FOR by Chad Lyle 

Filming continued this week on the second annual Argyle High School lip dub. An idea borrowed from the playbook of typically larger high schools, the lip dub is designed to boost school spirit and present a unified student body to the community. Last year’s attempt was filmed as a continuous tracking shot through the hallways of the high school, featuring different sports, clubs, or extracurricular activities at every turn. This time, a more ambitious video is being constructed in which teams are filmed in their natural habitat, i.e. tennis at the tennis court, baseball on the baseball field, and band in the band hall. While the Lip Dub, for some, is a tedious activity taking place in the midst of a busy finals week, for others, it is an exciting opportunity to recognize teams and activities while making something students can look back on for years to come.

Considering that school spirit has been tapering off over the past couple of years, especially among seniors, it’d be in everyone’s best interest to give the Lip Dub a chance. Surely everyone has their own reservations about participating, but considering the video probably isn’t going to be broadcast on Good Morning America, why not just have fun with it? High school will be over quickly enough, and the nostalgia might come sooner than expected.

Those stridently opposed to the lip dub offer a few good points, the best of which being that the lip dub should probably shoot during a less hectic time in the school year. The weeks leading up to and during semester finals are obviously inconvenient. Additionally, those who want to be involved should sign up ahead of time, so that students who do most of the on-camera singing and dancing are as invested as possible. However, while there are a few quirks that need to be addressed, the Lib Dub could still prove to be fun and entertaining should everyone put aside their grievances and participate.

AGAINST by Christopher Piel

For the second straight year, the school will be doing a lip dub, a video that includes various organizations within the student body lip syncing to different songs. It can be inferred from this second attempt that the administration has decided to make the Lip Dub an annual event and keep the tradition going for years to come. However, this event should not become a tradition because it is a waste of time for the students.

Like last year, every organization in the school is expected to be represented in this video. That means that time must be taken out of nearly every individual’s day in order to film the Lip Dub, an enormous waste of time. Although Mega Lunch has given students more free time every day, it doesn’t mean that they want to spend any of it on the Lip Dub. All that the Lip Dub does is take time away from students to plan, film, and put together a video that they would prefer to not exist.

There is no reason for the Lip Dub; the basis of it is to create a video that can be posted on YouTube. If the students took the time wasted to make this video and put it towards almost anything else, it would contribute to their lives more than the Lip Dub. The Lip Dub is something the student body did not want to participate in the first time around, and they certainly do not want it to be an annual event. Last year’s video wasn’t exactly an internet sensation; since February, the video has received almost thirteen thousand views on Vimeo and less than 400 views on YouTube. While numerous high schools’ videos are reaching viewing numbers in the hundreds of thousands, Argyle’s video can’t find the same success. This year’s showing can not be wildly different from last year considering the venue, organizations present, and style will remain almost identical to the previous video. Many would and should take this a sign that failure is inevitable and the video will, once again, be a bust. The good news, however, is that the students have very low expectations for round two, and, therefore, it will be rather difficult to disappoint them.

The reality is that the students do not want this video to be produced. Yes, it is a way to get almost everyone involved in one project and united under the theme “We are Argyle,” but, as last year’s video proved, putting everyone’s efforts together does not directly correlate with success. The student body just does not care to see themselves in a video with all of their other peers now or in the future. The Lip Dub is a video that most would rather just not happen; it is unnecessary and unappealing.

The Lip Dub is not a tradition that the school needs to have for years to come. It is unwanted by the students and very unsuccessful in comparison to the other schools that have given these pointless internet sensations a try. It is a tremendous waste of time for all who are involved. The school should make the 2016-17 Lip Dub its final edition and end the annual dread for all the students.