Daily Promises to Cover Kohlmeier, Martin By Any Means Necessary

Campus Newspaper May Stoop to Actual Journalism

ANN ARBOR, MI--In response to a new poll on reader response, the Michigan Daily has implemented a controversial policy that will maximize coverage of U-M volleyball player Mara Martin and cross country runner Alyson Kohlmeier, giving stories about the two women privilege over all other athletic reporting, campus reporting and even major international news. The groundbreaking decision was made by Daily sports editor, Ian Herbert, who said he chose to expand coverage on the two women because of their superior athletic performances and "because those chicks are super hot."

A recent campus poll indicates a strong correlation between readers of the Daily's sports section and a preference for needlessly large photographs of attractive women. "It turns out that 97% of our readership consists of heterosexual males, and lesbians," said Herbert. "Of course, that poll has a margin of error of 3%. In addition, we noticed that when we ran three pictures of Martin and one unnecessarily large file photo of Kohlmeier in one week, papers were flying off the racks. So I say, we need to give our readers what they want, logic and journalistic integrity be damned."

To that end, the Daily has now declared odd dates "Martin Days," while even dates are "Kohlmeier Days." Every issue will contain one fold-out photo of the represented athlete, as well as an accompanying story, possibly listing each girl's "likes" and "dislikes." Also, the bottom right-hand corner of every page will have a small drawing of the girls that slowly alters with each passing page, so that, when flipped through quickly, readers can watch Martin and Kohlmeier make creative use of a butternut squash.

"As soon as we have our fifteenth mass meeting of the month and get some more writers, we're going to create a special 'Kohlmeier and Martin' task force,'" added Herbert. "Sure, there are some who may call sneaking cameras in the locker rooms 'stalking,' but I call it 'investigative journalism.'"

However, there are some students who object to this type of news reporting. "Women are not objects!" said Laura Gibson, president of feminist campus group, The FWord. "Never mind that by issuing cliched responses to every perceived threat to my ideology, I actually turn my cause into a caricature of its true self, objectifying its proponents as a result."

"Which is wrong," she added, "because women are not objects!"

Other Daily readers have voiced concerns about the longterm consequences of the paper's new style. "Personally," said Engineering Dean Leonard Sullivan, "I don't have a problem with this policy. But I am worried about my little hamlet of North Campus. You give thousands of lonely, socially-inept EECS students free pictures of sweaty, attractive young ladies in tight spandex and, well, let's just say we won't need a full page ad for the Dean's List this semester."

Despite the objections of some, many students and faculty tout the paper's new policy as innovative. "I don't believe it objectifi es women to praise their athletic prowess," said athletic director Bill Martin. "The Daily is just catering to their target demographic. That's the same reason we market football and hockey so heavily instead of, what's that sport the girls are always playing? Oh yeah, non-revenue. Is that a sport? People are always talking about it, but I just fi gured it was one of those things I didn't get, like 'curling' or 'skeeting.'"

Martin and Kohlmeier were unavailable for comment, though they could easily remedy that by giving me their personal phone numbers.