More On “Fight Club”
We received an anonymous letter yesterday, which sheds more light on the “Fight Club” rumors which have been swirling around this election season. The “Concerned Student of the University of Oregon and ASUO outsider” who wrote the letter didn’t reveal thetir identity, which does call into question the veracity of the opinions expressed. Nevertheless, it’s an interesting read, and the writer seems well informed. Read for yourself.
[…] you know what they’re talking about? It’s called Fight Club. The progressive bloc in the ASUO have their own Mystic Society of No Homers to organize their […]
Douchebaggery consists of people from the left and the right. The OC doesn’t discriminate and whaps both sides of the coin. There just happen to be more douchebags on the left (NATE GULLEY).
Slade, I can’t get my own writers interested in the ASUO, let alone any shadowy, far-right organizations. The Collegiate Network gives us about enough money to print one issue, the Leadership Institute gives us about half as much. We also receive a few publications which are about as germane to campus politics as the teachings of Scientology, as well as the sweet Ann Coulter poster you can see outside of our office. Believe it or not, none of this is enough to tempt me away from making my own editorial decisions.
Seriously, man, do you even read the Commentator? How well do you really think we fit in with “mainstream conservativism?” Honestly, I don’t even care how you perceive our politics, it’s the fact that you think we get our positions spoon-fed to us that pisses me off. Ask anyone on the committees I served on this year (budget reform, Rec Center reform) if my approach was formulaic or overtly political. Hell, you were at our Symposium on Fiscal Responsibility, Slade, did we sound like spoon-fed ideologues there?
Unfortunately, the response to any suggestion of reform is almost always paranoid and defensive. Yes, the ASUO has been operating without any real changes for 15 years now and it wouldn’t be the end of the world if it were unchanged for another 15. However, since there are common-sense places to make sensible reform, why not do it? Oh right, because everyone has been conditioned to fear change, and to demonize anyone who who ruins the comfortable arrangements at the I-Fee feeding trough. If that’s what being liberal on this campus means, then you can keep the label… it has nothing to do with what I grew up admiring about liberals.
Tim: “Furthermore, there
“…and not be open about the people who support you folks.”
You mean like on the masthead, where it says “Member Collegiate Network”? C’mon, Slade, you can cast better aspersions than that.
DRINK!
Seriously, since when are we not open about our corporate 501(c)3 paymasters? It’s also not as if the CN or the LI have any say over the content: they don’t. The reason we didn’t get any LI money during my time with the magazine was they wanted to dictate the slant. After the ISI put in the new leadership at the CN, that organization was also less than super excited about the content of the magazine. Heck, for a while the CN didn’t even have a link to the OC’s site from their publications list. That’s since been restored, but the OC is in nobody’s pocket and I, frankly, object to the insinuation that it is.
Furthermore, there’s a difference between getting a grant to publish your content and setting up a coalition with off-campus powers to elect members of student government sympathetic to their cause.
You’re awfully eager to put words in my mouth; I’m not talking conspiracy here. It’s not as though anyone with the inclination and Google can’t figure things out.
I don’t think you folks do anything wrong or unethical, either; I just think it’s a bit hypocritical to critcize a few lefty folks for getting together to give some advice to interested students as being some kind of conspiratorial tampering, and not be open about the people who support you folks.
The LI did send that one “Free Speech on Campus” book that contained, if memory serves, more copy errors than any given Jones piece. It was comedy gold. I never went to any LI events, and under my tenure at the magazine we didn’t even get any money from them. We did get some cash from the CN, but toward the end of my time there was a leadership shift and relations with that particular organization have been a little strained since.
I haven’t worked for the Commentator for a year. I’m at another publication now, thank you.
And, yes, the OC isn’t as bad as other conservative journals. But the ASUO thinks it’s filled with Nazis nonetheless. That’s not surprising; members of the ASUO refer to the ODE as the “enemy,” right?
