OU students’ riot silly, ill-conceived
Editorial
Ah, sweet daylight savings time.The harbinger of long hours of sunlight, warm weather and riots at Ohio University.We once again watched with bemused contempt as OU students proved they really need better things to do with their time. For the second year in a row, daylight savings time was the impetus for a mass idiot-fest as a couple thousand OU students swarmed the streets, protesting the grave misjustice performed upon them by the demon that is the vernal equinox.Last year’s riot appeared, on the surface, to be the result of a spontaneous uprising. However, this year’s incident seemed to be planned. Accounts abound of the bars at OU being empty at 1:30 a.m. as students flooded into the streets, awaiting the dreaded two o’clock hour.Of course, when you consider OU doesn’t have a football team worth rioting over, it seems they need some excuse to set things on fire. But hey, kids, riots aren’t exactly the most productive way to spend your Saturday nights/Sunday mornings. We’re not advocating studying during that time, but surely something else can be done that doesn’t cause as many problems.After the smoke cleared and 34 students were carted away, this question remains: What was the true cause of the disturbance? Was it the students being wronged, or merely a case of students wishing to live up to the dubious standards set before them?A member of Ohio U’s Student Senate told the Associated Press she felt the disturbances had nothing to do with alcohol. Rather, it was a case of the heathens wishing to outdo the heathens which preceded them.Whether she is correct or not, the point still remains to be such: Protests and disturbances for a legitimate reason, handled in a legitimate fashion, are OK. Rioting because bars close early or the football team wins a big game is not.Rioting on a college campus usually results in nothing more than a big ol’ black eye for the school involved. In this case, OU will soon become almost as famous for their daylight savings time debacles as they are for their ineptitude on any athletic playing field and massive drunkfest/Halloween party, which is another source of headaches for the law enforcement officers in the area.Riots, as a general rule, are entirely unproductive. Especially in a situation such as this or the riots of the past few years when the Bucks knock off a dreaded foe on the football field. While riots may be appropriate for the proletariat when they are protesting working conditions or starving masses when the government hoards food, neither situation applies when one is referring to college students in central or southeastern Ohio. Oh, wait – can we use “Ohio” without permission? Perhaps that was the reason for the riots. OU students were simply frustrated over their school’s inability to pull off their ridiculous attempt to copyright the word “Ohio” in certain uses.These disturbances have provided nothing positive to either the academic culture or general atmosphere of Ohio University. While it may be a point of pride for a few misguided souls, most Bobcats are probably hanging their heads – again.The moral of the story is simple. OU – and OSU, if we’re not careful – will quickly become seen as the boys who cried wolf. Mass disturbances are a powerful tool, if they are used correctly and at the proper time. However, those conditions rarely occur here in America. You would think a school nicknamed the “Harvard on the Hocking” could figure that out.
