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Opinion

Florida Alligator
Opinion

American Lit 3-D: Film gimmick has no place in some films

By The Alligator Editorial Board | Feb. 21, 2011

We’ve already established that we’re a little old-school with our love for physical books. While we learn to slowly embrace the digital reading revolution, we’ve overlooked another change. The influx of 3-D movies has been well-documented and discussed, but for the most part we haven’t worried about the reasoning behind the fad. If filmmakers want us to feel like those action-movie explosions are happening in our faces, so be it.

Florida Alligator
Opinion

Quiet de-funding presidential elections

By Zack Smith | Feb. 20, 2011

With Big Bird facing extinction, the federal government on the verge of a shutdown and protests rocking the Middle East as well as our own state capitols, a hallmark of our electoral system for the past quarter of a century was quietly slated for the death chamber.

Florida Alligator
Opinion

Racial profiling a necessary evil

By Ryan Scheb | Feb. 17, 2011

In a letter to the editor published Thursday, the concept of racial profiling is mentioned in conjunction with the evilness of the Republican Party and its opposition to affirmative action. While I realize I won’t make many friends with this argument, I have no problem with racial profiling. Is it ideal? Absolutely not. In an ideal world, every single person would be treated the same in every situation. However, that is simply unrealistic; thus, I believe racial profiling to be a necessary evil.

Florida Alligator
Opinion

Columnist overlooks recycling benefits

By Italo Lenta | Feb. 17, 2011

I was both disappointed and appalled to read Laura Ellermeyer’s column in Tuesday’s  edition entitled, “Recycling proves wasteful in long term.” Leaving aside for the moment the fact that a first-year finance student such as Laura is entitled to hold whatever opinion she wants concerning recycling, I find it inexcusable that the Alligator would print such a socially and environmentally irresponsible article. First, it is a fact that recycling our cans, bottles, plastics and paper allows us to reuse our planet’s scarce resources over and over, thereby reducing the impact caused by the extraction of mineral, forest or petroleum products. Does Ellermeyer know that recycling aluminum cans saves 95 percent of the energy used to produce those cans from scratch? That means you can make 20 cans out of recycled material with the same amount of energy it takes to make one can of new material. Energy savings from recycling cans in 1993 alone were enough to light a city the size of Pittsburgh for six years. It also takes water — a lot of water — to process raw aluminum into cans. Why should we willfully waste resources when we can easily conserve them?

Florida Alligator
Opinion

Recycling more than a financial matter

By Brian McNab | Feb. 17, 2011

In response to Tuesday’s column by Laura Ellermeyer, a student of finance, I think she missed the potential of a further means of reducing the cost of waste management. She — as  is appropriate for finance majors and the students of economics — is preoccupied with the ebb and flow of money, not with the conditions of the planet on which we live. She recommends not recycling because it will save money. Unfortunately, she did not go far enough. To further the reduction in cost, she should have advocated that we could save more money by just dumping our garbage into the streets, where the recycling will be done by dogs, raccoons, opossums and the poor. That way we could fire all of the people who cart away our garbage and sell the trucks that are used to other cities that are stupid enough to insist on recycling.

Florida Alligator
Opinion

Affirmative Action bake sale ignores history

By Diana Moreno | Feb. 16, 2011

The UF College Republicans, the same people who brought you the People Eating Tasty Animals barbecue in 2009 “to raise awareness of the extreme stances of the animal rights organization PETA,” have taken their political activism to the next level with their Affirmative Action bake sale. By charging different prices based on race and gender, they plan to, as their Facebook event page puts it, “denounce the bias of Affirmative Action.”

Florida Alligator
Opinion

Reusing items a good alternative to recycling

By Ashley Pennington | Feb. 16, 2011

Laura Ellermeyer’s editorial in Tuesday’s paper highlights an important topic: the cost of waste. Perhaps a more appropriate title and discussion could have been “Reduce and Reuse First; Recycling Still Uses Resources.” It is true there are costs associated with recycling — fiscal and environmental. That is why the best action one can take is trying to consume less. This helps reduce the amount of resources used to mine and create the products in the first place, as well as avoids the added resource use associated with the process of recycling.

Florida Alligator
Opinion

Gov. Rick Scott cares only for himself

By Chad Mohammed | Feb. 16, 2011

Last week, Gov. Rick Scott presented his budget for the 2012 fiscal year, proclaiming, “This was the budget you asked for.” The proposed budget is $5 billion leaner than budgets of years past, as Scott promised. However, the governor cut from areas most critical to the state’s well-being.

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