The Rhetoric of THON

I'll probably post about this again on Monday, after THON is over. With the building anticipation of what I truly believe is the best event on any college campus, I can literally think of little else besides this 46 hour long Dance Marathon.

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I'm on a Rules and Regulations Committee, which basically means I'll be working security for a little over half of THON. 5 hours on, 5 hours of is the custom. So what does this dedication say about Penn State, college students, and what people think about cancer?

For our last meeting, everyone in the committee talked about why we personally are doing THON. I was so surprised by how many people have, one way or another, been affected so drastically by cancer. Almost everyone in our 40+ person committee said losing a loved one to cancer was a huge motivator as to why they are volunteering for THON. What I think this says is that there may be no greater inspiration in the world than the lost of a loved one. Although these people are gone and cannot tell us how great whatever we are doing in their honor is, it seems that most people don't particularly care about that, and simply want to do good in the name of a lost loved one. This can, as in the case of THON, be a tremendously good thing. I'm sure that someone's strife to make a loved one proud has led to terrible, terrible things too. I think using loved ones as a motivation can be a great thing, it simply depends on what the motivation is being used for.

Penn State has been racked by so much scandal these past few months, that I think THON should have a huge impact on the image of Penn State. People need to realize that great, wonderful things are happening on this campus, and that THON is simply the most visible of these things. Thousands upon thousands of students are volunteering their time and unmatched effort for so many diverse and equally great causes, and I hate to see THON get so much publicity over everything else combined.

College students are often a slightly maligned set of people. We are commonly seen as lazy, unmotivated, and wasting our youth away for various bad pursuits. THON and other charities should put these stereotypes right away, yet they seem to prevail. Unfortunately, I cannot see a reason for this stereotype to change, because people have every reason to rid the preconceptions of college students they old now, and still neglect to.