On Tuesday night Tom Elliott ’08 went to the Student Senate to warn his government about the impending doom that would soon plague the Wabash campus. His somber demeanor reflected the immediate urgency of the plight Wabash College would soon be thrown into. Anyone that reads his email would know this.
Zombies are coming. The government didn’t listen. We’ll pay for our neglect.
Thomas Jerry Elliott Jr., Founding President of the Wabash Chapter of the Zombie Survival Club, petitioned for recognition to the Student Senate as an official organization of the student body. Mr. Elliott was not asking for funding or for the Senate to do anything but recognize the organization. He had all of the paperwork stipulated by the Senate that a club needed to be affirmed.
The Student Senate vote was tied 13-13, and Vice President John Moton broke the tie, voting down the Zombie Survival Club as an official student body organization.
Organizations like the Zombie Club have clear precedent. In the last meeting of last year a limited government organization was confirmed by the Senate. The group fulfilled every Senate requirement, had a clearly articulated meaning, group hierarchy and even bylaws. Although the organization seemed a bit facetious to some Senate membership it nonetheless went through because there were students who wanted the organization and the Senate represents its constituents. Some students undoubtedly found an organization whose leadership is determined by rock-paper-scissors ‘silly,’ but the organization was still recognized.
What Senate does have control over is the budget. If The Zombie Survival Club requested funds for chainsaws, copies of Shaun of the Dead or Max Brooks’ The Zombie Survival Guide it only follows that the Senate should not fund them – it would be a frivolous waste of Student Activity Fee funding and not something in the best interest of the student body.
It is not the responsibility of the Senate to determine if an organization is ‘silly’ or serves a purpose – they are elected by their peers and are expected to, at least nominally, reflect the desires of their constituents. It is a fair assessment to say that everyone on campus finds at least one (and probably more) organization ‘silly.’ There are many potential tests for the viability of an organization, like requiring membership rosters at budget time, but we do not think that silliness, a subjective term if ever there were one, is the right test.
We would welcome some sort of viability standard, and we would support wholeheartedly a standard that had some sort of objective and quantifiable meaning beyond the interpretations of the members of a fluid and politically elected body. Indeed, we would call upon the Senate to formulate such an objective test and implement it starting immediately. It is our opinion that a subjective standard for clubs is not a standard with which the students should have to deal.