4 OPINION Page 4 Thursday, March 10, 1988 The Michigan Daily Edited and managed by students at The University of Michigan Vol. XCVIII No. 107 420 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. DOD money corrupI V 1V1ual p PRPOALfor inst: A PROPOSAL TO punish isolated , individuals for "racist acts" cannot+ end racism on campus because it1 fails to attack the problem at its cause: it addresses the symptom rather than the disease. The numerous racist incidents that have occurred on this campus in the past year are mere manifestations of the + underlying problem of institutional1 racism. "Institutional Racism" is an ex-+ pression that has been much in vogue lately but it is extremely im- portant to understand both exactly what it means, and how it comes to this University. Institutional racism is rooted in a society that is funda- mentally, albeit unofficially, segre- gated. Even well-educated, liberal University students are affected by When a white person, through no fault of her own, grows up in an all-white suburb and goes to an all- white High School, and conse- quently is taught to associate mi- norities with crime, drugs and poor neighborhoods, she is a victim of institutional racism. When she goes to the University of Michigan and finds herself in an environment where most of the jan- itors are minorities, and a dispro- portionate number of her professors and her fellow students are white, the attitudes she has learned from her environment are not likely to change. She is probably not the kind of person who would make racist jokes over the radio, but she laughs when her friends occasionally tell racist jokes in private. She is not aware that she has certain negative attitudes toward minorities, because she has never had to confront these attitudes. *,Consequently, when she leaves the University,her choice of where Facts, Fictio PAT ROBERTSON, a Republican presidential candidate, is making false, unsubstantiated claims that seriously harm his credibility. Robertson has an uncanny affinity with sensationalizing important national issues, similar to the reporting of the National Enquirer. In a campaign stop at a Georgia university, a student asked Robertson his position on South Africa. Robertson replied that if the U.S. does not support the white South African government, then South Africa will fall to the com- munists. Anti-Communism seems to be the banner that he hopes will enlarge his political base. Robertson has even alluded to the Biblical prophecies of Armageddon, conveniently fitting the Soviets into this scenario. For instance, he has predicted several times that the So- viet Union would invade Israel and the "last days" would begin. During his campaign, Robertson has made statements that have surprised many people. When a U.S. Lt. Colonel was recently kidnapped in Southern Lebanon, Robertson chastised the Reagan administration for slow efforts in freeing the hostages. Robertson's Christian Broadcasting Network claimed to know where the hostages were and aired this information on national television. Refnre the New Hmnhire and mi slment itutional acts to live, who to befriend and eventually who to hire, will be sub- tly affected by feelings that she has never questioned. In this way, in- stitutional racism will perpetuate it- self through her ignorance. No one in our society, and hence no student at this University, can claim to be untouched by institu- tional racism. It is too widespread and pervasive for anyone to claim exemption. Punishing these self-proclaimed blatant racists through expulsion from the University would con- tribute to the problem by making these individuals all the more likely to remain ignorant. Most impor- tantly, punishing such individuals takes no step toward educating the thousands of students who are aware neither of their victimization by institutional racism, nor of their own subtly racist attitudes. There are several steps that the University could take to break the self-perpetuating circle of institu- tional racism. First, it could help eliminate the problem at its source by increasing minority recruitment and retention among the student body, and by hiring more minority faculty and administrators. Sec- ondly, it could educate students to recognize the racism inherent in our society and in the attitudes they have learned from it through a mandatory course. If President Fleming were serious about eliminating racism from this campus, these are some steps he would take. He continues to insist, however, that the administration should have formal power to punish students for racist acts. One can only conclude either that he does not understand the problem, or that he has a set of private objectives wholly unrelated to the problem at hand. By Justin Schwartz Activism around military research at the U has fallen considerably over this last year, but University military research has actually increased. It now comprises 13 percent of University federally sponsored research. University faculty are involved in work on such weapons systems as nerve gas, C-cubed (command, control, and communications) for nuclear war, anti- submarine warfare, Star Wars, and the first strike submarine missiles. And current University plans include aggressive solicitation of Pentagon contracts. Last April the University Regents repealed even the rarely enforced guidelines prohibiting classified military research which might kill or maim human beings that had been instituted in 1972 as a response to student protest over the University contribution to the war in Vietnam. This growing trend raises the issue