As seen in the Oregon Daily Emerald!
The EMU is a great place — not only is it home to the Oregon Daily Emerald, but it’s also the campus’s source for binding, sandwiches and, thanks to the Pacifica Forum, controversy.
The Pacifica Forum was founded 15 years ago by Orval Etter, a 94-year-old retired public policy professor. His intention was to create an informal group that would gather to discuss issues such as violence, militarism, and war from multiple points of view. However, in 2003 the Forum began inviting Holocaust deniers and white separatists to speak at their meetings in order to give perspective on the Israel debate, which is a surefire way to piss off the neighbors. For example, in 2008 the Forum hosted a lecturer who referred to Martin Luther King Jr. as a “moral leper and communist dupe” and declared that an ODE columnist who supported the War in Iraq displayed a “Talmudic hatred for humanity.” So, y’know, that’s one point of view, I guess.
Recently the Southern Poverty Law Center , an Alabama-based civil rights organization, declared the Pacifica Forum a hate group, which led ASUO President Sam Dotters-Katz to demand that it no longer be allowed to meet in the EMU. Members of the Pacifica Forum argue that they have every right to be there, as Etter is a professor emeritus at the University, and that they are a free speech organization, not a hate group. The debate came to a head on Friday at the Pacifica Forum’s most recent meeting, billed as a response to the SPLC’s designation. What began as a discussion devolved by the end of the meeting into members of the Pacifica Forum and its detractors exercising their right to free speech very loudly at one another. Notable highlights from the proceedings include a comparison of the Southern Poverty Law Center to the KGB and the declaration from those involved with the Forum that hate doesn’t incite violence, which the Forum’s opponents countered by declaring the Forum a “freak show” and defined anti-Semitism as reading Holocaust denier literature “without puking.” The dispute ended when Etter rose from his wheelchair, Dr. Strangelove style, and adjourned the meeting.
To the Pacifica Forum: If you’re trying to prove to the community that you aren’t a hate group, yelling at your detractors isn’t going to do you any good. Right now a whole lot of people perceive you as crazy and antagonistic, and whether that’s true or not doesn’t matter when your meetings consist of a roomful of people yelling at one another. In defending your right to be on campus, you’ve basically dug your own grave.
To the Forum’s opponents: I understand that these are heated issues. I’ve listened to the tape of the proceedings, and people indeed said some shocking things. But by yelling right back and referring to their views as “garbage” you’re just fanning the flames and doing nothing to resolve the issue.
In this writer’s opinion, the Pacifica Forum is a hate group. It’s one thing to host a speaker at your discussion group who denies the Holocaust, but when you repeatedly give stage time to Holocaust denial and speakers with ties to Neo-Nazi organizations and white supremacy groups, there is cause for concern. The Forum has thus far been allowed to meet on campus because of Etter’s ties to the University, however, I echo the opinion of Sam Dotters-Katz that the presence of a hate group in the EMU undermines student union’s mission of cultural development.
However, the absolute worst way to deal with what certainly appears to be a hate group is to stand there and pitch hate right back in its face — it’s a waste of time and is about as likely to make people reconsider their beliefs as their yelling is to make you change yours.
I get that this is also a very personal debate. I’m not Jewish, and while I find a lot of the things that were said at the meeting to be offensive, I’d guess they’re much more so to people closer to the situation than I. But in fighting hate, it’s important to keep your cool, lest you become what you’re fighting against. Because here’s the thing: After awhile listening to the tape, I couldn’t tell who was who anymore — it all sounded like a bunch of angry people yelling at each other.
Wednesday, April 29, 2009
Sunday, April 26, 2009
Mystery Science Hatemail Theater 3000
Woah... Fuck you, Truman Capps!
So some of you may have noticed that my most recent column for the Daily Emerald pissed off basically everyone in the universe. This is a sampling of some of my more colorful constructive feedback.
**
Read your article concerning concealed carry on college campus.
Good to know – I was wondering, actually. How’d you like it?
May I inform you of a few facts, about myself in particular.
Oh, this probably isn’t a fan letter.
When I went to school (Grammar school & high school were all in one building) in rural NC in the 1950s every old farm truck that we got to drive to school in order to pick up fertilizer, etc. on the way home had a gun rack and a .22 rifle or shotgun hung in all the racks.
Fertilizer Etc? That sounds like some sort of hillbilly boutique shop.
Most were loaded, none were stolen. In the beds of those trucks were a variety of weapons; axes, bush axes, pitchforks, hoes, grubbing hoes, chains, ropes, wire, knives, etc. etc.
So what I’m getting from this is that rural North Carolina in the 1950s had a serious zombie problem. And also, I live by a few sorority houses and I’ve seen more than my fair share of grubbing hoes in the beds of pickup trucks, thank you very much.
Every boy I knew back in those days had a pocket knife you could shave the hairs on your arm with ; a matter of pride.
Yeah, gotta keep that arm hair in check. Y’know, for the… Pride.
I doubt seriously if you could have kidnapped one of us without serious risk to your well being. This was high school. By the way, we were taught at an early age to respect our fellow man and not to interfere with his lawful pursuit of his business. Notice I said lawful pursuit.
I’m sorry that my contrary opinion apparently interfered with your lawful pursuit. From, like, two thousand miles away. Apparently the pen is mightier than the concealed weapon.
By the time I was college age, (20) I was halfway around the world in Nam, a crew chief in a US Navy Combat Flight Crew. We carried handguns on our persons and had fully automatic weapons on the plane which we used to defend this country.
