A Do-It-Yourself Introduction
Ohmigod it's 5am and we're all reaaaaaally tired here DIY-ing (doin' it yourself, er, ourselves) this Dis guide. Yup, in addition to writing and editing all over this precious slab of felled trees*, we actually printed it ourselves at the Bay Area Alternative Press (BAAP).
We run things by Consensus, and we couldn't really agree on an introduction... Four people submitted intros, all were rejected for one reason or another. I guess we're really picky. Then someone thought of the brilliant idea of letting you introduce the guide to yourself, MAD LIBTM style. So in the spirit of DIY, here's a Do-It-Yourself introduction to Cal Disorientation 2008!
Welcome to [name of University]! You'll find lots of fun things to do here, like [fun activity], [fun activity], and [really fun "Mature Audiences" activity]. You can read all about such pleasurable endeavours in this year's guide.
But wait - [name of University] is not all peaches and cream. Did you know that [name of University] has been involved in the production of every single [type of weapon of mass destruction] ever created in the U.S. aresenal? But that's not all - [name of University] recently sold out to [name of huge evil corporation that's wrecking the planet]. We could go on - for instance, [name of University] has a long history of not compensating its [a type of worker] and its [a type of really oppressed worker] fairly. But that, too, you'll read about in the guide.
What, you say that's just life in the big city? Buck up! [a kind of human being who spends lots of time studying] are struggling for justice. For instance, did you know that [number] students recently [illegal protest activity, past tense] at [place where people just loooove to protest], and [number] were [something that police like to do to people, past tense]? Guess [name of ultraliberal city] is still [name of ultraliberal city] after all!
Oh by the way, on a more serious note, here's the ONE paragraph from all the rejected intros we agreed upon - yes, it's in a style completely different from the above, hope that's not toooo disorienting for you. If you like, try turning this into a MAD LIB, but we kinda like it as is:
"We believe that there is currently a disconnect between how the University currently functions and how it would need to function in order to serve the spiritual, psychological, social and environmental needs of its students, faculty, staff and community members. Currently it functions like a machine instead of an organism. A machine has separate, inanimate and unchanging mechanical parts that were created separately and serve fundamentally distinct purposes. An organism is also composed of many "parts" but they are alive, constantly changing and function interdependently. Our University currently functions as an economic machine. Students, taxpayers and corporations pay money for job training and research. Departments exist in isolated enclaves, rarely interacting with one another and the courses offered by many of these departments treat students (often only known by their student ID numbers) as isolated units who are evaluated numerically and are expected to race through the system as efficiently as possible in order to get corporate jobs. What if the University was, instead, structured like an ecosystem where the rains of wisdom watered the diverse thirst of its community for meaning, connection and self-empowerment? What would it take to transition the University from its current condition to its glorious future?"
Hmmm... ponder that for a while and let us know what you think.
Peace and Love,
Your Disorienting Buddies
P.S. - We ran out of pages and $$$. Check out www.caldisorientation.org for waaaaaay more great stuff than we could fit in print. It's a wiki, post or edit a disorienting story yourself!
P.P.S. - Wanna produce a 2009 edition? Cool. Visit www.caldisorientation.org and...make it happen!
* Actually, it's on recycled paper. 