4-Friday, March 28, 2008 The Michigan Daily - michigandaily.com Edited and managed by students at the University of Michigan since 1890. 420 Maynard St. Ann Arbor, MI 48109 tothedaily@umich.edu ANDREW GROSSMAN EDITOR IN CHIEF GARY GRACA EDITORIA( PAGE EDITOR GABE NELSON MANAGING EDITOR Unsigned editorials leflect the official position of the Daily's editorial board.:All other signed articles and illustrations represent solely the views ofttheir authors. The Daily's public editor, Paul H. Johnson, acts as the readers'representative and takes a critical look at coverage and content in every section of the paper. Readers are encouraged to contact the public editor with questions andcomments. He canbe reached at publiceditor@umich.edu. FROM THE DAILY A student gov't stronghold Competitive elections would boost election turnout fter a term plagued with scandal, this year's student gov- ernment elections should have driven students to the ballot box to elect representatives who would change the Univer- sity for the better. However, last week's embarrassingly low voter turnout proved that an overwhelming majority of students remain disillusioned and apathetic about student government elections. Just as in years past, there is much concern, but few original ideas. Here's the obvious solution: In order for students to regain their interest in voting and student government, more legitimate political parties from which voters could choose. NOTAL QOTASL Do you think we are going to supply you with a translator all of your life?" - Peter Olszewski, Pennsylvania county judge, sentencing four Spanish speakers to learn English while on parole or serve the jail time for convicted assault, as reported yesterday by The Associated Press. JASON MAHAKIAN E-MAIL MAHAKIAN AT MAHAKIAJ@UMICH.EDU 1ooKscieticious5 \\ A,\ -iCKEYi The limis of idealism 0 0 Only 6.4 percent of eligible voters - a measly 2,246 students - cast ballots last week, and as expected the Michigan Action Party swept the election. In the Michigan Student Assembly's presidential race, 71 percent of voters picked MAP's candidates, and all 13 MAP representative candidates earned spots on the assembly. In LSA Stu- dent Government, MAP ran unopposed for the presidency and vice-presidency and won nine representative seats. These results are almost carbon copies of those from the past few years - in each election, MAP or its predecessor Students 4 Michigan crushed the competition. Many could dismiss this as another exam- ple of voter apathy, a problem emblematic of young people's attitude toward voting in races at every level. But at the University, the situation is different. These blowouts hardly convince students that their votes make a difference. It's not that students at the University don't care about student poli- tics; they just don't have an incentive to care about an election that seems more and more like a formality. It hasn't always been like that. The high- est voter turnout in. recent years was in 2006, when there was real competition between parties with platforms that were different, yet legitimate. The two main com- petitors were S4M and the Michigan Pro- gressive Party. The Conservative Party and the Defend Affirmative Action Party threw their hats in the ring too, though they ulti- mately proved to be less serious contenders. But all the parties offered students some- thing they don't really have now: choice. To be fair, other parties were represent- ed in last week's race, with DAAP and the Change In Action party both putting forth candidates. The problem with these par- ties was that their-platforms weren't strong enough to pose a serious threat. DAAP has noble intentions of integrating campus, but its goals of abolishing the student code of conduct and ending racism are broad and vague, and the party's platform lacks con- crete goals that is could reasonably accom- plish. The Change In Action party, while adamant in its opposition to corruption, was still a fledgling party. If new parties intend to legitimately chal- -lenge the MAP political powerhouse, they have several obstacles. They must be persis- tent, bucking the trend of new groups that spring up and then fizzle out after a loss. But endurance isn't enough. A legitimate new party must address issues missing from other parties' platforms. It must set an agen- da that is relevant to campus with realistic goals that it will pursue once elected. Even when a new party loses with an innovative platform, the dominant party is expected to incorporate some of these ideas - that's accountability. Students need contested elections and more choices to make them feel that their votes really matter. This year's turnout should not be taken as voter apathy; it should be seen as a plea for more and better choices. a ive hundred kids were lined up at 9 a.m. and the 8,000 free tickets to see the Dalai Lama were gone within three hours. I'm not N exactly surprised by the popularity of the event - after all, he is the world's most famous monk - but I'm curious to know what exactly it was that moti- ASHLEA vated thousands of college students to SURLES crawl out of bed on a freezing morning to gettickets to hear an old