MAYBE it's just my inner tree-hugging minimalist coming out, but in the past two weeks of moving in and getting settled for my final year of college, I've been confronted by the amazing amount of stuff that students own. Add it up any way you like, our consumer habits border on disgusting.
Some approach the issue of consumption from an environmental standpoint. And there are many merits to such a stance -- our earth simply cannot indefinitely withstand the amount of resources we take from it or the amount of refuse we dump back into it. But if that were the only problem, we humans are probably intelligent enough to find a way to combat scientific reality with ingenuity and regulation. But consumption does not end at the environment; in excess, it makes hypocrites out of well meaning people and compromises our character as individuals and as a community.
At the University this issue comes to the foreground when watching first-year students move in. The long list of items that first-years should bring to the University, provided on the University housing Web site, includes a microwave, fridge, TV, radio, carpet, lamps, power strips -- and on and on. Most locals and older students hate driving down Route 29 on move-in weekend. It is full of heavy traffic and an amazing amount of stores stuffed with more people than one might previously deem imaginable. That first weekend, most right-thinking people avoid Bed, Bath and Beyond, Target, and Walmart. If you do accidentally visit one of those establishments, you will find the shelves of school and dorm supplies in dire need of restocking.
Simultaneously, we've heard 100 times that the class of 2011 is the most diverse class in the history of the University. The University media machine touts these numbers as social goods -- proof that the University is a vital place. And in our politically correct culture, the figures are virtually irreproachable. Looking around during first-year move-in day, however, I cared far less about the color of students' skin and more about the amazing amount of stuff every car had in tow. The University can socially engineer all it wants, but makes no comment about consumption habits and, in some instances, encourages them.
Instituting strict fire safety policies and banning first years from parking their cars on grounds is about as close as the University gets to regulating consumption habits of students, both made out of practical necessity rather than actual value judgments. Indeed, limiting the amount of microwaves, televisions, and mini-fridges per hall might detract some students from attending the University or upset student satisfaction and disturb our ever-coveted ratings. In an effort to pander to feckless undergraduates, the administration has lost sight of priorities and makes little attempt to limit inordinate consumption.
But if only excessive consumption stopped at our dorm rooms. The eye does not need to travel far to see all the costly items that students have on their person. Cell phones, iPods, laptops and brand-name clothing abound. On the weekends, a more literal type of consumption, typified at a frat party, tempts the senses of almost every University undergraduate at one time or another.
I understand the motivation to compete with peers for the most stuff. But as thinking University students we must be aware of this desire, fueled by caprice and whim, and combat it by refining and limiting our tastes. None of us are blameless in our habits and we should, as a community, confront our hypocrisies.
Indeed, there is a disturbing schizophrenic split between our confessed social and political mantras and our purchasing habits. Ostensibly, the University is a place of diversity, understanding, and dialogue with a commitment to the underprivileged among us. And yet, by simply looking around one can easily see how hollow and short-lived this actual commitment is. Even purchases with a purpose, like Fair Trade, shade-grown coffee beans, serve our consumptive desires and, secondarily, our good intentions.
This certainly isn't a problem isolated to the University, but to become better, smarter, nobler students we must confront excessive consumerism and be more wary of our habits, especially where they are glaring hypocrisies. As University students we are the children of privilege. Let us not forget then that privilege demands responsibility.
Christa Byker is a Cavalier Daily Associate Editor. She can be reached at cbyker@cavalierdaily.com.
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