of the place of military research at a liberal university like Michigan. One common myth that arises is that university military research is just research that happens to be paid by the military, but is itself neutral, objective, disinter- ested inquiry into truth. If the military cares to support such inquiry, why not take the money and run? Of course no one really believes this. Everyone knows that the Pentagon is interested in specific sorts of truths, namely, those truths which promote new and improved ways to kill people. Truths about nerve gas or electromag- netic pulse are a rather special sort of truth. If you are not interested in killing people with nerve gas or fighting nuclear wars, you will not be interested in them. If a line of inquiry turns out to have no application to this goal, it will not be supported by the military budget. So, for example,when Engineering Professor Thomas Senior reputedly defended his work on electromagnetic pulse as a way to improve commercial television transmis- sion, this raised the question of why the Air Force wanted to pay for work with that purpose. The obvious answer was that Senior was deluding himself or us about the point of his research. That the point of military research is to improve the Pentagon's ability to kill or maim human Justin Schwartz is a graduate student in philosophy and political science. He works with the Michigan Alliance for Disarmament. beings should raise serious questions about whether such research should be permitted, much less encouraged, at an institution of higher education. To accept or engage in military research is, therefor, not neutral. Such research has as its main purpose increased efficiency in killing. But it is not neutral in another way, because the killing in question is done by specific institutions for particular purposes. Military research means taking sides. The obvious answer to these questions clearly show that the question about mili- tary research is not about neutral; inquiry, but about the University's active support of the political purposes to which the US military in particular is put. University military research is a matter of active support of these particular goals to the exclusion of supporting the political goals of other countries which might patronize such research. And that raises the question of whether we should support these goals. Vice Provost James Duderstadt, for- merly the Dean of the Engineering School, has had the honesty to pose the real question and offer a definite, although indefensible, answer to it. He has claimed that the contributing to the "national de- fense" should be "a major goal" of the university. In Duderstadt's view, and this is widely shared although rarely so bluntly put, the University should commit itself to the political goals of the U.S. govern- ment by assisting the Pentagon to kill people in support of those goals. Now unless one is an absolute pacifist, which I am not, one will not regard killing as always wrong in itself. But unless one is some kind of monster, one will be very skeptical of the need for killing unless the purposes are acceptable and there is no better alternative. This is a platitude, but if taken seriously, it would rule out military research for the Pentagon's purposes. This will no doubt seem a startling thing to say, but don't take my word for it. Far from fearing a Soviet attack, then. Defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger said in his fiscal year 1986 Annual Report, "low level conflict will likely remain the most immediate threat to free world secu- rity." "The most important security chal- lenge confronting the United States is to improve its military capabilities for low- intensity conflict," according to the Jan. 1985 issue of the US Army's Military Review. Low intensity conflict is a new name for the kind of counterrevolutionary ts the 'U' intervention the US engaged in Vietnam and is building up to in Nicaragua. Such conflict is only "low intensity on this end. The US dropped seven megatons of high explosives on Vietnam, twice the amount of explosives used by all sides in World War II. Sixty thousand Nicaraguans of that nation of 3 million have died in the US-sponsored contra war. And it is hard to see the threat that socialist Vietnam was supposed to pose on us, or which socialist Nicaragua is supposed to pose. Of course, as President Johnson warned about the Vietnamese, "If we don't stop them there, they'll be in San Diego." Many of them are, but mostly as small businesspeople. In Nicaragua, as in Vietnam; what is going on is the Pentagon's attempt to stop, with excessive violence, poor nations from asserting some degree of control over their resources and political direction. This is what "national defense," as Duderstadt uses it, really means. Is that a goal which a liberal university ought to promote? The second thing "national defense" means is being able to "prevail" in nuclear wars "at any level of conflict," in the words of the Pentagon's own Defense Guidance document leaked to the New York Times on May 30, 1982. Star Wars work, endorsed by the University Regents in 1986, is a case in point. In 1984 Weinberger told the U.S. Congress, "If we can get a system which we know can ren- der their missiles impotent, we could be back in a situation we were in, for exam- ple, when we were the only nation with a nuclear weapon." No Star Wars system can provide an effective defense against a first strike. But if the U.S. struck first, Star Wars might reduce the Soviet retalia- tion to destroying only a few cities,"acceptable