You’ve seen him. You can’t miss the bright red sweatshirt, hunched shoulders, and constant presence outside of Willard. Sometimes he’s pensive, sometimes he’s defensive, and most times he’s outright offensive. Yet each day as I pass him on my way into class, I wonder: is he a crotchety middle-aged man who takes pleasure in irritating people by the minute, or is he merely stirring the pot?
The fact of the matter is that most of us see and hear him in passing and yet, he manages to offend us in t-minus thirty seconds or less. As Jacklyn Hanson—a junior majoring in Broadcast Journalism—pointed out, “People are extremely turned off by his approach and the fact that he is so judgmental.” It’s true. What could he possibly accomplish by telling people he doesn’t know that they’re going to hell? I found my answer when I interviewed Matt McDonald—a sophomore majoring in Architectural Engineering—who said, “I think that he is just someone who enjoys being heard.” Honestly, I had never thought about this concept before. I was too busy fuming about his poor approach to even fathom thinking rationally about his presence outside of my first class. I mean, he just stands there trying to convert people! People don’t even hear him, let alone process anything he’s saying! We’re talking about a man who is jobless, quite possibly homeless, and lacks basic understanding of social etiquette. And he has the nerve to stand outside of a busy building for hours at a time, rain or snow, just to be heard?! He has to know we’re not processing what he’s saying; he must know that he’s not getting through; that we will continue to go out on Thursday nights, and that we will continue to write our stories the way we want them to be written. Yet he persists.Can there possibly be a lesson to be learned here? We most certainly aren’t learning how to love people, or how to effectively deliver a message. I will, however, argue that we are learning to speak up. As a technology-addicted generation, we have no problem voicing our opinions behind the walls of Twitter or YikYak. But maybe it’s time to speak out about how we feel in person. If that field hockey girl you spotted at The Mix is cute enough to tweet about, it’s time to go talk to her. If you know someone who is gay and an ignorant person uses the term in a derogatory manner, it’s time to correct him or her. If you’re frustrated by your local representative, it’s time to vote and make your voice count. It’s not appropriate to force your opinion on an unwilling listener, and it’s not appropriate to tell people what to believe. However, it is absolutely necessary to speak out about your beliefs in person. It is necessary to have conversation, to protest, to petition, and to look someone in the eyes and tell him or her how you feel.
