It’s that special time of year again, the time the British affectionately call the “silly season,” when normal life ceases and everything is abuzz with election fever.

In case you haven’t noticed, the campus has recently gone topsy-turvy with the grand spectacle of ASUU campaigning. Everything from N64 to X96 has shown up, and campaigners are throwing around bagels, donuts, muffins and pizza with reckless abandon.

And yet, strangely, amidst all this hubbub, students seem to be paying very little attention. Only 3,407 students voted in this year’s primary elections. That’s only a small fraction of the U’s overall student body. Debates have also been sparsely attended, with scarcely more than 100 students showing up to the LDS Institute-sponsored primary debate, and even fewer coming to the Honors/LEAP-sponsored contest last Friday. The student body seems to be collectively asking, “Is there any reason we should care?”

The answer, according to Steven Paradise of the now defunct Apathy Party is, “Well?maybe.” Paradise says that if the campaigns presented real issues with real choices, then students would definitely benefit from voting. But when elections are just a circus punctuated by pizza and donuts, students would be wise to just take the free lunch and go home.

Paradise has a point. Sometimes it seems like the political parties’ only purpose is to entertain. But voters must be careful not to blame the candidates for the U’s student involvement woes. In most cases, the shortcomings of the campaign process result not from the worthlessness of the candidates, but the inherent limitations of student elections.

The first, and most obvious, source of student disinterest is the general silliness of the campaigns themselves. According to Paradise, the attitude of most campaigners is, “Here, we’ll feed you. Vote for us.” It’s hard to take seriously a political party whose major appeal lies in the fact that it gave you more pizza than the party in the tent a few yards away. However, because the U is such a small and geographically confined political body, such strategies are inevitable.

The only real way to reach students is to campaign heavily in the high-traffic areas of campus. Also, since students are almost always busy, campaign signs just don’t do the job in getting their attention. Food is the only option for candidates who really want to spread their views.

The second source of student disinterest, according to Paradise, is the totally uninformative nature of campaigns. The parties put up big signs with nice looking pictures and candidates wear cool t-shirts, but they don’t say much about their actual beliefs. This lack of information is certainly annoying. But students can’t really expect each candidate for a legislative position to explain their views in detail. Every college in the university has several representatives in the student assembly, so the sheer volume of candidates makes specific discussion of issues impossible. Furthermore, this year’s primary elections showed that, sometimes, not even the most informative campaigns can get people’s attention. Probable Cause, an unorthodox party headed by law students Steve Rinehart and Annie Deprey, spelled out a highly specific agenda and placed a huge sign directly in front of the Union building describing it in detail. But the party still failed to clear the primaries. Speaking to The Daily Utah Chronicle after being eliminated, Rinehart said that his highly informative campaign might have even backfired, turning voters off with its “abrasive” style.

Another reason for student apathy, according to Paradise, is the total lack of difference between the candidates. Paradise referred to the upcoming Star Wars movie, titled “Attack of the Clones,” and suggested that this year’s ASUU contest is an “Election of the Clones.”

Take one look at the two remaining parties’ platforms and you’ll know what Paradise means. Impact and Elevation both talk about parking, tuition and student involvement, and both sound eerily like last year’s victorious No Bull party. But again, the limitations of student campaigning make this problem unavoidable. Even on large campuses such as the U’s, the number of issues and the possible approaches to them are limited. Parties that deviate from addressing normal, run-of-the-mill concerns (such as Probable Cause) come across looking extreme and unbelievable. Candidates therefore can’t avoid at least some degree of sameness.

The largest reason students don’t vote may simply be the belief that ASUU doesn’t do anything. ASUU looks nice and gives a lot of people a chance to beef up their rsums, but Paradise says it doesn’t have the power to make a difference on really big issues.

This argument may be somewhat true?U President Bernie Machen ultimately holds the keys to parking and tuition? but students have to realize that ASUU’s success depends more on students’ willingness to reflect their interests through voting. If everyone believes ASUU is nothing but a paper tiger, it will turn into just that. Also, ASUU holds the strings to a pretty fat purse, and that definitely translates into power.

Paradise argues that the campaigns really don’t matter. However, students can still help make ASUU successful by getting informed. A certain amount of silliness in this season may be unavoidable, but greater student involvement will bring a little seriousness, too.

John welcomes feedback at: [email protected] or send letters to the editor to: [email protected].