Opinion

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Opinion

Cherish your time in Gainesville while you can, graduation is looming

Oct. 24, 2016

This past week I received my first graduate school acceptance letter, and I was subsequently hit by the realization that this will likely be my last year in this wonderfully bizarre town. I was always aware of this possibility in the back of my mind, but without substantial proof to back it up, I merely rested on the assumption that I would be in this town, well, forever. When your future is so devoid of any certainty, it’s easy to fill in the void with your present life and assume that every day will simply be a repeat of your current one. Now, imbued with the knowledge that my time in Gainesville is finite, I can feel the nostalgia creeping up on me as it colors my perspective of this town ever so slightly.

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Opinion

College students’ struggle needs to be addressed

Oct. 24, 2016

Today’s student is someone who has to balance classes, a number of extracurricular activities and, last but certainly not least, find a way to pay rent. Students who have multiple responsibilities other than their classes are two times more likely to drop out as opposed to those who don't. This statistic is startling, because it is clear that almost every student has outside obligations to balance. Our view of what the average college student looks like is generally far from reality. Forty percent of students in the U.S. attend college on a part-time basis, while the average student works 19 hours a week. About 40 percent of students are above the age of 25, and the number of students in minority groups attending higher education institutions is on the rise. These statistics prove the laws and practices in place pertaining to students and college need to be re-evaluated and changed. A shift in policy to represent the ever-changing college student would assist millions of individuals throughout the country.

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Opinion

I’ve taken it a-pun myself to find a good pun for this headline

Oct. 24, 2016

I’ve developed a habit of taking every pun as a personal attack against my intelligence.

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Opinion

Trump and Sanders have changed politics forever

Oct. 23, 2016

What great nation has lasted an eternity? Some empires come to mind when we try to answer this question. The Roman Empire lasted roughly 507 years. While Judaism is roughly 2,500 years old, the Jewish nation has come and gone many times over the course of that history. This year, our democracy in America rejoiced in its 240th birthday.

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Opinion

RIP to the birds, the bees and sex euphemisms

Oct. 23, 2016

An aspect of parenting we usually like to avoid is the birds and the bees. The beasts with two backs. The dirty deed. Dipping the wick — OK. No one says that, but that’s the point. Have you noticed how we have so many euphemisms for sex? That shows just how much we try to avoid the conversation, but it’s necessary in order to be healthy and safe.

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Opinion

Why it's OK to have opinions and perspectives in your news coverage

Oct. 23, 2016

Journalism is a pretty conservative field. The Associated Press Stylebook has yet to accept that “they” can be a singular pronoun and The New York Times still uses Mr. and Ms., which reinforce the gender binary. Student journalists are taught to be objective, to get both sides of every story — present the facts and tie them together.

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Opinion

Let’s talk about taboo topics: being open about feelings and mental health

Oct. 23, 2016

Who decides what is OK to talk about? How do we all just seem to know what a taboo topic is? If there is a yearly workshop, I wasn’t invited. But somehow, I’m still aware of what we are supposed to avoid talking about. At a party, we’re told to steer clear of discussions about sex, politics, religion and the like. I don’t know what parties these people were talking about, because every party I attend somehow turns into a spirited political debate. Regardless, I maintain that this is a commonly used list of topics to avoid. Another common addition to this list is health. We’re told that no one wants to hear about our recent ailments or your visit to the doctor, and this may be true. People often get weird when others share personal information. Further, there is one topic that makes many people extremely uncomfortable. If you want to quiet a room full of people, bring up your mental-health struggles.

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Sports

Picks Column: Bye Week Edition

Oct. 20, 2016

Ahh, bye week.

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Opinion

The Great Barrier Reef is dead. Well, almost.

Oct. 20, 2016

I read an obituary for the Great Barrier Reef a few days ago that stated the reef had died after a long battle with bleaching. This bleaching was caused by stress from climate change and indirect human interaction such as toxins from oil spills and sediment from runoff. It didn’t seem right to me that I had never heard of the website that posted the obituary, so I did some quick research and learned it was just something meant to grab people’s attention in a dramatic way. The good news that is the reef is still alive. The bad news is it’s dying at a rapid rate and will most likely be completely destroyed soon if something isn’t done to slow the rate of climate change.

