Invisible People
16 April 2010
April 1st is Census Day in the U.S., and as the US Census Bureau continues to collect data, some conservative politicians like Representatives Michelle Bachmann (R- Minn) and Ron Paul (R-Texas) are concerned that census questions may be “too personal” and “invasive.” They think the census counts as “government intrusion.” But their criticism is more likely aimed at how the census has changed over the past two centuries, and their claims are less substantiated by fact than by paranoia (C’mon, your telephone number is “too personal”? Yeah, right!) Though silent on the issue, these conservative politicians are probably more peeved by the increasingly LGBTQ-friendly policies adopted by the US Census Bureau in order to make sure that data on LGBTQ people is collected. Bachmann’s argument that the census isn’t private enough is in opposition to society’s push to do the right thing and “queer the census.”
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Gong
16 April 2010
We speak a dangerous language. Globalization has turned English into a linguistical monster, squashing indigenous languages untiltill the cultural knowledge that is embedded and transmitted through language quietly peters out. It used to be colonialism, now it’s globalization in the form of a rapidly increasing Western influence. And it’s not only English, but also Mandarin Chinese, Spanish, Arabic, Portuguese, Indonesian, and Thai to name a few—; national languages are unfailingly the culprits. Of the world’s estimated 6,909 languages, half of these are endangered, and of the endangered, 473 languages are nearly extinct, with only a few elderly speakers still alive.
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Season of Change
16 April 2010
Winter is over, and the Green is green once again. The Olympians are back in their homes, and the tapping season has come to an end. Our pallid complexions are reverting to their tanner states, and our windows are left open so that our musty, dusty rooms can finally breathe in the aromas of Hanover. We at the DFP, with a new Editorial board and a cleansed critical palette, are excited for and committed to another term of keeping our eyes, ears, and noses open, following leads, and voicing our opinions. Whether or not you agree with us, we hope you, too, will share your voice with us and remain open to change.
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A Better Thayer
16 April 2010
You’re hungry. You and your friends decide to go to Thayer Dining Hall since Collis is crowded and chaotic, as usual. When you reach Thayer, you enter a large, emotionless abyss—a sea of chairs, fans and fancy TV screens, along with troops of tired, hollowed-eyed students trying to clock in their social time for the week. The fans are so loud that you usually are limited to small talk and niceties. Buying food and catching up with friends has never been so dull and boring. Thankfully, the college is planning on renovating Thayer beginning this summer, and will be renamed to the Class of 1953 Commons when it opens. That may mean that sophomores will not be able to eat at FoCo during their sophomore summer, but hold your groans, for Collis will remain open. Moreover, in the long run, this renovation can potentially reinvent the facetime rat-race that is the Dartmouth dining experience.
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Obamacare Victorious?
16 April 2010
Healthcare reform has become the law of the land. This is a momentous, yet tumultuous time in America’s history. A great victory has been won but like all great victories, health care reform is controversial. The great majority of Republicans have sworn to roll back healthcare. The Democrats have a huge struggle on their hands, but they have history on their side. Katrina Swett, wife of former Congressman Dick Swett and current Democratic candidate for Congress visited the Dartmouth College Democrats on Monday, April 13th. She believes healthcare reform is just one of the many aspects of a decent society. Democrats fought hard to erect socially progressive programs such as Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and Civil Rights Equality throughout the twentieth century. All of these reforms, now sacrosanct in our society, met fierce backlash when they were first introduced. However, just like it is hard to imagine a United States of America without a commitment to racial equality or Social Security today, it will be hard to imagine a world without a better health care system tomorrow.
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Ca$h Hurts Africa
16 April 2010
Aid and the well being of Africa are so inextricably linked in today’s culture that to question the value of the former seems utterly sacrilegious. However, this is exactly what Dambisa Moyo PhD discussed on April 1 over lunch with the Great Issues Scholars. Born and raised in Zambia, Moyo received her BA and MBA at American University in Washington, D.C., her Masters at Harvard and her Ph.D in economics at Oxford. She went to work at the World Bank in D.C. and now has worked for eight years at Goldman Sachs in debt capital markets, hedge fund coverage and in global macroeconomics. She signed copies of her book Dead Aid for the scholars. Her book expounds on the controversial topic of her talk in Moore Hall.
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DIY Microfinance
16 April 2010
Over Spring break, I went to Ghana on behalf of WomensTrust, a microfinance institution, to help fix their operations. Yet, I didn’t go as a white knight. I was not the savior for a poor, ignorant people, nor were the local people on the staff supplicants to my “developed world knowledge.” I was a partner, someone who had a few specialized skills that could help them and at the same time learn from them. I did not sweep in to grandly dictate to them how things should be. To do so would be to disregard the fact that they were intelligent human beings who knew the situation best—they were, after all, the ones living in it.
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Apoca-Blitz
16 April 2010
To me, switching away from Blitzmail means giving up on the beautiful dream of a decentralized, community-maintained cyberspace. For those of you who don’t know, Dartmouth’s Taskforce on E-mail and Collaboration Tools (TEC-T) is reviewing two possibilities for the future of Dartmouth email: Google Apps and Microsoft Online Services, both services offered free of charge. The taskforce plans to make a recommendation by May 25th, and the transition could begin as early as June. Switching to one of these services will mean that our email will no longer be hosted on Dartmouth-owned servers. It also means the software powering our email system—including the clients we run on our own computers—will no longer be built and maintained by Dartmouth staff and other community members.
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It All Adds Up
05 March 2010
Seeing as they were during V-Week and near the performance of the Vagina Monologues, you can’t say they weren’t timely. Whether you feel that they were “cowardly,” as one D opinion writer seemed to believe, or that they addressed a dark underbelly of campus that everyone knows about but rarely acknowledges, you certainly can’t say that they failed to elicit a reaction.
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Tyranny of Ignorance
05 March 2010
Science is not democratic. Science is not emotional. Gravity doesn’t care if everyone votes against it. Power won’t make itself perpetual for a while if Congress passes a stimulus. Poison ivy won’t stop that itch if you ask it nicely. The virus killing that child won’t stop no matter how hard and how tearfully his [...]
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- Issue 11.3
- Protests in the Arab World
- Martin Luther King Jr. Day: 11.1
- Deepwater Horizon: 10.12
- Pride: 10.11
- Dead Aid; Rebuilding Thayer; The End of Blitz; Endangered Languages: 10.10
- It’s Everybody’s Issue: 10.9
- The Vagina Monologues: 10.8
- President Kim, You’re Missing the Point: Issue 10.7
- Disrespecting Our Dartmouth Family: Issue 10.6
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