Dear Editor,

The amendment passed by a two to one margin, a landslide, from which we can conclude that us-versus-them arguments are extremely powerful. In the campaign, the Beacon, and its fixed eight percent of SGA funding, was on one side, with every other student organization on the other. Or so the argument went.

Never mind that the Beacon’s fixed 8 percent a year was not a threat to the extent or vibrancy of other orgs’ activities. And never mind that now the Beacon has to think about its next funding petition to the SGA when covering the SGA—the only org to do so in earnest.

When someone tells you that “they” are stealing your slice of pie, once you tap into that anger and fear, you’re most of the way to victory.

I wish that students in America, of all places, would deem press freedom priceless and realize that the true “us versus them” here is the journalist on the one end of the phone and the person with something to hide on the other.

I wish we would flex that critical thinking and historical understanding. We’re too far from Watergate, I guess.

You know what the worth of journalism is, Emersonians? Certainly more than eight percent of a democracy, more than 8 percent of anything.

What a sad day.

Chris Girard

Class of 2010

Political Communication

Former Beacon Managing Editor