The Daily Tar Heel
Printing news. Raising hell. Since 1893.
Thursday, March 28, 2024 Newsletters Latest print issue

We keep you informed.

Help us keep going. Donate Today.
The Daily Tar Heel

Junior Andrew Clark mocks student body presidential campaigns with fake site

Andrew Clark is running a fake campaign for student body president. 

Andrew Clark is running a fake campaign for student body president. 

Clark created a fake campaign website and Facebook page for a student body president campaign in collaboration with the comedy group The Scene is Dead. His platform, which is written completely in Latin dummy text, was posted on the campaign’s website along with profiles of his campaign team and a link to a fake petition.

Clark declined to comment at this time. He did not attend either of the interest meetings held by the UNC Board of Elections to give his intent to run or fill out the appropriate forms, and he is therefore technically not qualified to be on the ballot for student body president.

After watching the campaign video, first-year Ethan Baechtold said he thought the video almost shed light on some things concerning the student body president elections coming up.

“If any of that is indicative to what real campaigns are like, I think it’s good that someone is using satire to bring that up,” he said.

Candice Hsu, a sophomore psychology major, said this way of promoting social justice through satire is acceptable.

“I’m pretty sure people can decide between what is fake and real, so you just have to take it with a grain of salt and laugh it off,” Hsu said.

Clark’s campaign video highlights typical ideas and conventions that are associated with elections. He said in his campaign video his key ideas are blind ambition and empty promises and his campaign team is made up of first-year recipients of Morehead-Cain and Robertson scholarships.

“Carolina, let’s face it, you’ll be voting for a straight, white, male Morehead no matter what,” Clark said in his video.

Student body president campaigns began this week for the upcoming term and elections are being held on Feb. 14. Some students who have read through Clark’s campaign website and Facebook page believe his motive was to identify certain stereotypes that are attached to political campaigns.

Eva Ramirez, a first-year said she found the video funny and that she liked it.

“I think it’s purpose was to call attention to the stereotypical person that’s going to be the student body president and make us pay attention to who we are actually electing,” Ramirez said.

Other students find the fake campaign alarming.

Ben Vadala-Roth, a graduate student studying math, said he knew it was a joke and it couldn’t have been real.

“I would hope that someone is more serious than that and actually cares about the issues that (Clark) is pointing out,” Vadala-Roth said.

First-year Glamar Galeas said she thought the point of the campaign was to show students who they should or should not vote for.

university@dailytarheel.com

To get the day's news and headlines in your inbox each morning, sign up for our email newsletters.

Special Print Edition
The Daily Tar Heel's Collaborative Mental Health Edition