When people first hear about the University willingly accepting money from the National Security Agency, terms like “sellout” and “Big Brother campus” make their way into the conversation. But I don’t think an Orwellian university is the big threat here.

For those who haven’t heard: The National Security Agency will pay N.C. State $60.75 million to build a new analytics lab on Centennial Campus. 

Yes, this is the same NSA we discovered in June to be reading our emails and listening in on our phone calls through a surveillance program called PRISM.

But if you take a drive down Dan Allen or Hillsborough and look around, you’ll see something far more terrifying than Airstrip One. There are more hipsters walking around than any other student “try-hard” subculture. (Yes, even more numerous than the “well-dressed” fraternity guys in oversized pants.)

Everyone hates hipsters. Even hipsters hate hipsters. In fact, talking about hating them is as unfruitful as trying to define exactly what a hipster is. But, alas, in the wake of recent events, the topic cannot be avoided.

It’s no wonder the thick-rimmed-glasses-wearing, thigh-gap-wanting, Lana Del Rey-listening kids are so drawn to N.C. State. The campus is constantly under renovation, which screams innovation and progressivism. And as everybody knows, all hipsters love involving themselves in anything mildly progressive.

And the one thing that screams “HEY, LOOK HOW PROGRESSIVE WE ARE!” more than the annual digging up of the few square feet of grass we have is signing a contract with the NSA.

Just look at the PRISM logo. It’s the visual representation of someone pretending to know who Pink Floyd is.

After whistleblower Edward Snowden ruined the NSA’s credibility, the security agency is bound to make changes in some sort of comeback effort. President Obama has already called for a review of the surveillance program as a direct result of the country’s antipathetic reaction to Snowden’s leaks. 

The NSA’s first step is easy. Find a quickly growing research college and latch on. The Triangle, having made even the Forbes list for its rapid growth, seems like an obvious choice.

So why not latch onto Duke? The NSA, in its attempt to foster progressivism, chose State because we are in the capital city of the most embarrassingly red state in the nation. They want to help separate us from our association with the General Assembly and instead associate ourselves with The New NSA, which all Democrats are sure to support now that Obama has stuck his hand in the mix.

N.C. State welcomes the NSA for a few reasons. Chancellor Woodson said the analytics lab would be a job creator. Sure, this “do anything to create jobs” attitude might seem like an echo of Gov. McCrory’s sentiments, but Woodson (like the NSA) clearly wants nothing to do with McCrory and the Assembly’s nonsense religiouslature.

Whereas McCrory refuses to subsidize anything that does not get “butts in seats” — those seats being jobs — Woodson understands the importance of subsidizing the renovation of campus hot spots like Talley Student Center, and the Court of the Carolinas, and the Field House, and Harris Field, and Centennial Campus, and … even if we won’t be around to see the fruit of these labors.

Chancellor Woodson knows what progressivism is all about, and he recognizes that the NSA does, too. All we students can do is embrace it, even if it means dealing with coffee-breathed, greasy haired hipsters.

If we never see the NSA make a remarkable comeback, which would in turn earn the entire country’s trust, the general population will just go on hating the agency, while the try-hard contrarians will insist on its integrity for the sake of being hip.