Ninety-Two Years of Editorial Freedom Cl " E Sit !3U 13Iai g PALE Cloudy and cooler today, with a good chance of showers. A high in the mid- 40s. i F I wVol. XCII, No. 36 Copyright 1981, The Michigan Daily Ann Arbor, Michigan-Wednesday, October 21, 1981 Ten Cents 12 Pages "The word 'fat' is no big deal here. It's a descriptive adjective. Not an insult." They're By CHRISTINA ROUVALIS At 21, Mylan Devereaux wants to stop hating herself and start liking herself-all 250 pounds. She wants to leave behind the memory of her teenage years when she felt too awkward to relax anywhere except in a movie theater and too humiliated to attend her Weight Watchers class. A DISCARD of what she calls the "size ten or smaller society," Devereaux joined the state chapter of the National Association to Aid Fat Americans last month and found a group of people who told her: It's OK to be fat. "The (NAAFA) meeting was one of the only places I've been where it didn't matter how big you were," Devereaux said. "I didn't feel con- spicuous. I didn't feel on edge for once. "I felt normal for a change." appy, and AT HER FIRST meeting, held at the Southfiel mall, Devereaux sat in a room filled with fat pet sons. Fat by their own definition. "The word 'fat' is no big deal here," said Dori Mann, the chapter's vice president. "It's descriptive adjective. Not an insult." Devereaux not only felt at ease among her nei fat friends, she was uplifted by their message. "STAND STRAIGHT and tall and proud," Judi Takalo, the chapter's treasurer told the grout "We don't have to justify our size to anyone. I'r big, I'm proud and I'm beautiful." Although some of the 30 chapters of this nationa organization lobby for "fat rights"-which includ a call for wider seats in public auditoriums and a end to sizism in advertising-the Michigan chat ter is predominantly a social group. Members spent most of this meeting laughini say itsOK d talking, and eating cookies and punch-proudly. r- SOCIALIZING IS an activity that average- weight persons take for granted but many fat per- s sons shun, said Sherry Kessler, chapter president. a "I knew one woman who only goes out for grocery shopping and that's at night," Kessler w said. "A lot of people are afraid to go out." Devereaux agreed. "A lot of people put their life e on hold. It's almost paralyzing. p. "I USED TO STAY home and vegetate," she m said of her high school days when she weighed 350 pounds. "I didn't want to be seen in public. I al always felt like a toad. I looked terrible and I knew le what I was supposed to look like. Smaller." n Friends, Devereaux said, were hard to come by. p- "A fat girl is an embarrassment. No one wants to be seen with her." g, And boyfriends or dates, well, they were unat- to be at tainable, she said. "MEN ALWAYS SAY something when a women passes. Cat calls or whatever," Devereaux said. "If you're fat they say something that isn't nice. You're a joke." Many group members agree with Devereaux that the day-to-day rejection, whether it is real or imagined, is the biggest burden of carrying extra poundage. The local chapters meet monthly, and as a social boost, the national organization offers a pen pal service and computer dating. STEPHEN MYDLARZ, 24, a network specialist at Northern Telecom, dated little before he joined NAAFA. Now, he said, he is flooded by attention from women. "If I see an attractive man talking to an attrac- See THEY, Page 2 Vacancy rate By JENNIFER MILLER Those wintry days of frantic door-to- door apartment hunting may be only a bad memory. "Take your time this year," advises Jo Williams, assistant director of the off-campus housing office. "There's no need to grab the first thing that looks half-way decent." WILLIAMS' advice came after a study done by her office found a central campus vacancy rate of 13.7 percent this September, up dramatically from the less than 1 percent rate two years ago. The tight Ann Arbor housing market of the past forced students to start competing for scarce, high-rent housing early in the winter term. By the end of the term, most central cam- pus apartments already were taken. But for the past two years, landlords have been left with a number of vacan- 'Take your time this year, there 's need to grab the first thing that loo half-way decent.' -Jo Williams, assistant direc of off-campus housi soars year's vacancy rate probably won't cause a general lowering of rents - which were raised an average of 11 per- no cent this year. However, the slow housing market ks may give students more leverage to negotiate with a landlord, such as asking for certain repairs and removing or adding clauses in the for lease. "I think we'll see landlords being ing more competitive against each other," -Williams said, "going out of their way ,pril." to say to students, 'Rent from me in- eanrib. stead of someone else, because I'll do a anbe. this for you'." a e Items over which students may be or of the able to negotiate include painting, rd wth refurbishing, adding a privacy clause, ;reed with and asking the landlord to use an incen- to look. tive clause for on-time rent payments, Cohen Cohen and Williams said. time you The incentive clause gives the tenant said this , See CITY, Page 2 cies after classes started in the fall. Some landlords were offering lower rents, or were willing to negotiate prices this fall. WILLIAMS cautioned students not to wait until the end of summer to find a place, however. The glut of vacancies and the rent deals "might never happen again," she said. "Don't feel you have to make an early decision," Williams said, "but do find a place before you leave inA Students should take their time more selective when choosing to live, she said. Dale Cohen, associate direct Ann Arbor Tenants' Union, ag Williams. "There 's more time Don't sign a lease right away,' said, "but find a place by the i leave in April." BOTH COHEN and Williams Photo by DEBORAH LEWIS JO WILLIAMS, assistant director of off-campus housing, reviews an analysis of the city housing market she completed recently. The off-campus housing vacancy rate is on the rise, she reported. 