University of Virginia Library

'Root Of Evil'

In your editorial, "Fair
Pay," you assert that the CD is
primarily a business and only
incidentally an extracurricular
activity (which I dispute, but
which I shall assume for the
purposes of my argument). In
good conscience, I cannot
allow your extension of this
logic when your urge that
certain student government
officers be salaried (and I do
not care what "most other
major universities" do).

First of all, one major
sickness of this university is
that in too many respects,
students must yield to dollars
in the administration's
priorities. Students are treated
like the numbers they use for
identification, like insensitive
rats in a maze, and they are
thought to enjoy being
manipulated by some
administrators who look ahead
no farther than the pyramid on
the backside of a one-dollar bill
in much of their
decision-making.

Far be it for me to sound
like some student radical;
however, even a cursory
examination of such disgraces
as the basketball ticket
distribution schemes, the Food
Services blight which has so
properly and belatedly been
exposed by the CD, and the
arbitrary/inconsistent parking
rules will plainly show that
students' extracurricular
welfare takes a back seat to the
production of revenue.

Willfully short-sighted
construction projects, such as
the already-known-to-be
inadequate culinary and
parking facilities planned for
the new law and graduate
business complex, demonstrate
the desire of some
administrators (forced by
Richmond legislators
thrice-removed from reality) to
pinch pennies in the short run
at the expense of everybody's
welfare in the short and long
runs.

Just as dollar decisions
often lead to mediocrity on the
upper bureaucratic level, I am
convinced that replacing the
service motivation with
monetary compensation (in
excess of personal expenses)
would produce an unhealthy
environment on the level of
student-run activities as well.
For example, when Madison
Hall volunteers put forth many
hours helping the needy in the
Charlottesville area, they
certainly are serving the
community "beyond the call
of duty", and yet it would not
be presumptuous to say they
expect and receive no salary
for these services other than,
perhaps, appreciative clients,
and above all the satisfaction
derived from service for its
own sake.

I submit the same holds
true for all student-run
activities which do not
consider themselves
"businesses." If the quality of
the students elected to student
government is high, it is
because these people have a
desire to serve their colleagues
and learn about politics in its
broader sense.

Contrary to another
assertion in your editorial, a
salary at the end of the
political rainbow of student
elections, popularity contests
as they necessarily are, could
very easily attract
less-than-dedicated hacks to
the soapbox, as is too often the
case out in the Real World.

Yes, I'm afraid money is
the root of much evil. But let's
not try to introduce
insensitive, "Midas mediocrity"
from the roof down into the
foundations of this university,
which should unashamedly be
an ivory tower, a proving
ground for trials and errors in
the pervasive Jeffersonian
spirit.

We all have lifetimes before
us in which we may hunt the
Buck; if some of us cannot
wait, then let them pay the
Madison Hall volunteers et. al.
first, whether they want to be
paid or not. Eventually, they'll
want it.