The LI sends a lot of books. I’ve never known anyone to read one. They’re terrible. Sometimes they send money, which you can verify with the controllers. Jesus, man, step outside the Mystery Machine for two seconds and realize that there is no secret conspiracy, at least concerning the OC.
T, how do I put this nicely? As far as PR goes, you guys aren’t really one of my target audiences. 😉
I’ve never been a defender of the Senate, as pretty much anyone who’s talked to me on the subject can tell you.
And, in the OC’s defense, I do think you folks are much better than a lot of conservative campus papers. You’re not as dependent on outside organizations as your counterparts on some other campuses I know.
And I’m honestly curious about what they send you folks.
Also: “So, that
Yeah, I’m not sure why you guys did that, actually.
Good response though, Ted. The LI has always been a marginal part of the OC. Like the Collegiate Network, it’s filled with some decent, normal people, and also a lot of crazy wingnuts. To imply that the OC doesn’t know who the wingnuts are is silly.
Slade is also implying that he goes through your ASUO mail. Class act all the way.
“Come on Nieders, you can
Dude, Slade, the last package we got from LI was a bunch of books called “Who’s Deceiving the Liberals” which we distributed as “free humor.” It suggested that there is a “gnostic liberal conspiracy” which seeks to destroy American culture in order to establish a UN-based world government, triggering the end of times. To suggest that these contributions somehow inform my position on ASUO issues is beyond absurd.
I’m curious Slade, why is it so incomprehensible that my positions on ASUO issues simply come from the reality of the situation? Shouldn’t political systems have some balance? Do you really think the display at the last Senate meeting was the product of a healthy, balanced political institution? It’s sad when legitimate criticism is dismissed out of hand because of who it comes from. So much for liberal open-mindedness.
Most of it is spam mail, actually.
So, Slade sucks at PR, right?
So, that’s why you guys get packages from the leadership institute all the time. Wonder what’s in them.
Come on Nieders, you can’t tell me you want the campus to have “it’s own natural political dynamic,” and keep working for the organization you work for.
It is my educated opinion that Oscar Guerra himself wrote this anonymous letter. The peculiar use of incomplete sentences and other speech patterns is typical of Guerra, but the letter is much-more put together, suggesting Guerra spent a lot of time to make each detail just right. Most people cannot hide the specific way in which they combine English subparts.
Four other details are on my mind: “new” is spelled incorrectly for “knew,” Ashley Rees is spelled Ashley Reese, Guzman lacks the punctuation accent, and there is a single space after periods.
Those who forget silent “k” often take an aural approach to English. The incorrect spelling of Rees suggests she is the person most removed from the writer, since the rest of the names mentioned were spelled correctly with meticulous detail. For instance, the proper capitalization of “L” in McLain. Guzman lacks the proper punctuation, but we all know that only other Chicano/a students include the accent, which is exactly why Guerra intelligently ommitted it.
Finally, I am not sure why the document is not single spaced between sentences. The details suggests a Freshman or Sophomore wrote the document, since they have not yet permanently changed the high school habit of pressing the space bar TWICE after sentences. Because Guerra is a senior, he most likely hits the space bar twice without being conscious of the fact, but some majors are more disciplined in instilling proper grammar than others.
Just some thoughts.
And that is unfortunate because every single student on campus contributes to the fee to go and fund things like Mecha and the MCC… their voice should still be hear and their interests still protected, just because they don’t participate in Mecha or what have you.
decisions get made by those who show up
You dont even know what my cause is. Everything that has to do with student govt and funded student groups is a waste of time, space and money. 99.9% of students in college dont give a rip about any of those, if you want to help students abolish student govt and the funded groups along with it.
Cry me a river, Anthony. I kinda side with you, but I also kinda think that you do way more disservice to your cause. You and the MCC deserve each other.
