A new ruling enacted earlier this month regarding board equivalency at the Laker was passed by … well, no one really knows whom. Apparently the dining hall can do whatever they want.

I’m a little biased because I already have a reason to be mad at the Dining Hall: They cooked metal into my food a few weeks back. But hey, speaking of metal, I still got that Bronze Anytime Meal Plan right? Wrong.

Board equivalency at the Laker Inn sounds like a good thing, and it partially is, for just about everyone who eats on campus except freshman, forced to have what’s known as a “Metal Plan,” which stipulates that we can eat whatever we want when we want it.

However, we don’t get board equivalency at the Laker, nor can we eat anytime we want.

To make up for man-hours that must be accounted for, hours have been cut at Egan so more employees can work at the Laker–that’s a lie.

They don’t have a shortage of manpower at the Laker. Just take a look sometime. If anything, they have an influx. Basically, we’re being scammed.

See, ever since fall break, Egan closes two hours earlier, along with another privilege taken away, the to-go boxes, now limited to just one daily. So if you’re in a hurry, better stuff your face.

As if that weren’t enough, you can’t get Starbucks as late as you usually do. You know, when you actually need it to stay up to write that paper that you haven’t started yet.

But I understand. It’s got to do with money, which is OK. That’s what I’d expect from a Catholic school–morals and ethics.

Unfortunately, what they’ve done isn’t entirely legal.

It’s kind of like this poster of Megan Fox I have hanging in my dorm. Ten dollars on the price tag. Ten dollars I paid. Now if the people I bought the poster from decided to come to my dorm and rip the bottom half of the poster off, which would be her legs–quite possibly the best part–I would be a bit perturbed, to say the least. I paid for the whole poster, and that’s what was advertised, so that’s what I expect to have.

I paid for an entire term of the Anytime Meal Plan that gave me as much food as I wanted to bring back to my dorm and was open until midnight. It would be different if they waited for the term to end, because then I would be paying next term’s bill with an understanding of new exceptions in the product I was purchasing. But it’s especially disheartening considering this “one-of-a-kind” meal plan was accentuated throughout the whole recruiting process to prospective students teetering their final decision to attend Mercyhurst College. They lied to both the parents, wanting to make sure their child is healthy, and the prospective students deciding what plan is most monetarily effective for their eating habits.

I think I’ll call for a Boston Tea Party rebellion if this doesn’t let up. Why should I pay more money for a few upperclassmen and this monopoly’s benefit? Unfortunately, all three upper-classes combined outnumber freshman, and they know that. But, they don’t know me.