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Opinion
mday, November 18, 1991
The Battalion
Page?
end junk mail
back to Barton
Condensed version of column topics '91
I n deference to my many fans
who have come up to me on the
street, in class, at work or in vari
ous "nightspots" about town and given
me suggestions for columns, I have
compiled this list of some of the more
impressive column suggestions. Look
for your own!
• There needs to be a bet
ter method of allocating and
distributing financial aid
money. Some students wait
well into the semester for the
financial aid checks to arrive,
and it just won't do. Students
need their check before the
semester actually begins
because that's when the biggest
financial drain takes place.
| If it takes so long to process
the applications for financial
aid, the deadlines for the appli
cations should begin earlier so
that the processing can begin
earlier. Students won't be bit
ing their nails over money, and
those processing the applica
tions and distributing the checks won't
be so harried in their efforts to get the
money out.
• Don't run at night in camou
flage. There are several groups in the
Corps who tend to do this, and some
individuals. And it's just not a good
idea. You see, camouflage, by its very
definition, makes one quite difficult to
see. And when you're wearing camou
flage while running at night, especially
if you're running in the street, you are
much more likely to be hit by a car than
fyou are if you are wearing, say, a white
H’-shirt or sweatshirt.
Granted, there are always members
of these running Corps groups who are
wearing white or reflective belts and
looking out for the others; but still,
there is an occasional -straggler.
It's not that big a deal to wear a little
white. If it keeps one guy from being
run over, it's worth it, don'cha think?
• Start pointing the sprinklers at
the vegetation, not the sidewalks. If
there is not enough money to hire a
technician for this task, perhaps there is
a horticulture student or two out there
who could handle it and would be will
ing to do it just because they're good
Ags. After all, the "A" in "A&M" does
stand for "agriculture."
• Too many lights are turned off
during Silver Taps. I've mentioned
y.this before because I've always thought
it was a safety hazard, but the guy who
told me to write about it again was mad
Hobbs is a senior
journaiism
major.
because he was on the way to the
library to study when suddenly all the
lights went out around him, and he ran
his bike into a lamp post and hurt him
self.
If you can't see a lamp post right in
front of you, how are you going to be
able to see somebody creeping up on
you? It's a veritable breeding
ground for crime. And, like
this guy said, we don't want
Silver Taps to become a self-
perpetuating tradition.
• Automobile drivers
should be heavily penalized
for not recognizing bicycles as
vehicles and yielding to them
at the appropriate times. We
complain a lot about how
inconsiderate bikers are; but,
when you're behind the wheel
of a big 4-door Chevy, it's easy
to occasionally forget that bik
ers have the same right to the
road that you do.
As long as we automobile
drivers do not consistently
treat bicycles as legitimate vehicles,
cyclists are going to be more likely to
push the rules of the road to their lim
its, so that they, too, can use the streets
efficiently.
So make sure to let bikers have the
right of way when it belongs to them,
watch them for signals and stops, and
when you pass them, pass courteously.
• Hey, Joe Barton, quit sending us
all that crap in the mail! Though most
students on this campus claim to be
Republicans, a quick trip to the post
office on a day that Congressman
Barton has sent out a mailing shows
that most folks don't read his pam
phlets, they trash them.
But, as taxpayers, we pay postage
for every one of those damned things
h£ sends out —jit's called "franking
privileges" — whether we voted for
him or not. So, it we don't want to read
them, we ought to let him know, for the
good of the economy, that we don't
want them.
I suggest jotting "return to sender" on
the pamphlet and dropping it back in
the mailbox. Maybe he'll get the idea.
• The Miss Texas A&M
Scholarship Pageant is a pageant that
exploits women by judging them
according to their appearance, not just
by academic performance, talent and
personality. Catch a clue, gang: If it
was just about brains, the contestants
wouldn't wrap up their butts with duct
tape.
PC has far-reaching consequences
Uninvolved people suffer
I am writing this letter in response to the Reagan
Clamon’s column entitled "PC changes harm no
one" that appeared last Tuesday.
In it, Clamon quite thoroughly demonstrated his com
plete lack of understanding of the controversy surround
ing "political correctness" and the motivation of the
College Republicans in trying to bring it to the attention
of the student body.
But not only did the author miss the boat on
political correctness, he then went on to attribute
to College Republicans views that we do not sup
port, and attacked us for those views that he
made up himself.
The article first mistakenly characterizes
"political correctness" as the process of changing
certain names or labels, such as black to African-
American or Indian to Native-American, and
showing "sensitivity to minorities ... in public
policy."
It is then concluded that groups like College
Republicans are being quite silly in getting worked up
over such things, and that the whole PC thing is just an
election ploy.
“But when a man like Stanford professor
Robert Rabin, chairman of the Student Conduct
Legislative Council, argues publicly that free
speech rights extend only to victimized minori
ties, since the white majority does not need
such protections, I get a little worried.”
My, how insightful... NOT.