I think it would be a good time to potentially bring up the fact that the SEIU, which happens to be one of the main reasons for the Incidental Fee increases, is represented by someone named Felisa Hagins. It occurs to me that maybe, just maybe, the unions are also involved…which wouldn’t be surprising considering the Incidental fee’s largest increases last year were from union contracts, which pushed up the amount of money that was needed to reach Current Service Level.
at least minority students have access to an endless supply of scholarships, us white guys with our male privelege arent as lucky with all those grants and such at our finger tips.
Yup. It’s all part of the big plan. Actually it is a sub-plan underneath the master plan for a new basketball arena.
Is it racist when the ASUO raises the I Fee so much that it inhibits minority students from accessing education?
“I am an alumni of the University of Oregon and I refuse to let my college alma matter move to the right” -Felisa
Ha-ha, I think we all know the UO isnt in any danger of moving to the “right.” Let’s be straight here, the UO is a leftist’s DREAM come true. Case in point Nate Gulley SOMEHOW gets off with no penalty and blames everyone else for his outrageous behavior. How many conservatives profs or administrators are on campus? Other than the Rhino that sits in the Presidents office, NONE. There is one legit conservative group on campus in the College Republicans compared to the countless leftist groups. Better watch out for that takeover from the right! Also would it be bad to have a increase of a conservative presence on campus so maybe there could be, I don’t know…a diversity of political opinion? Gosh that would be horrible.
To agree with Toby when students on campus in student govt speak of conservatism it seems to me they are refering to fiscal responsibility and accountability, obviously two hated concepts of the left.
Progressive = oppressive.
Amen! What these “leaders” don’t get is that fiscal conservatism and responsibility is a good thing.
I’m not going to badmouth the LI because I appreciate what they have done for us, but they certainly aren’t exactly organizing and training us. Resources exist for conservatives to organize on campus, but I’m personally not that interested because my brand of “conservativism” doesn’t jive with many of the people who allocate said resources. I mean, Islamofascism awareness day? Seriously?
My issue with “Fight Club” is that I think that this campus should have it’s own, natural political dynamic rather than have it be dictated by outside interests. The “Progressive”-to-“Conservative” spectrum that people are used to working with doesn’t really apply to this campus at all. When the “liberals” seem to believe that the highest social idea involves censorship and self-denunciation, I think it’s clear how the spectrum is off. When you deduce that the now-pervasive spectre of racism is tied to a budget funding level, you understand the real political dynamics at work here.
Given what a shoddy job so-called conservatives have been making of national politics, I guess it’s an honor to reclaim the term for common-sense, responsible government. The people who are being called “ASUO fiscal conservatives” are not taking orders from any group or national interest; they are basing their positions on the numbers in the budget and the long history of Incidental Fee growth. It’s difficult to stand up for the 15,000+ students who don’t vote, to ensure that their money is well spent, especially when it makes you a “supporter of white supremacist power structures.”
That’s all.
Silly (but typical) liberal. Karl Rove has nothing to do with the Leadership Institute. Period.
I know you lefties just have so much hate built up, but please at least try and get your facts straight when you rant. Although, that might be hard sinc eyou run on emotion and pipe dreams as opposed to facts…
PS- I like how you try and use “progressive” as opposed to “liberal”. Nice try, but crazy is still crazy no matter how you pronounce it.
You mean back when it was funded by the LI? Do the LI folks know Rove is running it? You’d better tell them! Quickly now!
Anonymous internet poster claiming the OC isn’t as good as it used to be? DRINK!
I just would like to make some comments about fight club, first of all OSA is not involved, this is a project of people who are concerned about the right wings leadership institute. The leadership institute is led by people like Karl Rove who want to shut down progressive politics on campus. Oregon has a response from the left
Yeah!!! Fight Club!!! Yale has Skull and Bones, University of Oregon has Fight Club. I guess I’m not progressive enough to be a member.
WHY are we talking about fight club!?!?!?! NO SERIOUSLY: Go vote people. That is all.