UV is an outlet for sex-starved and lonely law students of all genders.
First came Atrisha Lewis’ provocative argument (“Ensure Ultra Vires is Reflective of the School Community it Serves”), the gist being that UV underrepresents the female student body and that women students have a duty to contribute. Then came Lauren Heuser’s response (“Are Women Ultra Vires?”), radiant as it was with super sleek economics jargon (cost-benefit analysis, what?). Like most third instalments, I can promise you sex, little to no cohesion, and a bad taste in your mouth. (See: Batman Forever, Spider-man 3, Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines, etc.).
As compelling as Atrisha Lewis’s call to duty was, my failure to respond until now can only be explained by laziness or apathy. If I’m being really honest, then ok, fine, I feel pretty inadequate when confronted by the accomplishments of my fellow classmates (I can eat 6 Krispy Kremes in a sitting). If I’m being really, really honest, cost-benefit analyses befuddle me. I credit Lauren Heuser’s article for spurring me on to write this ill-considered “opinion piece.” More importantly, it made me engage in my own cost-benefit analysis.
Unfortunately, I think I need a bona fide economist to help me out here. When I consider the list, the costs seem to come out on top of the benefits and yet here I am. All this time and effort and almost certain social trauma cannot be offset by some set of benefits I can’t imagine. But since I am writing this article, the benefits, by definition, must outweigh the costs. Am I doing this wrong? I am amazed that these analyses can be done so intuitively that making decisions in life isn’t normally so painstaking. Economics is like magic! Whatever. Now I’ve lost interest in this train of thought.
SEX. PARTYING. SEX. Apparently this is what “sells” Ultra Vires. In typical Canadian fashion, I propose a compromise. Female law student: check. Sex and ribaldrous miscellany: check. As I continue to write this piece, I can feel the costs increasingly outweighing any phantasmagorical benefits (fascinating feeling), but I am bolstered by rule 10 of Michael Porter Gartke’s “Top 10 Rules for Writing for UV”: that my article and any article purporting to be funny will suck. (Low expectations are where I live.)
Sex is super fun if you can get it. Unfortunately, as most law students either live in the library or a clinic or some dark, disgusting den drinking away their distresses, I’m going to hazard a guess that the having of it is slightly rarer than the frequency of A’s administered at each exam period. That leaves partying but since I am caught by the previously identified group of students, I can’t say much on this count either. This is depressing. It does, however, make me realize that UV may be the only outlet for many of us to fulfill whatever sex/partying needs we may have, whether we are contributors or readers, and therefore, UV may, arguably, be serving an important social purpose. (It’s not the prettiest of raison d’etres but we all gotta poop too.)
This is also, somewhat serendipitously, the love issue. In the spirit of hijacking this “personal PR machine” of our male student body, I invite you, random law student, to look me up on stalkerguide, if you are so inclined to rectify our respective deficiencies in student life. I like superhero movies. I also have boobs.
As you finish skimming this “article,” you may wonder where the sex was? What about the partying? Wasn’t there something about cost-benefits analysis promised? BAZINGA! If there is any redeeming feature of these few hundred words, it’s that it delivered as all third instalments do: with a whimper.
Now onto more socially constructive activities.
