Oberlin, I'm disgusted with you, you conservative, foolish, whiner

I have spent four years of my life in wonderful Oberlin, Ohio, and have seen and experienced more stuff than I ever thought I would. Unfortunately, at this point, my resonating feeling is disgust. Though it is very disconcerting realizing that we pay almost $1,000 a week to attend this school, that is not what I'm disgusted about. My repugnance stems from what the population in general has transformed into. Don't get me wrong, I'm not insulting everyone here, that's not my intention, rather I am criticizing the entity we all, myself included, have become.

What I think we have become is a bunch of conservative, whining, divided, foolish, rhetoric spewing pseudo-intellectuals. We propose to the world that we are such a liberal utopia, but that is just not the case. We may be politically liberal, but we are fascistly conservative when it comes to tolerance. Try having a discussion or an argument over a political issue here, or just look in the Review's letter section and you'll find what I'm talking about, we no longer have dialogue. Kwame Ture's visit didn't bring about dialogue, it brought labeling and name calling. If one agreed with him on any issue they were instantly labeled anti-Semitic, if one disagreed, they became racist. Other issues if you disagree may cause one to be labeled: ageist, classist, sexist, speciesist (speciesist? come on). We have stopped being able to disagree and discuss, rather we turn to name calling, ending all possible intelligent discussion. I may never fully accept someone's view on an issue, but with discussion I may learn, or alter my opinion due to what they are saying. We no longer want to hear what others have to say, because, of course, we are right and they are wrong. If one doesn't agree with the accepted Oberlin opinion they are immediately berated and ostracized. There's liberalness and diversity for you, a bunch of intellectual clones who won't listen to any difference in opinion.

We also are a bunch of whiners, hell, I'm being one now. I've done it all year, complaining that when Res. Services remodeled our dorm they took our lounge curtains, didn't replace them, but wouldn't give us the old ones back. Come on though, I didn't need to have a rally for curtains. We've had a rally here because some say we should be able to smoke pot in our rooms without any restrictions. Does anyone else think this is ridiculous? I think most of the restrictions here in regards to drugs are pretty loose compared to many other places, but we still complain. We bitch about everything with the quote: "We pay $28,000 a year, we deserve (fill in the blank)." Just because we pay this doesn't give us the right to everything we want, there are a few factors to take into consideration. Yes, I think we pay way more than what we get in return, but we also made the decision to come here. Just because through our tuition we may "pay these peoples' salaries," that does not mean "they should do exactly what we want." Yes, they should provide what students need, but not to the level of a little child in the toy store yelling, "Mommy, give me this!" as some here would have. Everything that happens here is a monumental issue, what about real problems? I think the fact that a scant percent of children from the town this college is in have the financial or educational ability to attend this institution is pathetic. Illiteracy is rampant in the high schools, and we think the tantamount problem is whether it can be official that I can share a dorm room with a woman, or if someone used politically correct jargon in a letter.

There is such a huge intellectual arrogance here, it's frightening. "I've taken an intro. class in (fill in the blank,) now I am so educated, and will spew exactly what my professor or the author of a book claims as truth, to anyone who listens." We are so convinced we are the moral and intellectual superiors we feel this huge need to impose our views on everyone else. Since others aren't intelligent enough to think on their own, we better do it for them. Trouble is we aren't as intelligent or perfect as we think we are. We may think we aren't racist, prejudiced, bigoted, anti-Semitic or whatever but everyone here is in a way. We, the enlightened educational elite stereotype each other. Everyone in Zechiel is a frat-boy jock, everyone in Baldwin is a lesbian, athletes and Conservatory students are stupid, drummers in Wilder are "pale neo-hippie boys with memories of pot smoke and long-lost Grateful Dead shows," everyone from Third World and African Heritage House hate white people, the Jews run this school, the list goes on and on, and I don't think anyone isn't guilty of doing this.

What's the point of saying all this, other than the fact that many people are going to get pissed, because they are going to be confronted with the truth. My point is not to piss off, but rather to ask people, including myself, to look at themselves, and take a step back to analyze. Are you so concerned with minute issues that you lose focus on the big picture? Are you protesting or complaining for the mere sake of doing it or are you changing something that makes a significant difference? Do you need to lighten up a little, take a deep breath and a Prozac and grasp ahold of the reigns of reality, or can you handle the real world outside of your little bubble? Let's face it, as many problems as Oberlin has, it is vacation-land compared to the real world. Yes, we can make it better, but adding a little perspective for all of us would help.