Quite often, when we see people suffer on TV, the com- puter, or whatever device of mass desensitization we happen to be hooked into, we absorb it with a kind of glancing melancholy, from which we quickly recover. Misery is flung at us with the intensity of a crack head and is then metabolized at an equally blinding pace.

However, every once in a while, we encounter things that we find particularly striking in their egregiousness. It can range from something as ghastly as child starvation to a vicious kick to the groin. For myself, I was recently bent out of shape by a recent error made by UCLA, in which nearly 900 students were accidentally in- formed that they had been accepted when they actually were not. This mistake initially struck a chord with me because of the proximity of it; I have applied to colleges and hope to be accepted, and I have put a level of emo- tional attachment into hoping that I would eventually be admitted into a university. And, when I did receive an admittance letter, I was insanely happy, which makes the incident with UCLA a particularly painful scenario to picture. I am positive that every one of the high school students who received an accidental acceptance letter was probably also ecstatic.

When someone applies to a college, there should be some basic level of understanding that the issue of acceptance will be dealt with in a fairly cut-and-dry way. You will know, definitively, if you have been rejected or accepted, and you will adjust your life accord- ingly. It’s not unlike a driving test: The person giving you the test can’t order you to do something il– legal, then fail you on the grounds that you did something illegal, as it is deceitful and confusing. It’s an important part of people’s lives,and it is incredibly insulting to students to have to deal with the technical incompetence of the university.

Strong feelings surrounding the false acceptance letters were shared by other students, such as Skyline ASSC member Katelyn Smathers, who empathized with the jilted students.

“I feel that it is an unforgivable technical oversight,” Smathers said. “They probably got a lot of people’s hopes up then burned them down.” It’s infuriating that things like this happen, and it’s further maddening that there’s little that can be done other than illustrating solidarity, as tired and worn out as that seems.