After listening to the podcast, I felt that it really depicted the truth; I thought it was very straightforward and honest. I listened to it last night, and after hearing the class and their opinions today, my point of view is very different. I personally did not get offended from the podcast. It was the plain and simple truth that Penn State is a party school. Although some do not admit that the extreme cases happen often, I personally know of a lot of people who have gone to those extremes several times. How do students here define extreme? It depends on the person. Personally, I value things differently and for me, the extreme is obviously different than for those who just don’t care, especially if something’s seem usual. I feel that the pride and sense of family here keeps people from admitting that.
As a Penn State student I was not really surprised about anything said in the podcast, everything sounded like the usual Friday night here. As a college student in general, I thought that this podcast brought up the problems all Universities face with drinking and partying. Although brutally honest, I thought that it did create an accurate portrayal. At the beginning of the podcast, the two reporters were discussing everything that was happening right in front of them. Its not like they looked for the unusual or extreme cases, they were witnessing them just sitting there watching a usual evening pass by.
I believe that the credibility for the people like Spaniard, was truthful. Despite the problem, he admitted that Penn State could not completely rid alcohol from everything because it would cut money from the alumni and change the Penn State family from what it had always been before. The credibility of the interviewers were also strong. I feel they admitted to partying themselves, yet realized and argued that the issue was important.
The most pathos or emotional appeal I received was the death of Joe Dado. Once again, it was an extreme case, but it is the truth. The idea that people forget what happened in the past, really made me upset. I feel like his death was something for students to learn from, more than just bringing a buddy with them to drink. I thought the ethos was the strongest with the bartender, Rob, who admitted what Penn State students were really like. He was not trying to cover up their use of alcohol but brought up how even now, people drinking harder. The intent of this podcast was to show why Penn State was the number one party school that year; I believe that most of the statistics helped the argument. The only information that I did not agree with was the way they made as the number one party school. I do not think it is very accurate to have picked it based off of student votes.
Issues like the “drunk button” and “frat jackets” portray the kind of ideas or things that are apart of a party school like Penn State. I believe that this podcast depicts Penn State as another party school in the country, with the specifics that make it Penn State. The foot ball games, the fraternities all-similar to other universities. Despite that, the sense of school pride has made it different from the others.