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Opinion

Darts & Laurels: October 21, 2016

Oct. 20, 2016

You’ve been studying all week. Late nights in the library. Early mornings with the study group. You’ve never felt more prepared for an exam in your life. Now, here you are, sitting in the exam room with your blue book in front of you. “I’m ready for this,” you think to yourself as the teaching assistants pass out the exams. Once they’ve all been dispersed, you read the first question on the exam. But it’s not really a question. You raise your hand, and a TA walks over. “Is this a joke?” you ask. The TA shrugs, mutters “good luck,” and walks away. You glance back down at the exam, hoping it’s changed. It isn’t. Staring right back at you are 35 questions, each with four multiple choice answers, each question and each answer reading nothing but…

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Opinion

You're in charge, not your phone: don't be controlled by apps, notifications

Oct. 20, 2016

Ready for a challenge? Make your smartphone a “dumb phone.”

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Opinion

The awe-inspiring impact of accidental science

Oct. 19, 2016

In history, there have been scientific discoveries responsible for the general well-being of the human race. Moreover, many of those discoveries were found by accident. In 1928, Scottish biologist Alexander Fleming was doing work trying to rid the world of the super inconvenient staph infection. When he left his dirty dishes out over the weekend in his laboratory, an unfamiliar fungus covered them. That fungus, Fleming learned, killed all surrounding bacteria. Thus, penicillin was discovered, or invented, forever changing the world of medicine. If that doesn’t convince you that some of the most amazing scientific projects succeeded by accident, the fact that Viagra was originally created to combat minor chest pains should.

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Opinion

In defense of Krishna: a chaplain’s response

Oct. 19, 2016

Those who serve Krishna Lunch are volunteers. So are most who write for the Alligator. You don’t expect gowns and tuxedos on your Krishna Lunch servers, and you don’t expect Pulitzer-quality columns in the Alligator. Still, one can only marvel at the stunningly superficial and ignorant remarks about Hare Krishnas published in this space a few days ago.

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Opinion

Excellent educations should be filled with both humanities and sciences

Oct. 19, 2016

As a student and faculty member, I have had offers to study and work at several highly ranked institutes of technology.

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Sports

Column: Does golf really need Tiger Woods?

By Ray Boone | Oct. 18, 2016

Boone: Yes, he makes the sport better

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Opinion

Religious self-reflection is necessary

Oct. 18, 2016

There is a religious private school, somewhere out there in this great big world, that teaches young Muslim women that it is morally permissible for men to strike their wives, to kill gay people and that Jews and Christians upset Allah. If we were to ask you where you think such a school was situated, what would you say? Iraq? Pakistan? Iran?

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Opinion

Appreciating music for the tunes and the emotion

Oct. 18, 2016

The late movie critic Roger Ebert once said he didn’t have a favorite movie but that he had many favorites. In terms of music, I feel the same way. Jimi Hendrix, Creedence Clearwater Revival, Led Zeppelin, Fleetwood Mac, the Rolling Stones, the Doors, Sam Cooke, Prince, Michael Jackson, Ice Cube — depending on the day and how long the car ride is, I will listen to any, or all, of these artists with glee. Please do not ask which is my favorite. Did Voldemort have a favorite Horcrux? No, he needed all of them. So, too, do I need the variety of sounds, styles and emotions that each of these artists offer in their music (Sorry, that was an awful “Harry Potter” analogy).

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Opinion

This is why I don't like cover bands: A review of a tribute performance

Oct. 18, 2016

 The other night I went to High Dive to catch a tribute set of my favorite band of all time, The Smiths. The cover set was played by the Ordinary Boys, a band whose only function is to replicate the sound of The Smiths, as well as Morrissey’s solo work (yuck).

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Opinion

We don't have to adhere to traditional standards of perfection or happiness

Oct. 18, 2016

Life is a rough experience filled with ups and downs. Since the moment we are born, expectations of greatness are placed on us. Our parents look at us and say, “I hope he becomes a doctor,” or “She will be a movie star.”

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Opinion

It’s time to get rid of the division between high culture and low culture

Oct. 17, 2016

Quite a few things happened this past week that have forced me to reflect on the dichotomy of high and low culture. Perhaps you’ve already heard of the first event: Bob Dylan winning the Nobel Prize in Literature, and thus becoming the first musician to do so. As an unapologetically devoted fan of both music and the written word, it goes without saying that I was thrilled to see Dylan join the ranks of Toni Morrison, Gabriel García Márquez and Samuel Beckett. Unfortunately, countless academics, authors and journalists vehemently disagreed with my opinion, citing a variety of reasons but often reaching the same conclusion: Songwriting simply cannot reach the level of artistic achievement pure literature can.