Opinion

Thoughts from the Georgetown community.

Editorials

Empty promises, not empty beds

In anticipation of the 780 beds to be provided next fall by the newly-completed Southwest Quadrangle, Director of Student Housing Services Shirley Menendez told students in an Oct. 31 e-mail that the University would “have enough space to accommodate all students who want to live on campus.

By the February 27, 2003

Voices

How to fulfill a service requirement

You could easily waste a week questioning the merit of mandatory community service. While this may satisfy some deep philosophical need, it is a waste of time. The nuns will not back down. You might as well get it over with. First and most importantly: Get a friend in on it, preferably one with a good sense of humor.

By the February 20, 2003

Voices

I hate ‘Kumbaya’

I got a letter in the mail the other day. Usually, seeing my name on an envelope is like my birthday and Halloween all in one, but reading this particular letter was punishing, mean, even degrading. I, after all, was the one who had written it. When I wrote that letter, Father Pat promised me two things.

By the February 20, 2003

Voices

Earth-shattering epiphany

Who would have thought that a single color could be so loaded? Sure, plenty of colors mean something, make instant connections in your mind, but those tend to be cursory. Green, blue and yellow may mean something, but they don’t make a statement about you.

By the February 20, 2003

Voices

Get out that Starter jacket

I got it in my head that I had to look north as I decided where to attend college last year. As I explained to distressed parents and pets alike, “It’s just not cold enough for me in D.C.; I need sub-zero temperatures and blankets of snow from the second week in October to the last week in April to function.

By the February 20, 2003

Voices

I kid you not

This past weekend, as I was standing behind my apartment and staring up at the trees that laid bare by the winter’s cold, I came to an important understanding about my life: I cannot have children. This sudden awareness of my procreational limitations was not an epiphany gained from watching the neighborhood squirrels.

By the February 20, 2003

Voices

My new weather control device is unstoppable

My new weather-control device is unstoppable. After years of top-secret research and development and months of focus-group testing on Kurdish tribesmen, I have tasted the succulent nectar of world domination just days before your President begins dropping bombs on my swimming pools.

By the February 20, 2003

Editorials

Vote Morgenstern/de Man

Being an effective leader of the Georgetown University Student Association has nothing to do with slick politicking or bold promises of reform. It requires a strong working knowledge of the University’s administrative system and experience with using GUSA to implement change.

By the February 20, 2003

Editorials

Get on your feet

As part of Georgetown’s increased security efforts in response to the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, a Department of Public Safety vehicle has been stationed at University entrances, Healy Gates and Reservoir Road, 24-hours a day. While the car adequately addresses campus traffic control, it has not been as successful at policing crimes occurring near campus: On Feb.

By the February 20, 2003

Voices

Letter to the Editor

Mike DeBonis’ column (“Trash Talk,” Feb. 6) was reasonably well-written, which is to be applauded. However, the sanctimonious attitude he exhibits is not. The article ends with the paragraph, “Do yourself a favor if you’re a talk radio junkie or a HoyaTalk regular: Break out of the cycle and take a few minutes to get the real story.

By the February 13, 2003

Editorials

Free and anonymous

Unfortunately for students, on-campus HIV testing is neither cheap nor anonymous. Currently, the Student Primary Care Clinic does offer testing, but a recently proposed plan would have made it both free and anonymous for students. However, once again the University proved itself incapable of meeting student needs by denying funding for the plan yesterday.

By the February 13, 2003

Editorials

An inexcusable mistake

On Feb. 5, students were unable to access their Georgetown University e-mail accounts for approximately 14 hours. The administration shut down GUMail in order to remove a message sent out to the University community, which contained confidential and sensitive information about three students.

By the February 13, 2003

Editorials

Better than hydro

In his State of the Union address, President George W. Bush explained his National Energy Policy, an energy plan which breaks definitively with Republicans of the past who have not advocated environmentally-friendly policies. Bush claims that he has presented an energy plan that is environmentally sound and progressive in the development of “technology and innovation,” citing his effort to earmark $1.

By the February 13, 2003

Voices

How to make Hoya love

Valentine’s Day is just around the corner, and I make the ladies sweat. That’s why the Voice begged me to write this article. What, the editors wondered, can we find out about “the life of love” from the hottest thing to hit the Georgetown campus since Tabasco and Jesuits? Plenty, I say.

By the February 13, 2003

Voices

Kickin’ it in the badlands

I think my erudite and well-read English professor should start pronouncing Gustav Flaubert’s name in a cheap, Americanized fashion: Flaw-burt. He should continue his French literary name-dropping as usual but just mispronounce Flaubert’s name on purpose: Bordieu, Foucault, Sartre, Flaw-burt.

By the February 13, 2003

Voices

Just four rugs?

“Excuse me, is this your child?” the waiter asked. We must have been an odd sight—an American couple dining at a Dallas family restaurant with what appeared to be a gangly six-year-old Brit. After being assured that I was not, in fact, the victim of an elaborate trans-Atlantic kidnapping scheme and that we had just lived abroad for a while, he left us alone without informing the police.

By the February 13, 2003

Voices

Letter to the Editor

As members of Advocates for Improved Response Methods to Sexual Assault (AFIRMS), we applaud the Georgetown Voice for its endorsement of our proposed changes to the sexual assault policy. The editors have clearly examined our reports carefully with the interests of students in mind.

By the February 13, 2003

Voices

Detached, ironically

If college is a part of my formative years, then it is safe to say that I am still developing the basic paradigms through which I view the world. I don’t just mean my stance on political systems such as representative democracy or bureaucratic authoritarianism, or how to choose an appropriate theoretical economic framework with which to analyze the Mexican debt crisis of 1982.

By the February 6, 2003

Editorials

Change the sexual assault policy

On Jan. 22, the Advocates for Improved Response Methods to Sexual Assault (AFIRMS) group released an analysis of Georgetown’s sexual assault policy and adjudication process to more than 30 student affairs administrators. AFIRMS puts forth a series of valuable recommendations for altering the University’s Student Code of Conduct, adjudication system and disclosure policy and the administration should give them serious consideration.

By the February 6, 2003

Voices

Letter to the Editor

I appreciate your article about ANSWER (“In the Anti-war Movement is Only One ANSWER Right?” Jan. 30). While it is nice that there is such a large organization opposed to war, it is not the only movement. I am a member of the Libertarian Party, a group you would find holding “Starbucks in Iraq” signs before any sort of Marxist Revolutionist propaganda.

By the February 6, 2003