Editorial
Campus vandals need ratting out
November 8, 2007
If you are a regular reader of the Student Voice police report you’ll notice that every week UW-River Falls experiences multiple instances of vandalism to campus property. From broken smoke detectors in the residence halls to cutting nets on the Ramer tennis courts and, most recently, tipping over light poles on the main campus walkways. Add this to the regular theft of bicycles (even a bicycle seat was stolen this past week) and it would seem our campus is a breaking ground for deviant behavior. While we’re sure it’s no different at other universities, it’s no excuse for those of us who do care about our university to not take action against those who lack respect for this property that we all share.
We’re not here to plead with the vandals themselves, as it would seem they lack the intelligence and conscience to care about much of anything at all. We would like to ask everyone on campus to do their part to hold accountable those individuals responsible for acts of vandalism.
Some may think that this breaks some unwritten code regarding snitching. The fact is, if you let people continue to trash campus, it affects the entire student body. The cost of vandalism for us as students is something that cannot be taken lightly, especially when tuition costs are already increasing at an accelerated rate. If you think about it, while you’re a student at UWRF, campus property is partially your property. Why would you let somebody trash your property? Even beyond that, if you have a conscience, why would you let anyone trash someone else’s property? Are we really that apathetic to the point where we don’t care about anything or anyone else?
So next time you see someone trashing our campus or some else’s property, don’t hesitate to notify the proper authorities. If those of us with a good conscience do that, then maybe it will make the next person who wants to have some fun at the expense of you, or someone else, think twice before they trash student property. So go ahead and be a snitch.