As they walk around campus, students new to Binghamton University are likely to overhear their more seasoned peers express one of two sentiments about our fair institution.

1. It’s cold.

2. People hate it here.

If transfer students haven’t lost it already, that “Ivy of the SUNYs” attitude will disappear by their first full week here. Coincidentally, that’s around the time it takes for non-DDR-obsessed freshmen to realize Late Night Binghamton is nothing more than an excuse for free cookies.

The antipathy BU students show for their future alma mater comes entirely without apology. In fact, one could go so far as to say that we actually love to hate BU. It’s our favorite sport, higher upon the list than procrastination and prescription drug abuse, and way ahead of men’s Division I basketball.

But be warned: there’s an infinitesimally fine line between legitimately hating on BU is more nuanced than it may first appear. If you like it here too much, you’re branded as idealistic and new. But if you complain without having been faced by a “legitimate” reason (huge classes, long lines at the registrar, disappearing liberal arts programs or overly paternal administrators) — and these come up quite often — you’re just a negative asshole. And nobody likes them.

Still, hyperbole is appreciated, and one great place to find it is urbandictionary.com, where users define terms as they see fit. User entries are ranked according to how many “thumbs up” they get. Predictably, at number one:

1. Binghamton

Imagine Hell, then make it cold

The geographic makeup of the school is also a source of much griping. For illustration, we can again refer to the urban dictionary:

7. binghamton

… Refer to Long Island but at -50 degrees

A large portion of campus hails from the illustrious Isla Larga, and the rest of the population harbors some resentment (they, of course, think it’s envy). Most of the rest come from the New York metro area, and there’s a lot of cross-debate between the two groups as to who’s more “gangsta,” Bayside or Sunnyside.

Which leads us to the racial cliques and stereotypes that pervade the campus mindset… yeah, we’re going to take the high road and just kind of gloss that one over.

So we guess there’s no escaping it: this place sucks more than Mr. Bucket, and it’s cold to boot.

But after spending enough alcohol-free nights on the couch next to your parents watching Everybody Loves Raymond repeats, frost bite doesn’t look as bad and you start realizing how underrated the quaint charm of the Rathskellar really is.

Frozen hell or not, before you realize it, it becomes home.