's wrong, who wins and who loses.
In these kinds of arguments we are mostly talking past one another, going different ways on the highways of our dysfunctional "conversations." When are we ever willing to get into the same car as the other person and talk with them rather than against them? Over Christmas dinner, it's quite easy to
attack your uncle's prejudices and dismiss his humanity by calling him a bigot (and don't we all have that one uncle?). It's quite a different thing to cut through the cloud of hurtful words that we both throw at each other and have a real conversation, to meet one another's opinions and beliefs on a deeper level.
Asking what we believe is actually quite shallow, as opposed to why we believe it. "What" questions often turn divisive because they are ways of distancing ourselves from one another. When I ask you this kind of question, I'm not looking for the human in you. On the other hand, real conversations revolve around "why" questions. These questions are about approaching the other person and seeing them as someone like yourself. To be sure, it doesn't mean that we ignore the differences; rather, we begin to understand the reasons for those differences.
The most rewarding interfaith discussion I've been a part of was when my group of friends had a conversation about our respective thoughts on Jesus. After answering each other's "what" questions, our group began to dig deeper. We asked questions like, "For you, why does it matter that Jesus is divine? Why is that important?" And to the Muslims in the group, "Why
do you believe that God can't be incarnate? Why is that a necessary belief for your spirituality?"
ENVIRONMENT
We certainly didn't come to any agreements, but we did reach an understanding of one another. What we did was "achieve disagreement." David Blankenhorn, the founder of the Institute for American Values, uses this term and explained what he meant during a conversation on same-sex marriage hosted by faith radio host Krista Tippett. We can easily dismiss another person by calling them "bad" and "stupid" for what they believe. Blankenhorn calls this a "false disagreement." In contrast, to have a generous and redemptive conversation, rather than a divisive argument, means addressing the other as someone like yourself. This is exactly what we need as members of a diverse society where our lives intersect with lives of others on a daily basis.
Arguments about faith and social ethics in our country are, for the most part, not just divisive but idiotic. Blankenhorn remarks, "In today's world of hyperpolarization and the sheer idiocy that is our public debate the heart just cries out for this kind of serious effort to achieve disagreement." His words reverberate with me. As a convert and as a Muslim-American, I cry out to be understood. Is it too much for me to imagine that others who believe differently than I want the same?
Garrett Fugate is a graduate student from St. Louis studying architecture.
Help the Earth this New Year
I don't believe in making New Year's resolutions. We shouldn't make changes in our lives simply because it's Jan. 1 and society says we should. Instead of making egocentric changes this year, I propose a profound, committed shift in attitude. A change that takes ourselves out of the spotlight and puts something much bigger on center stage: the environment.
Many philosophies on human-environment interaction have come and gone throughout history. The way we treat the natural world represents the values and morals of our society. Each society in history has or had an overarching idea about the environment that integrated itself in day-to-day functioning. For example, the Swinomish tribe of Washington places a cultural and ceremonial value on the salmon, indicating its ties to the coastal land and its natural inhabitants. In contrast, Americans of the late 1800s saw the environment as an opportunity for expansion. American Imperialism resulted in the great land grab of Guam, Hawaii, the Philippines and Puerto Rico. This allowed the U.S. to force its ideologies on sovereign nations, while at the same time opened up natural resources to economic exploitation. Although abuse of the environment occurred all over the world long before imperialism, it still stands as a sad example of how our society views the environment: an avenue for monetary and political gains.
By Gabrielle Murnan opinion@kansan.com
anthropocentric society, meaning we think humans are the most important and central living entity on this planet. We place ourselves at the top of every food chain by pointing out our superior ability to form morals. But does the ability to create standards of behavior place us in a position to manipulate and abuse natural resources and other living species? We may have higher intellectual functioning, but the basic processes that keep us alive come from our environment. Our food, water and air are all virtue of other living organisms and natural systems. We could not survive without the microorganisms that create nutrient-rich soil for our food. Life as we know it would be altered without clean water sources that replenish our bodies. And we could not function without clean air given by plant life.
Unarguably, we are an
Is this simply another environmentalist's rant? No, this is a call to action — a call for a change in attitude. It is time for us to shake off the stigma of "tree hugger" and find the intrinsic value in all species. This year, I encourage everyone to shed the anthropocentric ideal and adopt a more biocentric view: the idea that all species are connected and interdependent, therefore value lies in everything. This idea has power. Happy New Year. Let it be one the Earth will remember.
Gabriele Murnan is a sophomore from Pittsburg studying environmental studies.
@Brett Steinbrink
@KansanOpinion To play Quidditch again!
FFA OF THE DAY Every picture of Bill Self is a selfie.
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@KansanOpinion March Madness. Is there really any other answer?
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