Multiple events help sup­port National Coming-Out Day

“Sexual ori­en­ta­tion is not only based on gen­der, but the type of peo­ple you are attracted to—the char­ac­ter­is­tics that you like about them,” said Dr. Corvino dur­ing his pre­sen­ta­tion titled, “What’s Morally Wrong with Homosexuality?”

He went on to say that “Homosexuality is not some­thing of which to be ashamed. It’s not some­thing to be ter­ri­fied of or some­thing to dis­crim­i­nate against.” .

Dr. John Corvino, Associate Professor of Philosophy at Wayne State University, has been talk­ing about homo­sex­u­al­ity issues for almost 18 years.

FSU pro­fes­sor Katherine Harris, President of the Gender Alliance of Ferris Employees, said, “I’ve seen some of his lec­tures before on video. He is very pol­ished and because he uses humor and doesn’t argue right in front of your face, he helps give lee­way to talk about the issues at hand and make you think about them.”

FSU pro­fes­sional med­ical tech­nol­ogy, pathol­ogy, and phys­i­ol­ogy major, Carl Byington, said, “I thought every­thing he said was cor­rect and easy for most any­one to under­stand. His humor and use of exam­ple were very enter­tain­ing but kept in mind the seri­ous­ness of the sub­ject of gay, homo­sex­ual, bisex­ual, and trans­gen­der issues.”

Dr. Corvino goes on to say that when we argue about issues such as gay mar­riage or homo­sex­u­al­ity in gen­eral, “we need argu­ments that have reasons—not just someone’s opin­ions based on their reli­gious back­ground or conservativeness.”

Same-sex rela­tion­ships make some peo­ple happy, so why dis­rupt that? We have to stop this moral abom­i­na­tion said Dr. Corvino. “We should make moral judg­ments,” said Corvino, “Not just judge peo­ple on who they are or what they do.”

He talked about why homo­sex­u­al­ity is right and didn’t give rea­sons why it’s not wrong. He explained that the argu­ments peo­ple come up with, such as, “homo­sex­u­al­ity is unnat­ural” or “ani­mals don’t do that,” are lousy arguments.

Byington said, “The con­flict of inter­est and use of nature vs nur­ture were very inter­est­ing to lis­ten to. The idea that nat­ural ver­sus unnat­ural events within a het­ero­sex­ual and homo­sex­ual cou­ple was also just as intriguing.”

He went on to say, “If soci­ety as a mass views het­ero­sex­ual rela­tions as nat­ural then why view homo­sex­ual rela­tions as unnat­ural? We are all human beings, some just choose to be with the same sex. This doesn’t change our DNA or alter our genetic code to be any­thing less than what we are—human.”

Corvino said that peo­ple can­not choose their feel­ings, but they can choose the activ­i­ties they par­tic­i­pate in with regard to those feelings.

That could cause uproar because peo­ple say homo­sex­u­als should just choose other activ­i­ties then. When think­ing about that, Corvino said, “Just because it both­ers you on a visual level doesn’t make it morally wrong. We make other people’s lives more dif­fi­cult when we think homo­sex­u­al­ity is morally wrong.”

“Straight peo­ple talk about their boyfriends and girl­friends just fine in pub­lic, but once gays and les­bians talk about their part­ners it becomes an issue,” said Corvino.

President Eisler said, in regards to Corvino’s lec­ture, “It was well pre­sented. He’s a very artic­u­late and thought­ful per­son. His issues were well pre­sented and had well-reasoned ques­tions. I’m very pleased with the Ferris employ­ees who put this together with Dr. Corvino.”

What bet­ter day than a rainy day to go see an upbeat com­edy like this?

“Couple’s Retreat” is a roman­tic com­edy about four cou­ples who go on a spon­ta­neous trip to “Eden.” Eden West is a place for cou­ples look­ing to get the “spark” back into their rela­tion­ships. Eden East is the other side of the island for sin­gles look­ing to have a great time. These four cou­ples signed up for Eden West, not real­iz­ing what they were get­ting them­selves into.

As the story goes on, it shows the impor­tance of what rela­tion­ships are and how to get back into the mood of what rela­tion­ships mean, some­thing each cou­ple lost sight of a long time ago.

The sto­ry­line is great, every­one can learn some­thing from this movie. It made me think about some things as well. However, with stars like Vince Vaughn, Jon Favreau, and Jason Bateman, along with many other come­di­ans play­ing smaller roles, I thought it was going to be more of a funny com­edy than a roman­tic one.

