Viper Manifesto

Front Page of Viewpoint

(Illustration by Melanilene Balot)

“The misfits. The rebels. The troublemakers. The ones who see things differently.” – Craig Tanimoto It is very hard to convert a non-believer; to agitate and activate a passive, apathetic person. Especially, since the medium by which we reach the studentry is through writing. It is very easy to ignore a piece of paper that your fellow students labored for. And that has been Viewpoint’s story in the past year. Despite all our efforts to reach the consciousness of the studentry, we have often been seen as renegades. Loose cannons. The crazy ones. From the very conception of Viewpoint, it has been maligned – we were called de facto, unofficial, underground, and a lot of other things. Every time we publish an issue, our opinion is condemned. There came a moment when even our silence is vilified. All because we see things differently. Just because we stir things up, because we want change. Sadly, we were thought of as people who are not proud of the institution that we belong to. Seeing something wrong with the system and commenting on it doesn’t qualify us as prodigal sons and daughters of our alma mater. We just want to see improvement in the state of our beloved University. The system is not the institution, and the institution is not the system. And while it is easy to doubt why we do this – why we say the things we say and do the things we do – let us remind everyone that if not for our drive to serve our fellow Araullians, we would have given up long ago. It is so much easier to just fade into the background. To be an ordinary student. Any pompous, self-serving propagandist could not have weathered the storms we have faced as a publication. To clarify a few points, we reiterate what we have stated in our CEGP incident report: We do not see ourselves as anti-administration, instead we see ourselves as a pro-students. It just so happened that there are points where the two philosophies go in different directions. Also, we do not seek personal benefit from what we do. We wish only to contribute to the pride of the Araullian community, to add to its already rich and wonderful heritage of student-leadership and excellence. So here we are. We remain standing and strong, despite many attempts to silence us. That alone is proof of victory – not our victory, but the triumph of democracy, of our inherent right to freedom of speech and expression. And we will remain strong, as long as there are student interests and rights to protect. As the AUSSG’s credo goes: “For the student’s rights, we remain!” True universities are places of light and learning; places that foster critical thinking and encourage free thought and speech; places that value the individuality and dynamism of its students. Thus, we proudly claim that our existence is a proof that our beloved Araullo qualifies as one of them.Dan Kevin Roque