man speak. Was it the mere prospect of being in the presence of greatness? Were students anxious to check off "see the Dalai Lama live and in person" from their life to-do list, or waxing obedi- ent and fronting for their parents? Or were young intellectuals simply com- pelled by the promise of words of epic wisdom and unparalleled inspiration? After all, this is the.Dalai Lama we're talking about. He's probably the strongestvoice for peace in our time, the most prominent proponent of harmony and the most legitimate hippie to date. He's a Nobel laureate, an honorary Canadian citizen and recipient of America's prestigious Congressional Gold Medal. Now, he's advocating a movement towards "post- identity thinking." As he proposed in a TIME magazine interview, we should "look past divisions of nation, race and religion and try to address our shared problems at the source," rather than taking them out on one another.' The magazine called this a "new global vision" and described it as "one of the brightest hopes for our new world order." But I don't quite under- stand why. Hasn't the bulk of society been striving to achieve this appar- ently "revolutionary" ideal of ethnic, religious and racial equality for quite some time now? All things considered, history suggests that this goal of uto- pian coexistence is more than a tad too ambitious for humanity to handle. I can't help but write off the Dalai Lama's suspiciously peaceful idea as nothing less than a fantastically far- fetched daydream - let's be serious, this is the 21st century, we don't really do that whole peace thing anymore. In many respects, our troposphere is just as heavy with hatred as ever. A declining global economy, stacked on top of heightened immigration and intensifying globalization, has pit- ted natives of all countries against immigrants of all heritages. And ris- ing inflation in many nations seems to be levering the ever-widening gap between the rich and the poor even further open. In many cases, prejudice is being crystallized, if not created, everywhere everyday. And his 68-year reign - which has earned him tle sta- tus of the most seasoned leader on the planet - has ensured that the current Dalai Lama has not missed any of this. So, considering all he has seen, how can the Dalai Lama still fervently expend his energy and Tibet's resourc- es, advocating what seems by all accounts to be nothing more substan- tial than a happy daydream? it could be his religiosity (after all, he is the world's foremost Buddhist monk) that ties him to this outlandish ideal. But he actually claims to value the scientific over the spiritual; he aptly advises people "not to get needlessly distracted by reli- gion," and has taken heat for endorsing secular ethics more so than any of his predecessor. So, essentially, the Dalai Lama appears to be a level-headed and world-renowned advocate of a mental- ity that I, for some reason, consider to be about as realistic as magic wands. And so, ironically, that makes me, the fresh-faced (but apparently not so much) representative of youthful optimism, absolutely skeptical about the value of the Dalai Lama's "new" campaign. But isn't youth supposed to be synonymous with optimism? Upon consideration, I wonder if I am a prod- uct of a generation that has entirely skipped the rose-colored glasses phase of young adult life and made my way through college to promptly settle right into the mindset of a weary, late- Questioning the Dalai Lama's message of peace life cynic? It seems so, by all accounts. I don't know if that's because the world we live in has been much less idyllic than it was for our parents, but I am a 21-year old with the cynicism of Dio- genes. I cannot even fathom a world of post-identity, non-prejudice, all- embracing, completely equitable pro- portions. And I don't believe thatI am alone in my unlit tunnel. When the Dalai Lama takes the podium in a few weeks and turns his wide-eyed gaze out into the sold-out audience, perhaps he will be looking out into a sea of my counter- parts - young people seeking a reason, or a way, to be inspired about the pros- pect of a better world. Ashlea Surles can be reached at ajsurles@umich.edu. EDITORIAL BOARD MEMBERS: Emad Ansari, Harun Buljina, Anindya Bhadra, Kevin Bunkley, Ben Caleca, Satyajeet Deshmukh, Milly Dick, Mike Eber, Emmarie Huetteman, Theresa Kennelly, Emily Michels, Arikia Millikan, Kate Peabody, Robert Soave, lmran Syed, Neil Tambe, Matt Trecha, Kate Truesdell, Radhika Upadhyaya, Rachel Van Gilder, Rachel Wagner, Patrick Zabawa. LEE DITOR SEND LETTERS TO: TOTHEDAILY@UMICH.EDU Top students on campus can be found in all colleges TO THE DAILY: In the Statement Wednesday, the Daily's "Students of the year" (03/26/2008) featured 10 student leaders who work tirelessly to improve the world around them. They have all made strides in their fields, both literally and figuratively. They all deserve recogni- tion for the difference they have made on campus. They are also all LSA students. Was the Daily unable to see leadership in Rackham Graduate School? Was there no ARIELA STEIF one to recognize from the Business School? There weren't any Engineering students, Social Work