Among the many definitive characteristics of our species, one simple yet consequential trait can be interpreted in two different lights: our capacity to categorize or our capacity to divide.As a UCLA student, that reality permeates every step through our pristine campus, coalescing into comfortable clumps on the two cardinal polar extremes, and clashing on the long marker in the sand known as Bruin Walk. It is the phenomenon known as the South campus vs. North campus controversy.

You’ve heard it before. A South campus major decries his friend the political science major as “lazy, lucky and showered” and a North campus major feels that her friend the physical science major is “self-entitled, bitter and smelly.” It’s a long-lasting dispute that makes no one happy.

So this is why both sides are wrong.

One principal fact we have to recognize in order to approach the issue appropriately is that the life of a South campus major is more difficult. And I don’t just say that based on the 10th week symptoms of screaming at whiteboards and clawing hair out, that most South campus majors experience, but also in terms of course selection, number of prerequisite courses, freedom to choose, grading and attractiveness of classmates. Hats off to you, South campus. Your life blows.

But this gives South campus majors the right to complain. As long as they are doing their very difficult work, I don’t see what’s wrong with permitting them to let off a bit of steam by talking about how arduous their classes are. Are they expected to go through all that and be positive 100 percent of the time? That’s ridiculous. As Marie Antoinette would have said, “Let them complain and if they want to eat cake they can do that too,” or something like that. Marie was a great gal.

However, with that in mind, the undeniable difficulty of the South campus lifestyle needs to stop being used to invalidate the legitimacy and ability of North campus majors. There is a difference between North and South campus. North campus isn’t a lazy man’s solution to South campus. It’s a different field of study. Maybe your roommate who is a sociology major had fewer all-nighters than you during the quarter, but he is probably more equipped to write an analytical paper on cultural trends (while you are more equipped to solve chemical equations). In order to be successful in the fields that North campus require, it may necessitate less physical work. It still takes a very rare and productive set of skills that UCLA, one of the most selective public schools in the known universe, saw and chose in that person. The fact that the major asks for less work and has certain advantages in the striving toward success is an unchangeable disparity.

And, to clarify, North campus is not easy. A North campus major may only have five prerequisites to get into the major as compared to the 6,000 prerequisites required for a science major, but this doesn’t mean the North campus major gets transported by a cloud and floats on to graduation. The classes are still difficult. The foremost difference is in the volume of the work, not in the difficulty.

So (drum roll), once and for all, which side of campus is superior? Of course, the answer is neither. Each attack hurled at the other side is an illegitimate way of approaching the “supremacy” of either choice. We all need to accept that we all have embarked on a path, maybe of our own choice, maybe not, that intends to lead to a goal: success. And all of us will do what it takes in order to accomplish that goal. 

South campus majors should understand that it requires less volume of work for North campus majors, and that doesn’t mean that it is any less of a pursuit. North campus majors should understand that South campus majors do have it, at least a little bit, rougher and should be given the right to express their grief.