Many of us have been waiting for this moment for four years, ever since that vote-counting fiasco in Florida shocked our young political minds out of their naïve shells. Since coming to Wesleyan, we are more aware than most other people of what Bush has done wrong. Yes, most students here believe that Bush has made some mistakes. Yes, many downright hate him. Can we all at least agree that he has been successful at one thing? President Bush threw one hell of a match into the gas tank of the Wesleyan student body.
I was in Boston last Wednesday night when the Red Sox won the World Series. I went to be a part of history. When I stepped off the subway at Fenway Park, in the midst of sirens and alarms and the din of firecrackers and uncontrolled human euphoria, I knew how that history was taking shape. I was witnessing an identity crisis on the largest of scales. After eighty-six years of painful waiting, a team of rag tag ball players (a bunch of idiots) had given a city a win to top all other wins. But at the same time, that win threw into question the city’s very identity. The ‘Red-Sox nation’ has been accustomed to always losing. That is what made us who we were. Speaking from personal experience as a born-in-Boston Sox fan, that’s what made me. Like everyone else, I expected them to lose. It gave me a reason to hate all the winners. It gave me a reason to watch one more inning.
Can we expect the same thing if Kerry wins tonight? Well, maybe not the firecrackers (though who knows), but none of us have ever experienced a Wesleyan University without having George W. Bush around as our political punching bag.
The Argus staff ran an editorial last Friday which mentioned “Wesleyan’s reputation as a politically conscious community.” They’re right for once. We are politically conscious. However, for all any of us know, being politically conscious has only meant criticizing the Bush administration. If Kerry wins, Wesleyan students will lose the luxury of having their causes served to them on a platter. We may actually have to go out and take a position on the issues that were actually behind the election, the issues that many of us have never tackled before. Minimum wage? National debt? Health coverage? What really is the next step to get our troops out of Iraq?
We can say that Bush has been wrong, but that’s only the beginning. If Kerry wins, we will have to decide what we think needs to be done. We may even have to criticize him and that will be a hard thing to do. Criticizing a winner is never easy. Especially when you’re a part of the team.
The editorial went on to lament that “the level of activism evident this year has been disappointing at best.” Yikes! If the level of activism truly has been low in this year of change then I would hate to see what happens to it if Kerry is elected. Wesleyan may just lose its identity and its reputation as the activist University. If it does, then maybe all of us, Wesleyan students and Bostonians alike, will just have to take up some new cause and start rooting for the Chicago Cubs.
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