LETTER: Who says what is important

To the editor:

    Just when I thought I might get around to reading The Statesman again, I’m given another reminder why I, as well as numerous USU students, don’t take more than a few minutes to skim through the publication that’s “just that good.” Paternalistic and perennially biased, Statesman editors come across as no more than angry college seniors forced to reckon with their dying industry in the April 11 “Our View,” commanding us bubble-living college students to pay attention to the important issues on our campus and in our state.

    The irony, of course, is that by lambasting the facebook-obsessed students of USU, the editors of the Statesman betray their own facebook-obsessed lives, and the political and social crusades for which their status updates and posted links testify to their own definition of what “important” issues are. Don’t just assume that because a student doesn’t take an activist and self-righteous approach to decrying HB477 or school budget cuts (see, liking said editors’ status updates) that they don’t care about our school, state, community or world. On the contrary, they may just not care about your conception of our school or state. You all are right on one thing: I’ll only be in college once.

    But why should I use that time in pursuit of your own civic or social crusade? I have plenty of time in my life to face the sobering reality of the world’s issues, which, believe it or not, are not defined by the biased snippets taken from the Associated Press that The Statesman editors choose to run. I’ll be celebrating “Unplugged Week,” but in my own way. How, you ask? By not sustaining the editors’ grim post-graduation job hopes alive by spending my every waking second religiously following your newspaper and the issues you define as important.

Adam Nettina