🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <9clcad$amd$1@eeyore.INS.cwru.edu>,
 Dan Alt <dan@prozac.eeap.cwru.edu> wrote:

> John Martin <martin@fafnir.astr.cwru.edu> wrote:
> : conspiracy."  What exactly is this immovable force Dan?  I'd like to
> : know who this foe you fear so much is that you won't name them.
> 
> 	Now you're making me out to sound like Dave Zinkin.. :)

Doesn't it just enrage you to know that I've been vindicated time and 
time again, Dan?

Clearly it would be too painful for you to publicly admit that I was 
right, and you and your accomplices were wrong, all these years.  Don't 
worry... I won't force you to do the right thing.  God knows most of the 
CWRUgenners of my time didn't care about the difference between right 
and wrong -- assuming that they knew the difference to begin with.

> 	I don't think there's a conspiracy of people going out of there
> way to make life bad.  Fearless Leader isn't in the back room sending
> out Boris and Natasha to poison the food, unstock the vending machine,
> and change the blueprints for the Lewis building.

That doesn't describe all of the administrators and faculty, to be sure 
-- and I've never said otherwise.  But there are just enough people who 
fit that description to poison the entire CWRU atmosphere.

> 	Rather there is an institutional mindset that the students are 
> fundamentally unimportant except as revenue sources.  This mindset
> permeates most levels of the adminstrative side of the school.

And it comes directly from the people described above.

> 	Anyone who has ever tried to reserve a room for an event or
> park their car on campus, to cite just two examples, knows what I mean.

Or get a class with a professor who knows how to teach and cares enough 
to do so.  Or find a dean who isn't more interested in protecting 
incompetence than anything else.  Or get a CWRUnet problem fixed.  Or, 
to use one of the funniest examples from my CWRU experience, try to get 
off the meal plan with a valid medical excuse.

I still laugh at the memory of Becky Lude, Marriott moron, calling to 
tell me that "I looked up Crohn's disease in a dictionary and it doesn't 
sound bad."  Unfortunately for Bubbleheaded Becky, she made the mistake 
of calling my home in Rochester instead of my dorm (Hello!  This wasn't 
during a break!), and ended up saying that to my father -- a radiologist 
who specializes in, among other things, diagnosing and treating 
gastrointestinal disorders -- instead of me.  She continued to insist 
that she knew better, and her superiors decided to stand behind her 
rather than listen to reason.  It took a call from an attorney to get 
her and the school to back off and allow me to follow my prescribed 
dietary guidelines.

> :   Student involvement at CWRU has improved.  And I think the people
> : that have contributed to that deserve some thanks.  But I there are
> : a lot of people out there still that are obviously knowledgeable and
> : keep up with things because they know enough to see the problems, but
> : then they don't take that extra risk by taking the next step.  And I
> : was mad and taunted them but what I really should say is that it
> : isn't as big a risk as you think it is to take that step from just
> : complaining to doing something about it.  
> 
> 	You CAN'T do anything about it.  But feel free to try.

You can if enough people care.  Unfortunately, CWRU teaches students not 
to care about anyone, or anything, but themselves -- because that's 
exactly how the administrators and professors act.  Thankfully, unlike 
most CWRUgenners, I didn't succumb.

> : got Spring Fest.  Dan, Spring Fest hasn't solved world hunger or tuition
> : hikes but I think it makes a really positive contribution that is pretty
> : far reaching.
> 
> 	Far reaching how?  Is anyone going to look back at their
> 4/5/6/more years at CWRU and think, "Gosh, I spent a truckload of money
> going to a school with inadequate facilities, lousy food, and a dismal social
> life, which I didn't even want to go to to begin with and now I have 
> a degree from a school no one's heard of, but at least there was a 
> nifty party in front of the library, so that made it all worthwhile."

Probably not.  But some of us get the satisfaction of knowing that the 
worst is over -- that no matter how we're treated in the various stages 
of our careers, it isn't even close to the level of incompetence and 
abuse for which CWRU is infamous.

Stupidity and malice are a horrible combination -- but that's exactly 
what you get when you go to CWRU.  Some people let it go on without 
protest, or go out of their way to make excuses for it.  Others of us 
realize what's happening, fight it when necessary and get out when the 
opportunity presents itself, while remaining vigilant so as to protect 
others from a similar fate.  I'm proud of the fact that I've personally 
talked at least two hundred people out of attending CWRU; even if the 
school doesn't know the difference, those two hundred people will.

 -- DZ