You were a crew chief at age 20? Yeah, well, I wrote a hit public access TV show and directed it, so I’m not sweating it either.
I did my time as a police officer and served the public with a weapon on my person most of the time.
I carry a weapon (with a TX concealed carry permit) about 99.9% of the time.
LOL TEXAS LOL
I do my time about once a week on the range to keep myself well versed in the use of that weapon. I very seldom go anyplace I can't carry the weapon. I am retired so I have very little need to go where the weapon can't go.
Because, I mean, the Old Country Buffet can get pretty crazy on a Friday night. You can’t just go in there with your dick swingin’ in the breeze.
I haven't been on an airplane since 9-11 and don't intend to board another one unless it is a matter of life or death, mine. I most certainly have no need to go on a college campus as they are about the most liberal places I can think of, most especially in my part of the country.
Wow, really? The most liberal places in all of Texas? You’re just adorable. Listen, let me tell you something: Never come to Oregon. I see like five drum circles before breakfast, and just last night I saw what I thought was a woman taking a piss at a urinal.
In short I should like to take this opportunity to remind you that, contrary to popular opinion, the world is a dangerous place.
…Really? You mean the terrorists aren’t kidding when they say ‘Death to America’?
We have a real war going on here just south of the border in Mexico plus the usual amount of crime in a city. (El Paso, TX).
I’m with you there – I’d want to have a gun on me at all times in El Paso too. That way, suicide is always an option.
I do not intend to be caught in a crossfire without the ability or means to protect myself & mine. Thank you, however you may keep the "hope & change" that this government has promised us and I will keep my guns. I shall not trespass on any college campuses.
That’s a damn shame, because I feel like you’d be a real big hit with us liberal kids.
I shall also endeavour to not offer assistance to anyone in distress or who is being attacked as my interference could pose a risk to my fellow man.
Yeah, well, it’s all about the sanctity of life with me. Pray tell, dear sir, what are your thoughts on the matter?
I assume it would be a greater risk to offer my assistance than the risk incurred by being harmed by a career criminal and besides, I should most likely be prosecuted if I did so and harmed the criminal. We most certainly wouldn't want to harm the criminal, it would probably damage his self esteem while operating in his chosen profession.
And I appreciate that – criminals kick ass!
John,
Texas
**
(From the Oregon Commentator blog)
You didn’t think we were going to let yesterday’s opinion piece in the ODE about concealed carry on campus slip by, did you? In case you missed it, columnist Truman Capps wrote about how icky guns are and how they shouldn’t be allowed on college campuses.
You did, however, let my hard hitting investigative piece about corruption at the highest levels of the Miss Lane County Pageant slip by, though – and you call yourselves journalists.
There is no Oregon statute against concealed carry in bars or college campuses. According to ORS 166.370, possession of a firearm in a public building is a Class C felony, but one of the exceptions is “[a] person who is licensed under ORS 166.291 and 166.292 to carry a concealed handgun.” In fact, the only public buildings you are not allowed to carry a firearm into are courtrooms, airports and federal buildings.
The university system code against concealed carry is in clear contradiction of state law. I don’t even know where Capps got the idea that concealed carry is illegal in bars.
Wow, my bad – I assumed the state legislature had taken precautions against serving alcohol to people carrying guns. That must have been another one of my trips to the magical happy land of Common Sense.
Perhaps before he writes an article disseminated to the whole campus, he should do some basic research first. Or perhaps his editors should fact-check his stories for, y’know, blatant errors. Perhaps a retraction is in order.
Yeah, because if I made that correction then everyone would stop being mad at me for trying to strip away their civil liberties and throw them into gulags by not allowing them to carry handguns on college campuses.
I wrote an article last year about concealed carry on campus, which prompted this response from the ODE. Searching through the blog archives for “concealed carry” and “gun control” is also fun.
P.S. In his penultimate paragraph, Capps writes, “[I]f campus safety is such a concern, let Department of Public Safety have guns.” Can we nominate this for oxymoronic phrase of the year or something?
Instead, let everyone but public safety have guns. Just watch them try and write a parking ticket then!
**
(From “FoundingFathers”)
3 Quotes about arms from our Founding Fathers:
"The strongest reason for people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government." -- (Thomas Jefferson)
Followed by the quote, “Man, I hope a bunch of whackjobs in Michigan don’t use that as an excuse to stockpile guns if we elect a black guy.”
"Any society that would give up a little freedom to gain a little security will deserve neither and lose both." Benjamin Franklin
”What happens in a brothel in Paris stays in a brothel in Paris… Right?”
"...to disarm the people - that was the best and most effectual way to enslave them." (George Mason, 3 Elliot, Debates at 380)
”And, speaking as a slaveowner myself, chains are great too.”
Do you think our founding fathers were kidding about this? Would they give up their rights because of a handful of isolated tragedies? Want to dwell on tragedies...the US...with your tax dollars...with the puppets you have elected...have killed ONE MILLION Iraqi's.
Dude, HUGE burn on puppets.
This self-identified-liberal gun restriction rhetoric in this article has been echoed so many times, its sickening. We've all heard this before.
”Self identified liberal”? Fuck you, asshole, I don’t need to go have somebody else designate me as a liberal – I’ll do that myself. There’s at least one individual liberty I support.
Gun control laws only stop law-abiding citizens. In the coming years, we will see civil unrest the likes of which we can't fathom at the moment. Martial law may be enacted by our puppet-on-a-string for a president Obama.