losses," as the govern- ment sees it. I submit that if "national de- fense" means destroying poor nations and fighting nuclear wars, then it ought not to be a goal of the University of Michigan or any other institution in American society. Several campus groups are organizing campaigns around military research at the university for the remainder of this term and next year. The Michigan Alliance for Disarmament is sponsoring educational work in the dorms leading up a ballot initiative for next fall, and meets Sunday nights at 7:30 in 439 Mason Hall. Michi- gan Student Assembly is working on a national conference on Chemical and Bio- logical Warfare for the fall. I I I LETTERS: Base Israeli-PLO terrorism on the facts n and Phony has asked for proof of this allega- tion, and Robertson has yet to validate his claim. Last week, Robertson dropped a libel suit against former California Representative Paul N. McCloskey. McCloskey had accused Robertson of using his father's influence to avoid combat in Korea. In Robertson's speeches and campaign platform there are notable inconsistencies. In January 1985, Robertson asserted that only Christians and Jews were qualified to run government - in September 1987 Robertson denied he ever made those statements in a Time magazine interview, but in De- cember 1987 he conceded that he did make those assertions in a New York Times article. Robertson has many contradictory views: " Robertson stresses the importance of fighting the Soviet Union and communism worldwide by pushing for a stronger defense - in campaign literature Robertson favors a cut of $20 billion to $40 billion in the defense budget. " In a television ad Robertson vowed not to impose his religious views if nominated and elected President - his deputy press secretary has stated that Robertson supports school prayer and the teaching of creationism. " Robertson has freauently To the Daily: In his letter of January 20, (Prospects for Mideast Peace), Tahini Abbouslu states that "the way to peace is n o t through violence." Apparently he feels propaganda is a suit- able alternative. As examples of Zionist ter- rorism, Abbouslu cites events at Deir Yassin, in 1948, and at Sabra and Shatilla, Lebanon, in 1982. I assume by terrorism he refers to attacks on civilians. The town of Deir Yassin was targeted in 1948 because it was crucial to the Arab block- ade of Jerusalem, where Iraqi troops and snipers were housed. As such it was a military, not a civilian target. Abbouslu states that the entire population was massacred. A more accu- rate figure is approximately 115 out of a population o f 800. Many of these were sol- Sex stats discredit religion diers who had fired on Jewish troops, but a portion was civilian, and these murders in- spired outrage in the Jewish community (unlike PLO at- tacks on civilians, which are usually praised by Arab lead- ers). Deir Yassin standsa solitary example of Zionist "terrorism", in contrast to dozens of PLO sponsored attacks on civilians. This is why it is still cited af- ter 40 years. On the contrary, Arab attacks on civilians in 1948 are largely unremem- bered, as too many other in- stances have occupied our at- tention. Regarding the 1982 events a Sabra and Shatilla, Lebanon, Abbouslu conveniently omits the fact that those victims fell not to Israeli soldiers (who were not even in the camps at the time), but to the Phalange, a Christian Lebanese Militia. Small Matter. Nevertheless, the Israeli government did accept indirect responsibility, in the form of committee findings which stated that authorities should have foreseen the possibility of such violence,,and were remiss in not preventing it. Blame was publicly placed at the highest levels of leadership, including Defense Minister Ariel Sharon. A civil demon- stration of 400,000 Israelis underscored attitudes against the massacre. However, it simply was not a massacre by Israelis, as Abbouslu states. Such lies inform opinions regarding the relative severity of violence by the Israeli Army, when compared with the PLO (Daily Editorial 1/18/88). I do not insist that everyone in the university community agree' with me on the general question of Arab-Israeli rela- tions, only that they base their, views on facts. In this, Ab- bouslu fails dismally. -Corey Luskin January 21 Readers who cannot bring their letters in on disk should To the Daily: Your article, "Survey finds similar sexual activity among churchgoers" was particularly biased and twisted. Referring to the "Teen Sex Survey in the Evangelical Church," you quote in your article that,"thirty-five percent of the 17 year-olds said they had engaged in sexual intercourse, while 26 percent of the 16 year-olds dais (sic) they had had intercourse." Later in the article you state that accordingto a Lou harris poll, "57 percent of the nation's 17 year olds are sexually experienced, while 46 percent of the 16 year olds . . . said they had had sexual intercourse." It is obvious even using these questionable statistics that there is a vast difference 35 percent and 57 percent and between 26 percent and 46 percent! There is a 2 0 My question to you is - how did the staff possibly come up with that misleading title or the ridiculous first sentence that states, "Teenagers who attend conservative churches are similar in the sexual conduct to many of America's 17 year olds?" Of course the answer is that this twisted story is yet another way for the Daily to discredit religion. -Paula M. Storm February 4 include their phone for verification. Call for details. numbers 747-2814 I ljllNICE SHOT " B__ _ _ 055! - .4 l ZIIII% -- I I