In actuality, "political correctness" has little if any
thing to do with anything referred to in Clamon's article
about PC.
Instead, PC refers to the efforts of left-wing ideologies
to silence conservative dissent on a wide range of issues,
and more importantly, the wholesale politicalization of
large parts of the curriculum at many U.S. universities.
Some examples should serve to illustrate my point.
At schools like Vassar, Brown, Berkeley, and
Dartmouth, university administrators have tried to cen
sor or suppress student journalists with surprising fre
quency.
At University of California at Los Angeles, there was
comic strip in the student paper about a rooster who was
enrolled at the school.
The strip eventually ran afoul of the campus sensitivi
ty police when, one day, the rooster was asked how he
got into the school, he replied "affirmative action." After
much uproar, the student editor who allowed the cartoon
to run was suspended.
When the editor of the paper at UC Northridge heard
about this, he decried the suspension as a violation of free
speech and ran the cartoon in his own paper in protest.
He, of course, met with the same fate and also was sus
pended.
At root, however, these conflicts are ideological, not
racial. Just ask Les Grant, a politically conservative, black
student at Dartmouth.
After he refused to support divestment of college
funds from South Africa at a Dartmouth sensitivity pro
gram, he was hung in effigy in the main administration
building for his insensitivity to minority concerns. Tell
him that PC doesn't harm anyone.
Stephan Beck is
a senior
electrical
engineering
major.
At Dartmouth, the administration seems to have made
a second vocation out of harassing the conservative
Dartmouth Review.
Telephone operators for the college denied any
knowledge of the paper's existence when people tried to
contact the Review.
Once, when the widow of a wealthy alumnus sent a
check for $10,000 to the paper, the College inter
cepted it and refused to release the money until
the furious donor threatened to cut the college
out of her will. Additionally, alumni who con
tributed to the paper were pressured to drop
their support by the school. (The antics of the
faculty and administrators at Dartmouth could
fill a book, and they do. (See The Hollow Men by
Charles Sykes.)
A freshman, Catholic student at Georgetown
University was punished for refusing to attend a
mandatory AIDS awareness presentation (where the par
ticipants could enjoy enlightening films and condom
demonstrations with cucumbers and other fruit) because
it was inconsistent with his religious beliefs. He was
given a three-hour work sanction tor his failure to attend.
As a final example we can look to one of the most
respected universities in the country.
At Yale, a student had a sexual harassment complaint
filed against him by a woman from the Gay-Straight
Lesbian Coalition for posting the announcement of a
debate on the resolution "Resolved: CIA Discrimination
against Homosexuals is Justified." The administration
sided with the woman and told him to remove the poster.
Then, when another student protested the university's
stance as a "ludicrous violation" of free speech by posting
the ad himself, the harassment charges were transferred
to him, and he was denied the right to participate in grad
uation ceremonies for posting the notice of a debate.
Administrators warned him that he might not even
receive his degree if he didn't apologize.
That is what is at the heart of the PC controversy, not
whether we say man-hole or person-hole or black or
African-American or any other such silliness that was
presented in Clamon’s column.
The university is supposed to be a place where spirit
ed debate on any topic can occur in an environment of
academic freedom.
But on some campuses, the inability of those currently
in power to defend their policies in an environment of
open debate, and their arrogance in silencing principled
opposition, have resulted in an atmosphere where the
benefits of rational discourse are jettisoned for what is
politically expedient, where students are taught what to
think, rather than how to think, and where academic
standards are compromised or deserted completely in
pursuit of the egalitarian goal of the week.
Inflated rhetoric? Perhaps. But when a man like
Stanford professor Robert Rabin, chairman of the Student
Conduct Legislative Council, argues publicly that free
speech rights extend only to victimized minorities, since
the white majority does not need such protections, I get a little
worried.
There are a host of other aspects to this problem that
can't be reasonably discussed in such a short article. But
maybe now a few more people understand what the PC
controversy is really about and others will stop making
light of an issue that is affecting students everywhere and
seriously damaging the integrity and reputation of higher
education all across the country.
Mail Call
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theCof-
Israelis should not
give land to Arabs
❖ From reading the newspaper or listening
to the news, one might get the impression that
peace in the Middle East is somehow dependent
on concessions that Israel might make to the
Arabs in Madrid. This is a very naive and totally
erroneous assumption.
Israel is only 43 years old. The Middle East
has been a volatile and dangerous part of the
world for centuries. Israel had nothing to do
with the war between Iran and Iraq or Iraq's
invasion of Kuwait or Syria's involvement in
Lebanon or any of the other countless aggres
sions between Arab and Arab.
Nor is the issue the plight of the poor, home
less Palestinians as the Arabs are now claiming.
Not only are there 21 Arab nations, not one of
whom will grant citizenship to their Palestinian
brethren, but 80 percent of Palestine is already in
Arab hands. What was once Palestine was
divided by the British into what is now called
Israel (20 percent) and Jordan (80 percent). No
Arab nation has ever suggested the creation of a
Palestinian state in the Arab-held portion of
Palestine, or even giving the Palestinians some
sort of rights in Jordan where they are a clear
majority.
