WEDNESDAY, JUNE 30, 2004
OPINION
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
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7
Free for All Call 864-0500
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For more comments, go to www.kansan.com
And remember boys and girls, there's no sex in the champagne room.oh, there's champagne in the champagne room, but you don't want champagne,you want sex.And there's no sex in the champagne room.
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David Padgett sucks. Ryan Greene sucks.
costumes almost punch each other? Thank you Cher and Elton John Concert.
I like dirty boys. Dirty boys with no money.
costumes almost punch each other? Thank you Cher and Elton John Concert.
Why is it that all the guys at the bar are under the impression that a good resting place for their hand is my ass? unfortunately, a guy last thursday had to learn the hard way. I broke his hand. Oops, my bad.
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Stuck here in 435, one-lane highway. I love Kansas and Kansas City and their roadwork.
Hi, I'm drunk and I'm watching my friend in the Phi Kap shirt make out with my boss and my best friend and all I have to say is I'm ready to go home.
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To all of you walking around with your ass sticking out of the top of your pants thinking you look cool, pull that up, I don't want to see that.
costumes almost punch each other? Thank you Cher and Elton John Concert.
Once I have a car, I will give people rides if they are trying to hitch a ride on Massachusetts Street. And that's a promise.
costumes almost punch each other? Thank you Cher and Elton John Concert.
When you're drunk, walking home three miles sucks buttocks.
Saferide needs to have an answering service to tell me when their hours are.
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I don't like the Lakers either. We all know that Luke Walton sucks. He's going to turn out to be just like Christian Latener, good in college but horrible in the NBA. And he is not really good, he sucks.
Generations of Americans get dumber
perspective
Thanks to a lighter workload this summer, I've found myself watching more TV. As a result, I came up with a question, when did we, as a collective nation, decide that we didn't care anymore what we put in our eyes and ears? I found myself flipping through literally hundreds of channels and found that either TV executives have decided that everyone is already dumb, or they have an agenda to slowly eat away whatever cognitive function is left.
Chris Crawford opinionon@kansan.com
I agree with the theory that a combination of things is hurting the American mind. Mainly the rotting American educational system and today's popular culture. Because pop culture pushes its omnipresence from every possible medium in a growing, multimedia, global community, it seems to be the biggest culprit.
When did we get from "The Greatest Generation" to "Generation Whatever Letter Is Next (X, Y...)"? The answer might be when we decided that half an hour would be well spent watching a guy get punched in the nuts. Thank you America's Funniest Home Videos and Jackass. Or maybe when we demanded a show where contestants could eat bull penis and live insects. Thank you Fear Factor. Could we have lost our way and tumbled down the slippery slope when we decided that it was worth $40 on pay-per-view to watch grown men in superhero
The fact is that television is the most influential medium and it continues to cater to the lowest common denominator.
Newlyweds on MTV celebrates the fact that Jessica Simpson is a spoiled, brainless dimwit. And how does America react to the show? We put her on the cover of every magazine and gave her and her very patient husband a short-lived, primetime network variety show. Even in the '60s, it was hard to sell a variety show. But not for the vapid Simpson. All she had to do was flash her big dumb grin and America said, "Hell yeah we'll watch bad skits and music for an hour, Yeehaww!!"
I can't say that I'm immune to this "dumbing down of America." A couple of weeks ago I went to Walgreens with my girlfriend. We happened to be on the toy aisle. In the middle of the toys I found a self-inflating whoopee cushion. You didn't have to blow it up; every squeeze was ready to go. I couldn't get enough of it. I squeezed it four or five times and by the last squeeze I was crying with joy. I proceeded to find my girlfriend on the next aisle and waited until there was someone else shopping at the end of the aisle. I squeezed it behind her and quickly walked away to another aisle. I continued this game on each aisle until I was dying laughing and she was very angry.
The point of the story is that if adults seem to be affected by the infantilization of popular culture and acceptance of all things lowbrow then how will our children react to a cultural environment that continues to snowball downhill?
I have a theory that might allow a glimpse into the future. For years I have developed the "Devolution of the Crawford Man Theory." My great-grandfather started his own car company (not dealership), Sun Automobiles. My grandfather not only was a dentist but also the first television weatherman in Indianapolis in 1950.
My father is just a doctor. I am and have been a career-student for years. The theory goes that if the line of Crawford men continues, if I have a son, he will only clap and throw poop against the wall.
Crawfordd is an Overland park senior in journalism.
Student hourly employees deserve respect
perspective
Part-time jobs are a near necessity in college today. Most students seem to be either looking for a job or already have one. Some have work-study jobs as part of their financial aid packages. Others take up a parttime job to get a little extra spending cash. Even others have jobs so that they can make ends meet and be able to attend college. These jobs range in variety from delivering pizza to telemarketing and retail.
However, there is an under-appreciated group of workers at the University; student-hourly jobs. These positions are offered to students meeting full-time enrollment during the fall and spring semesters. As much as their off-campus counterparts, these jobs may range from working in one of the three dining centers on campus to working in a University office. Most of the time, these students must maintain a minimum number of hours at work as well as manage an often hectic class schedule.
Now the reason I feel that these students are under-appreciated is because most of them are on the "front lines" at the University. By front lines, I mean customer service jobs in which the students have to deal with angry parents or students. Perfect examples of these offices would be admissions, housing, enrollment and financial aid, to name a few.
Lance Watson opinioon@kansan.com
Usually, when students are working at any of these customer service jobs, they are at the front desk, where any random question may be thrown at them. This means that they are not only expected to know common knowledge about their job, but often finite details that others might look over quite easily. Not only are they expected to know Euler's Theorems, but also the bed dimensions in the residence halls. Scientific postulates on how to calculate the speed of light must go hand in hand with how to look up information for admissions in an often confusing computer system.
Finally, and most remarkable, is their constant patience with ranting parents and students. Day after day, these students return to their job knowing that sometime during the day, they will be dealing with an unhappy parent or a distraught student. Now granted, these students do have the backup of a full-time staff who is there to deal with a problem when things become too serious, or when a student is no longer effective in the conversation.
But most of the time, the parents will unleash all of their aggression on the student and either be done with the issue or give into the fact that rules are rules and go about the correct way. If the latter happens, the student will inform them of their options and continue to try to be as helpful as possible. I am not sure if many of us non-student hourlies could be patient enough to break down an appeals process to a parent that has just finished insulting you and the department you work for.
So, in conclusion, my hat goes off to those students who go back to work day after day. I ask you, the reader, whenever you go into an office to raise hell about a problem with your housing or an enrollment hold, just take a good look at the person you are about to chew out. Most likely, they are a student too. Treat them as you would like to be treated. They don't get paid enough to deal with your anger and sarcasm.
Watson is a New Orleans sophomore in human development and family life and sociology.