FSU nurs­ing major, Amanda Nieman, said, “I thought the movie was good; long, but good. The only thing I didn’t expect was the fact that it was more of a roman­tic story than a funny story. It was funny, but not as funny as I expected it to be.”

I have to agree, the two and a half hour long movie was drawn out and was not as funny as expected con­sid­er­ing the num­ber of famous come­di­ans in the movie.

I did not waste my time or money with the movie, how­ever. I give the movie a sat­is­fac­tory rating.

Tailgating brings peo­ple together before the game

Tailgating goes back for over a hun­dred years with no sign of stop­ping soon.

According to tail​gat​ing​.com, tail­gat­ing was first started in 1869 when the first col­lege foot­ball game between the Rutgers and Princeton.

Tailgating often thought of as a way to sup­port a team and and social­ize with other fans has pro­gressed since the 19th cen­tury into a ver­i­ta­ble tradition.

FSU stu­dent, Jen Likowski, said “Tailgating is fun because you can relax, hang out with friends all day, enjoy great food and bev­er­ages of any choice, and then of course, there is the football.”

Tailgating is the cel­e­bra­tion in the park­ing lot, and the com­mis­sioner of tail­gat­ing knows it, because he cre­ated it.

Joe Cahn, not your aver­age Joe, is the com­mis­sioner of tail­gat­ing. He sold his house and his New Orleans cook­ing school, bought a motor home and “hit the road to explore what he calls ‘the new American community—tailgate par­ties,’ accord­ing to tail​gat​ing​.com.

“It’s the last great American neighborhood—the tail­gat­ing neighborhood—where no one locks their doors, every­one is happy to see you and all are together shar­ing fun, food and foot­ball. It’s the fam­i­lies.  It’s the fans.  It’s a com­mu­nity social.  It’s pre-game, half­time, post-game and more.  It’s the total game day expe­ri­ence,” said Cahn on tail​gat​ing​.com

Cahn is cred­ited as the world’s only pro­fes­sional tailgater.

“During his Tailgating America Tours he has used 83, 397 gal­lons of gas to travel to all 31 NFL sta­di­ums, over 123 col­lege sta­di­ums, and nine NASCAR tracks, tail­gated with hun­dreds of thou­sands of peo­ple and served more than 326 pots of Jambalaya.”

Food being one of the most impor­tant aspects of tail­gat­ing, par­ties have a vari­ety of rang­ing from hot dogs to burg­ers and ribs.

Food is con­trib­u­tory to the atmos­phere, in addi­ton to games like lad­der ball and bean bag toss. There are some rules regard­ing mod­er­a­tion and the amount of space one is allowed to uti­lize. For that list per­tain­ing to Ferris, con­sult the stu­dent pol­icy hand­book, or just look at the copy below.

Football Tailgate Policy

The his­tor­i­cal aer­ial photo dis­play was shown in the Rankin Art Gallery for a month

Aerial pho­tos are always cool to look at, but look­ing at a school’s trans­for­ma­tion over decades is even better.

Not only were there aer­ial pho­tos of the Ferris cam­pus, but also old, antique machines not used any­where any­more, and an exam­ple would be an old camera.

The dis­play was very cool and inter­est­ing because not did it only show us Ferris’ trans­for­ma­tion over years and years, but the pho­tog­ra­pher and art direc­tor cre­ated an “I Spy” theme along with it.

Next to every pic­ture was a lit­tle box that asked us if we can find cer­tain build­ings and asked where to find the loca­tion future build­ings would be, which are around now.

I liked the way they did that because it kept view­ers inter­ested in the pic­tures and actu­ally made us look at the pic­tures for longer peri­ods of time.

I never knew what Ferris looked like with­out the Quad, with­out FLITE being as big as it is now, and with­out some halls that are here today.

The exhibit showed how both Big Rapids and Ferris changed dras­ti­cally because of the college’s popularity.

As Ferris recently cel­e­brated its 125th anniver­sary or birth­day, the pho­tos are more mem­o­rable then ever.

It’s always good to see how far a school has come and how far it may go in the future.

A parade and other fes­tiv­i­ties are planned to cel­e­brate homecoming

This year’s home­com­ing theme is “heroes.” Homecoming Heroes 2009: Saving the World Since 1884.

Homecoming is the week of Oct. 4 through Oct. 10. Activities will be going on each day.