Yeah, that’s right! If we’re not allowed to have our guns with us on college campuses, Obama will overthrow the country! He’ll just make sure everybody’s on a college campus first so we can’t use our guns to put up a fight!
Tell me what you are going to do when the desperate criminals break down your door with their eye on everything you hold dear? Call the police? Sing them a song about Obama? Tell them about your carbon footprint?
Actually, the plan was to have gay sex with one of them while simultaneously giving a 16 year old an abortion. Good guesses, though.
Take you rights back! Our founding fathers died for them...
While raping their slaves.
**
Truman Capps is slightly dismayed that the group of people he pissed off the most was the gun owners who have their weapons on hand at all times.
Wednesday, April 22, 2009
Mo' Firearms, Mo' Problems
As seen in the Oregon Daily Emerald!
The common argument made by the NRA is that guns don’t kill people, people kill people. This is mostly true, with the notable exception of the scene in True Lies where Jamie Lee Curtis drops a machine gun and it kills a roomful of terrorists. I would argue, however, that guns make it significantly easier for people to kill other people, and the majority of people on Earth ought not to be killed in the first place, with the notable exception of roomfuls of terrorists and certain Somali pirates. This reasoning is why I’m against allowing concealed carry on university campuses.
Currently, concealed weapon permit holders can take their guns with them everywhere except for government buildings, bars, and college campuses. While most people agree that it’s a good idea to keep firearms away from edifices of government and booze, there are 11 colleges nationwide that allow concealed carry on campus, most notably every public college in Utah. Due to some inexplicable admiration of Utah, lawmakers in the Texas House of Representatives are in the process of passing a bill which will make it illegal for public universities in Texas to prohibit gun owners with concealed carry permits from bringing their weapons onto college campuses.
Advocates of concealed carry on campus allege that allowing students and faculty to bring firearms to school is in accordance with their second amendment rights. The website for Students for Concealed Carry on Campus (SCCC), a nationwide grassroots organization that advocates exactly what you’d expect it to, makes mention of the fact that experts agree concealed carry permit holders are five times less likely to commit violent crimes. What appears to be the central tenet of the call for allowing concealed carry on college campuses is the necessity to allow college students and faculty to defend themselves in the event of a Virginia Tech-style shooting spree.
I live in Portland and listen to NPR, and my family owns both a Prius and a Subaru (with a Volvo in our recent past) – it goes without saying that I disagree with the notion that a campus full of armed students and staff is any safer than an unarmed campus. While I agree that guns don’t kill people, people kill people, I also am a firm believer in “Mo’ firearms, mo’ problems,” especially on a college campus.
I’ve never heard a lot of people arguing to allow concealed carry in bars. Just about everyone seems to agree that a drunk person with ready access to a loaded gun is a genuinely bad thing. The thing is, after about 7:00 on any night of the week, a college campus and the surrounding areas become home to dozens of tiny bars, in the form of frat parties and freshmen playing beer pong in their dorm rooms. Have you ever seen two drunk people get into an argument? Imagine if one of them had a gun. It doesn’t even have to be a concealed carry permit holder – it could be a concealed carry permit holder’s roommate who took his gun. Let’s keep both alcohol and firearms prohibited on campus – people apparently respect at least one of those rules, and it’s been working out so far.
Of course, banning firearms on campus only ensures that law abiding students and staff don’t carry, which, in the eyes of the SCCC, puts us at the mercy of potential campus shooters. On the SCCC website, an image on the front page asks visitors which campus a mass murderer would be more likely to target – one that doesn’t allow students to carry guns, or one where students are allowed to be armed?
Here’s the thing, though – in my experience, mass murderers don’t seem to be terribly preoccupied with self-preservation. That could be why most of them commit suicide. And sure, an armed student body could potentially put down a campus shooter. But I think there’s a greater likelihood that if a campus shooter attacked an armed student body, responding police would have to deal with dozens of armed, adrenaline crazed people running around, and the resulting confusion wouldn’t do anybody any good. Mo’ firearms, mo’ problems.
If campus safety is that big of a concern, let’s let DPS have guns, not everyone else. Until then, I’m hesitant about allowing hundreds of guns onto campus in order to protect against one.
The common argument made by the NRA is that guns don’t kill people, people kill people. This is mostly true, with the notable exception of the scene in True Lies where Jamie Lee Curtis drops a machine gun and it kills a roomful of terrorists. I would argue, however, that guns make it significantly easier for people to kill other people, and the majority of people on Earth ought not to be killed in the first place, with the notable exception of roomfuls of terrorists and certain Somali pirates. This reasoning is why I’m against allowing concealed carry on university campuses.
Currently, concealed weapon permit holders can take their guns with them everywhere except for government buildings, bars, and college campuses. While most people agree that it’s a good idea to keep firearms away from edifices of government and booze, there are 11 colleges nationwide that allow concealed carry on campus, most notably every public college in Utah. Due to some inexplicable admiration of Utah, lawmakers in the Texas House of Representatives are in the process of passing a bill which will make it illegal for public universities in Texas to prohibit gun owners with concealed carry permits from bringing their weapons onto college campuses.
Advocates of concealed carry on campus allege that allowing students and faculty to bring firearms to school is in accordance with their second amendment rights. The website for Students for Concealed Carry on Campus (SCCC), a nationwide grassroots organization that advocates exactly what you’d expect it to, makes mention of the fact that experts agree concealed carry permit holders are five times less likely to commit violent crimes. What appears to be the central tenet of the call for allowing concealed carry on college campuses is the necessity to allow college students and faculty to defend themselves in the event of a Virginia Tech-style shooting spree.
