Henry David Thoreau once said, "Humility, like the darkness, reveals the heavenly lights."
Famous rapper Clipse said, "I tried being humble; humble get no respect." Side with whom you will, but WGRE likes to mention that they're the #1 college radio station in the nation (I can think of at least two advertisements for it.). All joking comparisons aside, there are a lot of prestigious awards they could win, but nothing tops their brand new "Coolest Radio Station in America" award from Playboy.
It's not because WGRE holds any wilder keg parties than any other college radio station.
No, it's simply that according to Steve Mazeika of Playboy, "We think ‘Where would someone who wants to live the Playboy lifestyle want to go to school? [WGRE] was nominated for a reason — it resonates with students, they are interested and it has a place in campus life."
There you have it, DePauw students want to live the Playboy lifestyle. The things that happened around campus on Little 5 make so much more sense now…
I'd like to say the resonance with students is because of Kyle Gough, Scott Silver, and my awesome show "Rockers and Soccer" but that's probably not true since some guy called in and yelled at us for saying his team was going to lose last week (however if you love the Premier League and your team is playing well lately, tune in on Fridays from 3-4 p.m. We've even been nominated for DJs of the week).
Maybe WGRE is just a gift from the music gods to fight off annoying, popular artists by playing songs nobody has heard before. Sophomore John Schacher said, "I like the wide variety of music on WGRE. It's never the same stuff twice when I tune in." It's the only radio station in the world where it's acceptable for DJs to hang up on people who request Creed, Nickelback, or "Friday" by Rebecca Black. OK, maybe it's not acceptable, but I still might do it.
In truth WGRE's good taste in music comes from how easy it is for students to get involved with the station. Anyone can apply for a radio show and those who apply early almost always get a show. Applications for next semester go up on the WGRE site in the next week or so and if you've never gotten involved, you're missing out. Once you have your own radio show you can play introduce all of your favorite jams to the world and answer the phone when President Casey wants to hear The Killers. Keep in mind that WGRE is the only organization on campus that still hazes — if you get really unlucky they might make you do 4-6 a.m. shift on Tuesday morning but that's the price some people have to pay to get into to the cool gang. It builds character.
In all seriousness, WGRE is an awesome organization that everybody should consider getting involved in. All of their awards have been earned through hard work and this latest award takes us one step closer to being the number-one party school in the nation, though much to the administration's dismay.
— Carter is a sophomore from Carmel, Ind., majoring in English writing. opinion@thedepauw.com