Page 2/The Battalion/Friday, September 12,1986
Opinion
Juvenile eyes can't discern
Not so long ago,
alternated eve
nings, sitting on
the porches of my
grandmothers’
homes and listen
ing to their stories
about my elderly
relatives. It
seemed to me that
they really never
could have experi
enced youth. m
Surely, I thought,
Cathie
Anderson
ly, I thought, the complicated
web of lines in their faces and wisps of
gray in their hair always must have been
there. I tried to imagine them as chil
dren, as the mischief-makers who
seemed to fill the ranks of my acquaint
ance. But the only visions I could con
jure up were shrunken versions of their
bent and fragile frames.
I never thought of what it was like to
be old, to grow old or to feel old, at least
not in that way. Old to me at nine or 10
meant reaching the grand age of, per
haps, 30.
Now, however, having reached the
near-grand age of 22, my brain has
grasped what my juvenile eyes saw be
fore — the assorted bottles of potions
and pills put above my reach, the time it
took my senior mates to move about
while I skipped along ahead of them or
the tall glass of water, in which Granny’s
teeth floated nightly.
Why, only yesterday did it come to
me that sitting on those porches,
Momma Little and I or Granny and I
represented the two most vulnerable
stages in human life — childhood and
old age. At these times people are easy
targets of abuse, neglect or exploitation
and are least capable of walking away.
Unfortunately, abuse of the elderly
seems to take a back seat to child abuse.
Both are atrocious crimes, and the two
shouldn’t be ranked in order of impor
tance.
Seniors are adults, but they are as sus
ceptible as children, proven just this
week in Pleasant Grove where Albert
Peterek Sr., a 72-year-old man confined
to his bed, was left by his son without
food or water for five days.
Peterek’s 36-year-old son, Albert Jr.,
took $100 in grocery money and left
him Sept. 3. The elder Peterek was not
discovered until late Monday when
neighbors knocked on his bedroom win
dow and found him, begging for food.
Although Peterek is now in fair con
dition, officials said he was dehydrated
and had a number of infected sores on
his legs when he was admitted to the
hospital.
A felony warrant for injury to an el
derly person was issued Tuesday and a
$5,000 bond set for the younger Pete
rek, who remains at-large.
Peterek said his son had been fixing
his meals and paying bills.
He said he lived off a $6l7-a-month
Social Security check. His son had been
cashing the checks because Peterek
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FACToRS —-
R.EAC.T.
As I was walk
ing past Zachry
Engineering Cen
ter last evening, a
man with a brief-
Amit
Mukerjee
Guest Columnist
case shinnied down a rope and abruptly
landed beside me. He tugged the rope
twice and it disappeared into a second
floor window.
“Howdy,” I said. “Spelunking practi
ce?”
“Going home for the day,” he said.
Then sensing that something was not
quite right, he added, “Haven’t you
heard of Operation Sunset?”
That reminded me of my war days,
when we would crawl through jungles
smothered in leeches, waiting for the
enemy to shoot us. However, this guy
had a tattoo on his left hand, which
clearly means (to anyone with the slight
est tinge of grey in his brain) that he was
not the type to let any enemy shoot him.
He would shoot first. So I asked him if
Operation Sunset was the newest, hot
test cave climbing club, just in case I was
not with it.
He looked hurt, and explained to me
that he was the leader of an under
ground movement in Zachry with the
object of getting out of closed buildings.
It was called Rapid Evacuation After
Closing Time (R.E. A.C.T.). Their motto
was “always equipped.” You may be cer
tain that I did not question him further
about the nature of his equipment. We
quickly parted company, with me
looking back to see if he opened his
briefcase.
I tried the doors of Zachry. Indeed,
all the doors were locked, except the
one by the fountain. There I found, res
plendent in uniform, another man who
looked like the type who doesn’t let ene
mies shoot him. He was busy trying to
control a long line of people who were
signing a sheet of paper.
Now, I have this problem that when
ever I see long lines I see visions of free
trips to Florida. This is perhaps because
when I was four years old, my distant
uncle won third prize in a contest for
which the first prize was a vacation in
Florida. In fact, last week during regis
tration, I kept asking everybody inside
the Pavilion about Florida, but no one
really seemed to know.
In any case, I joined the end of the
line and imagined myself under palm
trees on the beach. Before I could make
any progress toward the bikini-clad
beauty lounging near the concession
stand, a group of youths in camouflage
dress emerged from the dark caverns of
Zachry and shattered my trip. Emitting
bloodcurdling Oriental noises, they
pushed us aside and charged through
the doors. The uniformed honcho took
off in hot pursuit, leaving us leaderless,
like passengers in Pan Am jets. Without
the beloved shepherd our line withered
away and everyone went home disap
pointed about Florida.
