Perspectives – Page 28 – Cardinal & Cream

PERSPECTIVE: Distraction, apathy characterize young people

March 2, 2012 Cardinal & Cream

“What gives your life meaning or purpose?”
Seated on a green lawn dotted with groups of university students enjoying the first spring days in Paris, I listened as my new friends responded to the survey folded in my hands. Glazed-over expressions accompanied each improvised response, and more questions usually revealed a general lack of concern for anything spiritual. Regardless of growing up in Catholic school or with devout Muslim parents, matters of faith had been tucked away in the back of their minds. […]

PERSPECTIVE: Technology Limits Interaction

March 1, 2012 Cardinal & Cream

Several years ago a hurricane battered my hometown of Naples, Fla., knocking the power out for days. Lights flickered off, air conditioning stopped humming, TVs stopped working and computers and cell phones stopped charging. As the ominous clouds cleared and the winds calmed, the power lines lay lifeless. While inside things were dark and dead, outside, life bloomed and flourished. People found comfort in the fresh outdoor air and the presence of pleasant company. Neighbors who had not talked in years gathered on front porches catching up on life, while children who usually spent their time cooped up inside playing video games climbed trees, played tag and used their imaginations together. The neighborhood buzzed with life in a way it had not in years. […]

PERSPECTIVE: Hip-hop promotes misogyny

February 28, 2012 Cardinal & Cream

Throughout the rise of hip-hop and rap, big names such as Bill Cosby and Gladys Knight have come out against its controversial content: a constant slew of racist remarks coupled with the demeaning of women, cheapening of sex and promotion of the gangster lifestyle of drugs and violence as a means to overcome impoverished pasts. But in the midst of their struggle to overcome, these artists are bring ing down — and keeping down — the perception of women nation wide. Injustice cannot be defeat ed with more in justice. […]

Women’s rights ignored

December 14, 2011 Cardinal & Cream

I walked the cramped row of concrete houses in the Indian slum and watched a group of boys playing cards on the dirt ground. One of them yelled something I could not understand, and the little group fell into fits of laughter. I listened and wondered how many of their sisters’ voices would never join them in laughter, how many little voices had been silenced forever. […]

Occupiers’ hypocrisy exposed

December 12, 2011 Cardinal & Cream

The demonstration that started it all is Occupy Wall Street, a group of just a few hundred protestors in Liberty Square aiming to shut down Wall Street. The protestors refer to themselves as the 99 percent, and claim they are opposed to the 1 percent who possess the most wealth. […]

Student involvement essential

December 6, 2011 Cardinal & Cream

Complaints are commonplace, but working through solutions too often is not. Students often grumble about what seems like an unnecessarily high amount of handicap-parking spots or the shrinking number of seats available at noon in the Brewer Student Dining Hall. While some of these problems cannot be fixed — the Grant Events Center will always need its own parking no matter how close it is to students’ dorm rooms — proposing solutions to any complaint is better than just airing frustration. […]

Christian voices silent on women, follow world

November 8, 2011 Cardinal & Cream

Have you ever been at a party and heard a funny joke about women behind the wheel, or in front of the stove? Successful jokes take reality and twist it, exaggerating its characteristics to make a caricature that, ridiculous as it is, still resembles the truth enough to make you laugh. When a joke about women is received with riotous laughter, it illustrates a far deeper societal problem than the situation might lead you to believe. […]