I live in Portland and listen to NPR, and my family owns both a Prius and a Subaru (with a Volvo in our recent past) – it goes without saying that I disagree with the notion that a campus full of armed students and staff is any safer than an unarmed campus. While I agree that guns don’t kill people, people kill people, I also am a firm believer in “Mo’ firearms, mo’ problems,” especially on a college campus.
I’ve never heard a lot of people arguing to allow concealed carry in bars. Just about everyone seems to agree that a drunk person with ready access to a loaded gun is a genuinely bad thing. The thing is, after about 7:00 on any night of the week, a college campus and the surrounding areas become home to dozens of tiny bars, in the form of frat parties and freshmen playing beer pong in their dorm rooms. Have you ever seen two drunk people get into an argument? Imagine if one of them had a gun. It doesn’t even have to be a concealed carry permit holder – it could be a concealed carry permit holder’s roommate who took his gun. Let’s keep both alcohol and firearms prohibited on campus – people apparently respect at least one of those rules, and it’s been working out so far.
Of course, banning firearms on campus only ensures that law abiding students and staff don’t carry, which, in the eyes of the SCCC, puts us at the mercy of potential campus shooters. On the SCCC website, an image on the front page asks visitors which campus a mass murderer would be more likely to target – one that doesn’t allow students to carry guns, or one where students are allowed to be armed?
Here’s the thing, though – in my experience, mass murderers don’t seem to be terribly preoccupied with self-preservation. That could be why most of them commit suicide. And sure, an armed student body could potentially put down a campus shooter. But I think there’s a greater likelihood that if a campus shooter attacked an armed student body, responding police would have to deal with dozens of armed, adrenaline crazed people running around, and the resulting confusion wouldn’t do anybody any good. Mo’ firearms, mo’ problems.
If campus safety is that big of a concern, let’s let DPS have guns, not everyone else. Until then, I’m hesitant about allowing hundreds of guns onto campus in order to protect against one.
Sunday, April 19, 2009
Don't Know What You Got 'Till It's Gone
Not the same, goddamnit...
And that was the last time I ever saw my hard drive. Alive, that is.
The next day, an Apple technician told me over the phone what I’d dreaded was true – my hard drive had hit an iceberg and sank, taking a year and a half’s worth of accumulated stuff with it like so many ill-fated extras in the movie Titanic.*
*Titanic is one of my girlfriend’s favorite movies, and she let me use her computer extensively throughout the crisis I’m writing about. This one’s for you, Jen.
Getting my computer fixed took about five days. I don’t know if any of you have ever had to spend an extended period of time without your computer, but if you haven’t, I don’t recommend it. Those five days felt like a boring, depressing month, because as I quickly realized, my computer is pretty much at the center of my life. I use my computer for all my homework in addition to all my non-homework. About the only thing I don’t use my computer for is eating, and even then, I eat about half of my meals sitting in front of my computer watching Arrested Development on Hulu. The second day without my computer, I ate a Qdoba burrito sitting at my empty desk, staring at the wall, completely out of habit. Not kidding.
It didn’t help that one of the overhead lights in my room burnt out at roughly the same time as my hard drive burnt out, because this made my room look shadowier and more depressing. My room is a boring place without my computer – I’ve got no TV and no printed pornography, so what else is there to do? Read? I wound up going to the library a few times to use their computers, but there are several hobos who also make regular use of the library computers. Not only did this make me feel dirtier for having used the same keyboards, but also I felt that we suddenly had something in common thanks to our shared desperation for Internet access. It’s never a nice feeling to know you’re doing the same thing as a hobo. That’s why I don’t yell racial slurs on street corners anymore.
Hoping to avoid catching AIDS from a library desktop, I checked out a school laptop from the technology department. As I recall from what little Harry Potter I’ve read, the school brooms at Hogwarts were pretty beat up and wouldn’t quite fly straight. The same could be said of the University of Oregon’s laptops. The six-year-old Dell I got from the library had the same general sliminess to it that most library computers do, and within ten minutes of getting it set up at home it crashed due to a thoroughly drained battery. For the 11 and a half hours it was in my apartment (I had to take this highly valuable piece of equipment back to the library at 9:00 the next morning to renew it) it felt vaguely like an impostor, as though your mother had gone on a business trip for five days and had hired a down on her luck prostitute to fill in while she’s gone. You wouldn’t feel comfortable with that woman. You wouldn’t form an attachment. And you’re damn sure you wouldn’t hug her. My loaner computer was basically a fake hooker mom, and I almost missed staring at the wall while I ate.
On Tuesday the tech repair center called to tell me my computer was fixed. I picked it up and was glad to see the little guy again, but his brush with death had clearly changed him. He was not the same on the inside – most likely because they’d had to replace his hard drive. The old hard drive, it seems, had incurred a mechanical failure of the sort that caused a piece of metal to scrape back and forth across the drive, literally scratching data right off of it. Apparently when they opened the back of the computer, ones and zeroes just came cascading out of there. Y’know, because so much data got scratched off. Not my best joke, but that was more or less what I thought about when they told me.
I’d been backing up my My Documents folder to an online backup server for several months. That, I had thought, was enough – it covered all of my schoolwork, all the blogs, and everything I’d written since 5th grade (although to be fair, the world would be a much better place without most of the video game fan fiction I cranked out in middle school). As far as I was concerned, these were the only important things on my computer.