This morning near Zachry I again-
bumped into the man from R.E.A.C.T.
“Hello,” he said. “I heard you wit
nessed our double-pincer attack yester
day. If you want to join us, be at the
Xisper Downs when eight bells toll.”
If I was shocked sockless at the depth
and penetration of his counteroffensive
operations, I knew better than to say so.
I was mumbling about other pressing
engagements that would keep me inter
minably occupied at precisely eight
bells, when I noticed that he had disap
peared. He was crawling up the wall like
a roach.
“I thought you specialized in coming
out of buildings?” I shouted.
“Remember, this is Operation Day
break,” he said while pulling himself in
through a skylight.
Spelunking habits die hard.
Amit Mukerjee is an assistant profes
sor of computer science.
EDITOR’S NOTE: All Zachry doors ex
cept the one near the fountain will re
main closed from 5 p.m. to 7:30 a.m. ev
ery day until a set of locks for which a
key has been lost can be replaced.
Mail Call
Obligated to respond
EDITOR:
I feel somewhat obliged to respond to Marco Roberts’
column printed in The Battalion Sept. 10.1 must say that I
was somewhat flattered by him dedicating his entire
column to me, however he raised too many issues to deal
with in one sitting.
I would like to address one issue. That is the reason I
mentioned the name of the student who died of AIDS last
spring. It was not my intention in any way to cause the
family of the student any embarrassment, but rather to
make a point. That is that the casualties of the immoral
lifestyle that Roberts so jealously defends are real people
with real names and not just statistics written down at the
health center. His case is just one. I am sure there will be
more.
What Roberts does not know is that the
aforementioned individual and I went to high school
together. We graduated in the same class and came to
Texas A&M together. I knew him well.
When I heard of his death, I was very grieved. As I
thought of many memories of him, one thing stood Out in
my mind — that his life was characterized by a general
unhappiness which caused him constantly to try new fads
and new lifestyles for fulfillment.
This trend led him into homosexuality. My brother
visited him in the hospital shortly before his death and told
me that even then, he had not found happiness. So much
for the gay lifestyle.
His death was a very personal loss to me, and if I
caused the family any embarrassment, I would apologize
for that. I would also apologize, though, for Roberts,
because after all, it was not my philosophy of life that killed
this individual, it was his.
Mike Foarde
Letters to the editor should not exceed 300 words in length. The editorial
staff reserves the right to edit letters for style and length, but will make
every effort to maintain the author’s intent. Each letter must be signed
and must include the address and telephone number of the writer.
couldn’t leave the house without assis
tance and couldn’t write his name be
cause of partial paralysis from strokes.
Peterek said he did not expect to see
his son again but said he didn’t know if
he wanted the police to arrest him.
According to a report issued by Texas
Attorney General Jim Mattox, “the U.S.
House Select Subcommittee on Aging
found that more than 1.1 million Amer
icans over the age of 65 are victims of
abuse every year and the Texas Depart
ment of Health estimates a minimum of
110,000 older Texans are abused an
nually.”
Abusers come into frequent contact
with the elderly and are in a position to
exert physical, psychological or financial
control. Adult children are not the only
candidates for such abuse. Attendants at
nursing homes and other types of care
takers also may abuse the elderly.
Four out of five cases of elder abuse
are not reported. This means there are
over 500,000 cases of elder abuse yearly.
According to the report, the fastest-
growing segment of the population is
age 85 or older, thus the number of
people at risk is increasing steadily.
The report says that types of abuse
could include any of the following:
• Verbal-emotional. This is the most
difficult to document and can be
or blatant. It consists of insults,
or other humiliating acts.
• Exploitation. An elderly perv.
resources are used for personal
tary gain.
• Active neglect. This consists
withholding food, medicine or tiw
‘Active neglect, in short, means
ByS<
Sen
ormer Se<
Haig
ty on T
country out o
Active neglect, in snort, means li
to provide the basics necessary tosieR * ate ,, s ’
hr.ilth, litr .\lul
• Physical abuse. An elderly [r|L. American
is burned, bruised or hurt in ancj , r ,
way. ■T5c^ 1 ,;
• . . ... , as the specia
Sexual abuse. Indicatorsarei jj e |, j oe Ba
to the genital area or fear of being dinner at t
with a caretaker. H>ut 250 of
requires anyont the campaign
™ ittend lx
law . . ., .... r -
knows of elder abuse to report thetf 101 al ; temi
lem to the Texas Department of Hj|| nn ^' on
Services, and anyone who does sosm
mune from civil or criminal ItabikHnaig desc
long as they acted in good faitfii emrr glng yoi
without malice. of Represent;
Many lessons can be learned frcitofi has a ton
story of Albert Peterek Sr. One is jhis race agaii
Suc h problems will not disappear •| rei1
out funding for programs to ht:|.[ , ai ^ ta '
mors or an understanding of the uo,, in 7 wh ich
nerabihty. Kj-ty does p
After all, you can’t discern abtjcrm of a se
the elderly through juvenile eyes. He described
‘Other shoe’ drops
on Safeway workers with
At the bottom
of the New York
Times (Aug. 19,
page D4), was a
three-paragraph
item that tells you
more about the va
lues of our times
than most of the
stuff printed on
page one. It said
that Safeway had
laid off one-quar
ter of its headquarters staff.
