Opinion & Editorial
Los Angeles | COLLEGIAN
Wednesday October 19, 2011
03
Compiled by Hayden Velasquez
How do feel about the possiblitiy of having three designated areas on campus to smoke ?
Mallory Gonzalez Major - Photography
Alexis Williams Major - Theater
kimberly Anglemyer Major - Cinema
Anthony Williams Major - Cinema
Jonathan Tobar Major - Undecided
“I think it would be a very good idea [to regulate smoking areas to specific areas] because I’ve kind of been confusing where I can and can’t smoke. I don’t like the idea of having a campus where I can’t smoke at all, so to respect other people that don’t smoke, I think it’d be a great idea. I lived in Burbank where you cannot smoke anywhere. It’s a nuisance to me and I’m a smoker. If you’re a smoker you should be respectful of other people that don’t smoke.”
“It does bother me when it’s really crowded and people are smoking in your face, but I generally like chewing on a lot of Ritz crackers and just blowing the crumbs back on their face. You know, it’s like a free for all. You have to fight your own battles. You can’t just put people into little stalls like horses just because they’re smoking. If someone is blowing smoke in your face, you should tell them to stop or just blow something in their face—a blow for a blow.”
“I mean, I guess it’s ok as long as there is enough space to accommodate those who are smoking. I don’t feel it really affects me because of the electric cigarette [I use]. I don’t exhale smoke so it doesn’t bother anybody. And legally I can smoke it indoors if I like, but I choose not to because people get weirded (sic) out when they see the vapor. I respect the rights of non-smokers. At the same time I feel that as long as there is a place for people who are still struggling with that addiction, I think it’s ok.”
“I understand the students who don’t smoke. It’s bothersome, don’t get me wrong, but at the same time if your outdoors, your outdoors—period. What we have in place is just fine; you have the line to stay x amount of feet from certain buildings. There in the library, they have a little square; as long as you’re not in this square, you not too close, so everything is clearly delineated not to smoke. I think that’s enough.”
“It does not offend me that much, but it gives me a sensation that I would like to smoke again—because I used to smoke back then. But now [I quit], so now I have more than a year without smoking. When I smell people that are actually smoking I get the sensation to go back, so for that reason I say that designate certain areas away from buildings that would be awesome.”
Illustration by Jose Tobar /Collegian
Students Pay Hidden Price For Fashion By Jessica Schneider
Since moving to Los Angeles from the Midwest this summer, I’ve learned a lot about fashion: name brands, trendy accessories and hip boutiques. But when I ask any of the students hanging out in the Quad or in line at the Bookstore who made their t-shirt, I’m not asking if it’s Prada. I mean quite literally, who made your t-shirt? Was it women in El Salvador, or children in Bangladesh? The problem with talking to students on campus about fashion is that it’s not a logical system of thought; unlike the subjects we’re here to study. So when we students begin to identify our inner selves, or
our ideologies through our outward appearance, the products we purchase suddenly become a symbol of social status instead of social interaction. This obscures the labor (those previously mentioned Bangladeshi children in sweatshops) that produces our latest little black dress or hipster skinny jeans, because we no longer see the products as separate from the lifestyle they represent. The counter-culture ideology of the 1960s is trying to resurge itself in the Occupy Wall Street movement. It taught us to express our politics through unique self-representation, meaning, the personal is political,
but it has been co-opted and become capitalist orthodoxy today. Consumerism for younger people like us is no longer about conformity, but individualism and lifestyles. Products and advertisements today tell us to be different and break the rules: Are you vaguely pissed off at “the system”? Prove it through your brand-name shirts with cheeky little slogans that tell the world off and your designer jeans. Commodify your dissent. Rebellion through consumption. By appropriating democratic aspirations, capitalist culture gives us “choices” – not freedom. This
obscures the socioeconomic patterns or political ideology students are trying to analyze by applying the theory we learn in sociology or political science classes. Because we students are the target demographic due to our disposable incomes, capitalist culture seeks to get us to define our self-expression as the fresh, hip, self-styled existential, nonconformist individual without any sense of what exactly we are rebelling against. Are we striving for anything beyond consumption? Unfortunately, fashion, no matter how good it looks on campus, no matter how nonconformist we think
we’re dressed, is not a form of dissent. It does not subvert, challenge, or even question Western ideologies or corporate ethics – or lack thereof. For example, if students are wearing flannel shirts and appropriating this working class aesthetic, but not taking political action, then their outfits do not translate into safer working conditions or a living wage. In our capitalist culture, even the heroic individual has been usurped by the entrepreneur as corporate messiah, sending the message that we, the people, don’t create history, individuals only consume it. The point being? Cynicism is not critical or analytical;
sarcasm and irony are not activism. Buying a rainbow t-shirt at Target to show your support for gay rights while Target donates to anti-gay political campaigns does not a rebel make. Self-expression is a valued democratic aesthetic, as it should be, but it is not dissent. Political change is going to require, you know, actual politics. If students on campus devoted one-third of the time they devote to shopping or putting together their outfits on political campaigns, we could see a true shift in California politics.
Satisfaction Denied By Richard Martinez
Illustration by Luis Rivas /Collegian
It was late at night when I finally had the chance to go and get myself a snack. The professor had just dismissed us from class for a 15-minute break, so I hurried over to the vending machines determined to get myself something at least remotely healthy. Then my eyes landed on the most deliciously tempting coffee drink I ever saw. Clearly, it would lead to caloric overload, but I really did not care. At that moment all that mattered was that coffee drink. My willpower deserted me. I tried to resist temptation … and failed. Reaching into the dark depths of my shoulder bag, I dragged out the
last few coins I was able to part with and deposited them into the machine. My face was the very picture of anticipation as I waited for the machine to deliver my drink. It never came. The vending machine had failed me. And I realized then, as the girl next to me huffed in annoyance, that it had failed her as well. As we bemoaned the loss of our money and the drinks that never came, she figured out that we could that we could phone the vending machine provider and demand our money back. She
called and left her information while I hesitantly did the same. I never heard back from them, and my money was certainly not returned. To this day, my anger isn’t so much about the loss of my money, or my never tasting the possiblyheavenly drink. It is more about the fact that the company acted in such an unprofessional manner to account for the actions of their faulty product. I now wonder how many others suffered this horrific fate. Thankfully, I had my then functioning TAP card and was able to make it home.