There is a thing I believe. The thing is very important. It is a very important thing to believe, and it is important that you believe it too. If you don't believe it yet, please read the rest of this column, and make the thing one of your beliefs. We have a tremendous opportunity at Columbia, diverse as it is, to come together as a community and believe my thing. This is why I write for Spec Opinion.

Having said that, I'm fairly certain that most of you reading this believe the thing already. If you saw this headline, decided to click on it, and made it to the second paragraph, chances are slim that you need to be persuaded to believe the content of the piece. That's great! I'm glad you're here. In fact, I wrote this almost entirely with you in mind. Now, if you find yourself in a debate with someone who doesn't believe the thing, you will know exactly what to say. Debate is a great way to cement your belief in the thing, but it can also be frustrating because the other side's rationale is always so devoid of substance.

All of the opponents of my thing constantly root their abhorrent opinions in hyperbole, generalization, othering, and being wrong about their thing. Trying to explain this to hostile critics is usually an exercise in futility, because they plainly fail to understand my argument. I know this to be true because people who understand my argument believe my thing. Others lack the perspective and experience that allow me to look at the thing objectively. For me, the thing is not really an "opinion"—it is a self-evident truth, wrapped in an argument of profound complexity.

"And what is that argument?" the non-thing believer may ask condescendingly. Frankly, that's not important, nor should it be in times like these. What is important is listening. And until these people are willing to listen, it is simply not worth the trouble of engaging them. I would not be surprised if they read my article and come away learning nothing.

To be clear, not everybody who doesn't precisely believe the thing is irredeemable. To say that would mean adopting the same reductive discourse of opponents of the thing. There are a substantial number of students at Columbia who, for example, believe a thing very close to my thing but not quite as good as my thing. In these cases I am optimistic that open-mindedness will triumph and they will come around to my thing. That way, Columbia's community can be thoroughly cohesive and united in perspective. That's a recipe for success.

If you believe the thing, please share this article on Facebook. It's very easy, and will convey to all your friends that you believe the thing. It is important to be friends with people who believe the thing, and it is extremely valuable to believe the thing together. Along with the link, you can even include a little message in your post to give it a personal touch.

Here are some suggestions for your personal touch: "YES." "THIS. ALL OF THIS." "SOMEBODY GETS IT."

Or perhaps, you can paste your favorite paragraph from my column into your post—with quotation marks of course. This is in case your friends don't feel like reading the whole article, but still want something a bit longer than the headline to agree with. It will also tell them that you read the whole article, and that you are the kind of person who reads the whole article.

Try using this paragraph:

We can no longer deny the global societal implications and emergent effects of the reflexive exclusivity that permeates our lives. Instead we should seek to be transformative conduits of reified culture and politics, of liberty and of colloquial interchange—in other words, to reconcile the subjective and the objective spheres as ends in themselves. In the face of so much opposition, we have literally no other choice.

No other choice than to believe my thing.

Ziyad Abdelfattah is a Columbia College senior majoring in political science and music. He is a former poet laureate of the CUMB. Ziyad's Cry for Attention runs alternate Fridays.

To respond to this column, or to submit an op-ed, contact opinion@columbiaspectator.com.