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By Amelia Gravagno, Staff Writer

What I am about to admit will make me a pariah on campus, so if you see me walking to class, please refrain from throwing soda cans and rotten tomatoes.

I do not vote.

I have actually never voted. In the four years that I have been a legal adult and been able to make my contribution to the system whenever there has been a presidential election, a gubernatorial election, and countless propositions on the ballot, I missed every single one of them.

And when I say miss, I don't mean I forgot or was out of town that day. I made a conscious effort not to exercise my rights as an American.

Yes I am a registered member of the apathy party. How many of you out there hate my guts right now?

And let me state, remaining apathetic on this campus has been quite a chore. All day long I have to dodge members of the republicans, the democrats, the Palestinians, the Israelis, M.E.C.H.A. , the socialists, Students Against War, and about a million others.

I find it hilarious that every organization is convinced that their cause is the most valid, that their point of vciew is the one we should all subscribe to, and the guys at the table next to them shoujld just rot in hell.

I'm getting tired of being yelled at for not signing a petition, or not grabbing a flyer I know I will just throw away in two seconds.

Hey, me not taking the paper just saved a rainforest somewhere.

Contrary to popular belief, it's not that I don't care about starving children, genocide, or whether or not our president is in fact Satan incarnate. I just don't think arguing about it for hours on end is going to change the situation.

A riot in the quad certainly won't make Bush pull out of Iraq, no matter how clever the signs and chants are. It's not something I'm passionate about, and I'm not about to fake it just because a cause is trendy.

I, unlike seemlingly every other student at SF State, did not become uber political the second I stepped into Malcom X Plaza. I was apathetic when i arrived and remain so to the disgust of both liberal and conservative friends.

I guess I just don't understand the point of detesting someone just because they have a different political affiliation than me. As for not voting, maybe part of it is out of laziness. I don't feel right about putting in my two cents on an issue I know nothing about, yet I don't really do all that much to educate myself.

Now I just need to figure out how to spin the next time my parents get on my case for being "un-American."