Teresa Fogel, Student Activities Assistant of the Office of Student Leadership and Activities, said “The bon­fire has dis­ap­peared for years, but we are bring­ing it back this time.”

She also said we have a new activ­ity this year, the Ferris Best Comic Competition. The audi­tions will take place on Wednesday, Sept. 30 at 8:30 p.m. in Rankin 155. The top three win­ners of the audi­tions will per­form at the Lip Sync con­test, and the win­ner of that will open for Last Comic Standing’s Iliza Shlesinger. Shlesinger’s show is $3 for stu­dents and $5 for non-students as allo­cated by the Student Homecoming Committee, Entertainment Unlimited, and the Finance Division.

For more infor­ma­tion on the events and audi­tions, con­tact Fogel at fogelt@ferris.edu or x5936.

Job fairs are one of the most impor­tant events to go to dur­ing your colege career.

Marky Stein, writer for “The Interview Expert,” said the U.S. Department of Labor states that 16 to 18 per­cent of all job seek­ers find jobs at job fairs.

Stein says some impor­tant things in his arti­cle “Dressing for Job Fairs.” You need to dress nice because, Stein wrote after sur­vey­ing more than 40 job fair recruiters, “recruiters at these events said that, sim­ply on the basis of see­ing the job seeker—and before the seeker ever reached their booth, talked to them or handed out their resume—that the prospect dressed in extremely casual cloth­ing struck them as being unpre­pared, irre­spon­si­ble, less capa­ble, edu­cated and qual­i­fied and pos­sess­ing poor work habits.

On the other hand, they described more pro­fes­sion­ally dressed indi­vid­u­als as capa­ble, well-educated, intel­li­gent, trust­wor­thy, respon­si­ble, and peo­ple they wanted to hire.”

These rules don’t just apply for Job Fairs, but also for inter­views as well. Job Fairs are like mul­ti­ple inter­views in one room all in one day.

Angie Roman, Coordinator of Career Services at Ferris, said, “The num­ber one prob­lem with stu­dents when they go to job fairs is net­work­ing. Networking is the num­ber one tool stu­dents should use in order to find jobs. Student pre­pare for the Job Fair, but only for employ­ers related to their field. What they should do is pre­pare for all employ­ers, whether related to their field or not, to increase their net­work con­tacts for future career opportunities.”

The First Lady’s Attic helps stu­dents in need of appro­pri­ate attire for inter­views, pre­sen­ta­tions, and job fairs. It pro­vides fash­ion advice and shirt and coat mea­sure­ments too.

Lisa Kemmis, facil­i­ta­tor and fash­ion advi­sor for the First Lady’s Attic, said “Students can get clothes, shoes, coats, and acces­sories only twice per year, but can keep the clothes; every­thing is free. We’ve already had about 100 stu­dents come in this year and it’s only about two months into school.”

Ferris’ fall job fair is Thurs., Oct. 1 from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. in the Wink Arena.

For more infor­ma­tion con­tact Roman at angelaroman@ferris.edu or x2685.

Top Six Recommendations by Ferris Job Fair Employers

• Wear appro­pri­ate attire
• Visit web site of com­pany they are inter­ested in to get bet­ter knowledge
• Think out­side the box, explore oppor­tu­ni­ties by vis­it­ing and intro­duc­ing them­selves to every employer
• Experience with your field – on cam­pus, vol­un­teer, intern­ship, etc.
• Have bet­ter pre­pared questions
• If they uni­formly had some­thing to hand us to prequalify

Personal Characteristics Employers Seek

Satanic rit­u­als, demonic trans­fer­ences, thriv­ing off of human blood to stay full; “Jennifer’s Body” is not really what I expected.

Why did Megan Fox and Amanda Seyfried take on a movie like this? I mean, from their hit movies “Transformers” and “Mamma Mia” to a movie line about a girl killing boys?

Maybe this movie will be big because of that, but I wasn’t too impressed. It’s the typ­i­cal movie where I knew how it ended. I can’t deny the great act­ing from the two young stars, but this is not the type of movie I see them doing.

Fox plays Jennifer Check, the girl every­one wants to be friends with. Seyfried plays Jennifer’s best friend, Needy Lesnicky. After a night out to a tav­ern, Jennifer goes with a mys­te­ri­ous band and is used for a satanic rit­ual. Next thing Needy knows, Jennifer is killing their school’s boys for their blood to stay full, healthy, and beautiful.

The graph­ics are okay, the gore is not bad, but the gen­eral sto­ry­line was pretty lame. The good girl into a demonic killer reminds me of a “Carrie”/”The Exorcist” mix.