About a year ago, I found an awesome pen and ink drawing on the Internet of a SWAT team battling a horde of zombies breaking into a building. I don’t know where I found it, but I saved it onto my computer in my “Awesome Pictures” folder, which I had not been backing up. That picture is gone, and there’s very little chance I’m ever getting it back. There’s a part of me missing now – a very specific, niche part of me, but a part of me nonetheless. Will I ever find another SWAT team zombie battle picture? Probably not. There’s not a wide market for that sort of thing. I also lost all of my music and the software I’d downloaded, along with my Watchmen desktop. I now know exactly how people feel after their house burns down with all their possessions inside. I mean, do you know how long it’s going to take me to download Camino again?
Some people say that God doesn’t shut a door without opening a window, and I’ll admit, the loss of all my MP3s has galvanized me into obtaining a much wider variety of new music (through entirely legal means) than I would have before, and the chance to load up my computer with all new data gives me a chance to be a little tidier with it this time around. However, I can’t help but wish that maybe God could have just left the fucking door open in the first place because it would’ve saved everyone a headache.
Truman Capps is rebuilding his lolcat collection from scratch, so to speak.
Sunday, April 12, 2009
RIP Hard Drive
The hard drive in my MacBook died two days ago, turning the linchpin of my scholastic abilities into a $1500 paperweight. It also made all of the information present on it disappear faster than you can say "AIG." This included my homework, the novel I've been working on for four years, and everything else I've ever written.
Fortunately, I've been backing up my computer to an online Apple server every night for the past six months, and my Dad has been kind enough to wrestle with the service in an attempt to restore my information. Mad upz to Dad for that one. The good news is that I'll be getting everything back - novel, homework, my entire writing history. The bad news is that until I get my computer back from Apple, I'm going to have to be a computer hobo, looking at porn in the library and writing blogs on The Girlfriend's (currently functioning) MacBook.
So this is your Saturday update - hopefully next time you're here, there will be something else. If this wasn't funny enough for you, feel free to go on YouTube and look at Chocolate Rain remixes for awhile.
Truman Capps has had one helluva weekend.
Fortunately, I've been backing up my computer to an online Apple server every night for the past six months, and my Dad has been kind enough to wrestle with the service in an attempt to restore my information. Mad upz to Dad for that one. The good news is that I'll be getting everything back - novel, homework, my entire writing history. The bad news is that until I get my computer back from Apple, I'm going to have to be a computer hobo, looking at porn in the library and writing blogs on The Girlfriend's (currently functioning) MacBook.
So this is your Saturday update - hopefully next time you're here, there will be something else. If this wasn't funny enough for you, feel free to go on YouTube and look at Chocolate Rain remixes for awhile.
Truman Capps has had one helluva weekend.
Thursday, April 9, 2009
Slumdog Thousandaire
Late update - thank the spotty wireless service in my apartment.
As seen in the Oregon Daily Emerald!
Those of you who are living in the dorms have no doubt begun to look forward to a time when you can get the hell out of the dorms, just as my friends and I did last year. Your relationship with your roommate is slowly deteriorating, the stoners in your hall are steadfastly continuing to hotbox the shower, and come the first big heatwave of spring term you’ll learn that the dorms start to smell twice as bad when the temperature rises. These are some of the reasons why almost all students opt to find off-campus housing rather than returning to the dorms for a second year. Unfortunately, things do not improve once you get off campus.
There’s always the option of living across the river in Dux Village, Chase Village, or Stadium Park, but while the units over there are luxurious and generally affordable, they are also a half hour’s walk away from campus. If you don’t have a car, this puts you entirely at the mercy of LTD, which offers essentially no service to and from campus on the weekends or between 7 PM and 10 PM on weekdays. I was reluctant to put myself in this position, so I searched for and found an apartment close to campus. The results have been disappointing, to say the least.
Real estate close to campus is an interesting game – a few lending companies own nearly all of the property in the area, and as there is a steady supply of students flowing into Eugene with a constant need for cheap housing, they don’t have to work too hard to attract business. As a result, housing conditions are generally sub par and management is less than competent or courteous. When I first arrived in my apartment this year, which cost extra as it had been remodeled over the summer, I found floors covered in drywall, electrical sockets installed upside-down, and the doorjamb splintered where somebody had attempted to kick the door in. Our furnished dinner table is so unsteady that eating with one’s elbows on the table is a recipe for disaster, we had to haggle with management for weeks to get a fourth chair so our fourth roommate could eat at the wobbly table with us, and when the furnished TV we’d been promised finally arrived (ten weeks late) we were not surprised to find that the picture would go fuzzy if somebody so much as coughed anywhere near it. To cap it all off, my roommate’s bedroom is not level – there’s a three-inch incline from the north end of the room to the south end. This is especially frustrating to my roommate because he’s an architecture major, who now goes home after a hard day of designing structurally sound buildings to a room where walking eight feet results in a drop in altitude.
These incidents are not unique to my lending company, Capri Apartments. Residents in units owned by Von Klein Property Management and Bell Real Estate have had similar experiences. Many tenants complain that it’s nearly impossible to recover a security deposit from either company, and in one case a former resident related that Von Klein charged him for six hours worth of cleaning in his recently vacated apartment, despite the fact that he’d left it spotless. Repairs for broken utilities are said to come slowly or not at all. For students leaving the dorms who want to live close to campus, there really is no “good” option – as the majority of the properties close to campus are owned by these three companies, oftentimes the best one can do is find the lesser of three evils.
