I’m going to admit something now that I’ve kept hidden from the general public for far too long.  Are you ready for a bombshell? Here goes: I didn’t vote for President Barack Obama. In fact, the truth of the matter is, I didn’t vote, period. Take a minute to collect yourself, and I’ll see if I can explain.

You see, this past presidential election was a pickle for me because I honestly didn’t believe in either candidate, and I felt I would be cheating myself if I wasted a vote on the lesser of two evils. Thus, I decided to stay home that day and catch up on all the stuff I had backed up on the DVR (Highlander marathon). I tend to be someone who only takes action when I deem it necessary, and, for me, voting for Obama just to tell people that I voted for Obama didn’t seem necessary. In fact, it felt quite pretentious.

Now if you’re smart (and you surely are), you will have already realized why exactly I chose a Thursday in September to reveal this bit of information. Last week, a certain Leader of the Free World visited our campus and sent waves of giddy excitement up and down the collective spine of our student populace. Ever since I can’t escape the inevitable ice-breaker of every conversation I’ve had: “So uh, did you go to that Obama thing?”

For me, the problem with this is that the vast majority of the people who have asked me this went to the rally, and the vast majority of those people don’t actually care about politics at all. Most of these people would much rather have been at home watching America’s Next Top Trust Fund Baby on MTVH1, but instead they followed the crowds to Comcast Center. The rally for Obama seems to have been on par with a football game in that people went because they were supposed to, not because they cared.

Let’s face it. Though his status is dwindling, Obama is still more of a rock star-caliber celebrity than a politician in the eyes of our generation. I’m not so ignorant as to say that no one cares about his policies, as there is a demographic of young people who truly care about politics and believe in the president. But the group of people our age who claim to care just for public approval is much larger than anyone will admit.

Having the president visit our campus was cool, really, but don’t kid yourself into believing that the majority of the attendees were really invested in what was said, not just there to tell their friends and kids that they saw Obama up close. So to those of you who honestly went to the rally to be informed, I say kudos. 

And to those of you who went to have a good opener for picking up chicks, well, I say good luck.

Mike DiMarco is a senior English major. He can be reached at dimarco at umdbk dot com.