Wise Monkey News is here to provide young people an opportunity to discuss the issues that affect their lives. We hope that, through your participation, this website serves as a forum for the development, exchange, and expression of ideas that will prepare us to assume our positions as the leaders of tomorrow's world. Have something to say?
Protecting Freedom
by: Steve Groke - printed on 03-28-2001
STAR’s ongoing campaign to stop weapons training on campus, as well as its questioning of the image ROTC gives to a Catholic University, makes me reflect on why I joined the ROTC program. Why do I want to make a career out of serving our country? Why would I sacrifice my life and possibly the happiness of my family by joining the military?
All my life I’ve wanted to be part of something big—to stand for something I think is right.
Argentina: More than an economic crisis
by: Santiago Montalvan - printed on 02-06-2002
I would like to explain, from an Argentinean point of view, what is really happening in my home country and why. Throughout my entire life, the country?s economy has had its ups and downs, currency devaluations, and many corrupt political leaders. Today?s economic crisis in Argentina is by far one of the most serious I have seen. It is sad to know that the only way Argentina makes into the news is because the country is falling apart and not because it is a beautiful place.
World immigration standards need to change
by: Mono Vergara - printed on 03-27-2002
For a few minutes please forget about what we see in the media. Forget about that nonsense axis and all the other issues that "our leaders" tell us that they are important. Stop for a few minutes and look south, to the south of our world. Picture Africans swimming in the strait of Gibraltar, South Americans banging pots and pans, Cubans who die in the Caribbean every other day and lonely Mexican women running through the Arizona desert.
Japan's Forgotten People: The Ainu
by: Kukiko Iwamoto - printed on 04-11-2001
A widespread belief about Japan is that it is a homogenous nation. But there are minorities in Japan. About ten thousand years ago, people lived in the northern part of Japan (now called Hokkaido) who were ethnically separated from the rest of Japanese population by their different lifestyle, culture, and language. These people were called “Ainu” which means “human being” in their own language. Today, the Ainu are considered an indigenous people.
Winging it Costa Rica style: studying snakes in the tropics
by: Eron Osterhaus - printed on 02-20-2002
It's not that it's overly hot-it's not. It's the humidity. A shower is required after taking the effort to walk down the hall to take a shower in the first place. If it weren't for this rickety fan over-head, this room would be unbearable. Well, I guess the liter of Ron Bacardi Superior "Gold" that is currently accompanying me aids in that end as well. Often times there is not much else to do but "talk" to the bottle-considering I don't speak Spanish and my dorm mates don't seem too interested in carrying on conversations in English.
When dealt death and tragedy: How do we play our hand?
by: Ryan O'Connor - printed on 10-24-2001
My brother has been in El Salvador since last June. A friend of his from Santa Clara University, where he is a junior, was one of the victims of the attacks on September 11. She died, valiantly so it seems, aboard the flight that went down in rural Pennsylvania.
She had volunteered with my brother once a week, for an entire year at a San Jose-area school, tutoring children. She was the girlfriend of his co-editor on the Santa Clara student newspaper.