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OPINION

Page 4

Tuesday, October 27, 1987

The Michigan Daily



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Edited and managed by students at The University of Michigan

Vol. XCVIII, No. 34

420 Maynard St.
Ann Arbor, MI 48109

Unsigned editorials represent a majority of the Daily's Editorial Board. All other
cartoons, signed articles, and letters do not necessarily represent the opinion
of the Daily.
Investigate harassment of labor and minorities:

Racist abuse at the

'

LAST THURSDAY, Mary Clark, a
University Building Services
employee and a steward for the
AFSCME union, was the victim of
a racist attack. She returned to a
bathroom she had already cleaned
only to find the toilets stopped up
with shit and "Funky Black Bitch"
written on the wall. It is vital to the
integrity of the University and Ann
Arbor community that this incident
be investigated.
The circumstances of t h e
Thursday attack are highly suspect.
Mary Clark worked on the second
floor of the East Engineering
building, but was moved to the
fourth floor once she became a
union steward: a person charged by
her co-workers to represent their
union grievances and contract
problems to the management. The
move to the fourth floor violated
Clark's contract and placed her with
one of two white workers in the
building.
Clark was then ordered by her
supervisor to report her where-
abouts and her progress with 'tasks
to the white worker who was
neither a supervisor nor manage-
ment whenever she left on a
grievance. There is nothing more
racially divisive than to make
workers of one race subservient to
another. Clark's supervisor had
nothing to say on the matter.
According to union chair Judy
Levy, Clark is the only union
steward in Plant Building Services
in four years to hold the job more
than two weeks and since taking the
position on September 23 she has
encountered increased workplace
harassment by management.
She has been denied meeting
durations specified in the contract;
she has been sent on false calls
where she had to walk back alone at
night; her supervisor has been late
to meetings and then insisted upon
continuing them during the

workers' break time; she has been
dogged by the entire management of
Plant Building Services (four
supervisors and four managers) all
at one time while doing simple tasks
such as cleaning.
Mary Clark is not alone. The
employees of Plant Building
Services, the University organ
which oversees the maintenance and
cleaning of most of the central
campus buildings, have been the
victims of increasing racial and
labor harassment. Workers have
been threatened, moved around
frequently, and forced to work
while sick or injured. Workers
have been forced to sign false
statements and then fired on the
basis of the fake contract. One
worker who spoke to Daily
reporters lost his job immediately
after the interview.
Physical, racial, and labor related
harassment has been alleged in
numerous buildings on campus;
yet, the Plant Building Services
administration replies "no com-
ment" or "these cases are nothing
out of the ordinary." Clark's own
supervisor claimed the graffiti was
not racist nor unusual and asserted
that students were responsible.
These malicious acts must not be
swept under the bureaucratic rug for
a University janitor to clean up
later. Racial and labor harassment
at the University must end im-
mediately and an integral step to this
end is a full investigation of both
the racist attack and the labor
relations problems inside of the
Building Services administration.

Women
By Susan Sherman
& Audrey Haberman
As a part of Sexual Assault Awareness
week, this day is dedicated to many ways
that women can "fight back." Among our
concerns is the message women receive
that we should be afraid to walk alone at
night. This message appears to be one of
safety, but in reality, it further victimizes
women. This message blames women for
rape because it allows people to wonder
"what she was doing out alone anyway."
We believe women have the right to walk
whenever and wherever we choose. Our
purpose in writing to the Daily is twofold:
to remind women that we have choices and
the right to empower ourselves so that we
can walk alone without fear, and to alert
men that they can play a role in making
our streets safe.
Stranger rapes do occur in Ann Arbor
but it is important to remember that 9 out
of 10 rapesrare acquaintance rapes and 60
percent of rapes occur in the home. (FBI
Statistics) Nevertheless, women need to be
prepared, as much as possible, to handle
these situations. We are socialized to be
passive, agreeable and dependent.
Therefore, to learn to defend ourselves
Susan Sherman and Audrey Haberman
both work with the Sexual Assault
Prevention and Awareness Center.

