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Quit complaining, do something |
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Thursday, 05 April 2007 |
Americans like to complain. In fact, we like to complain a lot.
According to the most recent Gallup Poll, 68 percent of Americans are dissatisfied with the way things are going in our country.
Yet, voter turnout was just over 40 percent in the 2006 midterm election, according to MSNBC.
Sure, there’s the excuse that it’s only a midterm election. People just aren’t thinking about politics
when there isn’t a presidential election heating up the airwaves.
Plus, voting isn’t convenient. By the time you take off work and stand in line at the polls for two hours
before finally getting to vote, the day is shot.
The process of becoming registered, actually learning about the
candidates and then voting, it’s just too much for some people. And
it’s not like your vote is going to count for all that much anyway,
right?
Never mind that in November’s election for Watauga County sheriff, only
98 votes stood between incumbent Mark Shook and challenger L.D.
Hagaman. Even after provisional votes were in, Hagaman was still up by
121 votes, and Shook was well within his right to ask for a recount.
(Hagaman won, by the way, so you can thank him if you get pulled over
going down Highway 421).
No, individual votes don’t matter, especially when the sheriff race wasn’t the only recount for Watauga County in November.
But that’s local politics. How does that affect students, you may ask.
Let’s say that you’re right, that local politics have absolutely no
bearing on the lives of Appalachian State University students.
We’ll look, instead, at campus politics.
Only 2,881 students voted in the Student Government Association
election in 2006. That was a slight increase from the year before’s
turnout of 2,788.
This year’s election saw a total of 1,070 votes for the Gilliam/Windley
ticket. Granted that was our only choice, the Referendum for the
Renewable Energy Initiative only got 1,258 votes for and 94 votes
against.
What’s the excuse there? Couldn’t get to the polls? They’re on AppalNET. Didn’t know about the
candidates? Didn’t know about the referendum? Pick up your friendly copy of The Appalachian.
Maybe you just didn’t care, and that’s your right not to care. You have
the right to be as ignorant about campus issues as you want. You have
the right to participate as much or as little as you want on campus.
After all, according to the Student Development Record from last fall,
only 6,343 students are reported to be involved with social or academic
clubs or intercollegiate sports on campus.
After four years at this school, I’m more than a little tired of
hearing people complain about issues on campus and wonder why no one
does anything about them.
I don’t know who actually came up with these words of wisdom, but they
seem to be true: “If you want something done right, do it yourself.”
Stop playing World of Warcraft, get up and find a cause.
It can be as simple as picking up a copy of this paper, deciding we’re
idiots for writing this or that and telling us about it. You might have
a good argument, and you might know something we don’t.
I know I’m certainly not infallible, and neither is anyone else.
You’re a part of this campus, and you’re a part of this country no matter how satisfied you are with the way things are going.
Stop complaining and start acting.
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