Resulting from the new student seating policy (which I am personally a big fan of), the general sentiment of disdain towards the "drunk sorority girl," who seems to personify every student not in his or her seat by 11:59 AM has come more into light. So for that, I'll take their side.
First off, I'm a student who gets to every game early and is generally "that guy" at 11:20 trying to round the troops away from "just one more game" of flip cup. Nevertheless, these people should not be shat on for the following reasons:
1) Global reach: Everyone on here likes to talk about how sweet of a university this is and how we're so academically superior to OSU and Sparty. While sort of arrogant, everyone is dead on. UM is way better. We get far more students from all over the country / world, and this has become even moreso in recent years. For multiple reasons, Michigan has far far more out of state / country people that didn't grow up in Grand Rapids with Ford / Schembechler posters over their beds, relative to the previous eras of Michigan football that so many on here reminisce about. For the university and our diplomas / egos, this isn't exactly a bad thing.
Conclusion: More national / international university with flourishing world class grad programs = less kids that care as much as the rest of us. Just be grateful that most of them still go, we still have 20k students at most games, and don't whine that we only have 109k instead of 112k at kick off. It could be worse. SEE: Wisconsin day games.
2) Richrod / Late Carr (??) Effect: Let's face it, 2007-2012 has been a relatively dark era for Michigan football. My first games were in 2010, and something about having the only entertaining games being shootouts against Illinois and UMass doesnt breed the immense school pride that will pull people away from that last game of flip cup to see them touch the banner. Couple that with the more geographically diverse student body, and you have less people showing up for noon kickoffs, especially against Directional Michigan and Purdue.
Conclusion: Non-elite teams and unexciting games, coupled with #1 = less kids that care as much as the rest of us. Again, just be grateful that most of them still go, we still have 20k students at most games, and don't whine that we only have 109k instead of 112k at kick off.
