There is a new aura in the office tonight. The staff of The Student Life, so regularly predominated by juniors and seniors, is more than half made up of first and second year students. Any mention of what was once considered "TSL clique" or "culture" has no validity as the staff and leadership have changed. If only perceptions could be as fluid.

There has been a new aura in news rooms around the world these past two weeks. The events of September 11 have left a pall of ignorance upon the media, who were forced to report upon a terrorist attack on America with the same amount of shock and disbelief that was felt by every observer in the world. Very few of our media icons pretend any longer to know the dynamics of our national climate. After a summer season of high speed chases, stem-cell controversy and Levy/Condit scandal, the news media has been forced to grapple with an adversary that could either make or break what we currently know as journalism. It is not and will never be a perfect industry, but the successful struggle to invesitgate and inform by Peter Jennings on ABC, Dan Rather on CBS, and CNN on the World Wide Web, as well as by many other journalists floundering equally to understand the world’s drastic turn of events gives hope to a nation and a world that do not trust those whose business it is to disperse information.

It is thus my suggestion to this college as well as to the community at large to not judge the media to harshly. In a world where most televised and printed news is a business, corporations print and broadcast what the people so evidentally want, and when the public responds the media listens because it really serves little other purpose than to please. The point is not the blame prostitutes for prostitution. It is to remind you, the readers and consumers, that whenever you curse the mention of Monica Lewinsky in the newspaper or the sight of a high-speed chase on TV, know also that others buy the issues and pause at the stations which headline these stories.

This means something slightly different for the staff and the leadership of The Student Life. As a new generation of journalists at Pomona, we have the ability and motivation to move against the momentum (or lack thereof) that has traditionally weighed us down. While we aim to please and comply with the responses and input of our readers, we also strive to uphold a journalistic tradition of reporting the news fairly and accurately.

For those of you who have judged The Student Life in the past, please take a step back and attempt to look at us with fresh eyes, as many are forced to look at the world and our popular media after recent tragic events. We understand the phenomenon of being quick with criticism and slow with praise, but we do hope that something in this issue and in this publication can be found praise worthy. We have entered a time when the ability to hold back our gut judgements and adapt our beliefs is not only important, but vital to our existence as a nation and as a unified world. Imagine a world where our preconceptions could be so fluid.

Sincerely,

Amit Thakkar