Sunday, April 08, 2007

Stop "Compalining"!

Hello everyone!

For those of you with short-term memory, or for those of you who usually don't read my blog but stumbled here by accident, a while back I wrote about the debit card issue at LCC and how we're going to be fighting against it, etc. It's a fascinating read, and I definitely recommend it.

Anyway, last week I started a myspace site titled "LCC Students Against The Debit Card". The reason for this is because we've found that most LCC students don't even know about it, and this is one way we're trying to spread the word. But in order to let the students know about the site, I've been going through the myspace "current student" listing for LCC and inviting each person one at a time to join the friend list. It's a painstaking, arduous task, but it's the only way that I know to get the word out.

So it's been four or five days since I started, and (as of Sunday morning) I've gone through 500 out of over 5,200 current students on myspace, or at least ones who have identified themselves as an LCC student. Here's what I've found:

1. Former LCC students who are still students at another school (such as the University of Oregon) show up on the current student list. This means I have to look at each profile and scroll down to the part that shows what school the student is currently in. Sometimes it will say things like "2002-current" under the "years attended" heading for LCC, and I wonder if that person has really been there for five years. And I thought my three years was a long time...

Anyway, I try to only invite current students, but sometimes I get in a hurry or I get lazy and someone like the guy below gets invited. But most times I try not to invite someone who's no longer at LCC. This means that even though I've gone through 500 people, I haven't actually invited 500 people.

2. Certain users set up their accounts so that you have to enter either their last names or their email addresses to invite them. This keeps spammers from sending them a friend request. But it also keeps me from sending them a friend request. So again, even though I've gone through 500 people, I haven't actually invited 500 people. this is really frustrating because I've found myself saying, "Hey, it's that girl from my Government class from the fall term. Crap, I don't know her last name. I don't even know her first name. Grrr!"

But all in all, I've probably invited about half the students I've looked at, making it around 250 as of now. And out of the 250, 85 have joined as of Sunday morning, officially surpassing the number on my personal site. Oh well.

But I'm sure there will be more out of the 250 who haven't checked their site yet but will join once they do. If we hit 125 out of the original 500, that's 1 in 4, which means that when all 5,200 students are gone through, we could realistically end up 1,300 students total. That's significantly more than the 200 or so who have signed up for the card.

The purpose of the site, however, is not to collect numbers, but to keep the students informed and to provide a sounding board since the college certainly hasn't done that. I've gotten a few messages and postings that have been in support of our cause and have been thankful for the information. But I did receive one negative message from Coelispex, AKA Chelly this morning. So without further ado, here it is:
----------------- Original Message -----------------
From: Coelispex
Date: Apr 8, 2007 4:16 AM


All of you "intellectuals" who claim to compalin about the lack of education you receive at LCC are in the dark like Vampires.

As a UCLA alumnus, I will tell you that education is an illusion. You will learn what you will learn.

Read books and understand them. If you depend on your professors to teach you, I feel no regret in calling you an idiot.

You are what you know...

Chelly

There you go. I've found that whenever someone starts a sentence with "As a [blank] alumnus..." you can expect the rest of that sentence to say something really stupid. It's the whole "I need to remind you about my credentials in order to justify what I'm about to say because what I'm about to say can't stand on its own" idea. Even worse, this guy is essentially saying, "College doesn't teach you anything. Take my word for it--I know stuff like this because I've been to college." Am I the only one who doesn't understand that logic?

Am I also the only one who doesn't understand the logic in criticizing someone for saying something that that person never said? I mean, I know FoxNews does it all the time, but still. Nowhere on the myspace profile was there anything complaining about a lack of education, unless you count the lack of education students have received about the card itself.

But had this guy said "Getting a Bachelor's degree in English from UCLA doesn't mean squat," he'd have a point. Apparently, logic and common sense are not prerequisites.

Oh yeah, "...in the dark like Vampires" is the stupidest simile I've ever heard in my life. And why would an English major capitalize "vampires"? Sure, "compalin" is most likely a typing error, but come on, "Vampire"?

So of course I had to respond:
Chelly,

What are you talking about? Did you even read the "About me" section of the profile? It's written in big, easy to read letters.

The issue is not "a lack of education"--it's about a debit card system the college administration is foisting upon us that is riddled with hidden fees, among other things. If you're going to criticize something, at least know what you're criticizing. If you're going to call someone an idiot, at least learn how to spell "complain", otherwise you'll come across as an idiot. And no, that's not something I learned from a professor--it's just common sense.

I'm not impressed that you're a UCLA alumnus, and if you need to send myspace messages to people calling them idiots in order to feel better about yourself, then "I feel no regret in calling you an idiot."

So if you're interested in defending the debit card system, do some research first, and then get back to me. But if you're just out to try to make yourself look smart at the expense of someone else, find a high school dropout's site. You might stand a chance. Regardless, stop wasting my time.

LSATDC

PS While I do appreciate Kurt Vonnegut Jr. being heavily featured on your myspace page, you're still a douche.
Yes, I resorted to calling him a douche, but man was it fun, and I felt a lot better after doing so. And now I feel even better posting it here on my blog.

So what have we learned today? If you don't want the world the three people who read this blog to know what a douche you are, think before you send messages to people you don't know about things you know nothing about. Also, it's not okay to send messages calling someone an idiot, but it's perfectly fine to respond to that message by calling the person a douche and then posting it on your blog. But only if that person really is a douche.

Rob