'U' prof helps draft African *aid strategy By MARK GINDIN Developing countries in Africa should shift from a reliance on the public sec- tor toward free market economies, ac- cording to a report issued by the World Bank and written in part by a Univer- sity professor. The report, drafted by a team of World Bank officials headed by Univer- sity Prof. Elliot Berg, deals primarily with underdeveloped countries below the Sahara Desert in Africa. THE REPORT stresses three main areas of policy failure: i The economic environment in the sub-Saharan countries has not enhan- ced growth in part, because trade policies have overprotected industry and agriculture; o . " Governments of the countries are 0 "trying to do too much" to solve the nations' problems; " There has been a consistent bias against agriculture in pricing, tax, and exchange rate policies. The report officially was released Monday at three news conferences, held simultaneously in New York, Paris, and London, Berg said. The Bank is now officially considering the document and the position it will take in the future regarding aid to Africa, he said. THE WORLD BANK, formally called the International Bank for Reconstruc- tion and Development, was set up by the world's non-communist countries after World War II in an effort to aid developing nations, Berg said. About 100 countries are involved, he said, and the United States contributed 27 per- cent of the Bank's revenue last year. Making the change in Sub-Saharan nations from economies dominated by the public sector will require a large amount of outside aid, Berg said, and it is the responsibility of the more affluent countries to provide that help. "We are calling for international aid to the area to double within the next decade," he said. Among the changes recommended in the report is a concerted effort to make the economies of the countries more competitive, Berg said. Currently many countries have government monopolies in industries that could be handled more efficiently by the free market, he said. "THERE IS A small private sector that has been discouraged and trod on" by present government policies, Berg said. The internal, small-scale businesses should have more freedom and incentives to operate, he said. The monetary exchange rates in many of the sub-Saharan countries are vastly overvalued, Berg said. The overvalued currency discourages domestic business by making imports less expensive than domestic goods, he said. Much of the imported food con- sumed by a country's people is sub- sidized by the government, Berg said. This policy also encourages the pur- chase of imports while discouraging domestic agriculture. Many of the taxes in various coun- tries are heavy and discourage produc- See WORLD, Page 5 Photo by DEBORAH LEWIS A bevy of beauties Tavi Fulkerson, fashion reporter for the Ann Arbor News, and photographer Larry men featured on a new calendar before a party held yesterday afternoon Wright, look on as Laura Mendiola gets autographs from some of the Michigan at Dooley's. TODAY Grandma in jail N 82-YEAR-OLD woman told a judge she was sorry she sold marijuana, and said her 98-year old mother had warned her she could get introuble for it. After Minnie Hall made her guilty plea Monday, Sevierville, Tenn. Circuit Judge Ken Porter fined her $250 and suspended an 11-month, 29-day jail sen- tence. Hall told Porter her mother had been mad at her sin- ce Sevier County sheriff's deputies arrested her at home Oct. 5. The arrest came after a county grand jury indicted Nol har ndnn Randr 'TTnnin 9f2 0and fir nther nennle ~/ ~ ~ N~ .' '-.~ -~ i / / H ~t ,~ ,; , , :;. :' : 'ii <2 I .' 4 N, I the newest thing in toys for grown-ups as Ronnie Doll and Nancy Doll. They have outfits for almost every oc- casion-the ranch, the campaign trail, Camp David and an inaugural ball. Dell Publishing Company is offering the cut- out paper images in "First Family Paper Doll & Cut-Out Book." Q What good old days?2 Radical turnaround The adult book store once bore a sign in red letters saying, "Do not enter if offended be nudity or the human body." But behind the white door these days there's a mural of Jesus Christ. The Chapman highway Adult Book Shop has been turned into the Pentecostal Revival Center. There are pews where projection booths stood. Stained glass windows decorate the front double doors, and the scarlet letters on the side entrance are hidden by white paint. There's a steeple on the roof. "From darkness to light," said the Rev. William Bryant. Congregation mem- bers met in Bryant's home for several months while they For some of the most successful women in America, the good old days are right now. Cosmopolitan magazine asked women VIPs what their worst jobs had been, and learned that nr many the nast meant hard times. Imagine financial _ . yi 3 I I