It’s only natural that the first Gandhi statue in the state of Virginia was presented to a university that has the school motto “Be the Change.” Given to JMU by the Ambassador of India to the United States last week, the larger-than-life Gandhi statue can’t be missed, but will most likely go unappreciated in its location.

Standing at about the height of Yao Ming (that freakishly tall Chinese basketball player in all those commercials a few years back), the statue is anything but realistic. The cute Indian man that fought for India’s independence stood at a mere 5’3” (the statue is only off by a couple of feet, no biggie).

Placed in the new library on the side of campus dominated by science, math, and technology majors, the statue is probably not of significance to most that encounter it. In fact, probably 50% of those students don’t even know who Gandhi is. It’s okay though, because if you asked me about organic bonds all I could tell you about them is that it sounds like the word orgasm and giggle (teehee).

But why JMU didn’t put the statue on the side of campus with Justice Studies, History, Philosophy, Religion, Anthropology, Sociology, and other majors of the like—I have no idea.

JMU is also only the third college in the United States to have a statue of Gandhi (yeah, I thought it was random too). Kind of surprising when there are so many other super liberal schools (think about all those barefoot-walking, acid-tripping, organic-eating hippie schools that pride themselves on peace and love).

But, hey, according to JMU students, “The statue will bring something to JMU as a whole because it promotes Gandhi’s ideas of nonviolence and peace.” Yeah, and simply putting a peace sign poster in the middle of Baghdad is going to bring world peace!