students, Art and Design stu- dents or Nursing students who made the cut? It seems ludicrous that the College of Litera- ture, Science and the Arts could be the only school producing notable leaders. While the students spotlighted Wednes- day certainly earnedtheirsmall acknowledg- ment, I can't help but feel that the Daily has completely overlooked the other 19 schools, colleges and departments that make up the University. What about the rest of us? Courtenay Holscher Engineeringjunior E-MAIL STEIF AT ASTEIF@UMICH.EDU Generation speedfreaks y Ace hristopher Reeve's death - while no doubt an important moment in history - was not a defining momentof our time. It wasn't a moon landing. It wasn't Sept.11. The man who played Superman died. A few days ago, a friend of mine was explaining why CNN.com was the homepage on DAVE her computer. She MEKELBiURG said she made the change after learn- ing about Reeve's untimely death five months after it actually happened. She didn't know about it because she didn't have a homepage or an RSS feed to ram it down her throat. At the time, this struck me as perfectly normal. And it is - at least for us. When I say "us," I'm speaking about our generation. Fellow Daily colum- nist Karl Stampfl mused in his column Monday about our how generation should remain nameless (The unnamed generation, 03/24/2008), but I don't quite agree with his assertion that diversity or globalization will be our generation's legacy. After reading Karl's column, what my friend said about Reeve's death kept ringing in my head. Then it hit me: There was something inherently generational about our exchange. We don't seek out information. Instead, it walks up and smacks us in the face. We don't even notice it anymore. A breaking news ticker on ESPN.com no longer screams "Read me!" but quietly mumbles "Guess what, that WNBA score you probably don't care about is ready." The $6 million, save-the-world ques- tion is this: How the hell do you sift through all the distractions and non- sense? The nearly $1 billion answer is this: Adderall. Or Ritalin. Or whatever wonder drug suits your pharmacologi- cal needs. A new University study says roughly 20 percent of college students use prescription drugs. There are more non-prescribed users of Adderall and Ritalin than users with prescriptions. I mean, shit, I'm on Adderall right now. I have a prescription for it and need it to do work (I actually have Attention Deficit Disorder) but still, I'm flying. For those of you straight shooters, you're just as hopped up as we pill-poppers are: your coffee, Red Bulls, Diet Cokes, green tea and gin- seng replace our dextroamphetamines. Even my 13-year-old brother drinks a cup of coffee before school. We're all speed freaks. When someone tells you our genera- tionhas noidentity,youtellthat person that we are a single beating heart. That single heart just happens to be beating a million times per minute because it's cracked out on Ritalin. On the positive side our hyperactiv- ity has increased our productivity. Yet, I can't quite shake the feeling that for all the countless hours spent on blogs, Facebook,YouTube andWikipedia,our energy is a bit misdirected. It has led to such odd phenomena as "Wikipedia Syndrome," my term for someone who spends countless hours on Wikipedia looking up useless shit but couldn't tell you what day it is. Our generation seems like it has no idea what's going .on. We're the kids who can't figure out where Iraq is. We're responsible for pageant queens who say Africa stole our maps. Yet we are still going at 400 miles per hour all the time. Something is wrong here. The quest for knowledge is dead. We can search Wikipedia all we want for information, but that doesn't make us more knowledgeable, especially when we forget what we read two minutes later. Even then, are we really seek- ing out any of that information? Speed killed our curiosity. In an age of infor- mation overload, it's easy to get infor- mation. There's so much out there, we can't possibly be expected to want to know all of it. We've been told all our life that we'll never know everything, but no other generation has had that fact driven home as hard as we have. No drowning man ever asked for a sip of water. Even our response has been fleeting. No one cares what we think - unless you read our blogs (which no one does, so shut up). Our irrelevance to our elders is deafening. Unlike other gen- erations, we have ignored older gen- Moving at 400 mp.h., we've still fallenbehind erations as they cast fearful glances below at our speed-crazed ascent to adulthood. The Baby Boomers - The Worst Generation in my book - hold The Greatest Generation up toward the heavens. We just don'tgive a shit. Maybe that's our most redeeming quality. In our generation's stimulant- fueled drive, the normal amongus have tuned out the criticism from above. We aren't whining, kicking and screaming at older generations like our parents did in the 1960s. We speak only to each other, quietly biding our time until we rise to power. We might even do something pro- ductive once we're there. Dave Mekelburg was a Daily fall/ winter associate news editor. He can be reached at dmek@umich.edu.