What came first, the cynicism of the student body or those equally negative and detrimental opinions expressed in The Chronicle editorial pages. Forget chickens and eggs, this is something that’s got me quite flustered.
I decided to become a Chronicle columnist because, last year, I was just plain bored. Every column about the same thing. That’s the problem with having 30 columnists that each write once every two weeks: every writer wants to have their say on the same issue. William Safire, op-ed columnist for the New York Times, who writes every day or so, isn’t going to be writing about the PSM conference on Monday and then again on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday. Well that would be just dumb.
So I decided to take on this academic challenge because I was tired of hearing the same thing said from a different byline. Good for me? Not really. Now I have to read the paper every single day. Every single column (maybe even the funny cartoons). Gotta make sure I’m not being repetitious, right?
Let me tell you, if you actually read the editorial page every single day of the week, you’re going to start hating Duke. It’s pretty much as inevitable as Nader losing this presidential election.
You’ll hate the tenting policy. You’ll hate Duke Student Government. You’ll hate Durham. You’ll hate the West Campus parking situation and definitely hate the new tailgate policy. You’ll hate both Palestinians and Israelis. You’ll hate Brodhead, Moneta and Majdi. And what’s amusing is that you’ll hate all these things more than you hate the Tar Heels. And that is a serious sign of something fundamentally flawed with the op-ed section of this paper.
And why? Because 82 percent of the columns written on these last two pages are just so annoyingly negative. Wednesday, I read a whole article talking about how someone hates DSG so much and believes that it provides no possible positive solutions or decisions that he would go out of his way to run, win and then disband the government. Are you kidding me? I just wasted about six minutes reading that column, and all I learned was that he holds the same grudge he already wrote about in a previous column. He pretty much hates DSG. Good to know.
I read an article the same day with a punchline about how there couldn’t possibly be anything fun or rewarding to do in Durham. While it offered fun things to do in Chapel Hill (which in my opinion is a great article topic), it left all of the readers with a poor taste in our mouths for our four year home. Is that necessary?
Now I’m not saying I’m king of the playground when it comes to columns. I just try to turn these op-eds into something that can be enjoyable as well as informative. But I think there needs to be some point. A moral or lesson. Almost like a Dr. Seuss novel. We can’t just talk about how the Onceler cut down all the Truffula trees. We need to say how you can plant a seed to bring all the Lorax back.
So… the literary irony in this column is that all I’ve done thus far is expressed my negative views on these daily editorials. Here you go people: a solution. I want two things: 1) I want the writers in these pages to stop thinking of themselves as “holier than thou” critics and self proclaimed informants to the student body. Instead, start thinking of yourselves as intellectuals with opinions and suggestions, something we know you all are, but from many have yet to see. 2) Freshmen to seniors: If you have any opinion whatsoever and the writing skills of a middle school graduate (pretty much the only necessities for this position), apply to be a columnist. I’d rather not have a job next semester if it means I can read one article a day in this op-ed section and not be totally bored or repulsed.
We all know there are problems on this campus, but people need to start offering up some solutions. Talking about how much you hate Duke without any alternative is pretty pointless. It’s all just so “blah,” I don’t even feel like reading anymore. Let’s do something to change all that.
Yoni Riemer is a Trinity sophomore.
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