The side-eye. One subtle glance of disgust. A slight eyebrow raise if you’ve really offended someone. The thousands who have walked through the halls of UCSD have been trained to hone our “Triton eye.” Other universities memorize fight songs (without looking like a mass of deflated car dealership blow-up men) while we find our camaraderie by universally lowering our standards to our more academic-looking populace. That’s the nicest way I’ve ever put it, for the record. I personally reject this mentality. It is high time that we redirect our predilection for accepting a lousy hand into channeling our disgust towards something more productive. You can call me an optimist, but it won’t remove this red wine stain I’ve made on the carpet.

I have come to realize and accept my duty of spreading the gospel of the Triton Side-Eye. An angry, homosexual Mahatma Gandhi, if you will. Three years I have spent biting my tongue over the lunacy of this campus but no more. It’s 2013, and if I can’t use the passive-aggressiveness I keep to myself for the betterment of others, then I’m really just wasting my time. I am here to teach you how to be the “change” you wanted to see in your high school yearbook quote.

Considering how often I see plaid print shoes and pajamas-as-daywear, I see it fit to teach through the horrors I courageously face time and time again. Fear not, this is no fashion column; I will cut far deeper than that. The theories I have on our Greek system will scandalize you. My lamentations about computer science majors might literally just be a list of smells, stains and unfamiliar objects I have encountered in the CSE labs, but you’ll never be the same. I will be at my most relatable when I articulate the way we are routinely assaulted with shouts of “tasty Korean BBQ for $5” is a devastating violation of our basic human rights. Our campus is littered with organizations, clubs and literal law school prep courses advertised through goddamn memes. The situation is really, really dire.

This may all seem rather mean, and it is. I never said this was going to be easy. Hopping on this train might hurt a little at first, but just give it a few minutes like the best of us. You might feel better knowing that I am, in all likelihood, a sociopath who only knows true emotion when buying decorative pumpkins. I just get to call it “cultural critique” because I now have an official platform to disseminate my magnificently disturbing way of thinking. Even so, I am almost certain I have a point, and this rather subpar red wine won’t stop me from making it. We need more people like me — brave souls who can set right what has gone so wrong here. For us to be better, we must know exactly what is utterly offensive to the senses and when we ourselves are the culprits. UCSD wasn’t cast off as “socially dead” because the ship was full. It has been the lazy and uncultivated perception of our surroundings that has gotten us here, and now we’re just living the nightmare.

The craziest part of it all is that the hole we have dug ourselves into actually has real consequences. The Buzzfeed listicle you were looking at while receiving a world-class education might have obscured the view, but being smart isn’t enough to rough it out there anymore. Unless your ambitions lie in working in a desolate lab for the rest of your life, you actually have to carry yourself with some respectable presence nowadays. On that note, your “romantic” prospects are absolutely being affected by the fact that your most defining personality traits are a grease-stained keyboard and an “I hate myself” haircut. Like, hey girl, I hate myself all the same, but this tequila sunrise is an exceptionally better way to express that than a blunt, mid-length cut with no layers. And yes, I switched drinks because I’m crazypants. I do realize I promised this wouldn’t be about fashion, but imagery is just as important a literary device as my poorly veiled superiority.

But seriously, friend to friend (please don’t touch me), we’re in this together. “Together,” as in I have managed to intellectualize the offenses that UCSD has placed in front of me, and you are so lucky to hear my wisdom. Your prep work is simply to start using those eye muscles. I won’t rest until I have whipped you into shape.