A Columnist’s Manifesto

At 23 years of age, it is almost impossible to legitimize yourself as the authority on anything. Phrases such as, “you have much growing to do,” or “you haven’t experienced enough in your short life” are commonly used whenever people our age aim at telling others how to do anything.

In a general sense, a small part of me agrees with such statements as the experiences of some of my peers warrant such an assumption.

However, a larger part of me understands that age is merely a number, a number often used by those to belittle the lives of younger people.

Ernest Myers said, “Don’t just count your years, make your years count,” and for the most part in my short time on this Earth, most of those around me would say that I have.

While experiencing the variety of lemons life has thrown at me, I’ve developed my own opinions about a variety of different issues.

Thanks mostly in part to opportunity I have been given an avenue to drive my points into the minds of my peers.

I’ve seen the evolution of the media over the years and although the Statesman doesn’t reach the audiences of the New York Times or Washington Post, I still keep an innate sense of responsibility to write in a way that directly or indirectly reaches a broad and diverse array of people.

Opinions are powerful weapons, especially today as most of our “news” is obtained by social networks that are simply a person’s interpretation of a certain current event. Rather than sitting at a computer rambling off a stream of conscious, I understand that readers deserve better.

Personally, experience has always been my best adviser and I often utilize some of it to emphasize my thoughts on certain issues. I can’t generalize the lives of my peers as our stories are all different, but I feel it is of the utmost importance for an opinions column to somehow, someway, make a connection with the reader.

Sure, some of you may feel differently on certain issues, but if my words spark conversation or a debate of sorts, I must be doing something right, right?

Being entitled to one’s own opinion is a right, but while writing an opinions column it’s best to, at the very least, keep one’s opinion informed. So yes, I often write what I feel, but every time I back it up with evidence.

For a writer, there is nothing more inspiring and motivating than hearing someone make a comment about your work. It’s not something I look for every Wednesday, but when your words are meant to engage and illicit intellectual depth, when it happens, it’s empowering.

Such a thing would never occur if I merely wrote to entertain myself There are these things called diaries that are perfect for this sort of thing. 

Opinions columnists may not touch the lives of all those around us, we may not directly affect you every day, but our words should first aim at being true to ourselves followed most importantly by at least trying to speak to a wide variety off people. If not, we’re better off posting our notes on Facebook to our small group of friends.

But who am I to tell anyone what a column should be or how one should write? What have I done or experienced?  I’m just a college student who has written for the past two years, who has a variety of people comment both negatively and positively to his words, just a college student who came of age as the world changed before my unknowing eyes as a result of Sep. 11, just a college student who saw the pain in the eyes of residents of New Orleans as their president flew by, just a college student with friends and acquaintances from both sides of the spectrum, just a college student who has seen firsthand the effects of America’s economic problems. 

After all that, how could I, just being a college student, have an opinion on anything?