Answers I liked

[Zedability]

Official petition to rename the Board Comment Board the "Kosher Boardboard". All in favor, say aye.

[Portia]

Official petition to rename the Board Comment Board the "Kosher Boardboard". All in favor, say aye. ;)

:-D

[yayfulness]

Hah, I like it!

[Shrinky Dink]

The list of baby names from Rexburg is absolutely making my day!!

[Emiliana]

Hella kudos to The Black Sheep for her answer about HIV in the LGBT community. Can't find it to link to it right now.

[TheBlackSheep]

Thanks, lady! I appreciate it. Shoutout (that they'll never see) to my girlfriend (who works for GLSEN), a friend from high school (who works for a gay rights and AIDS advocacy group), Hobbes, and my mom for their notes (even if I didn't listen to my mom except to change one word). I'm pleased with how it turned out. Thanks for noticing it.

[Cognoscente]

SUCH a great answer. It was basically a term paper we all got for free.

[Shrinky Dink]

I'm just going to say that I'm extremely glad that my husband and I have great parents and neither has really been overbearing in the slightest.

[Portia]

I'm just going to say that A-Dawg ain't no looker himself.

[Man with a Mustache]

I'm just going to say that A-Dawg ain't no looker himself.

Seriously, when are we going to stop feeding the troll?

[C is for]

I'm just going to say that A-Dawg ain't no looker himself.

Quite unrelatedly, I ran into someone on Mutual last night and my friends didn't immediately understand why I was like "Oh nope not this guy he's a terrible person" and I didn't know how to explain it. (though now I can think of a link I could send them)

That has nothing to do with the quoted text. Just a comment I thought of.

[Cognoscente]

[Portia]

Wait, Mutual is Mormon Tinder, right? Where's Craig Jessop when I need him for his bon mots?

[Cognoscente]

Wait, Mutual is Mormon Tinder, right? Where's Craig Jessop when I need him for his bon mots?

Tinder is Mormon Tinder in Utah. It's kind of a pain in the ass for the rest of us.

[yayfulness]

File this one under "corrections I liked": http://theboard.byu.edu/questions/89951/

My mayor (city of ~45,000) was elected by a margin of 50-60 votes. This sort of thing happens at the municipal level all the time. Hardly anyone bothers to vote, so the people who do vote have an exaggerated influence.

One of my professors told the class last quarter that a few years ago, the city considered dropping its subsidy of the municipal golf course. Senior citizens turned out in droves to protest, so that effort quickly got shut down, and instead prices were raised but seniors got a special discount (and taxes from everyone in the city, including impoverished non-golfers like yours truly, go to subsidize it). A student happened to be in attendance and asked why there weren't student discounts too. One of the city council members told him, "Look around. How many other students do you see?" There were none. "That's why seniors get discounts and students don't. If you start voting and showing up to meetings en masse, we'll start taking your preferences into consideration."

Back when I was still at BYU, another professor pointed out that if the university's students were to organize, field a candidate, reliably turn out to vote, and vote as a block, the student body would have a permanent and unassailable seat on the city council. But that never happens, because students suck at all four of those things. I don't know if it's ever been attempted in Provo. Someone tried it here in San Luis Obispo, and it failed miserably because the candidate barely put forth an effort and nobody turned out for him.

So I guess it's true that college students typically don't have much influence. But that's by choice, not by anything inherent to the system.

In addition to elections, I've been to dozens of public meetings and hearings over the course of my education. Almost nobody ever shows up. Last quarter, my class created a neighborhood revitalization concept plan for a city in the Bay Area. We had three meetings. Average attendance? About twelve constituents. If you happened to be one of the twelve people who showed up, your voice represented around 8% of the public input into the project.

I recognize that there are some structural issues that can keep people from voting or participating. For college students, things like scheduling, homework loads, and the decision of where to maintain legal residence can complicate things significantly. For other populations, the barriers (especially language- and schedule-related) can be even stronger. But as an educated and privileged person who's well-integrated into society, the only reason that you don't have a voice is because you're keeping your mouth firmly shut.

[Portia]

Wait, Mutual is Mormon Tinder, right? Where's Craig Jessop when I need him for his bon mots?

Tinder is Mormon Tinder in Utah. It's kind of a pain in the ass for the rest of us.

So many guns. So much camo. So many babies. Ugh.

[Portia]

*n.b. LA Tinder actually seemed weirder

[Cognoscente]

I enjoyed The Entomphagist's explanation of trans fats. Informative and thorough without being obtuse to laypeople--the best kind of Board answer.

[Emiliana]

I'm too lazy to go find the link, but did anyone else notice someone getting away with a signature of "single af"? I wonder if the editors didn't catch it, didn't know what it was, or just didn't figure it was a big deal... Anyway, it amused me.

[C is for]

Maybe they thought it meant single American Fork...