Drunk Students and Rich Drunk Alumni: Good. Drunk Students: Bad.

Is it that time of year already, when Princeton Review releases its party school rankings and The Old Main Propaganda Shop  goes full metal hypocrite  while trying to downplay Penn State's high ranking? Why yes....yes by golly, it is.

Before we take a look at how The Propaganda Shop tied itself in ethical knots this year, let's review last years performance when Penn State came in third on the list.  Penn State Bullshit Artist Geoff Rushton  told the Collegain that

...the rankings are unscientific and frivolous because they are done through an online
survey.

Students who are looking to attend Penn State should think about more serious aspects of the university, rather than a "silly marketing ploy, which is what the Princeton Review party rankings are," Rushton
said.

But as Geoff was uttering those words, Old Main was pimping on its Web site two Princeton Review rankings of Penn State that it liked. After Geoff read my blog post on this, those rankings were purged from the Web site.

Geoff showed world class hypocrisy last year. Could The Propaganda Shop top itself this year? With Penn State topping the party school list for the first time this year, The  Old Main Propaganda would be under pressure to outdo itself too. And they didn't disappoint.

This year it was Penn State Bullshit Artist Annemarie Mountz's turn.

[She] said the survey results are not representative. "There are about 10 sites I found on Facebook urging students to vote and make Penn State the No. 1 party school, which shows that these rankings are nothing more than a popularity contest. It's become a badge of honor among students to get their school as No. 1 in these categories. The results are not connected to reality."

According to Mounz using the internet to rustle  up votes for a party ranking is bad and the resulting rankings are meaningless.

Let's go to the film....

It was the fall of 2005 and Sportsillustrated.com was running a tournament to rank football  tailgating parties and The Old Main Propaganda Shop turned to its Propaganda Portal, i.e. they used the internet, to encourage the Nittany Nation to vote for Dear Old State.

Nittany Lion football fans know all the great traditions of tailgating at Beaver Stadium for Penn State football games. Now is their chance to make sure that tailgating scene is recognized as the best in the nation. SportsIllustrated.com and self-described "commissioner of tailgating" Joe Cahn have seeded Penn State among the eight best tailgates in college football, giving fans the chance to vote in weekly head-to-head match-ups online to determine what stadium has the best tailgate. In a first-round match-up with the University of Texas, Penn State trailed by more than 3,000 votes Wednesday morning -- so it's up to Nittany Lion fans and tailgaters to make up that difference.
To cast your vote for Penn State, go to http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/magazine/specials/tailgate/2005/footballgrid/ and scroll down to the pairings for "College Football Venues."

Each week that fall as Penn State advanced from round to round, The Propaganda Shop turned to the Propaganda Portal to urge on the faithful to vote.

And it worked. Penn State was ranked the number one party tailgating venue in the nation by Sportsillustrated.com and the folks in The Propaganda Shop rejoiced at this long overdue acknowledgment.

Penn State fans have known it for decades and now the nation knows again that Beaver Stadium and Happy Valley is the premier tailgating venue of any college or professional football team in the nation.

So let's review once more. Old Main successfully uses the internet to get Penn State ranked the number one tailgate party school:good. Students sucessfully use the internet to get Penn State ranked the number one party school:bad.

Technorati Tags: Penn State, Party School, hypocrisy, Princeton Review

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