Not to men­tion what hap­pens at the end; I wasn’t expect­ing what hap­pens, I’ll admit, but it still fol­lows the sto­ry­line of a lot of hor­ror movies. I want some­thing new that I didn’t see com­ing. I did like how it was put together though because it made me ask myself ques­tions like, “How’d this happen?”

I liked the actors in this movie so I fig­ured I’d take a risk and go see this one, as I did with “Whiteout,” but I didn’t have the same reac­tion. It’s a typ­i­cal hor­ror movie, but with more sex­ual innu­en­dos. If you like that mix, the movie is all yours.

With Hispanic Heritage Month begin­ning, Multi-cultural Student Services has lined up the Latin group Mr. LAC y El OSO to perform.

Mr. LAC y El OSO will be per­form­ing a free event for all dur­ing the Ferris Hispanic Festival on Wednesday Sept. 16, from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. in the quad, or the Rankin Center Dome room in the event of inclement weather.

Mr. LAC was born in Guatemala and El OSO was born in Mexico so they both grew up lis­ten­ing to Latin music.

Both Mr. LAC and El OSO have been sep­a­rately per­form­ing for a num­ber of years. They com­bined their musi­cal tal­ent in 2006 to form the group.

This duo’s music is described as Spanish-Urban music. Mr. LAC y El OSO is con­sid­ered to be the best Latin duo in their genre accord­ing to myxer​.com. They can play a vari­ety of music from Spanish Hip-Hop to the Salsa and Meringue.

Since 2006, the duo has released two albums, the first one released in 2006. Their sec­ond album, titled Original & Versatile, fol­lowed in 2008. This album was the key to their suc­cess with all orig­i­nal tracks recorded and pro­duced by Mr. LAC.

This suc­cess has led to a tour around the U.S. with stops in Sacramento, Los Angeles, and Indianapolis.

With the tour being a hit among fans, Mr. LAC y El OSO had the oppor­tu­nity to per­form with many other big names includ­ing Xtreme and Yung Jeezy.

They are cur­rently work­ing on a new album fea­tur­ing artist Prospect Da Child, Giggles, and many more. The release date is still uncertain.

Mr. LAC y El OSO believes they have found music to be their long-term career.

For more infor­ma­tion on Mr. LAC y El OSO visit myxer​.com or myspace​.com/​m​i​s​t​e​r​lac.

Entertainment Unlimited starts out the year with comedy

Comedian Alex Thomas comes to Ferris.

The Rankin Center Dome Room will be filled with jokes and laugh­ter tomor­row, Sept. 17, from 8 to 9 p.m.

Alex Thomas, both a come­dian and an actor, began his enter­tain­ment career right after high school.

Coming from a tal­ented fam­ily, his mom a pianist and his dad a mem­ber of the band Earth, Wind, and Fire, Thomas went straight to the pros when Keenan Ivory Wayans and Damon Wayans saw him in the hit com­edy show “In Living Color.”

Once his career started bloom­ing, Will Smith saw Thomas per­form­ing at the Laugh Factory Comedy Club in Hollywood and hired Thomas to write for his show “The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air.”

After writ­ing for Smith’s show for three sea­sons, Thomas kept up with his com­edy career by star­ring in two one-hour com­edy spe­cials, Showtime’s “Straight Clownin’” and BET’s “Alex Thomas Live.”

Thomas also opened up for famous stars like: Sinbad, Jamie Foxx, Mark Curry, Damon Wayans, and Bill Cosby.

He also guest starred in famous tele­vi­sion shows, such as “The Jamie Foxx Show,” “Martin,” “Girlfriends,” “The Wayne Brothers,” “Moesha,” “The Parkers,” and “All of US.”

Thomas starred in such movies like, “The Players Club,” “Two Can Play That Game,” “Just Married,” “BAPS,” “The Wash,” and more.

Television and movies weren’t his only act­ing gigs. He also per­formed in music videos made by artists like: Kanye West, P. Diddy, Snoop Dogg, 50 Cent, and Bow Wow.

Alex Thomas is well known in the com­edy world and has met a lot of well known musi­cians and actors through­out his career.

With a lot of expe­ri­ence under his belt he is sure to leave us with a few laughs.

These facts about Thomas are from black​com​e​dy​tour​.com.

For more infor­ma­tion on this event con­tact Leanne Day at dayl@ferris.edu or x2610.