The real issue is that the only thing the Arabs
hate more than each other is Israel. It is the only
thing upon which the Arab nations can agree.
They have had an economic boycott against
Israel for years. Not only do they not trade with
Israel, but they will not do business with any
company that trades with or buys from Israel.
Since neither this or the numerous wars
against Israel have destroyed the tiny country,
the Arabs have somehow convinced the world
that cutting Israel into pieces will appease them
and bring peace to the region. I have trouble
believing this. First, because any agreement
made with an Arab leader could be invalidated
tomorrow when that leader is overthrown
(remember our friend the Shah of Iran), and sec
ond, because as the negotiation draws closer,
more terrorist attacks against Israelis are occur
ring daily and Moslem Arab religious leaders are
crying out ever more strongly that the only solu
tion is the total destruction of Israel. This tells
me that even if some agreement to stop trying to
destroy Israel is reached with an Arab leader, the
attacks will continue.
I think the talks are a great idea. Israel
deserves an end to the state of war which the
Arabs maintain against them. And yes, the
Palestinians deserve some sort of homeland,
although I think it should be in the larger part of
Palestine where they already are a majority, in
Jordan. Let's pray that some lasting good will
come of this conference.
Sharon Ivker
veterinary student
Ask about side
effects of medicine
❖ Have you ever had one of those weeks,
Ags? Or maybe it was two weeks when it
seemed as though fate was against you.
Well, here are a few thoughts to share with
all you Aggies who are tired of getting the shaft.
Now I won't waste time talking about how the
Mitsubishi dealership changed my oil improper
ly. And I won't harp on how the customer ser
vice at Texas Aggie Credit Union has vanished.
I won't even complain about the angering exper
iment I had the misfortune to do for the speech
communications department. However, when it
comes to my health, I draw the line.
I the midst of a terrible viral infection, I made
the mistake of visiting the A.P. Beutel Health
Center for some relief. I got relief in the form of
three prescriptions that seemed perfectly fine.
Unfortunately, two days later I found my tongue
swelling and my jaws locking up on me.
A trip to the emergency room taught me
something that the quack shack should have:
One of the drugs I was taking had these peculiar
side-effects. Consequently, I not only had to suf
fer the pain in my mouth, I also had to suffer the
pain of a shot in the derriere!
Why can't our own health facility warn us
about things like that? Advice to all Ags: Ask
about the medication you're given; you certainly
won't be told anything otherwise!
S. Elizabeth Craft '91
Student enjoys
column on crack
❖ Stacy Feducia's column on butt cracks was
hilarious! I appreciate The Battalion giving us
her funny and open-minded ideas. We need a
break from those other columnists who want to
hammer us again and again with race, sex, reli
gion, feminism and environmental barrages! I
agree with Feducia: "Air out those butt cracks."
John Guice '92
Study quietly
when in library
❖ I am writing this letter not because I have
loads of free time on my hands, not to practice
my writing skills, and not because frats and
sororities turn me off. Rather, I am writing
because I am fed up with the attitudes of some
frat and sororities members, who call themselves
Aggies, yet don't live up to the name when it
comes to respecting the rights of others.
I am talking about those people who congre
gate in thel "quiet section" of the fourth floor of
the Evansbibrary and proceed to discuss the
merits and demerits of wearing bright and
metallic-colored eye shadow, the bad-ass 10-keg-
ger of last weekend and whether Sheila was con
scious of Bill being in her pants. These serious,
private discussions are none of my business,
you say? Exactly! So why should I listen to such
B.S. when I am supposed to be studying for an
exam? I'll tell you why: because there are incon
siderate, self-centered, air-headed, loud
mouthed phonies in this school who can't keep
their mouths shut and respect the rights of those
who are using the library for what it is there for.
I remember a time not too long ago when the
quiet section of the fourth floor of Evans was a
place of serenity and peacefulness. But in the
last two months, I have witnessed an influx of
frat and sorority members, and, as a result, the
quietness I so enjoyed went out the window.I am
not out to put a bad name on these organiza
tions, and, certainly, not all the organizations or
all its members are to blame for pissing me off.
But those who are doing so, consider yourself
addressed.
I would like to conclude by offering two sug
gestions to these loud-mouths which would
make me, and others who feel as I, very happy.
One, if you must talk loudly, go across the hall to
the group study area, and two, grow up!
Miguel Martinez '93
Hava an opinion?
Express iti
The Battalion is interested in hearing from
its readers.
All letters to the editor are welcome.
Written letter must be no longer than 200
words. Letters must be signed and include
classification, address and daytime phone num
ber for verification purposes.
Anonymous letters will not be published.
The Battalion reserves the right to edit all
letters for length, style and accuracy. There is
no guarantee letters will appear.
Letters may be brought to 013 Reed
McDonald, sent to Campus Mail Stop 1111 or
can be faxed to 845-5408.