Columns

This week’s motion is “that the scarfie stereotype positively defines the university, not undermines it”. Maddie Harris argues the affirmative, while Kurt Purdon argues the negative.

Affirmative
 
When Kurt Purdon talks of thinking and not drinking, he’s stuck in a false dichotomy. Otago relies on its 100% scarfie image to attract students. We need to protect this image for future generations. It’s a question of conscience; sustainability of the university and sustainability of society. The ability to balance alcoholism with getting a degree sets us apart from the rest. There must at least be some defining incredibly intelligent quality in a scarfie that makes it through a degree spending over 50% of their uni life intoxicated. We say it’s a feature, not a flaw! Power chucks on tulips, wine goon races, and exploiting cheap Asian restaurants that actually consent to student BYOs are all character defining features that need to be cherished!
 
Firstly, do not give in to the nanny state! Cut red tape! Let the free market forces and individual incentives self regulate! The government is trying to brainwash you into thinking that they know what is best for you when they are only operating to satisfy their own personal agenda. Freedom!
 
Secondly, societal damage. When Kurt talks of the cool kids staying at home to study, he is deluded; they aren't cool. This isn’t the kind of behaviour we want to be promoting, and this is certainly not the dull boring sanitized environment we want our future generations to grow up in. Those “cool kids” are a petty minority undermining Otago’s defining capabilities.
 
Thirdly, binge drinking results in the creation of better doctors. It gives our practicing doctors practice, without the externalities of our scarfie culture (liver damage and alcohol related injuries) our doctors would not be educated in medicine. We are creating future doctors and future liver failures and working for them to earn millions at the same time. That’s a double long term focus, with a short term benefit.
 
Finally and economically, farming and rural families are the backbone of our economy. When farming students can’t make it through their degree due to excessive alcohol consumption, this is the work of the invisible hand. Or fate, same thing. As they then go back to farming, contribute to exports and our economy depends on exports. Without the scarfie image, they could possibly make it through a degree and then we’d have a less productive exports sector, an over-qualified workforce and not enough jobs. Structural unemployment would bring our export sector to its knees.
 
Trying to stop students from binge drinking imposes a national standard on them. It's just more complex than that. Any scarfie that actually makes it through their degree is a more productive addition to the workforce than some socially inept twit from afar. Drinking AND thinking on this side of the house.
 
- Maddie Harris

 
Negative
 
Universities are for thinking, not drinking. Maddie seems to think that if we have heaps of fun in the short term, then we will be better off. That’s a recipe for disaster. Maddie is only focussed on the short term whereas I am focussed on the long term. He has good intentions, but poor outcomes.
 
The drinking age needs to be raised to 22 immediately!
 
The binge drinking culture is incredibly damaging both to students, and the wider community. Think of our mokopuna! Firstly, alcohol has effects on the people that consume it. The health effects are long term and students suffer from short term biases when they make decisions. This means the effects on the brain and liver are not taken into account. We need more of a nanny state! Students blatantly cannot make proper and informed decisions for themselves, so therefore the government needs to make those decisions for them.
 
Secondly, there are negative externalities or spill-over costs. This means that other students and the wider community suffer from the harm caused by other people. For example, when scarfies get raged and on the piss on Castle Street, that gives the University of Otago a bad name. This harms the cool and responsible students who sit at home, study and don’t drink, as their double degrees are being devalued by other people’s Double Browns. Drunken people also cause damage to property. I stand up for the common man and his property rights. His personal sovereignty is breached every time a drunken student takes a tactical vom on the tulips in his front garden.
 
Finally, there is an economic argument. Alcohol companies like Lion Nathan are controlled by foreign shareholders who care about profit over people. Every time you buy yourself some filthy piss from the bottle store, you are sending money overseas in the form of corporate profits to line the pockets of rich fat cats. Where’s your compassion?! I want to graduate into a smart, green and prosperous economy which isn’t burdened by the dismal effects of alcohol.
 
At the end of this debate, you need to ask yourself this question. Does alcohol add value to students and wider society in the long term? The answer is most definitely no. Hear hear.
 
- Kurt Purdon