can

means to unlearn years of socialization. It
is not easy, but it is possible.
There are a variety of ways that women
can take control of the situation. We can
walk confidently. Stranger rapes are
usually planned in advance and the rapist
is looking for a vulnerable target. Look
men in the eye when you pass them. This
can also make you appear less vulnerable
and more likely to confront him if
necessary. If someone is coming up
behind you, turn around and see who it is.
A sharp look will often throw someone
off.
Trust your intuition. If something
feels wrong, follow that instinct. Some
nights you may feel perfectly comfortable
walking home from a class, a meeting or
the library. Other nights you may feel
tired or you may have had a couple beers
or a bad day, and you may not feel good
about walking alone. Learn to listen to
yourself. You are the best judge of how
you are feeling and whether you want to
walk alone or not. Whatever you choose is
OK. Again, women can and have the right
to make a choice.
Men can also fight against rape by
walking on the other side of the street or
by crossing the street when passing a
women. Men can walk with their hands
outside of their pockets. Off the street,
men can confront sexist jokes made
among friends. Every time men let a
sexist joke pass, he condones an

atmosphere where violence against
women is acceptable
There are also ways men and women can
fight back together. If you hear screaming
or a strange or suspicious noise on the
street, investigate it. If you don't feel
comfortable doing that alone, you can
knock on a neighbor's door or call campus
security or the police for help. You can
also investigate violent actions on the
street. You may not want to interfere but
sometimes directing attention to the fight
or argument will stop it. Finally, if you
live off campus, use your porch lights as a
way of keeping the streets and sidewalks
better lit.
What we have spoken of so far are
personal and emotional ways of fighting
back. There are physical ways of fighting
back as well and we encourage you to
develop these skills if you wish. For this
reason, the Sexual Assault Prevention and
Awareness Center is offering a Self
Defense demonstration on the diag at noon
and a self-defense workshop from 7:30-
9:30 p.m. in Ambatana Lounge in South
Quad.
Women can fight back in physical,
emotional and political spheres in order to
empower ourselves and end further
victimization. Men can also fight back by
recognizing the importance of making
streets a safer place for women and doing
what they can to help. By combining our
strengths, women and men can fight back
and make our community more safe.

fight

back! I


0

Daily

soft

on

passing

up

By Terry Calhoun
Part one in a two part series
Your editorial on passing up ("Stop
passing up," Daily, October 22) was far
too mild and betrays the inevitable igno-
rance of history perceptible in editorials
representing the view of a student editorial
board.
When I was a graduate student and then
a law student, from 1973 to 1980, more
than 100 women were being passed up at
each Michigan home game. I know this
for a fact because I was deeply involved
with a student group, SPUN (Stop Pass-
ing Up Now), which first quantified the
extent of the problem and then took effec-
tive action against it in 1979-1980.
At the time we faced a tremendous bar-
rier of ignorance about passing up on the
part of the athletic department, the Ann
Arbor police, and the university commu-
nity. By going to several games for the
sole purpose of watching passing up and
interviewing women who had been passed
up (to determine if the problem warranted
our action), we certified that the problem
was a serious one. During those games,
less than 5 percent of the women grabbed
(remember, over 100 each game) were un-
offended. Most were in varying states of
shock; many could not even speak. We
Calhoun holds M.A. and J.D. degrees
from the University of Michigan and is a
publisher.

found the women were not just sexually
groped-they were struck, kicked, thrown
through the air-often to land on the con-
crete. There was no doubt in most of the
victims' minds that they had been as-
saulted and battered. To us, watching, it
seemed an experience far worse than being
hit a few times with a policeman's night-
stick, for example; yet the Daily's official
position is now that the perpetrators do
not deserve arrest.
We spent a year talking to victims and
student groups (over 160 groups), sending
out letters and questionnaires, writing
newspaper articles, doing radio talk shows;
we spoke to the Regents and they appro-
priated money for some sophisticated
posters-we put up thousands of our own
less sophisticated ones. We stressed the
four main points and assumed that if the
university community were educated about
them that passing up would stop. Passing
up did stop. The following year and for
over half a decade, no one was passed up.
Now it has begun again, with a new
student body that is ignorant of what
passing up really means. And your edito-
rial was very little help.
I'd like the editorial board to read the
following and rethink its stand on passing
up: How would you feel if 200-300 people
took turns walking up to you, ramming
their hands into your crotch, pulling with
all their might at your penis-some
punching you with fists in the buttocks or
the midriff, others yanking at and tearing
your clothing while trying to pull it off

