the Mercury
www.utdmercury.com
The Student Newspaper of UTD
Vol. XXX, No. 11
‘The Scrubs’ get down and dirty for football season Page 10
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Are you racist?
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Page 3
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September 20, 2010
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Drugs, sex and alcohol, Poetry Slam has it all Page 7
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Wi-Fi woes Comic creations for all ages unresolved Rebecca Gomez
Staff Writer becks@student.utdallas.edu
Waterview Park apartment residents are now required to pay a mandatory $15 per month fee for the recently acquired AT&T Wi-Fi internet service. Some residents, tired of the unreliable network, have chosen to pay an additional monthly charge to add Time Warner’s internet service. Undecided junior Michael Stettler and his three roommates represent many residents who, after being told that the $15 fee was not cancelable, still found it worth their while to pay for an additional carrier.
Stettler said he and his roommates share a $30 monthly bill for Time Warner internet which provides them 15 megabits (MB) per second speed in addition to the $15 per resident fee Waterview charges for one MB per second speed on a good day. Residents of Waterview were not charged an internet usage fee prior to May, but were notified on their leasing contracts a fee would be imposed once Waterview found a new Wi-Fi provider. In June 2010, a month after the new service rolled out, Waterview had already begun issuing refund credits
see INTERNET page 4
Artist hopes to expand cartoon audience Mari Vila
Staff Writer mxv093120@utdallas.edu
POW! BAM! WHRUNCH! Batman is here to save the day! His DC Comics nemesis of the month will destroy all of Gotham because of generic daddy issues and a yearning for revenge. That makes perfect sense to a child, but to Arts & Humanities graduate student Ruben Nieto the narrative is weak. “POW! La Revolucion!” a collection of comic book style paintings by Nieto, will be on display until Oct. 2 at Centraltrak.
photo by Ben Hawkins
Close-up of Arts & Humanities graduate Ruben Nieto’s portrait, one of many in his collection titled “POW! La Revolucion!” featured at Centraltrak. Nieto’s pieces included familiar faces from his childhood. The exhibition is co-sponsored by UTD’s Center for US-Mexico Studies and celebrates the 200th anniversary of Mexico’s independence from Spain. Nieto’s paintings feature
large blotches of bright color and feature familiar yet unsettling images of comic book characters such as Batman and Daffy Duck. The paintings, which
feature recycled characters and motifs, decompose the narrative and recontextualize the imagery in an attempt to redefine the
see COMIC page 9
Beware: cheating is easy Academic dishonesty could stem from unclear policy Rebecca Gomez
Staff Writer becks@student.utdallas.edu
illustration by Laura-Jane Cunningham
Teaching tolerance
Students collaborating on schoolwork without express written consent by their professors can be guilty of academic dishonesty and possibly expelled from UTD. Fixing how collusion is addressed is not within the scope of the academic-integrity policy review committee set to convene this month, said Dean of Students Gene Fitch. “The reality is that some professors will tell you what the point of collusion is and some won’t,” Fitch said. Collusion is the point where student collaboration on homework, essays or exams is considered cheating by a professor. Intentional collusion is obvious cheat-
ing like students in different sections of a course sharing exam answers or plagiarizing each other’s papers. Collusion can also be unintentional; meaning if a student steals another student’s exam and uses it to cheat both students can be equally guilty of academic dishonesty. Accounting junior Paul Im said his rough draft for a final paper was stolen and used by a fellow classmate to write a nearly identical paper. Im said he explained to Judicial Affairs Officer (JAO) Susan McKee in Judicial Affairs (JA) that his notes were taken without his knowledge because he had already finished his paper and no longer needed the notes. Im was found guilty of
see POLICY page 6
Crowd goes wild for local multi-billionaire
MSA educates audience on Islamic culture Jessica Melton
Editor-in-Chief jjm082000@utdallas.edu
In hopes of battling stereotypes and overcoming prejudices, the Muslim Student Association (MSA) will host a 9/11 commemoration. Biology senior and MSA member Sunna Syed said the events’ main purpose is to remember the 3,000 people who lost their lives that day, while a secondary purpose is to educate
the community about Islamic culture. Syed said 9/11 often places Muslims under the spotlight, and negative stereotypes often ensue. “(The event) is sort of a way of saying we were hurt by this too, as equally if not more hurt on 9/11, because it was our religion that was hijacked,” Syed said. “They killed in the name of Islam, in the name of Muslims, in the name of a god and prophet that we hold very
dear and we’re not ok with that.” Marketing junior and MSA member Azim Sookoor said the actions of a few shouldn’t reflect on the majority of many. Part of MSA’s hope to educate people about Islamic culture involves an Imam, the leader of prayer at Mosque, who will lecture on Islam and terrorism and then answer
see MSA page 4
photo by Amanda Duke
Owner of the Dallas Mavericks and multi-billionaire entrepreneur Mark Cuban spoke Sept. 14 in the School of Management building as part of the Entrepreneur Club’s speaker series. Full audio available online: utdmercuryblog.com.