Information Overload 2: Electric Boogaloo

by Kiefer

(It was noted that my first column seemed to be less a summary of the news and the newsworthy, and more a series of ideas for NARticles that I was too lazy to flesh out completely. Maybe so, but every thought doesn't require a couple/two/three pages dedicated to it, and it's impossible to write a breaking news column on a quarterly basis, with a two/three week lag time between deadline and distribution. This is what it is, so deal with it, Pink Boy.)

Septuplets: Should we be encouraging couples to use fertility drugs to promote the possibilities of multiple births? Multiple births that endanger the lives of the children it helps to create? Especially when these multiple births cost the already overburdened health care community over $1 Million, billed to the public?...I'm sorry, but you cannot blame everything on El Nino...Attention Dilbert fans: You're playing right into management's hands. By venting your righteous anger at inefficient corporate policies and idiot supervisors through the placement of comic strips on the wall, you merely gain the illusion of control, while doing nothing to remedy the situation. A Dilbert-ized cubicle is a complacent cubicle...http://www.suck.com...This is a gratuitous plug for the NAR's screening of Craig Baldwin's "Sonic Outlaws" February 26th at 8 PM in the Student Center Theater...I just saw "Scream 2" (opening weekend). I was very impressed by the movie, which was smart in a MST-3000 kind of way (which is to say that it had nothing to say, but it said it in a very witty, informed manner). In the light of morning, however, I'm not sure if the trend this movie is part of is a good or bad thing. Either this trend is that of the mass media becoming more self-aware and knowing, which in my book is a positive; or it's a vapidization of intelligence, in which self-aware smugness has replaced actually saying anything. Is this a case of middlebrow art aiming high, or highbrow art sinking low?...When promoting "Diversity" in the workplace (or anywhere else, for that matter), please keep in mind that to gain the benefits of differing viewpoints, ideas, and opinions often touted by those flying the Diversity banner, one must incorporate people of different backgrounds, cultures, and understandings. All too often I have seen a group of middle-class, all-American, college-educated, Judeo-Christian, free-market economist employees considered a hallmark of Diversity, just because they represent a "good mix" of racial and sexual genetic makeup. Remember: there is less difference between a white American male and a African-American female than between a Japanese-American male and a Japanese male...As can be seen by all the yellow signs around campus, it is now against the law to go rummaging through garbage dumpsters. What does it say about our society that the only way we can think of to fix the homeless problem is by making homelessness illegal? (And as a side thought: In what manner are they going to enforce this law? I have a feeling that it will be ignored by the police except for right before big alumni drawing football games, parents' weekends, new student recruitment weekends, and other high profile events, when the law will be used to "beautify" campus.)

(The opinions expressed above are not those of the North Avenue Review, which has no opinion, nor even necessarily those of the author, who has all too many opinions. They are merely a collection of various thoughts, beliefs, and ideas collected over the previous three months. However, feel free to write to the paper at the addresses in the front on any or all of the above.)

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