Stockholm School of Economics in Riga Students' Magazine

Many discussed and argued whether the Gossip page is a tradition of SSE Riga and the Insider or just a mean way to hurt other people without facing the consequences. A few weeks ago we received quite a worrying letter about the Gossip page; as true journalists, we tried to ask your opinion on the subject. Theletter itself and the summary of the survey responses are offered for your judgment.

Greetings, the editorial stuff! (Don't read till 16; means, you CAN read it, Wladimir! :))

General impression is shoddy, let's put it straight! If you cut the gossip page, noone will even bother opening the "gossipsider", perhaps only for the sake of checking whether the gossip page is there or not.  The rest of the content is dead boring, it's drab, should I say. Issues raised there are of no interest (exceptions: the internship overviews, though brief, were almost useful (ridiculously short, taken into account the amount of pages used up for rubbish; Morten's column is saint, no doubt; Pauna's interview was a positive thing, too). Advice: put at least a little thought into it, get the catchy, hot topics (interships is a step closer; you could also publish some news from administration, and more interviews with the people in charge as regards the future of this school, because many students are concerned etc.) What's the use of publishing the interviews with exchanges if they answer with general, predictable phrases; NOONE CARES; that's why we have personal communication. Now comes the pain! The gossip page is the single most important component of the foundations of your little brochure, and as such this fact is NOT acceptable. Think about the gossip page! What is it? An obscene, insulting, immoral, jaundiced dirty little page that is a spit onto the dignity and values of our prestigious university. Not only does it manifest the ambivalence and lack of intelligence of our students (as well as humiliatingly poor English) (the side of you, you'd never normally like to reveal in public), but it is also the monument for the immoral, cowardly and revengeful (they are made heroes at the end of the day, as opposed to honest bastards like myself) that are keen to smear and insult the ones they would never dear to hit out at. In short, you are indeed making a negative contribution to the sseriga culture at present, the rest of the content does not outweigh that. If there is no way you can change all that, then perhaps there is time for the reconsideration of the need for such a magazine. I'm not saying you have spoiled the Insider, no, the problem is you haven't changed anything - you let the problems soar, and follow the old mistakes. You can ignore the shortcomings just now if you want to, but in time the shortcomings will not ignore you! (almost as Shakespear ...) All of this is merely a personal opinion, and you can write it off as an insult, but YOU KNOW YOU SHOULDN'T!

Yours faithfully,

Conscience of the Insider

P.S. I made some credible points, you have to give me that! My piece of writing would be more interesting to read than most of things you publish (apart from gossips, of course, and the exceptions)

P.P.S. Improvements in English, inspired by Wladimir, are plausible! Well done! Honestly!

P.P.P.S. Just wondering. Why do you ask for people's names and e-mails for feedback, but don't stick to that with gossips?

P.P.P.P.S. Publish this if you run out of "usual stuff". Do you have the heart for it? (Do you have the guts, put another way.)

P.P.P.P.P.S. I'd appreciate a reply in the next issue! Even if you skip my message! But it's up to you, dignitaries! Free country, and all that.

***

This was quite a response, we have to admit. Here we mean both the huge piece of text received from an anonymous critic and number of those who participated in our poll. 150 respondents, 86 comments – damn, gossiping is really a hot topic at SSE Riga (don't want to be Captain Obvious, but still – this was a bit unexpected). So what do we want to achieve with all this? To begin with, let's just summarize what we have. And then... plan for the future? Or ask for your advice, which actually makes more sense? We'll see.

But first things first. Our dear anonymous critic, we've been impressed by your letter. And actually now you can say to yourself, “Mission accomplished!” No-no-no, we are not removing the Gossip page, no offense. But you have delivered a certain message, that's for sure. We already bear in mind some ideas about researching “the future of this school”; as for “hot topics” — hmm, we are all bloody different, and it's a bit hard to understand your perception correctly. Once more – we encourage everyone to write us feedback and advice, as the Insider's special feature is that you can form the content yourself. Just be specific and initiative – your ideas are more than welcome.

About the gossip page – well, it was interesting to see how student's comments once more prove that it unites our community way more than fragments it. The vast majority of respondents (138 out of 150) have never been offended by an item of gossip. And quite a few comments were, so to say, menacing – something like, “don't you dare to remove it from the magazine!”. Let's try to be cold-minded and ask ourselves a question, “Why does the gossip page exist at SSE Riga? And why is it so popular?” One may argue that since most of us are serious/hard-working/nerdy/goal-oriented/insert-an-appropriate-word when it comes to studies, there has to be an outlet for our dark side, i.e. silly, lazy, and sarcastic. Another could say that gossip will inevitably appear in every relatively big community as it is entertaining and spices the life. Well, personally we would say that gossip... smooths the relationships. It allows you to look at the happy-go-lucky side of life, where every single person has much ridiculous and funny stuff to be told about him/her, which makes you go out of the box, shake off the official manner and put a smile from ear to ear on your face. Remember that life is meant to be enjoyed, so mock and be mocked! :-).

The Insiders