Once again, Iowa State students have taken to the streets in a public display of widespread, jackass stupidity.

Many people have asked: What do students at Iowa State have to riot about?

We aren’t living in a blighted inner-city neighborhood bereft of hope and opportunity, are we?

With respect to the Ivy League, students at ISU are amongst the most privileged people in the United States.

We are lucky to be at college, and we have relatively bright futures ahead of us.

Some have claimed last Thursday’s riot was in response to the Dry Veishea policy. This public disturbance had no purpose.

This wasn’t political protest. It wasn’t actually ABOUT anything.

But Thursday’s riot did not happen in a vacuum.

Iowa State students are acting out for a reason, and that reason has everything to do with a general feeling among students that the administration is unconcerned with our needs.

Students couldn’t feel like a lower priority on campus.

Who gets to sit in the good seats at basketball games?

Who gets affordable housing?

Who gets treated like an adult during Veishea?

Who gets to run their own student-run festival without administrative interference and threats?

Who gets to walk around Campustown without six cops watching on the corner and two more circling in the paddy wagon?

NOT STUDENTS.

When a vocal minority attempt to express their dissatisfaction, more people are concerned dissent will look bad to potential donors than they are about the complaint.

Students are little more than cash cows as a group, and our value is determined in the same fashion as the average Holstein.

We’re cool as long as we stand still while the university milks us dry.

Go to food service, go to class, give up your money, move into high-priced suites and, every year or so, take to the streets in a drunken stupor to tear down stops signs and scare the straights — but whatever you do, don’t organize.

More students showed up to riot than showed up to vote in the last GSB election, and that says something.

It says students at Iowa State need to do something to let off steam besides drinking.

We need to learn how to deal with our frustrations in a more productive manner.

Nothing will change as long as the administration knows that students won’t really do anything.

Start a petition or have a real demonstration because the riot thing is getting lame.