THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
FRIDAY,FEBRUARY 11,2011
PAGE 3A
opinion
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KU Flash Mob on Good Morning America. THAT'S WHAT'S UP!
Watson computers: All I want is to print something off. It's all I've ever wanted.
I just looked at a picture of the campus that was taken in the summer. I need to feel the sun's warmth. NOW!
There is school on St. Pat's day?
My plan of getting laid with an redhead Irish is ruined!
Why the FIRETRUCK do we have school on Saint Patrick's Day? I mean all I wants is some green beer and to puke it all up the next day, gez.
Today my roommate asked me what the song "Candy Shop" meant, and I said "What do you think it means?" And her reply was "An assortment of candies?"
Egyptian interdiction? What are we Team America World Police?
I was thinking "White Guy." As in, "Pretty Fly for a..."
I rejected my dad's request on FB mainly because I didn't want him to see my pictures :-)
FFA we gotta to be able to get down and dirty but still be classy.
Dear city of Lawrence, I think it is more beneficial to drive with the plow down rather than up when there is snow on the streets. Just a suggestion.
Community College, what a joke.
I think it's a good idea to unfriend your ex on Facebook. It gives you the power of "Yeah, I deleted YOU, b*tr*h"
PROTIP: Don't add your parents on Facebook.
Girls shouldn't be measuring penises that are not their boyfriends'. Just saying.
I've never wanted so badly to erase someone from my life. Until I met you.
The only good thing about Valentine's Day is that we play K-State.
WHAT?! Justin Bieber and Ozzy in the same commercial?! The world is ending before 2012!
Does anyone else enjoy watching people do the almost-fall-down dance as they walk up the hill in the snow. I do!
As I was walking to class, I kept smelling weed... I still have no idea where it came from.
Whenever I meet a lady in the bar, I wonder if underneath the gobs of makeup and behind the Spanx and that Wonderbra lies the girl of my dreams.
EDITORIAL
Throughout the past two weeks, winter conditions across the state of Kansas have reached severe levels, with wind chills plummeting to as low as 20 degrees below zero.
Online tools can save students from frigid temperatures
These conditions, along with heavy snow accumulations throughout the past two months, have made students' treks across campus especially difficult as of late.
Streets and sidewalks have become perilous with ice, and students are met head on with cold winds as they make their way across Mount Oread. For these reasons, students often are unable to make it to on-campus classes when the University remains open during such conditions.
Because of the many transportation difficulties that students face in these elements, the University should give more consideration to the idea of closing down campus on such days more often. Having students stay home would allow snow
removal crews more time to clear streets and sidewalks, unimpeded with the usual waves of pedestrian traffic.
But even when little snow is present, sub-zero temperatures pose health risks that cause several area schools and colleges to close down. It is important to remember that while many students and employees can simply dress warmly and walk across campus with relative ease, there are many others who have particular needs that cannot be adequately addressed in extreme winter weather.
Individuals who are elderly or disabled can often face added difficulties with driving, parking and moving across campus in the frigid cold, which has the potential to hinder their academic experience and opportunities.
Because of the risks of ice and wind chill, the University should consider closing campus more often during periods of intense wind chill and heavy snow for the physical well-being of
students and faculty.
While the University attempts to keep campus open as often as possible so that course schedules can remain relatively stable, many modern technologies can help to overcome this problem. Students may miss the experience of physically going to class, but the use of educational sites like Blackboard makes it possible to easily access class materials online.
On such snow days, teachers could make use of discussion boards and video conferencing to continue with the planned coursework in spite of the snow. Interactive technology gives teachers and lecturers of today more freedom than ever before to be able to contact students outside of the classroom.
Because these means are available and already used widely by instructors at the University, students would already be accustomed to using them as a means of participating in courses even
when campus is closed.
While the University tries to stay open during severe winter weather in an attempt to maintain revenue and timely course progression, the risks to the health of students and faculty members can increase when the cold becomes too extreme.
Educational technology offers instructors opportunities to continue classes online during inclement weather, and having this option ensures that courses can remain on-schedule even if campus is closed.
