As of late, one of the most debated topics filling the opinion pages of this newspaper has been that of the Student Services Finance Committee and its decisions. However, I have noticed that if you talk to the average John Q. Student about SSFC, MCSC, DES, or student-fee allocations, their eyes tend to glaze over and they begin a game of mental Tetris while they wait for you to finish.
So, I’d like to move on to greener pastures, and spend some time discussing an aberrant species of people that are infecting this campus like the clap.
Here at the UW, we seem to have spawned a new breed of jerks. These people seem to think that rules and unspoken codes of conduct do not apply to them, because they are special.
Take, for instance, the people who sashay right past the long line at a bar and try to get in because their cousin’s friend’s roommate from freshman year once had a class with the bouncer. I say we start booing them, loudly.
Not just a handful of people — let’s get the whole line booing. And remember faces. When you get into the bar, personally thank that person for making you wait in line an extra five minutes.
Another one I particularly hate is the under-tippers. Yep, the ones who drop $60 on sushi and then leave the waitress $2. Having been a server myself, I can tell you folks there is a special place in Hell reserved just for you. If you cannot afford to tip 15 percent, you cannot afford to eat out. If you are out with people who do this, call them on it.
Another one that really bugs me is the litterbugs/kiosk arsonists/bathroom-stall-taggers. What, you just cannot stand to see something looking nice? Oh, for future reference, “birthday” only has one “R”. Now go wash your stupid graffiti off the wall so some poor bouncer doesn’t have to.
And how about all those cool people who live on the seventh floor and have conversations from their balcony with people on the street in the middle of the night? Not all 900 of us within earshot really want to hear why Bobby dumped Katie. And their counterparts, the people who blast music at 3 a.m., are cool, too. So what if I have a class in four hours? So what if I need to study? I’ll drop everything to hear Pink get a party started four doors down.
Another group I really like are the ones who think the 30 minute time limit on exercise machines at the Nat and SERF are a suggestion. I promise, the people waiting in line do not care if you are about to set a personal record. Get off the damn machine and go to the back of the line.
My favorite, though, has to be the person who sits in the outside row of a lecture hall, puts the desktop up ten minutes before class starts, and then sighs with irritation when they have to put the desktop down fourteen times to let people get in. You know who you are, and with your level of cognitive reasoning, it’s a wonder you ever made it to college.
Having been a bartender for several years, I can also tell you we truly hate the people who hysterically flag us down when we are busy only to ask, “Um. Um. Umumum what do you have on tap?” Sure, I have nothing better to do than recite the list of beers to you four times while 50 other people are trying to order drinks.
Finally, a little traffic etiquette. Moped horns are for emergencies. They are for alerting other cars to your presence so you don’t get squashed. Anyone who continuously blasts his horn from the 200 block to the 700 block of Langdon is not as cool as they’d like to think they are.
Oh, and for you pedestrians who like to randomly walk out into the street, assuming cars will stop? Think again. As far as I am concerned, if you’re not in a crosswalk, it’s hunting season. You weigh, what? A buck thirty? My car weighs half a ton. I’ll win. Every time.
Folks, if you see someone pulling any of these stunts, call them on it. Maybe if enough of us are vocal, we can shame some of these people into acting like humans. And as for the rest of them? Well, maybe they’ll step out in front of the wrong car someday.
Taniquelle Thurner is a UW graduate and a former writer for the Badger Herald.