Area landlords argue that they are reluctant to provide exquisite housing or return deposits because students are less reliable tenants than ordinary renters, due to our propensity toward frequent wild parties and drunken antics, which can spell disaster for carpets, walls, or any other surface that can be vomited upon. In an online comment on the Daily Emerald website, a Eugene landlord who had spent 30 years renting to students pointed out that landlords have their own fair share of horror stories about young tenants who trashed their units and were completely uncooperative with management. By his report, out of hundreds of students he had rented to, only two had ever left their apartments as clean as they’d found them. The consensus among landlords seems to be that student government ought to interface with lending companies in order to “address issues of mutual concern.”
Economics teaches us that companies respond to incentives, so perhaps whoever wins the upcoming ASUO election ought to work with Capri, Bell, and Von Klein to draft a code of conduct for student tenants. If we show our willingness to take responsibility for our actions and keep our units in better condition, perhaps our landlords will start leasing us units that don’t slope three inches south.
As seen in the Oregon Daily Emerald!
Those of you who are living in the dorms have no doubt begun to look forward to a time when you can get the hell out of the dorms, just as my friends and I did last year. Your relationship with your roommate is slowly deteriorating, the stoners in your hall are steadfastly continuing to hotbox the shower, and come the first big heatwave of spring term you’ll learn that the dorms start to smell twice as bad when the temperature rises. These are some of the reasons why almost all students opt to find off-campus housing rather than returning to the dorms for a second year. Unfortunately, things do not improve once you get off campus.
There’s always the option of living across the river in Dux Village, Chase Village, or Stadium Park, but while the units over there are luxurious and generally affordable, they are also a half hour’s walk away from campus. If you don’t have a car, this puts you entirely at the mercy of LTD, which offers essentially no service to and from campus on the weekends or between 7 PM and 10 PM on weekdays. I was reluctant to put myself in this position, so I searched for and found an apartment close to campus. The results have been disappointing, to say the least.
Real estate close to campus is an interesting game – a few lending companies own nearly all of the property in the area, and as there is a steady supply of students flowing into Eugene with a constant need for cheap housing, they don’t have to work too hard to attract business. As a result, housing conditions are generally sub par and management is less than competent or courteous. When I first arrived in my apartment this year, which cost extra as it had been remodeled over the summer, I found floors covered in drywall, electrical sockets installed upside-down, and the doorjamb splintered where somebody had attempted to kick the door in. Our furnished dinner table is so unsteady that eating with one’s elbows on the table is a recipe for disaster, we had to haggle with management for weeks to get a fourth chair so our fourth roommate could eat at the wobbly table with us, and when the furnished TV we’d been promised finally arrived (ten weeks late) we were not surprised to find that the picture would go fuzzy if somebody so much as coughed anywhere near it. To cap it all off, my roommate’s bedroom is not level – there’s a three-inch incline from the north end of the room to the south end. This is especially frustrating to my roommate because he’s an architecture major, who now goes home after a hard day of designing structurally sound buildings to a room where walking eight feet results in a drop in altitude.
These incidents are not unique to my lending company, Capri Apartments. Residents in units owned by Von Klein Property Management and Bell Real Estate have had similar experiences. Many tenants complain that it’s nearly impossible to recover a security deposit from either company, and in one case a former resident related that Von Klein charged him for six hours worth of cleaning in his recently vacated apartment, despite the fact that he’d left it spotless. Repairs for broken utilities are said to come slowly or not at all. For students leaving the dorms who want to live close to campus, there really is no “good” option – as the majority of the properties close to campus are owned by these three companies, oftentimes the best one can do is find the lesser of three evils.
Area landlords argue that they are reluctant to provide exquisite housing or return deposits because students are less reliable tenants than ordinary renters, due to our propensity toward frequent wild parties and drunken antics, which can spell disaster for carpets, walls, or any other surface that can be vomited upon. In an online comment on the Daily Emerald website, a Eugene landlord who had spent 30 years renting to students pointed out that landlords have their own fair share of horror stories about young tenants who trashed their units and were completely uncooperative with management. By his report, out of hundreds of students he had rented to, only two had ever left their apartments as clean as they’d found them. The consensus among landlords seems to be that student government ought to interface with lending companies in order to “address issues of mutual concern.”
Economics teaches us that companies respond to incentives, so perhaps whoever wins the upcoming ASUO election ought to work with Capri, Bell, and Von Klein to draft a code of conduct for student tenants. If we show our willingness to take responsibility for our actions and keep our units in better condition, perhaps our landlords will start leasing us units that don’t slope three inches south.
Sunday, April 5, 2009
A Letter To My Friends In The Financial Industry
Thanks, old friends.
To: Bank of America, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, Citigroup, Bear Stearns, AIG, General Motors, Chrysler, Ford Motor Company
CC: Business majors, Bernard Madoff
Subject: My (your) money
Dearest friends,
Only 20 minutes ago I mailed in my state and federal income tax documents. Unfortunately, I didn’t make enough money this past year to get taxed by the feds, but the State of Oregon is charging me $128, and that check (forgive my handwriting) is in the mail as we speak. I would imagine that, as all I’m paying are state taxes, my money will probably go to state education budgets, road repair, police salaries, etc. Of course, I was once under the impression that all tax money went to programs that benefited the taxpayers, so I guess I’m not really an expert. Plus, you guys seem to be pros at getting money that isn’t yours, so I’m sure you’ll find a way to finagle my $128 out of the state’s hands. Also, please do enjoy the substantial payment from my parents.
