Once upon a time an architect was contracted to build four new buildings. A week before the new headquarters were to be opened, the company’s top brass came in to check the site out.

They loved the buildings, but between the four buildings was a large courtyard where thousands of people would walk.

But the architect refused to build any sidewalks there. He insisted that the sod was well placed, and that’s all they needed to know. The suits didn’t understand, but they agreed to let the architect do what he wanted.

Six months later, the architect returned to the sight of his masterpiece. He strolled down to the courtyard to check how his sod was doing.

As expected, several paths had been beaten down where the grass had received its heaviest traffic.

The architect proceeded to call his cement crew, have them come down to the courtyard and pour sidewalks over the dirt trails.

Then the facility featured sidewalks that lay where people would naturally walk.

The moral of the story is that you should not try to force things. Leaning back and letting a situation develop on its own often is much more productive. Our Government of the Student Body would learn a lot from this parable.

Last night, GSB finally announced the findings of its Carrie Chapman Catt Hall Review Committee. The committee was formed about three millenniums ago (April of this year) to study the Catt Hall issue and to give recommendations on how both sides of the debate could come to a compromise.

To bring you up to speed, the debate over Catt Hall is centered around a group called the September 29th Movement.

The Movement asserted that Carrie Chapman Catt, although a leader in the field of women’s rights, was a racist. They vehemently opposed placing Catt’s moniker on what used to be Botany Hall. The Movement held many rallies and protests and sparked heavy debate in the Daily and in classrooms alike.

Are you wondering why The Movement is referred to in past tense in the previous paragraph? It’s because as far as I know, and for all practical purposes, The Movement does not exist anymore. There is no more debate.

No more mindless and unproductive letters to the editor. No more rallies with Milton on the steps of Beardshear. No more “hunger strikes.” No more raiding Jischke’s office.

We haven’t heard a single word about the issue because most of The Movement’s founders graduated last spring.

For any of you who were living in Ames during those chaotic and annoying times, you’re not exactly shedding any tears.

I support the First Amendment with ferocity, but even I would open up the Daily last year and just want to yell, “Shut up!” at the editorial page.

Now things are quiet and settled. We sat back, and the situation solved itself. Those who were offended by Catt Hall are gone and were quickly forgotten. Amen and pass me a Nosworthy sandwich.

If everything is settled, why does GSB feel the need to dredge up these tired, old issues?

Re-opening the Catt Hall debate is like finally ditching that fat girl who stalked you for years and then stopping by the behemoth’s apartment months after she stopped calling.

I understand that the committee was created back when the issue was important to many ISU students and actually still had a little public life left in it.

But if the purpose of the committee was to “facilitate closure,” as Matt Ostanik, former GSB senator said, then why did the committee continue its work after the issue faded into obscurity?

Father Time beat GSB to the punch on closure by several months.

Coming out with another highly-publicized report about Catt Hall risks sending us into another debate which cannot and will not be resolved.

The administration simply is not going to take Catt’s name off the building and piss off all those donors who bought those little nameplate bricks in front of Catt Hall just to please the demands of an extremely small minority of the student body.

It’s not like GSB has come up with some amazing solution to forever put this behind us.

The report doesn’t ever reach a “yes” or a “no” on the issue of re-naming the hall. It’s simply 250 pages of investigative reports, position statements, letters and historical research (read: bullshit).

So I ask GSB, why are you doing this? Are you tired of reading about Jesse Ventura in the Daily? Are your meetings running too short this year?

Do you find yourself needing bigger and bigger doses of power as you gain a tolerance to the world’s most addictive drug?

There is great truth to the old adage, “Time heals all wounds.” Time has taken care of the great Catt Hall debate. Believe me GSB, you don’t have to.

---

David Roepke is a sophomore in journalism and mass communication from Aurora.