Office of Student Affairs 2007-2-01 A Modest Proposal, vol. 3, no. 5 Kimberly Allen, et al. © 2006 A Modest Proposal Find more information about this article here. This document has been made available for free and open access by the Eugene McDermott Library. Contact [email protected] for further information. T H E UTD STUDENT PUBLICATION INSIDE INSIDE Valentines Waterview Ready-made cut-out cards · •~~~~~~ for love at the last minute Ups Yours They increased rent. Again. By ten percent. page 3 Apple's latest offering, given to save us from the cellular industry's FEBRUARY 2007 • VOLUME 3 • ISSUE 5 • AMP.UTDALLAS.EDU 2 CoNTENTS fEBRUARY 2007 • V o LUME 3 • Issue 5 In This Issue. • • . H oLIDAY S PECIA L FE ATURE STORY 12 AMP Celebrates Valentines Day Waterview Ups Yours ... Again 3 Use these valentines to show the ones you love Rent to increase a whopping ten percent! how you feel. BY SCOTT HOOKER BY JORDAN YOUNGBLOOD AND Editors JONATHAN LANE Kimberley Allen SOCIAL COMMENTARY Ben Dower Love is in the Aif.Chick Flicks Liam S'koyles 4 Cultivating a Distaste for Death ~=----- BY JONATHAN LAN~! Benedict Voit A phillosophicallook at capital punishment. -=_,.,-~ Jordan Youngblood BY RICHARD LAIRD ART S & EvENTS 6 How iPhone Stole My Sanity No "radioactive emissions~ necessary: The Top Ten Albums of 2006 Apple's sexy phone, Verizon's stanky plans Our intrepid editor sifts through the past BY LUKE MCKENZIE year and picks his 10 favorites Contributors BY JORDAN YOUNGBLOOD The Koran Controversy Richard Badgett Scott Hooker 7 Swearing-in ceremony causes Richard Laird Christian Right to raise heU GLOBAL P OLITICS BY BEN DOWER Jonathan Lane 'Global Warming' hype a Felicity Lenes 8 The Definition of Secularism bunch of hot air Chris Mace Luke Mackenzie Do people really have the right to practice their religion? Our assumptions about climate change Marco Mavromaras BY MARCO MAVROMARAS should not force bad policy BY BENEDICT VOlT Bardiya Vaziri C AMPUS LIFE The O'Really Factor Comments on some of the more rediculous 9 lnnapropriately Secretive news stories of the day. Barnes and Noble BY KIMBERLEY ALLEN Write to Us BY ARIE LITOVSKY U>mments? Suggestions? I 0 Service With a Smile PUZZLES& G A MES Flattery? Fan-mail? Two UTD opportuoities to spend less and do more. Email arnodestproposal BY KIM ALLEN AND FELICITY LENES 20. Puzzles Page @gmail.com today! I I Study Abroad! Go global with UTD's least known scholarship 22 TheUranus BY LIAM SKOYLES Disclaimer Cover design by Luke McKenzte. Uranus cover design by BenedictVoit. Ben Dower, Jordan Youngblood, and Liam Skoyles. ,. Opinions expressed in this ------------ .. --------------.------------ .. ------------- puhlit/llif)n are those ofthe editur or writer of the artide Help Wanted! and are not necmarily those of 4'1 the University adminislralion, Do you like to writel Edit? Photograph? lllustratel Layoud Cook? the Board of Regents ofthe University ofuus Systmr OT Join us sometime! Help us put out a better paper- and pad your resume, too! 1/x Board ofth epihliutibtl. We're your voic,e. Why not use itf [email protected] I 972-883-5354 office ----------------------------------------------------- ------~--~F~E~A~I~U~R~E ~~S~I~O~R~Y______ __ 3 Watenriew Ups Yours . • • even on the operations and maintenance of the apartments. Student Body Vice President Felicity Lenes has officiaUy re­ quested the data University House used to determine the need for the 10% rent by scott hooker increase, but that information may take a [email protected] few weeks to be released to SG. A couple of festering issues appear Students received quite a shock in to have led to this particular shortfall. January when the Office of Housing The first was the longstanding policy of Operations sent them an e-mail detail­ subleases only ended this past summer, ing a 10% rent increase for all leases in which created the problems of often ill­ the Waterview Park Apartments. This maintained apartments being transferred increase is much greater than the previ­ from student to student while remain­ ous years' incremental 3% inflation-based ing under five to ten year-old rent costs. hikes, and the major reasoning behind These apartments were typically handed the move sterns from the significant off to new tenants via subleases, and the costs University House has sustained in management could not perform a com­ upgrading the maintenance of the apart­ plete set of maintenance done with nor­ ments. mal lease turnover. Secondly, in years Waterview's recurrent negligence and · dents should A Modest Proposal obtained an e-mail past, Waterview Park Apartments often mismanagement of the apartments; why shoulder the sent from Matthew Grief, Director of neglected ordinary maintenance, leading must students pay even more to keep the monetary responsibil- Housing