“Sandstorm” Unity

If any of you readers attend or associate with K-State, you are probably aware of the “drama” before last Saturday’s home game against the Jayhawks. For those of you who are in the dark on this, I will provide a brief overview. So, the KSU administration banned the playing of the song “Sandstorm” at Saturday’s game, because the student section tends to chant “F**k KU” to the beat whenever the song is played. Obviously, this is not good for school publicity.

However, if you were in attendance Saturday, you know that late in the game, the administration broke and decided to play the song. To put a lot of what happened into one phrase: The Octagon of Doom went insane. But what I would like to point out in the situation that unfolded is the power that was held by the K-State student section.

See, all week, all over campus, students were complaining about the ban on playing the song, and were despising the administration. But in the end, none of the individual efforts made much of a difference: not the tweets or the yaks, the complaints or the curses, none of it. Yet, during the game against KU, as the student body banded together in the unified “F**k KU” chant to whatever song they could possibly muster, the administration eventually lifted the ban and played the song. Part of the decision had to come from the fact that it was a close game at the time, but nevertheless, if it had not been for the unification of the students, standing against the administration, I don’t thing that the ban would have been lifted. The act of many students, coming together with the same purpose and mindset, by far outweighs the same students all voicing their concerns separately. When there is unification, one strong voice is heard, when there is multiple individuals, there is only chatter.

To me, whatever your opinion on the playing of “Sandstorm,” this is a great example of how a collective group hold much more value, and can accomplish much more, than the same number of individuals not banded together. As we begin and continue to combat the Anthropocene, it is not the acts of lone individuals that will have effect. It is those individuals joining together to form a single voice, because that is the only voice than can really stimulate change effectively. Individual efforts are not worthless, but when compared to what can be done by groups, communities, societies of individuals joined collectively, the difference is beyond measure.

The K-State student section was determined as a whole and that is why they were able to make a difference, despite higher authorities that thought differently. We need change, but change, significant and meaningful change, the change the we need, cannot be brought about by the I, but by the we.