MotherFuckingFuck

The next person who e-mails me just to let me know which candidates they're supporting for SBA elections is getting car bombed.

Here's my thing:

Student Government, in all of its forms, at all levels of education, is a pointless, vapid, superficial, and entirely unnecessary institution.  I said this to someone earlier today, and they were like, "Well, somebody has to do it." No.  Nobody has to do it.  Nobody at all has to do it, and if nobody did it, nobody would notice at all. Ever.

No Student (Government/Body Council/Bar Association) has ever accomplished anything for students that couldn't have been done more efficiently by another student organization requiring 95% less hoo-ha, pageantry, and bullshit.

In the 5th grade, they campaigned for an extra recess.  In junior high, they promised me Coke machines.  In high school, it was all about senior trips and better dances.  And in college it was about the neverending fight to give the students more voice with the administration, which at UT means letting some dude play dress-up at meetings of the Board of Regents.

In law school, the SBA is no different.  Sure, they may raise money for some neat charities.  Like hurricane refugees.  And my beer tab.   And I support them in their pursuit of such noble endeavors in the future.  But why, oh why, does any of that require that we waste our time electing people? Schools at all levels are full of student organizations--student event committees, student publications, student productions, cultural, political, and special interest groups of every conceivable stripe--that raise money, put on events, and provide any benefit that you could ever argue for as stemming from the operations of a student-elected governing body.  And they do it without subjecting the entire school to their messy internal politics.

Maybe, at bottom, this is all about resume building.  If so, I can understand that.  But couldn't you people just elect yourselves instead of involving us civilians?  I'd gladly sign over my proxy, if that's what it would take to get a little peace and quiet.

(Note: Comments are moderated at the moment.  I'll approve anything that's not a personal attack on someone.  Unless it's a personal attack on me, in which case I'll approve it even faster.)

Comment, from the ever-elusive OklahomaCity4L:

I completely agree with your SBA rant but I would absolutely include A&F (crap production about a bunch of stupid inside law school jokes with to-be lawyers who think they missed their callings as American Idol contestants) and TLF (raises money for 1Ls who can't get real jobs for the summer with countless BS guilt trips) in the pile o' sh** in which you place SBA.

W&V: I'd agree with the analysis of those organizations, and would certainly put Law Review at the top o' the list when it comes to massive time sucks that are of questionable value.  But the difference is this:  While the journals, the public interesty bleeding hearts, and the law school musicals expend countless hours of student time that might be better used for something else, it's still only the SBA that chooses to package their internal politics and impose them as an externality on the rest of us in order to legitimize a claim on pseudo-authority.  (To be fair, I guess TLF asks for votes . . . and money.  But I don't believe in TLF, either.)  ((And to be fairer, I suppose that our a cappella group singing in class to sell tickets or publicize auditions could be seen as just as negative of an externality as SBA elections.  But that assumes the assignment of some kind of positive value to the class time that we're displacing, and I don't know that anyone is ready to argue that.)

Comments

[Mr. P]

Right; Effing; On.

If there was a choice on the ballots to disband the SBA, that's how I'd vote.

[laffytaffy]

brilliant campaign move! i want to vote for you now more than ever!

[laffytaffy]

damn, yo, you really are moderating some shit... i wish i understood why the SBA has your blog by the nuts. they must know something... something big.

[Oklahoma City School of Law 4L]

I completely agree with your SBA rant but I would absolutely include A&F (crap production about a bunch of stupid inside law school jokes with to-be lawyers who think they missed their callings as American Idol contestants) and TLF (raises money for 1Ls who can't get real jobs for the summer with countless BS guilt trips) in the pile o' sh** in which you place SBA.

You're right about the resume comment.

SBA is a way for glorified party planners in the bottom half of the class to put something on their resume.

[easternair]

well put.

as an aside, i didn't know you and i went to elem, middle, and high school together, too.

remember the high school kid who ran and promised better cafeteria food? and the law students who promised to get rid of subway? man, i'm hungry and all there is where subway used to be is a bathroom.

[PG]

But who would decide how our money is to be disbursed to the various groups? Nowadays our military contracts everything out as much as possible, but we still need a Pentagon to write the checks.