1 TEMPLE
treatment. After all, here weredold woman
numbing numbers — billions and had recently
lions. Wall Street circled Safewavm^n was cha
vultures over a lame animal. Thed P^ na PP\ n 8 a
a hospital, po
Richard
Cohen
boys (and girls) of the 1980s, them
ment bankers, did their thing. It hi
seemed to matter that they were
stroying, not building; eliminating)
not creating them; stripping a comf
not expanding one — practicing!? i
verse capitalism in which notta
made but money for a fortunatefev
For 300
people, the other shoe had dropped.
The first shoe hit with a celebrated
thud — a sure 10 on the Richter scale
for greed. Safeway, the nation’s largest
supermarket chain, announced it was
taking itself private — cannibalizing it
self for the profit of its officers, share
holders, bankers, lawyers, lenders. Even
the printers got $3 million for prepar
ing various documents by which the rich
get richer. Take a look:
The investment banking firm that
bought Safeway got $60 million in fees
and an annual consulting fee of at least
$500,000 for 10 years. The banks that
arranged the financing got $48 million
in fees. (Interest on the loans is extra.)
The banking house of Morgan Stanley
& Co. will get $10 million for managing
the takeover while, in a refutation of the
Vince Lombardi maxim that winning is
the only thing, the manager of the los
ing bid, Drexel Burnham Lambert, will
get at least $ 15 million.
Lawyers and accountants will receive
$10 million and even the Haft family of
Washington (Dart Drugs, Crown
Books), which lost its attempt to take
over the company, walked away with a
cool $80 million in profit. We should
not forget the stockholders, who also
made a killing when the Hafts bid up
Safeway stock. Everyone made out like
bandits — everyone, that is, but Safeway
employees. What did they get? Well,
right off, 300 of them got the gate.
Almost certainly, more Safeway
workers will be fired and, almost cer
tainly, Safeway will have to sell off some
of its divisions. The reason for that is
that the company is being “restructu
red,” which is Wall Street lingo for
looted. Someone has to pay all those
fees, repay the loans and service the
debt. The company put its assets into
hock.
Back to the New York Times. When
the Hafts announced in July they were
gunning for Safeway, the story made
the front page of the business section.
Other newspapers accorded it similar
It’s somewhat unfair to pickoo
Times which is, after all, one of
conscientious newspapers i
J The baby
eight hours
Wednesday,
parents unha
he disappear!
Valerie El
raigned
on
and remaine
more
alas, when it comes to the glorifo
of takeover specialists, the thrwp
agraph item was typical. Onlyrareij
layoffs accorded the same treatmer
the deals that precede them. Andt*
more rarely is someone quoted
questions the morality of the ricli
ping off a company at the expend
the people who work for it. Even .Vi
Smith might say, “For shame."
It would be one thing if Safewaj
down on its luck and employees liicl
be fired. And it would be another J
if Safeway tried to produce someiE
new, develop a new product, aid
failed. But that is not what happen
Instead, a company built partlyoa![
energy and toil of its workers mu
around and devoured itself, reward |
everyone but the workers who m
build it.
When I complain about the lootiw
Safeway, I am told by those whose
ness is business that this is the *
things work — as if takeovers fi
natural law of some kind, someid
God intended. I am told we enjo
benefits of capitalism, which is
enough, and that such takeovers
duce a wonderful efficiency, whid
sometimes also true enough. ButwM
so efficient about throwing people*
into the street?
An economic system is man#
not divinely given; and what man^
make, he can improve. As it is now,W.
the press and the government extoW
porate wreckers — cheer a svi'
where something good for everyom
looted for the benefit of a few;!
where favored employees (corporaifj
ficers) make a fortune at the expeosi
others.
At Safeway, 300 people are
work and more will follow. Unlike J*
Americans, Safeway workers^' 1
about the other shoe. It dropped
them.
Copyright 1986, Washington Post Writtrs^j
The Battalion
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Southwest Journalism Conference
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Cathie Anderson, Editor
Kirsten Dietz, Managing Editor
Loren Steffy, Opinion Page Editor
Frank Smith, City Editor
Sue Krenek, News Editor
Ken Sury, Sports Editor
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