Commuters deserve access to TV in lounge
I am writing on behalf of commuters who use the Commuter Lounge, UC Underground. We’d probably describe ourselves as the ‘nerds’ and ‘geeks’ of UH. However, we think we are being discriminated against by Commuter Lounge staff.
Our complaint is that we’ve been trying to use video game systems on the TV in the lounge, however, we’ve only been able to use it once. After that, we were barred from using the TV for video games. Every other attempt has resulted in us being nagged into putting away our consoles.
Their explanations for why we can’t use the TV for video game use is that they don’t want to start a habit of letting people use the TV for video games, because if they let us use it, they have to let others use it.
However, we are the only people who actively use this place, and although we usually have this place filled to high capacity, we would be happy to let others join in when we play our video games.
They also say they’re simply afraid we’ll break the TV due to mishandling or error, however, we’re nerds and geeks – we know what we’re doing.
We’re paying for the UC out of our student fees, so technically we paid for that TV. Shouldn’t we be free to use it for video game use? Why even place signs in the lounge that say ‘Enjoy your lounge space?’ How can we enjoy our lounge space if we don’t have the freedom to use what we paid for as we see fit?
– Zack Leal, fine arts sophomore
Cutting down trees disrespectful to alumna
I’m a little concerned as a student of UH. Why are there random orange dots on the trees? It reminded me of a scene from a movie where an ‘X’ drawn on a tree meant it would be cut down. Well, I was walking by McElhinney Hall on Tuesday and noticed the trees that had been marked with an orange dot had been cut down! This distresses me because many other trees in Lynn Eusan Park have also been dotted.
The park might be the only place on campus to be named after Eusan, who was a trailblazer for the equal rights for African-Americans, other minorities and international students. She was a charter member of the first black sorority at UH, the first black Homecoming queen and perhaps most impressively, one of the founders of the African-American Studies Program at the University.
UH is now one of the most diverse schools in this country, partly because of the efforts of Eusan. I am very concerned at the prospect of halving the size of a park that represents everything UH is about. I think that perhaps this has not been entirely thought through.
-John Simeon, biochemistry and anthropology senior
