Let’s talk about the experience of the Student Alliance Party executive ticket.
I am a 43-year-old father of two. My son is a junior at Gainesville High School, and my daughter is a ninth-grader. Both of my children are exceptional students with bright futures, and they both have a strong desire to attend the UF. While on campus attending sport events and such, they frequently bring home the Alligator to read the latest news on sports, music and campus life.
On Wednesday, I went to Student Body President Jordan Johnson’s town hall forum concerning the new fee for the Reitz Union expansion and repairs. The forum made clear that Johnson is all about appearances and does not care about substance. Despite the repeated explanations I and others gave him that graduate students are already financially stretched thin and do not use the Reitz Union enough to justify paying the fee, he continued to evade the issue and use George W. Bush-like circular logic. Such an approach was not only insulting, but it betrayed the fact that, at the end of the day, Student Government is for and by the undergraduate population, and among them, the Greeks.
What happens when a world becomes so PC (politically correct) that even symbols created to break down barriers come under fire? Well, we have 65 members of the PC police saying they’re offended that their nationality is represented on the Writing on the Wall. Besides the wall having the word Cuban, it also features “Jap,” “Nigger” and other racial epithets. What annoys me about these people is that they totally ignore the fact that the wall represents offensive phrases and words used against someone.
I’m upset that Ana Laura Martinez was offended by the Writing on the Wall Project, but I’m even more upset that Martinez completely missed the point of the activity. The presence of the word “Cuban” on one of those bricks does not mean that the word itself is inherently offensive and derogatory. Instead, it means that the person who wrote “Cuban” on his/her brick felt offended when they heard someone say that word. This distinction is hardly about semantics. The difference is that the person who wrote “Cuban” on his or her brick felt victimized by the speaker, who perverted the meaning of a perfectly reasonable ethnic description.
If there’s any thinking going on behind the closed doors of the Unite Party, it’s clearly not very creative. Rather than offer fresh and innovative ideas about how to raise funds for a renovation of the Reitz Union, Student Body President Jordan Johnson’s Wednesday column in the Alligator recycled the same, tired rallying cry for a raise in student fees. He justified his position by using other Florida institutions as examples of “successful” fee-hiking campaigns. Instead of focusing his energy and Student Government position to encourage the Board of Trustees and the administration to search for financial solutions that would not further burden his constituency, Johnson has embraced the idea that the only way the Reitz can be renovated, his proclaimed “Heart of the Gator Nation,” is by adopting the usual go-to strategy of exploiting the labor of graduate employees. Johnson might claim to be grasping at “history,” but he is really reaching for the wallets of already underpaid and overworked graduate assistants who have rent to pay, classes to teach and families to feed. SG needs to stop showcasing its lack of originality and begin to serve as an example to other Florida universities in how it approaches these renovations, rather than justify a new fee simply because they can’t think of anything better.
This letter is in response to a number of articles, editorials and letters to the editors over the last month or so. Although I intend to address issues from the Dove World Outreach Center to the upcoming Tim Tebow Super Bowl advertisement, my message is somewhat cohesive: Stop apologizing for bigotry.
The administration of the Warrington College of Business Administration recently announced its plans to do away with managerial economics, a long-required course for many majors in the business college. The deans have decided to replace this course with international business, on the claim that a new global economy demands business students learn how to compete worldwide. However, the real reasons motivating their decision show little regard for the business college students and the value of their degrees.
This is regarding Kyle Maistri’s article in Tuesday’s paper about playing pick-up basketball at Southwest Rec. No one should go play pick-up if they are looking to impress the guys around them. Everyone goes to play for the exercise and for the love of the game. This article epitomizes the type of player everyone at Southwest Rec hates to play with. Don’t ever switch on defense, harass anyone who calls a foul on you and then call everything. You play to win, not to look good.