The university should give more consideration to the needs of students who are out in these sub-zero temperatures and should make efforts in the future to prevent them from having to needlessly risk their health just to make it to class.
Spencer Davidson is a senior in secondary English education from Linwood.
LETTER TO THE EDITOR
Keep your options open, Facebook unfriending not a desperate cry
After reading James Castle's Feb.
9 argument about the etiquette
behind de-friending (or not) an ex on
Facebook, I have to disagree with him
If so, Castle would understand that our nasty breakup and aftermath eventually resulted in a de-friending that was neither impolite nor upsetting.
Now, I have to give my ex some credit: Until the very end of things, he was a nice guy. He constantly went out of his way to keep me happy.
But now that our relationship is over, and we aren't on good terms, I wouldn't call not being friends on Facebook a desperate cry. Instead, I call it a realization that Facebook friends should be the people you actually care to contact.
Thus, there's a real reason why my ex and I aren't fake friends. Because, honesty, I have had enough of him already.
I have a new beau, so now more than ever, I don't long to know my ex's every move. Given he hasn't changed
much since we split, I could probably guess it anyway.
For example, I bet eight hours ago he used the term "broksi" while enjoying a beer. But I don't need the help of Mark Zuckerberg for that. I just use memories of real life.
So since I don't desire knowing my ex's activity, I don't include him as a friend.
Plus, going through the lengthy effort to creep on an ex while keeping yourself hidden doesn't make you seem neurotic and creepy. It does make you neurotic and creepy.
And worse, you're not over it. So rather than being rude, not being friends with my ex due to our circumstances isn't a violation of made-up social rules or a sign that I'm still upset a year and a half after the fact. It just shows we don't talk.
And that doesn't mean I need help.
It means I'm done.
CARTOON
Rachel Keith is a junior from Wichita.
...NOW, HOW CAN WE GET THE ECONOMY TO LOOK LIKE THE GRAPH DOES?"
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LETTER TO THE EDITOR
Egypt has the right to believe US does not care for its citizens
Alex Pugh's recent letter to the editor concerning Egypt is precisely the sort of rhetoric expressed by those who would continue to uphold the status quo in Egypt, the Middle East. His semantic acrobatics concerning the "facts" that might or might not lead one to conclude that the U.S. "cares" about the people of Egypt are de-contextualized at best, and harmful at worst.
The fact of the matter is that the United States has propped up a regime - one that is admittedly not democratic - to the end of keeping the doors of Palestine closed, and at the expense of the well-being of the Egyptian people. Their collusion with the interests of the U.S. and Israel has come with a heavy price-tag - both for the people of Egypt and Palestine as well as the American tax payer.
The harmful nature of Mr. Pugh's letter has to do with the way in which he claims to "agree with many points made by Ms. Jawhari," yet insists on superfluously dismantling a small component of that argument for no other reason than to make an irrelevant point. He effectively points out statistics concerning the state of poverty in the world today, but fails to acknowledge the fact that it is the U.S.'s
support for the regime that cements the reality of the Egyptian people. What's more: it is becoming increasingly clear that it is the actual will of the people that this changes. Surely the will of the people is an important aspect in a democratic paradigm.
As for the Army, I would remind Mr. Pugh and readers that neutrality is hardly a virtuous quality in times of conflict, as evinced by the fact that they stood by and did nothing as Mubarak's thugs terrorized the protesters in Tahrir Square.
The relevant point in the matter is that the Egyptian people do not perceive the United States as being a caring entity, and they have good reason to believe so. The paternalistic and imperialist language of political scientists like Mr. Pugh, who insist on claiming realities other than the one that is evident and ignoring the will of the people is precisely the language of those who would repress the people themselves, and reveals the way of global policy-making that the people of Egypt are resisting in the first place.
Joshua Anderson is a senior in English literature.
POP CULTURE
Beware: Facebook questionnaires reveal more than you think
Every so often I see the results of Facebook questionnaires that match a friend's personality with a TV character. The analogies are generated by their answers to questions which choices have obvious connections to certain characters.