(the whole experience lasting up to five
minutes); and then to finish it off several
of them grabbed you and threw you onto
the ground from above their heads? If it
were you, would you think the perpetra-
tors deserved arrest?
Fact-one : Most women do not enjoy
being passed up. Even those who think it
amusing as their friends lift them up into
the air may feel a bit differently after 200-
300 people they don't know have had their
hands on them. If you think about passing
a friend up, first think about what kind of
pervert might be sitting forty rows behind
you.
Fact two : It's not part of the game.
This needs no elaboration; passing up is
neither sporting nor mature.
Fact three : It is a crime. Passing up is
clearly assault and battery, and in most
instances, if fits the Michigan definition
of rape without penetration. An injured
victim could pursue a civil suit against the
perpetrators and the athletic department.
Fact four : Women get hurt, and hurt
badly. Torn clothing and bruises are only
the inevitable result for nearly all women
who are passed up. When it was more
prevalent, injuries such as broken elbows
were common.
We've already seen how serious the
Daily is about passing up. We'll soon see
how serious the athletic department is.
Sending people into the stands to "rescue"
those being passed up is useless; we saw
the police do that in 1979 and they rarely
got close to a victim. '

There will be a rally

and

protest against the treat-
ment of Mary Clark Wed-
nesday at 12 noon in front
of the Fleming Admin-
istration Building.

Unfair media view of Iran

T HE MYTH OF a free and indepen-
dent press in the United States was
debunked by last week's New York
Times coverage of hostilities in the
Persian Gulf.
OnTuesday, October 20, the
Times ran a series of articles about
the U.S. attack on two Iranian oil
rigs in the Persian Gulf. These nine
separate articles lacked even a
modicum of objectivity.
Approximately ninety percent of
the information in the articles was
attributed to sources in the United
States government.
The Times devoted only ten per-
cent of the coverage to information
provided by Iran and other sources.
Iran, one of the primary actors in
the Persian Gulf scenario and the
victim of the United States attack
was denied meaningful press
coverage simply because of its sta-
tus as an official state enemy.
Not only is the coverage of Iran's
reaction lacking in quantity, but it
also is deficient in its depth o f
investigation. Iran claims that five
people died in the U.S. attack. The
Times briefly mentions the Iranian

good for journalism,. nor for citi-
zens' awareness.
The media is thwarted in many of
its journalistic endeavors outside of
the United States by government
press control. The military thor-
oughly censors the media in hot
spots like the Persian Gulf. The
government has a stranglehold on
information surrounding inter-
national events, and only selectively
makes this information available to
the media. In the Gulf, the military
houses the U.S. media on Navy
ships and selectively flies them to
areas deemed newsworthy.
The corporate media personnel
must learn to properly exercise re-
sponsibility to their readers and not
blind loyalty to the government. As
history evidences from events like
the U.S. bombing of Cambodia
during the Vietnam War to the
more recent sale of U.S. arms to
Iran, the government is far from
honest in the way international
events are presented to the media
and subsequently the public.
While some responsibility lies
within the halls of the Pentagon and
the White House. most has to he

LETTERS
Daily didn't watch Cardinals enough

To the Daily:
I am writing this letter in
response to David Webster's
article entitled "Artificial base-
ball...bring back grass" (Daily,
10-21). I would like to say that
I do appreciate Mr. Webster's
comments about playing base-
ball on artificial turf. But I'd
also like to mention that the
kind of surface that a team
plays on should have little to
do with how appealing the
game is.
I do come from St. Louis
and I'd like to say that both the
Twins and the Cardinals have
madesthis series very interest-
ing. The Cardinals possess
speed and defense while the
Twins exhibit good pitching
and solid hitting skills. These
are the four basics needed to
play good baseball. The greats
of baseball, which have in-

McGee chasing the ball past
the warning track and colliding
with the outfield wall to make
a game-winning catch? These
plays are not just typical of the
Cardinals, but of all the other
players in the major leagues
who play on both natural grass
and artificial turf.
The stadiums that the Car-
dinals and Twins play in may
be disgusting to you, but to
most baseball fans, they are
exciting places to watch a
game in. While Busch Stadium
is not as aesthetically pleasing
as, say, Wrigley Field or Fen-

way Park, it still is a great
place to play. Whitey Herzog
has tailored his teams to play
in stadiums with fast surfaces
and long distances to the
fences. In St. Louis, we con-
sider the baseball game to be
one form of culture and Busch
Stadium still is a nice place to
take a date.
The same rings true for the
Metrodome. Fan support and
noise is overwhelming with
the addition of the roof, mak-
ing it difficult for an opposing
team to play there. Plus, the
effect of the roof on a fly ball

makes any play to the outfield
interesting.
The kind of surface a base-
ball team plays on is and the
stadium in which the game is
played has little to do with the
excitement and appeal of the
game. The fan support shown
for the two teams in this year's
World Series is evidence of this
point. It's not what the field is
made of that makes the differ-
ence but what's on the field!
Baseball is still real.
-Todd Lowenstein
October 23


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