Today’s paper is my last as opinion editor of The Reflector, and this fact causes me to think on what I’ve learned during the past two years. I have learned more about putting pages together, editing according to the Associated Press style of writing, managing an editorial staff, managing a deadline, creating headlines and remembering to do a slew of other detailed tasks.
By far the most important thing I’ve learned, however, is the importance of advancing ideas. Ideas are treasures our culture seems to be running out of (see the latest computer animated flick).
I write this primarily to encourage all of you reading my column that what you think is important, and you should submit an editorial as soon as possible. It seems to me in the last two semesters, I have received fewer letters from our readership than in semesters past. I don’t know the reason for this, but I figure it’s a good opportunity for me to philosophize a bit.
Although opinions abound on Internet news sites to the degree that sometimes editorial content mixes too much with news content, I feel there is a thought process in many people’s minds that editorial writers should write about simple, mundane issues (like computers and entertainment) and leave the weightier matters alone. I know this is not everyone, and it’s probably the minority. But I’ve seen it occur.
For instance, a lot of readers of newspapers would immediately dislike a column dealing with abortion. To them, abortion is simply a political issue governors, senators and presidents abuse for political ends. Others may think abortion is such a complex and debated issue it is not worth tackling, especially by a freshman opinion writer who doesn’t know anything about the world.
Is it relativism that makes our culture complacent? Does anyone care what anyone else thinks? Is an opinion section a completely worthless endeavor enjoyed only by egotistical columnists and those few citizens who still read newspapers?
This could be so, considering we live in a nation on its economic brink, and most people go to college to get a job. Learning and having worldviews challenged is often a secondary motive behind seeking higher education, and maybe this translates to reading newspapers. Maybe jobs in classified sections are more important than a bunch of words.
I admit sitting in philosophy class my second year at Mississippi State and thinking about how useless it was to discuss a feminist idea of castrating God the Father. It was absolutely crazy to me. Everyone has opinions about God already. Let us get on with real life, playing realistic video games and watching reality TV.
But there are significant intangible things in this world, and I fear apathy will get us into trouble one day if it becomes too deep seated. We must argue for our rights and our values, whatever they may be, before we lose the desire to even have values. We should develop a culture that once again thrives on ideas and will argue to hell and back to support them.
That is why the opinion section is vital to any newspaper and especially this one. Students and others should take full advantage of this platform so it doesn’t become a section stuck in a rut with the same columnists contributing every Tuesday and Friday with little else.
Instead of reading an article and brushing it off as ridiculous, perhaps you should consider writing in and letting others know why that article is mistaken. Discussing ideas is the only way we can really ever discover them.
Matt Watson is the opinion editor of The Reflector. He can be contacted at [email protected].