Operations to a concerned Wa· to vastly increased maintenance costs be­ apartments at a merely acceptable stan­ ity for Waterview's failures is terview Student on January 22. In it, he cause of this lack of care. dard of living? an ethical issue that the university must said that for the Fall of 2007, prelimi­ What the e-mail to the student body Furthermore, Waterview's attitude consider before allowing such steep rent nary work is being conducted to expand notably leaves out is the fact that if the toward the rent increase is one of in­ increases. I would suggest phasing in the the Peer Advisor program found only in previous management had done adequate difference towards student difficulties. rent rukes instead of introducing them all Phases VIII and IX to include all phases maintenance, students would not be From previous conversations members in one year. If the total increases would in the Waterview Park Apartments. More forced to pay now for the previous fail­ of student government have had with the be 10% this year and 3% each subse­ costs associated with this change are ex­ ures of Waterview Park. As many readers Waterview and the university, it is their quent year, why not increase rent by 7% ' pected. Additionally, he stated that in may recall, the Waterview Commission policy that on-campus housing should this year and 6% next year? The increases the future, students will be al:-!e to expect was formed after numerous issues with inherently carry a "premium" because of would then be divided over two years, rental increases more in line with housing the apartments and student affairs were its proximity to the campus. Hence the allowing for a more gradu~ adjustment market inflation, and that another reason detailed in a scathing Dallas Observer fact that Waterview housing tends to in students' budgets. Such a move would for this year's titanic increase is due to the article in the spring of 2005. Its wide­ be !lignificantly more expensive in com· show Waterview's concern for finding a "inconsistency" of applying rent increases reaching conclusions were announced parison to equivalent apartments near the middle ground with students and might to all ofWatcrview in years past. at the end of the summer, and there has campus. Instead of attracting students to repair some of the damage due to Mat­ Members of the Campus Housing been a lot of activity subsequent to that the campus apartments, Waterview seems thew Grief's e-mail. IfWaterview refuses and Advising Committee (CHAC) re­ point about implementing these propos­ intent on penalizing students for the to phase in the rent increase, it will have layed information from their meetings ~s. right to enjoy living in walking distance to accept the inevitable consequence that with administration about what has led While the implemented recommen­ to UTD. lhe university has expressed students will move elsewhere. The next to these significant increases in rental dations of the Waterview Commission concerns about the image of on-campus move is Waterview's, and I hope for the rates. It was estimated from the meet­ over the spring and summer of 2006 housing, and this is certainly no help. sake of student life at UTD that they re­ ings that approximately S1,000,000 in have vastly improved preventative main­ It can't be helped now that the uni· consider the increases. • maintenance costs and related expenses tenance and response times, these have versity waited too long to look into the has been spent on Phases I-IX. The justi­ also led to the significantly higher costs problems that plagued Waterview in years Srolt H()(Jl" may have lo u/1 himJt/fon Driw A lo fication for the 10% increase is said to be for the management. Be that as it may, past.lhe damage is already done, and the afford rml in May. for University House to be able to break why should students have to pay for costs are only mounting. W hether stu- DiJcwss tbis 4rtick at am,p.utsliJUu.edu! 4 S 0 C I A L ::-~~- C 0 M M F N I A R Y Cultivating a Distaste for Death A Philosophical Look at Capital Punishment .. .. ,. : . ~ .··::. · .. : .. ~ ... .... ... .. by richard laird ~k1021 [email protected] Prior to the November elections, I discovered that two of the prominent Texas Democrats running for statewide office - Chris Bell and Barbara Radnof­ sky - both supported the death penalty. This may have been a ploy to tap into the tough-on-crime Texan vote; if not, they must truly believe capital punishment is warranted. A recent Gallup poll indicated that 64% of Americans still favor the death penalty. I would like to offer them -and anyone else interested- a little of my insight on the subject. With an MS in AppUed Sociology from UTD, I know there are studies s;tying the death penalty is a deterrent to crime and more saying it is not.