In a rare and fleeting feat of government competence, the Undergraduate Student Government chose to listen to the voices of the masses and bring a rock(ish) act to our school on the brook.
College students like free things. Whether it is free food (arguably the only thing that retains this paper’s staff) or free music, people with low incomes tend to prefer not to pay for things they can otherwise get for free. In the case of digital media, the modern reality of widespread availability of free copies of media originally designed for sale has facilitated a widespread movement in support of file sharing and software piracy. At the same time, major institutions have tried to strike back at this rising tide of piracy, among them Stony Brook University.
Stony Brook is grappling with an increase in reported sexual assaults. To quote the Feb. 11, 2014 Statesman article, by Ashleigh Sherow, “…there were 17 forcible sexual offences in 2012 – five more than in 2011 and 10 more than in 2010.” Despite the large student body on campus, this number is unacceptable. With a population of roughly 16,000, that means .2 percent of students have reported a sexual assault, compared to New York State’s 304 reports for its 19.57 million people, resulting in .0016 percent of the population reporting sexual assaults.
I hate everything about Stony Brook University. You can be sure I will complain to all of my friends incessantly about it, whether it’s whining on Facebook or reminding them “I hate this school” every time they mention the name Stony Brook in conversation. So when the university offers me the opportunity to anonymously tell my professors exactly what I think they did wrong so that the school can improve, what do I do?
Banning tobacco on SUNY campuses will not convince anyone to quit, and until there is research showing outside second-hand smoke harms others, the Task Force should change its focus to helping addicts, not pushing them underground.