How about that government red tape, though, huh? Filling out all the returns and vouchers, checking boxes, adding stuff up, making out the check to the Oregon Department of Revenue instead of the Wall Street Collection Plate… It’s just a shame what you guys have to go through to get our money. That is, more of our money. The money that you didn’t set on fire while freebasing cocaine off of Lindsey Lohan’s tits.*
*I don’t know that for a fact, but Lindsey Lohan has been out of the public eye for awhile, so maybe you guys had her hired as a Cocaine Tits Consultant or something.
Now, please, don’t feel bad. This, of course, is a pointless statement, seeing as you have demonstrated that you have no sense of shame, but I’m only telling you not to feel bad so that I can explain why, if you did have the capacity to feel, you wouldn’t have to feel bad. While you did lie to just about everybody under the sun about how much money you were making and went to the racetrack with what little money was actually there, you weren’t committing a crime – you were living the American Dream. While simultaneously committing multiple crimes.
Everywhere in America – from Wall Street to whatever the most heavily trafficked commercial thoroughfare is in most small towns – people have been trying for decades to get something for nothing, quick results for no work, at great risk if necessary (anything to avoid that work). The diet pill industry is booming, and if you’ve looked at the Internet recently you’ll notice that there’s a few thousand ways to loose weight fast without working out or changing your diet. If you’ve been keeping up on my blog, you’ll remember that students today expect top grades for mediocre work. And then, of course, American television viewers are fully unwilling to watch any show that doesn’t yield quick and constant laughs, contributing to the demise of Arrested Development, Home Movies, and most recently King of the Hill.
But nobody in this country has been able to achieve their dreams as well as you. You guys lived without remorse, boldly making shady deals and inflating your own worth in order to maximize your gains, all while steadfastly avoiding any consideration of the long-term ramifications of your actions. God bless you fine gentlemen – and I’m sure a fair number of you are upstanding men of religion who have found a suitable workaround for Commandments 7, 8, and 10, as well as Deadly Sins 1, 4, and 5.
This is just one big lesson in being careful what you wish for. A significant number of Americans wanted quick laughs with minimal intelligence, and as a result we’ve all been subjected to the continued success of Dane Cook and Family Guy. Likewise, a whole lot of Americans wanted to give their money to somebody and have that somebody give them a lot more money right away, and thus nobody questioned your financial success because it was all so good. On a side note, poor taste and greed aligned late last year, when Dane Cook’s half brother and manager was arrested for embezzling $1 million from Cook over the course of 18 months.
So keep in mind, it’s not your fault – it’s our fault. We, America, dreamed big and created a climate where you guys could succeed: that’ll teach us to dream big. Of course, some people allege that as you guys have a significant amount of education and experience in the financial industry, perhaps you ought to have been setting a slightly better example for the rest of the country. But that’s a crock – it would be unfair to ask anything more of you guys after you spend all day cooking books for us.
I have to be honest – we all know my math skills aren’t up to par, and I can’t guarantee you that I didn’t fuck up somewhere on my tax forms. It’s fully possible that I owe you guys some more money (but of course, we all do) and, through my own financial mismanagement, neglected to give it to you. If this is the case, please accept my dearest apologies for depriving you of my money. Rest assured that if I’ve committed some sort of financial impropriety, the government will come down on me pretty hard and I’ll get my just rewards – until then, you guys keep on enjoying all the other peoples’ money you’re getting.
Truman Capps says, “Thou shalt not Ponzi.”
Wednesday, April 1, 2009
Spring Break Extension
As seen in the Oregon Daily Emerald!
Hi there, readers! It’s great to be back! Spring break is over, and I can’t wait to put my nose to the grindstone again! I feel adequately rested and prepared for the coming ten weeks of school!
April Fool’s.
Why is it that we college students love spring break so much? In the family of school holidays, it is by far the shortest, at only one week long — winter vacation is three weeks long, whereas our summer vacation comes close to three and a half months. However, MTV does not devote as many hours of programming to drunken summer revelry or crazy Chanukah parties. No, spring break seems to make up for its short length with an abundance of craziness, like the little brother who tries to prove his worth with beachside kegstands and Girls Gone Wild videos. However, now that my break is over I can’t help but feel unfulfilled, and not just because I did not personally witness any girls going wild.
I am not the sort of person who bitches and moans at the end of every break from school. After three weeks of winter vacation this year I was dying to get back to the college life in Eugene, and after a summer spent working two jobs in the food service industry I had gained a whole new appreciation for my college education. Spring break, on the other hand, has always been to me like a cup of Key Lime Pie flavored Yoplait – delicious and refreshing, but over much too soon. For a lot of students, winter term is often the roughest term, when they stack up the most demanding courseload to coincide with nasty weather, which leaves few options but to stay in the library. It’s so unfortunate, then, that our shortest break comes after the term when a lot of us exert ourselves the most. God knows I maintained an unwavering devotion to my studies throughout winter term, which was reflected in the truly excellent grades I received over the break.
April Fool’s.
This year, the Oregon University System shortened winter break by a week and added the extra time onto summer break. The reason for the shortened winter break was to keep with the OUS policy of beginning each new term on a Monday – working around holidays like Labor Day and Christmas makes it tough to start the term exactly on a Monday, so a week had to be shifted around. I don’t object to winter break being shortened from a month to three weeks – Christmas dinner with my extended family is just what it takes to make me want to come back to school again – but I have to say, tagging the extra week onto summer vacation, which is already some 13 weeks long, feels like a little too much of a good thing. However, I’d be more than willing to go to school for one more week in June if it meant I got one more week of break in late March.
