Opinion

The art of viral video design

Ultimately, the people behind Kony 2012 have tapped into us. They have figured out how to use social media, and how to use us using social media, to spread their message so quickly and effectively, almost blindly. They have harnessed the psychology behind social media in order to promote their cause.

Controlling birth

Policy makers might be wise in emulating, or taking lessons from, the Princeton model of wide-reaching education and contraception subsidies. The New York Times reported that a mass-media education campaign aimed at promoting and explaining safer sex could save American taxpayers around $431 million a year, while sex education and teenage-exclusive pregnancy prevention programs could potentially save $356 million. The biggest savings would come from increasing the amount of subsidized birth control available to less privileged women. At a cost of $235 million a year, such programs could save an estimated $1.32 billion annually.

Implementing freshmen rush bans

Throughout our work, we kept in mind the goals of the policy to ban freshman affiliation with Greek organizations: To reaffirm the centrality of the residential colleges and eating clubs in residential and social life at Princeton; to encourage freshmen to explore a variety of interests and take full advantage of all the opportunities on campus; and to ensure that students who choose to participate in fraternities and sororities do so only after they have had the benefit of a full year on campus.

The sad truth

A home for the pub

The financial, legal and logistical problems preventing the creation of a pub do not outweigh the potential benefits of a pub for the University community. As noted by the Working Group and the Editorial Board, there is a pressing need for an alternative to both the eating clubs and Nassau Street — a space where undergraduates, graduate students and faculty can socialize together.

Shooting to kill

Despite our careful upbringings and Ivy League educations, the fact remains that nearly all of us are at least a little racist. I don’t mean that we all harbor a sense of racial superiority; I mean that race contributes to our perceptions of others. I’ve seen enough students their walking pace or cross the street when confronted with people who make them “uncomfortable.” A myriad of factors go into triggering this defensiveness. It could be anything from the neighborhood to the way the strangers carry themselves to the color of the stranger’s skin. Race is one of many criteria we use when making judgments about other people.

GTL: Revisited

Though I’m not a viewer of “Jersey Shore,” I must duly admit the inspiration for my column this week comes from the infamous brood. At some point in recent weeks, their principal of “GTL” reached a level of pop culture salience that put it on my radar. GTL: gym, tan, laundry. It’s the key to living a satisfactory, accomplished life. A daily routine that incorporates all three activities makes any day a success. While I’m not sure why one would ever need to do daily laundry — nor do I think I could ever endorse such a reckless use of water — I like the idea behind the GTL concept quite a bit: adopting a regimen grounded in easy-to-manage, concrete, finite activities.

In defense of college

Santorum’s criticism does not merely lie in this idea of moral and philosophical corruption, but extends to the idea that colleges, namely Ivy League and similar institutions, breed elitism, smugness and liberal belief systems. There is not space on this page even to summarize the dialogue that surrounds elitism. However, we can note that as Princeton students receiving a well rounded, liberal arts education that is highly revered, we must realize that these generalizations and stereotypes exist. We must identify the bad parts of these stereotypes and endeavor not to perpetuate them.

A cornucopia of cheer

I admit I’m a hypocrite.  I’ve only seen a few performances that don’t involve friends or my extracurricular groups.  But that’s because my two extracurricular groups — the band and WPRB Sports —  support and cover our athletic teams.  I’ve dedicated my Friday and Saturday evenings to watching Princeton sports and haven’t regretted a moment of it, even though I don’t know the athletes personally.  I love sports, love watching them, love our teams and love supporting them with my friends.  And I would certainly encourage everyone to try coming to games, even if you don’t know if you’ll enjoy them.

Diagnosis

30 seconds of fame

I don’t understand why people feel the need to have a monopoly on “social activism.” The goal of social activism is to spread knowledge of a certain issue and to get more people involved in the discourse of the issue. People who rapidly switch their profile pictures or order KONY 2012 gear are not professing to be experts on Uganda or the LRA or Invisible Children. You’re right — they might even be doing it just because their friend did it a few seconds before. However, after watching the KONY 2012 video, they do know something more at the very least.

Finding work that fits you

Yet we were both looking for something a little closer to the heart — a little more along the lines of “in the nation’s service and the service of all nations.” We were hoping to find jobs with non-profits, in the public sector, with social enterprises or with development organizations. Unfortunately, social enterprises and their non-profit cousins lack the time and resources to compete with the recruiting machines of large corporations. We found that it was a lot harder to pursue a career dedicated to the public good than it was to interview with banksters.

What's in a name?

It is not just the vicious comments we observed in the wake of recent controversial opinion columns that demand we take time as a University community seriously to reassess the style and demeanor of our online discourse.

Crossed wires

Swiper, no swiping

The fact of the matter is that coffee is too easy a purchase when it comes to our TigerCards. A $3 swipe here. A $3 swipe there. And all of a sudden, you’re down $300. If coffee is not your vice, how about Frist pizza or quesadillas or whatever it is that keeps you going? It’s all just a swipe away. No one carries cash; therefore, there’s no such thing as an empty wallet to curb your spending. During those late nights, whether in preparation for a paper-writing marathon or during a post-Street famine, there seems to be an endless supply of invisible cash at your disposal. Hence, we lose track of all those little, slowly accumulating purchases.

So you want to write a book

We’re at the stage where anyone with an idea and enough words can have a book in print in a week.

Actual equality

To assert that the only way to achieve the common goal of greater equality in higher education is to allow the government to designate certain races as preferred over others seems counterintuitive

Editorial: Changing the plan

The Board believes that Princeton administrators should also seriously consider reforming the University’s academic calendar to give our students the same benefits given to students at our peer institutions, such as Harvard and Yale.

Cartoon: Om-nom-nom-ivore’s dilemma

Make it yourself

When you are limited — either by regulations or market forces — to only drinking more or less, you explore only how much you can drink. But when you are free to explore it as an interest, your conversations and actions will reflect a preference toward complexity and quality, which will influence your friends and their friends as well.