There seems to be a questionnaire for each popular show: "30 Rock," "Glee," "Sex in the City," "Entourage" .. "Murder She Wrote."
Previously, The Kansan covered how profile pictures and tweets reflect a favorable self-identity that we consciously cull, construe and cast onto the Internet (something we can thank Walt Whitman for). What's different about the "Which Character Are You?" quizzes is that the creators of television characters, television writers, purposely put their character's flaws front and center, unlike current Facebook aggrandizement trends.
Sometimes these personality tests are very accurate - of course Mark is Polly D, he loves The Ranch. But what interests me about these questionnaires is not their accuracy, but rather their reflection of how candid, or unknowingly candid, Facebookers are with publishing their faults.
BY MATTHEW MARSAGLIA
mmsarsaglia@kansan.com
At the same time, however, today's viewers are no longer satisfied with stock characters as they were in the past. Consequently, we expect television characters to demonstrate a certain level of complexity, or self-consciousness, by having to come to terms with how other characters reduce them to predefined, token roles.
Television writers don't necessarily "create" characters so much as they tweak established archetypes and throw them together with other archetypes in an attempt to imitate real life.
Often, characters, especially in comedic roles, become offended when other stock characters treat them as the very caricature the writers mold them into.
self-conscious of their creators and the predictable dialogue that's written for them. We see this, for instance, with Tracy Jordan in "30 Rock," who becomes frustrated when he's reminded of what white people expect from him; or when Frank Moody of "Californication" cringes after characters evince his cliché adoption of the machismo, stylishly nihilistic, misunderstood-because-of-my-distaste-for-convention, author archetype.
It's hard for them to take because they know that however impersonal these simplifications are, they play their own role in perpetuating them.
We especially see moments of embracing, self-referenced roles during times of conflict. These are occasions where characters ask themselves "Who am I?" To which they respond, "I'm a romantic," or "I'm a nerd," or "I'm an overtly gay man" or whatever public conception they willfully adopt as their battle cry.
And just as much as motivation is gained by people reminding themselves of their roles, we also see the reverse: characters encouraging conflicted character by reminding them of what societal label they're supposed to uphold in the
I know I'm sampling from just a few shows, but this ambivalence towards public identity is what makes these Facebook questionnaires so interesting to me.
By publishing the results of these questionnaires (and it's not as if the test takers don't know which "Sex in the City" character they are beforehand), Facebook users are not only openly acknowledging or promoting what stereotypical character they are, but also publicly admitting that, like such and such character, I too am insecure with my body, or am a misogynist, or a ditz, or an uppy yuppie, or a suffocating girlfriend, or a workaholic or whatever drawback makes this television character more real.
Perhaps unintentionally, this is what makes the questionnaire takers seem more real, and that's pretty cool.
Marsaglia is a senior in English from Naperville, III.
HOW TO SUBMIT A LETTER TO THE EDITOR
LETTER GUIDELINES
It's surreal, as if characters become
Send letters to kansanopdusk@gmail.com. Write LETTER TO THE EDITOR in the e-mail subject line.
I think back to a "30 Rock" episode where, when Jenna Maroney must confront a public boycott of her acting. Liz Lemon and Jenna's friend asks the blonde diva. "What would Sharon Stone do?"
Length: 300 words
The submission should include the author's name, grade and hometown.
Find our full letter to the editor policy online at kansan.com/letters.
Length: 300 words
Nick Gerik, editor
864-4810 or ngerik@kansan.com
Michael Holtz, managing editor
864-4810 or mholtz@kansan.com
Kelly Stroda, managing editor
864-4810 or kstrata@kansan.com
face of adversity.
D.M. Scott, opinion editor
864-4924 or dscott@kansan.com
Mandy Matney, associate opinion editor
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THE EDITORIAL BOARD
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THE EDITORIAL BOARD
Members of the Kansan Editorial Board are Nick Gerik, Alex Garrison, Kelly Stroda, D.M. Scott and Mandy Matney.