My advocacy for a lengthened spring break isn’t just based in my perceived difficulty of winter term, either; wouldn’t it make a little more sense if winter and spring break were closer to the same length, just for consistency’s sake? If spring break were longer, it would be easier for those who wanted to work to earn money for the coming term. While many employers are reluctant to hire a part time employee for only a week, a two-week position is somewhat easier to negotiate, and it also affords more time to actually make money. Also, a second week of break would allow enough time for people who had spent a week in Cancun to get home, acclimate to our climate, and buy enough emergency contraception to compensate for their week of hedonism. Also, let’s not forget that the weather tends to clear up and become beautiful during the first week of spring term – a longer spring break would allow us to enjoy some of this natural splendor before getting crushed under a mountain of academic splendor.
As the Oregon University System determines the break schedules for all state schools, a change like this would be unilateral and would affect tens of thousands of students and also incur significant logistical costs in terms of rescheduling events displaced by the lengthened spring break. While it may seem like a pointless expenditure to put all this effort into a change that relates mostly to students’ desire for more time off of school rather than an actual holiday, we must remember that the OUS already went through this process when they delayed the beginning of the school year by an additional week for scheduling purposes. All the better that this sort of change should occur to lengthen a break that many already agree needs to be longer.
I suppose if there’s any benefit to our current, weeklong spring break, it’s that it allows us to continue into spring term with whatever momentum we have left from the winter. I, for one, will not take this for granted. This term, knowing that 14 weeks of summer are ahead of me, I’m going to throw myself into my studies headfirst. I’ll start doing research, beating my deadlines, and striving to become the best student I can be. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, I’m going to start taking my education seriously.
April Fool’s.
Hi there, readers! It’s great to be back! Spring break is over, and I can’t wait to put my nose to the grindstone again! I feel adequately rested and prepared for the coming ten weeks of school!
April Fool’s.
Why is it that we college students love spring break so much? In the family of school holidays, it is by far the shortest, at only one week long — winter vacation is three weeks long, whereas our summer vacation comes close to three and a half months. However, MTV does not devote as many hours of programming to drunken summer revelry or crazy Chanukah parties. No, spring break seems to make up for its short length with an abundance of craziness, like the little brother who tries to prove his worth with beachside kegstands and Girls Gone Wild videos. However, now that my break is over I can’t help but feel unfulfilled, and not just because I did not personally witness any girls going wild.
I am not the sort of person who bitches and moans at the end of every break from school. After three weeks of winter vacation this year I was dying to get back to the college life in Eugene, and after a summer spent working two jobs in the food service industry I had gained a whole new appreciation for my college education. Spring break, on the other hand, has always been to me like a cup of Key Lime Pie flavored Yoplait – delicious and refreshing, but over much too soon. For a lot of students, winter term is often the roughest term, when they stack up the most demanding courseload to coincide with nasty weather, which leaves few options but to stay in the library. It’s so unfortunate, then, that our shortest break comes after the term when a lot of us exert ourselves the most. God knows I maintained an unwavering devotion to my studies throughout winter term, which was reflected in the truly excellent grades I received over the break.
April Fool’s.
This year, the Oregon University System shortened winter break by a week and added the extra time onto summer break. The reason for the shortened winter break was to keep with the OUS policy of beginning each new term on a Monday – working around holidays like Labor Day and Christmas makes it tough to start the term exactly on a Monday, so a week had to be shifted around. I don’t object to winter break being shortened from a month to three weeks – Christmas dinner with my extended family is just what it takes to make me want to come back to school again – but I have to say, tagging the extra week onto summer vacation, which is already some 13 weeks long, feels like a little too much of a good thing. However, I’d be more than willing to go to school for one more week in June if it meant I got one more week of break in late March.
My advocacy for a lengthened spring break isn’t just based in my perceived difficulty of winter term, either; wouldn’t it make a little more sense if winter and spring break were closer to the same length, just for consistency’s sake? If spring break were longer, it would be easier for those who wanted to work to earn money for the coming term. While many employers are reluctant to hire a part time employee for only a week, a two-week position is somewhat easier to negotiate, and it also affords more time to actually make money. Also, a second week of break would allow enough time for people who had spent a week in Cancun to get home, acclimate to our climate, and buy enough emergency contraception to compensate for their week of hedonism. Also, let’s not forget that the weather tends to clear up and become beautiful during the first week of spring term – a longer spring break would allow us to enjoy some of this natural splendor before getting crushed under a mountain of academic splendor.
As the Oregon University System determines the break schedules for all state schools, a change like this would be unilateral and would affect tens of thousands of students and also incur significant logistical costs in terms of rescheduling events displaced by the lengthened spring break. While it may seem like a pointless expenditure to put all this effort into a change that relates mostly to students’ desire for more time off of school rather than an actual holiday, we must remember that the OUS already went through this process when they delayed the beginning of the school year by an additional week for scheduling purposes. All the better that this sort of change should occur to lengthen a break that many already agree needs to be longer.
I suppose if there’s any benefit to our current, weeklong spring break, it’s that it allows us to continue into spring term with whatever momentum we have left from the winter. I, for one, will not take this for granted. This term, knowing that 14 weeks of summer are ahead of me, I’m going to throw myself into my studies headfirst. I’ll start doing research, beating my deadlines, and striving to become the best student I can be. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, I’m going to start taking my education seriously.
April Fool’s.
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