I must say I strongly disagree with Scott Brooks’ Thursday column (‘Fall: the season of cold temperatures and pointless student activism,’ Oct. 17, pg. 15).

Apathy is a contagion that has infected Boston University’s campus and cannot be ignored. Nowadays, too many students are unaware of their political and social surroundings. I understand that we need to be adolescents and we need to enjoy our youth. But at the same time, we are growing up in a world that is changing drastically before our eyes and we cannot sit and watch it pass us by.

I remember the moment I first heard about the war on terrorism when I was in high school. My peers were running around moaning and groaning about their transcripts and SAT scores, and all I could think about was how I never wanted to be a part of a war generation.

Of course college applications were important to me. I just couldn’t understand how many friends simply did not care about the destruction of a country and its people in which our nation was involved. Our men were being sent there to kill other people who may not have been part of the terrorist attacks that shook our nation. I hoped and prayed that college would be different that perhaps being educated in the city where the birth of the Union rose from a group of people who would not tolerate misrepresentation of their ideas would expose me to more politically active people. In lieu of that, all I see are college students who complain about government decisions but don’t even bother to vote.

I believe it was BU’s own Howard Zinn who said you can’t be neutral on a moving train. We are part of a generation that has closed its eyes on a world that has escaped us: a president we never wanted, a war in which we don’t want to take part and a world that believes that the only way to achieve peace and democracy is to fight. This will be the world we will grow up in and we must have a say in it.

I don’t know if the general consensus is that we, as youth, will not be taken seriously or we are too insecure about the influence of our voice, but apathy is not the solution. I do agree with Mr. Brooks that we should also occupy ourselves with subject matters that apply directly to us (such as the guest policy), and that these demonstrations should be more organized and then perhaps they would be more powerful. But to encourage the student body not to care about the big picture at all is awful. We are not only responsible for ourselves, but for humanity. There is a bigger civilization to which we belong and we have to recognize that.

People constantly ask me, ‘Why do you bother to protest?’ My response is, ‘Why don’t you?’ Ignoring the injustices in this world will not make them go away and the more often we do it, the more numb we become. I look at our generation and it amazes me to think that thirty years ago, that same generation stopped a war. Look at us now.