June 28, 2004

I heard about the Wisconsin quarter from my friend Jason. You can read his thoughts on it here and also read the Milwauke Journal article. I`m not sure why, but the design really bothers me, enough for me to write to Doyle. Granted I only sent an email, but still, it makes me feel better knowing that my wrath will get read and perhaps make some small bit of difference... somewhere...maybe. So, here is my little email to Governor Doyle.

I am outraged at the design for the Wisconsin Quarter and how the design was decided upon. The Milwaukee Journal reported that 347,662 online votes were used to determine the winning design. May I remind the Governor that anyone in the world can participate in an online vote. As such, the vote was hardly representative of the Wisconsin people, whom you claim to represent. Also, 347,662 votes is approximately an 8.8% voter turnout when compared to the 3,930,000 registered voters in 2000. This further emphasizes that the online vote, which did not represent the Wisconsin people by nature, did not represent the Wisconsin people when compared to the number of registered voters.

The "cow, cheese, and corn" design does not represent the Wisconsin motto of "Forward," nor does the design portray the state as educated, culturally diverse, or respectful of its history and heritage. Rather, the current quarter design furthers already held stereotypes and bias towards the State of Wisconsin as the home of "cheese heads."

I hope I don`t sound too stupid, but I think the anger gets across. "Outraged," hehe.

Aside from the quarter thing giving me something to blog about, I haven't been up to a whole lot lately. I have a lot of homework that I need to be doing, and I still need to nail down a job, and there is graduation in August. It all feels kind of strange at the moment, like I'm spinning on a merry-go-round looking at all the things that I need to do, but I'm cannot decide where to jump off at. I'm sure that I figure it out though.