“I’d basically be a figurehead,” thinks the average carefree, semi-popular college student running for USG office. After all, the all-important position would provide for yet another addendum to his resume that no potential employer will actually care about.

Stony Brook University’s USG  spring elections officially begin on April 11 at noon. As the sun reaches the highest point in the sky for the day, online portals will open, and candidates will start twiddling their thumbs in anticipation as they wait to find out who will win that glorious spot at the top.

But what if that’s not true? What if thumbs don’t twiddle? And maybe they won’t.

In truth, select candidates will not sit around waiting. According to an unnamed source, many candidates will be running to their friends’ rooms to poke and prod them until they agree to log onto their computers and add one more tiny tally to the vote total. After all, it’s all about who you know, right?

“USG representatives really don’t do much,” thinks the average candidate. And that is disturbing.

Granted, if USG were short a representative, the world would not come to its ultimate doom. The Earth’s rotation would remain uninterrupted, and life would go on. But that doesn’t mean that USG positions don’t matter.

Perhaps one of the worst effects of college on the mind is the development of a false sense of worldliness. Eighteen-year-olds set foot on college campuses and are suddenly convinced that they have officially completed their journey to adulthood. The idea of a ruling body becomes a joke, and undergraduate student government becomes a joke that is even funnier.

As corny as it may sound, USG speaks for the student body. It is the link between the students and the administration. It may be an underutilized link, but it is the link. And to see candidates who care so little about such important issues as funding and programming is simply disheartening. It makes one wonder what is worth caring about.

Maybe the university only needs a figurehead. Maybe any student would do. Maybe it’s just a formality. But that can be said about anything and living by that philosophy is nothing but nonsensical.