Recaps and Request

Good News.

The South Georgian received 10 awards this past weekend in Macon for the exceptional work done by the staff. It was very exciting. We won 6 first place awards.

- Excellence in Advertising
- Best Review: Kyle Ellis
- Best Campus Community Service - Sports
- Best Campus Community Service - News
- Best Campus Community Service - Editorial
- General Excellence

Isn't that freaking awesome? What does all that mean, you ask? Well, it means that we are the leading school newspaper for the 2-year division in the State of Georgia.
Also, the beautiful and talented, Sam Nhema, received the 2nd place award for Best Review. Congrats to her.

Sorry to break the update, but can I rant for a sec? Well, I'll take the silence as a yes. It makes me really sad to see extremely smart and interesting people succumb to the "age of shallowness" that is ever increasing these days. I hate to see people who are capable of having interesting conversations and contributing to society, throw all that away to instead focus on the more carnal aspects of life. Don't get me wrong, there is a time and a place and a GREAT need for that, but it's all about balance.

Ok, back to what I was saying.

A group of friends and I met with the Student Government Association today concerning the recent cases of discrimination that have occurred here on campus. For instance, one student, Isidro De los Santos, was sitting in a health class when the teacher, after seeing his name on the roll and having trouble pronouncing it, looked up and asked him, "Are you legal?"

Where does a faculty member get off thinking that it is ok to ask that sort of question, as a joke I'm sure, in front of the entire class? Thereby, isolating an individual as the butt of a joke and endorsing discrimination as acceptable behavior. All that does is help to reinforce the perception of ignorance and closed-mindedness that people have about the south and small-town America.

Also, a new student here on campus, Jason, who is living in the dorms, received a warm welcome to SGC. Late one evening he went to his room and heard some of the guys on his floor, the baseball players, call him a faggot. He ignored their comments and went to his room and shut his door, but that didn’t stop them. They proceeded to beat on his door and call him a faggot and tell him to come out. He heard one of them say, “Go do it!” Obviously he was frightened, so much so that he didn’t go to the bathroom, but instead peed in a cup in his room. That’s outrageous!

When he called the RM, Jeff Timothy, who also happens to be the coach of the baseball team, Jeff asked Jason, “What do you want me to do about it?” Can you imagine how it must have felt to turn to someone who is paid to protect you only to have that person ask you what they ought to do? Again, that is a serious problem and reflects horribly on the college and shows the urgent need for sensitivity training.

So we brought these guys to the SGA meeting and had them share their experiences and we proposed a solution. 1) Amend the current student handbook to include discrimination based on sexual orientation, which is does not cover currently, and 2) Create a code of consequences that would apply to faculty, staff, and students and insure that they are enforced consistently. We seemed to convey our point clearly and it seemed to resonate with those in attendance. I think it was a successful start to a process which should result in a positive change.

With all that said. I would like to talk about…I don’t know. I actually thought I had something else that I wanted to say, but I forgot. I guess I’ll say this.

ATTENTION: SAM NHEMA

I suppose I will use this as a way to communicate with you since you read often. How are you? That’s awesome. I would really like to have your email address. I don’t have that anywhere. Also, I had a great idea for an article that I would like for you to write for the South Georgian. Considering the tense situation between the US and Iran and talk of war and all those dreadful things, I thought that it would be very interesting to have an article written from the perspective of someone who has lived there and knows more about the climate of the country than most any one else. I would like to hear about Iran from another perspective than the, “Iran bad. America good.” perspective that most American media seems to convey.

Don’t you agree that it could make for an awesome article? It would be an editorial for our next edition, the March edition. Please, consider my proposal and let me know what you think. I would really appreciate it if you would do this for the paper. *Muah*

Well kittens, I think that is going to do it for now. Feel free to email me at jake@thesouthgeorgian.com concerning whatever. If you all know of anything that might be interesting and relevant for a college newspaper to cover, I’d be very excited to hear from you.

Until next time, much love and infinite peace and joy.

Jake.