Alligator, I’ve got a wager for you. I find it hilarious the Unite Party says it will be “conducting interviews” to determine its executive candidates. It’s common knowledge they have already chosen Marcus Dixon to run for vice president and Virlany Taboada to run for treasurer. Because I feel bad for the students who will come out to interview when Unite has made up its mind, I’m willing to put my reputation on the line. If I’m wrong then feel free to Dart me, Joshua Niederriter, when they announce their candidates. But if I’m right send a Dart at the party for misleading the Student Body. I hope you take me up on this offer because either way you win.
Last Thursday, the Supreme Court got it right. When the Supreme Court was created by the Founding Fathers, it was not intended to promote social justice or uphold laws that are popular with much of the public. The Supreme Court instead serves to ensure that laws follow the Constitution strictly as it is written.
Editor’s note: This letter was written in response to Thursday’s sex column. To read the column, visit alligator.org/the_avenue
Joe Dellosa, thank you for writing your column, “Infidelity should not be normalized,” in Tuesday’s Alligator. I agree with you wholeheartedly.
In response to Paul Murty’s column: Thank you for your intelligent column on Friday about ignoring the Dove World Outreach Center members when they preach intolerantly on campus.
I was flipping through some of last week’s articles and took issue with some of the articles you chose to run. First off, in “Chris Brown deserves a second chance,” Michelle Profis talks about still listening to Chris Brown’s music. How is this news? Obviously you noticed that this article would leave some people questioning the writer’s real attitude toward domestic violence because you put a disclaimer on it. Why not just pull the whole article? The author denies condoning domestic violence vehemently but then backtracks by saying just because he’s young and “talented” we should throw more money at him. The writer shows she doesn’t understand the seriousness of the crime by starting the article off by calling it “classic celebrity catastrophe,” as if it were just a wardrobe malfunction. It’s bad enough that celebrities routinely get off lightly for what would be heinous crimes if committed by you or me, but when you publish these kinds of opinions as mainstream thought, you only further the mentality that we accept this kind of behavior.
I was reading Thursday’s Alligator when I came across an article about revenge cheating. As I was reading the article, I read a sentence that claimed most people will be cheated on unless they are all-knowing or “one of those weirdos” who’s sober all the time. I find it ridiculous and irresponsible that a college newspaper, read by thousands of binge-drinking and drug-abusing students, would go as far as to label people who refrain from drugs and alcohol as “weirdos.” You are doing a disservice to our community and school by advocating the use of drugs through the condemnation of people choosing to remain abstinent. The Alligator has a moral and social responsibility to try and encourage a safe and healthy environment, not to reinforce the idea that everyone uses drugs and alcohol and those who don’t are “weirdos.” I am afraid that comments like this provide the acceptance and social proof necessary to foster unhealthy behaviors like drug and alcohol abuse. As a school and community, we should try to avoid the negative stigma associated with being one of the top five party schools in the country each year. We should start by looking at our attitudes and beliefs toward drugs and alcohol, and, at the very least, we shouldn’t promote drug use and abuse by condemning those who choose not to use drugs. I’m ashamed this statement was written, approved by the editors and printed for the entire community and Student Body to read. Hopefully, you will be more careful in the future.
Will Penman’s Monday column on same-sex marriage was a peculiar addition to an Alligator issue that included articles on the Dove World Outreach Center, gay adoption in Utah and commemorations of the civil rights movement. Although self-labeled as a man who “can’t figure out what to think about gay marriage,” his mocking ramblings about “not hearing much from the cousin-marriage people,” which also snipe that “it’s very impolite at UF to oppose gay marriage, you know,” show a trivializing ignorance toward the struggle of homosexuals to gain acceptance in contemporary society. Our Student Body’s support of LGBTQ students should not be mocked but cherished in a world where some nations put those convicted of homosexuality to death.
The protest that took place outside of the Dove World Outreach Center illustrates how the demand for tolerance and acceptance in today’s society goes too far. The protesters have their beliefs about God and how a religious organization should act, but the church has its own beliefs. Protesting the beliefs of another group makes little sense to me.
Solutions by The State News
