Letters to the Editor

Afrmative action is racism

To the Daily:

In response to the Ciara Benson's letter, "Minority views are not voiced at the 'U'" (3/23/98), I would like to take this opportunity to applaud Benson for capturing the very essence of affirmative action with the line, "... they assume that because they look a certain way or come from a certain background, educational privileges not only are available to them, but they have a right to them." For those not blessed enough to have been enlightened by Benson's entire letter, let me clarify that her letter was written in support of affirmative action.

Confused? I was. Allow me to explain: The "they" at the beginning of that quote was referring to the dominating evil force at work in the country, the white males, not the countless underrepresented persons who have used their race, sex or social background to get ahead.

Benson also says, "... they have never had to take a stand and fight for something as critical as their right to higher education." Besides contradicting herself by indicating, within the same letter, that higher education is not an inherent right in the first quote and is an inherent right in the second quote, she also presumes to know for what I've fought.

Please, fight for your "right" to higher education, but don't let me fight for mine. Benson, would you care to know that I was rejected by more schools than accepted me? I don't blame my race or sex for keeping me out of those other schools, just as I would never insult my own intelligence by giving credit to my race or sex for getting me into this one. Because I hold dear the idealistic notion that race and sex should be ignored when determining the merit of an individual, do people label me as an idealist? No, they label me as a racist and sexist.

Affirmative action is an issue of racial discrimination. Racial discrimination is both illogical and immoral. To deny the fact that affirmative action is a racial issue would be to undermine the intelligence of people on both sides of the issue.

I prefer to look at social issues from an individual perspective. Affirmative action asks us to make a sacrifice. As noble as that is, let's examine it on an individual basis, without rhetoric or statistics. I'm talking to you, the reader, the editors of the Daily and Ciara Benson. Would you be willing to give up your spot in college or employment for someone less deserving in the name of affirmative action? Would you be willing to "bend over and take one for the team," so to speak? I wouldn't. And as a citizen of a free country, I shouldn't have to. Call me a selfish bastard, but the very heart of our political and economic systems lies in the rights and responsibilities of the individual. This might be a shocker to those people expecting handouts, but this is the real world, where we don't have to share. I wanted an education at a top-notch school, so I worked for it, and I'll be damned if I support a program that "assumes" merit and presumes to manually "level the playing field," hurting my individual chance to succeed and undermining the very integrity of this nation's competitive spirit.

Avi Derrow
LSA sophomore

Homophobia hides behind the Bible

To the Daily:

Recently, Edward Blum wrote a very eloquent letter on God's forgiveness and the inclination of all people to sin ("Humankind cannot follow biblical laws," 3/30/98). In this, he somehow found the justification to declare homosexuality a sin.

He missed a very large point in Jonathon Seyfried's letter ("Modern Society does not adhere to biblical laws," 3/23/98). That was that the Bible condemns a large number of activities, many of which happen on a regular basis in our society. Therefore, to single out homosexuality, declare it a sin, and then say that somehow, we are completely justified to eat ham or to have marriages where the man and woman are equals is completely a pick-and-choose method of interpretation of the Bible.

The reason I mention those two points is simply that they are a small sampling of the many ways in which modern society outright ignores the teachings of the Bible.

But when it comes to something like homosexuality, Blum can recite chapter and verse to find every possible justification for what he really wants to do: promote homophobia and heterosexism. He even compares my sexual orientation to lying and cheating.

Homosexuality has even been compared to rape and murder (although not by Blum). These are acts that defile another person. But my capacity to love another man is only a fulfilling act for both of us. It in no way defiles either of us, or anyone else in society, for that matter.

The issue, then, is not me being gay. The issue is Blum (and others, like the religious right) being afraid of the unknown.

Anyone who has read (not quoted) the Bible and learned their history can tell you that hate of a specific group of people comes from the unknown.

That is why I challenge anyone who is heterosexist or homophobic to think, even for a moment, about what it is that they really do not like about homosexual people. Is it that the Bible is clear about gays? Or is it that they always just thought that homosexual people were weird and then later on found the scripture and verse to justify that view?

Luke Klipp
School of Music

Article was 'biased'

To the Daily:

I am writing in regards to the article by Peter Meyers, in the March 30 issue of the Daily ("Ku Klux Klan plans hate rally in Ann Arbor").

I noticed several rather disturbing aspects to this article which, particularly after discussing the article with some of my fellow U of M students, that I felt I should bring to the Daily's attention. I would encourage readers to reread the article in light of what I have to say here.

Perhaps I should begin my comments with the headline of the article in question. After reading through the article a couple of times, I was at a loss to find justification for the reference to the Klan's attempt to plan a rally as being a "hate" rally. Now I feel obligated to state at this point that my beliefs are not in league with those of the Klan as well as many of the activities that they used to and may still participate. But as previously stated, nowhere in the article could I find any justification for this allegation that was made in the headline of the article. I believe that I do understand the reason for the choice of wording in the title, and it doesn't take a communications major to realize this either. In fact, I believe that I can remember back to my freshman English class in high school to understand the motivation for the headline. I was taught to try to find a headline that would be captivating to the audience at a glance. If appropriate, it could also be somewhat provocative with the goal of gaining the audience's attention. Well, this certainly did have what I propose was the desired effect of causing me to read the article. But I was also taught that you must be fair to your audience and eventually justify whatever the headline inferred on the issue.

After reading the article, I was also left with the overwhelming feeling that Meyers had overstepped his responsibility as a reporter of giving an objective and unbiased portrayal of the circumstances. Rather, it seemed that his opinion was influencing the general tone of the article, and I sensed a lack of professional journalism. This led me to believe that perhaps this was an editorial rather than a news article that I was reading. Unfortunately, I failed to find anything in evidence to suggest this as a plausible explanation. It was at this point that I felt obligated to bring this to the attention of the Daily's editors.

Now I would like to emphasize once again that this is merely my opinion on this issue. But for what it's worth, I felt that the article did not effectively address these issues. I further felt that the article did not show good balance in describing the issue.

I do appreciate the Daily's attempt to bring this and other issues to the attention of myself and the rest of the student body. But as an intelligent reader, I would appreciate a more objective manner of presenting these issues.

Alex Partin
Engineering first-year student

04-09-98