Once again, the GSB specialty seats are being challenged. There is a bill to change the student government bylaws and create a process for students to register to vote as members of “special populations.” If this bill is not passed, specialty seats may disappear.

Regular seats on the GSB Senate are determined by college or residence area, but specialty seats are based on membership in “special populations.” These “special populations” are determined by race, age, country of origin and disability.

The existence of the specialty seats has been controversial for years. Those who oppose them want regular Senate seats open to students regardless of race, age, disability or the country a student is from.

The new GSB constitution effectively reduces the number of specialty seats from six to four starting next year. It also requires that students register as members of a “special population” in advance if they wish to vote for representatives of those “special populations.”

The bill creating the registration process for specialty seats was voted on during last week’s GSB meeting. It failed to pass.

GSB president Brian Burkehart then called for a special session of the Senate to try to keep the specialty seats.

With a two thirds vote of seated senators required and one failed vote already, Burkehart may not be able to save the specialty seats. But this is a good thing.

Specialty seats needlessly divide students based on factors they cannot control. To separate students like this, GSB should have an extremely compelling reason. But there were 10 Senate seats nobody ran for last spring and several vacant seats on the Senate right now.

Apathy, not bigotry by ISU students against members of “special populations,” determines who gets on the Senate. Does it make sense that we have seats designed to provide the opportunity for members of “special populations” to be on the Senate when there are so many vacant and uncontested seats?

Hearing about specialty seats was surprising to Ward Connerly. Ward successfully led ballot initiatives to end government racial preferences in California and the state of Washington. As a Regent with the University of California, he’s seen it all when it comes to counter-productive group preferences.

For example, there are universities that have separate black graduation ceremonies, separate black dormitories, separate black alumni associations and so forth all with administration encouragement and financial backing.

But seats on a student government that are gerrymandered by group preferences took even Ward aback. I mentioned the GSB specialty seats to him when he visited ISU this semester.

He seemed surprised at the idea we would separate students like this on our student government. Some ISU students I’ve talked to are also amazed we have this kind of policy on GSB. It is time for GSB to do something about it.

Few GSB Senators have the backbone to take a stand on this type of issue. My experience is that they like to be “above the debate.” They always “see both sides,” don’t take a position, debate tangential matters rather than the central issue and push off responsibility and accountability to someone else. Remember how GSB formed the Catt Hall Review Committee?

GSB should get rid of the discriminatory specialty seats just as GSB got rid of its discriminatory ban on funding religious-affiliated student organizations last year.

If GSB can’t squarely discuss controversial issues, why not let the student body make the decision? Allow students to decide if they want to be treated as individuals or be lumped together based on factors they can’t control.

GSB can give students this opportunity by passing an amendment to the GSB constitution to eliminate specialty seats. Then students can give it a thumbs up or thumbs down in a campus referendum.

Specialty seats are the most controversial element of the GSB constitution. Why not let ISU students decide about them? Is GSB afraid that students will vote the “wrong” way?

Officially sanctioned discrimination has a long history, but it doesn’t have to have a long future. Rather than trying to make discrimination into something good through various schemes, why not just end it?

Let’s get the student government out of the discrimination business, period.

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Benjamin Studenski is a senior in industrial engineering from Hastings, Minn.