[LoveW&V]

Dear W&V: You're my hero. The best are SBA campaign posters throughout the hallways with overdone efforts at being witty.

[excuse me?]

I was under the impression that all the real decisions (funding, policies, etc.) were still made by the administration, they just use the SBA as a messanger system to cut down on law student bitching.

[Ruth]

I'm not going to lie. I have no job for the summer and am really hoping that putting "glorified party planner" on my resume will help me next year. And my candidate statement is nothing but overdone attempts at being witty.

[lord fartblossom the magnificent]

you know, you've become a bit of a bitch lately, despite the fact that student elections blow ass.

[Mac]

I think people are annoyed because there was no clear announcement made about the 3L class officers. I'll agree with others' sentiments about SBA, but I actually care about what goes on with the alumni and the class of '06. I would have appreciated at least one email with a subject line pertaining to permanent class officers.

[wingsandvodka]

Good point.

Also a good point about me being a bitch, though I'd quibble with the term "lately" unless by "lately" you mean "since 1979."

[Ex.Coll.Blog]

Amen, brother.

But that would've meant the sole candidate might not have won...duh.

[You are kind of a big deal, huh?]

Why must Ann Hsu play into the stereotype that all Asian people eat puppies? As a white male dog owner, this offends me greatly.

What offends me even more, is SBA acting like it is anything more than the "dork fraternity" for all of us "law dorks." Seriously, come on SBA? You're better than that... or not.

Permanent class officers arrange reunions. Considering the fact that normal students do not like to come to law school now, why the hell would you want to come back in 10 years?

Don't forget the other important SBA service: first they sell us UT Law t-shirts, then a week later they make fun of the crappy "poo-colored" shirts we just bought! You can't buy such great representation.

[Jay]

Fuck Fuck Fuck.
Mutha mutha fuck mutha mutha fuck fuck
mutha fuck mutha fuck noich noich noich
1,2,1 2 3 4 noich noich noich
smokin weed, smokin wizz
doin coke, drinkin beers
drinkin beers beers beers
rollin fatty's, smokin blunts,
who smokes the blunts? we smoke the blunts

(My SBA candidate statement. Well, for my write in candidacy.)

[Peter]

wow, I wish my law school had this much drama going on... certainly would provide an incentive to go to the darn place.

Keeping on fighting the good fight!!

[Mader]

Waitwaitwait...

there's a bathroom down there?

[Chris]

Amen, indeed. Isn't the generally held view--apart from your cantankerous and wholly accurate rant--that there is a demand for decision-making that is not only collective, but somehow made legitimate by virtue of including the term "Body" or "Corporate" or "Association"? My view, which holds abroad, anyway, is that people just want to hang out with people of a like kind, end of story. Usually that breaks down along racial and geographical lines. And drunken descendants of zee Greeks.

Hallelujah. I ran on the soda machine platform in 3rd grade, not junior high, making me somewhat of a visionary in the field.

[Jimmy]

Being on student government for a university is like being a summer associate at the ol' firm.

You can only do 1/2 of 1% of what any full-fledged partner/associate can do in their daily regimen, so you get stuck doing the least consequential, most irrelevant, toilet-swabbing, cock-sucking, productivity-draining "work." Likewise, on SBA you are a mere meat puppet for the board of regents--or whoever else is paid to run the university business--during your ephemeral existence as a fixed-income product for the in-house endowment analysts.

The psychic and social returns for both are near nil (nevermind capital, human or otherwise). The resume padding--let's be honest--says next to nothing about your development as a productive member of society. And finally, the "coon-de-grace" here folks, if you stick around long enough, or just plain love Condi, will occur once the ABA adopts my resolution to change B=Bar to B=Beer, binding on law school SBA everywhere at institutions accepting Solomon Amendment funding. That'll teach 'em to lighten up. The Bastards.

For the record, here is the generally accepted contemporary view of Reunions (read JP Donleavy, it's important), law school '06 or otherwise.

http://www.bizbag.com/code/reunions.htm

For law students next year, consider a ballot initiative to disband the SBA. All you need is 100 signatures to get the measure on the ballot.

that is an awesome idea!

[tommy lawyer]

Fascist.

:o)