Thanksgiving is rapidly approaching, which means it’s time to give thanks to those important people in our lives, no matter how much right or wrong they’ve done. Let’s begin:

Thank you, Emporia State, for being a caring group of faculty and staff. Students are privileged to have such a professional, yet compassionate group of people to help them through their college careers. Thank you for being there for students when they need you most.

Thank you, ESU students, for making for making your voice heard and making ESU an accepting campus. From PRIDE to JA Sakura, students have made ESU a model campus for other universities to follow in our footsteps. Thank you, ESU students, for being a shining example of what acceptance should look like.

Thank you, Emporia, for attending to students’ needs. Your discounts and acceptance for the student populace allow for ESU students to feel comfortable while in town, making Emporia a home away from home. Thank you for your generosity towards the student body.

We give thanks for all these good deeds and more. Now, let us thank those who have done us wrong. 

After all, ‘tis the season.

Thank you, ESU, for confusing and teasing students with free parking. Your plans for the new front view of ESU may have had good intentions, but students don’t seem to be too excited about the idea. Thank you for trying, but please try to appeal to the needs of current students better.

Thank you, Gov. Sam Brownback, for allowing your state to free fall into a massive deficit. Under your watch, Kansas is now $30 billion in debt. It’s as if you watched taxpayer money being thrown into a furnace while you twisted and twirled your hands together menacingly in your homegrown, farm town lair with your blind followers behind you.

Education has seen numerous budget cutbacks to its funding, forcing universities to discontinue programs and let go some of their staff members. Thank you, Brownback, for your clear, undying support for educators and the education system. Now Kansas doesn’t need to worry about its educational system because soon it may not exist.

Finally, thank you, ESU, for your excellent food service that forces students to go on that diet they’ve always said they wanted to do. Who knew hunger and unhealthy food choices were such a great way to get students to lose or gain that weight like they’ve always wanted?

In this season of giving thanks, thanks should be given to those that deserve it. Whether you have been a gleaming, perfect human being or a wicked crustacean that deserves to be poked in the eye 1,200 times a day, you deserve to be thanked.

Thanks for being you.