THE RANT: Dear students of USD

Dear students of USD,

Happy October to the students at the University of South Dakota! I was going to rant in favor of a full smoking ban on campus. Then early last week, the news broke and starting next semester, smoking will officially be banned on campus. Well done, mission accomplished, let’s move on. So, while opening the doors of opportunity to what I was going to write about, I decided it’s time to introduce our own version of New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s soda ban. The ban would eliminate the sales of sugar sweetened beverages over 16-ounces on the campus of the Coyotes. So everywhere from the Dakota Dome, random pop machines throughout campus and even places in the MUC would be forced to revamp their offerings to those under 16oz. That means no more 20-ounce bottles of Mountain Dew because you need those extra four ounces over two servings in a bottle, because that is what keeps you up late at night. But in all seriousness, if we can pass a smoking ban on campus, it opens the floodgates to new opportunities. And yes, they are great opportunities. Shouldn’t the students of USD want to rant about how they want to change the world while offering the greatest amount of change here on campus? If we take the Bloomberg model to its entirety, you can still grab any size of a diet cola or calorie free drink at your earliest convenience. If we are banning some things in the name of student’s health, than shouldn’t we also take an effort to ban everything that we can possibly blame? Look out student cafeteria, you’re next!

Sincerely,

Jake Jungers,

Senior