Page 4- The Michigan Daily - Monday, September 17, 1990 EDITED AND MANAGED BY STUDENTS AT THE UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN 420 Maynard Street Ann Arbor, Michigan 48109 NOAH FINKEL Editor in Chief DAVID SCHWARTZ Opinion Editor 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. lil / F-NI the Dag@ilyE Censorship Applications discriminate against Blacks THE CURRENT RISE IN CENSOR- of Americans. Because hip hop is an ship has only helped to elucidate why African American form of art, it ex- artists are opposed to the legal curbing presses, both lyrically and rhythmi- of individuals' right to express cally, the experiences of members of themselves. Freedom of expression that history, including their hopes, their and speech became explicit rights in fears, their history, and yes, even their order to allow voices other than that of prejudices. This form of art can never the dominant culture to be heard. How- be fully understood by white America. ever, the latest wave of censoring the However, instead of recognizing arts has shown that politicians have, that rap is a different form of expres- whether knowingly or not, used their sion, the would-be censors - who are power to stifle minority cultures of members of the dominant culture - American society. say the United States is threatenedby the views expressed in rap and the The censorship that is occurring in ways in which they are expressed. the music industry is perhaps the most Unfortunately, because it is not a part obvious example of this point. While of their culture, it is easier for them to many groups such as Guns N' Roses focus solely on the "obscene" and and The Red Hot Chili Peppers have misogynist nature of rap music. come under attack for being obscene, The irony is that by censoring acts sexist, or (in the case of GnR) racist, such as 2 Live Crew, the "protectors of only rap - a form of music expressive morality" are implying that the misogy- of African-American culture - has nist views expressed by this group been banned in certain areas of the (and others) are views or ideologies United States. that are uncommon or even alien to the Groups like Public Enemy and rest of American society. Sadly, this NWA both experienced de facto cen- and worse forms of sexism are not sorship in the past. Police in many lo- only prevalent, but widely held beliefs. calities refused to give NWA members Still, Black artists and musicians the standard amount of protection dur- tend to bear the brunt of censorship ing performances due to the group's more than their white counterparts. No anti-police lyrics. In recent months, one has yet brought legal action against members of rap groups 2 Live Crew Andrew Dice Clay, for example, for and Kid N' Play were arrested for al- his performances. legedly obscene performances. Even if This is not to suggest, however, that censorship in general were not an is- Clay and other offensive performers sue, the fact that a predominance of should be included in the censorship certain kinds of music - that which net. All artists, whatever their culture, expresses a non-dominant culture - is should be free to pursue their music - being censored, is a problem that must or painting, or writing, or film making be addressed. ' - absent of government interference. Rap musicians are most likely being Still, the fact that Black artists are attacked not simply because they are targeted more forcefully than their Black, but rather because the culture white counterparts is a glaring example from which they draw their inspirations of the discriminatory dangers of cen- and influences is foreign to the majority sorship. Parental consent Becky Bell's case should serve as a reminder TWO YEARS AGO ON SEPTEMBER In order to obtain a judicial bypass, 16, 1988, Becky Bell, a 17 year old a female minor must present her case high school student died from a before a judge who determines whether botched illegal abortion. She lived in she is mature enough to have an Indiana, a state where parental consent abortion. The paradox that arises is required to obtain a legal abortion. presents a possible case in which a This law requires any woman under the female minor can be found to be too age of 18 to get permission from a immature to choose an abortion yet parent before allowing them have an mature enough to carry a pregnancy to abortion. term. This leaves young women in the Becky came from a close family, but State of Indiana and in other states with felt unable to tell them about her preg- parental consent laws with little few nancy for fear of disappointing her options. parents. A significant number of the female Statistics show that 50% of the first-year students at this University are teenagers in this country grow up in under the age of 18. Thus, the parental dysfunctional families, where children consent law passed last Wednesday by are often unable to approach their the Michigan State Legislature has a parents on matters such as this. Unlike possible effect on this campus. many of these children who risk Tonight at 7:30, p.m. on the Diag, rejection and possibly even violence by the parents of Becky Bell will speak at telling parents about plans for an a candlelight vigil for their daughter, abortion, Becky was in no such marking the two year anniversary of danger. her needless death. Mr. Bell has given Yet she refused to tell them, even as up his work so that he and his wife she lay dying in her hospital bed. Karen can dedicate their lives to "When restrictive abortion laws are educating the public about the true passed and enforced, young women nature of parental consent laws. The are injured, their lives often shattered. Bells did not even know that a parental Some will die." (Eleanor Smeal- Fund consent law existed in Indiana when for the Feminist Majority) their daughter died. By sharing their In a state where a female minor tragic story, the Bells hope to inform must gain consent for an abortion either people about the dangers of these laws from a parent or from a "judicial and possibly prevent the deaths of bypass," Becky was forced to obtain other young women. an illegal abortion. Because the judicial All students are encouraged to attend system in Indiana is not likely to grant the vigil and to fight against the a judicial bypass - only about twelve parental consent legislation in are given each year in that state - Michigan. This law can only lead to Becky did not attempt to obtain one. more tragedies like that of Becky Bell. TUDF-50JERk.-EFOT-W - IYO fUT9 IV O U& FEFQ F at v, WELtr '.'o PuffN G r'UT Y ED Y h'o:'( URW5 T -r LEAS,,2-- PONT\ r C\JIL jRj(Np5 INNAFR oP hO-K fl~N5 i y\I~TI~k I~h5&NL i~i&y ~I'~ C ULP UC-, _ __ _ _ __ _ _ J L 0 f _ MSA sacrifices student interest in its budget * By Stephanie Simon and Tony Barkow The recently released internal budget for the Michigan Student Assembly contains an inequity that will prove severely detri- mental to the students of the University of Michigan. The budget of the External Re- lations Committee (ERC) has been cut for the second consecutive year, with this year's budget being reduced by almost one- third, from $4200 to only $3000. The External Relations Committee is the voice and representative of U-M stu- dents to the local, state, and federal gov- ernments. The ERC represents and lobbies for students in issues such as financial aid, students' rights, and quality of education. This includes, but is not limited to, federal and state education allocations and student opposition to tuition increases. These are the purposes of student govern- ment and of MSA: to represent you, the students, in these areas. Lobbying is expensive and far more ef- fective when University populations band together through participation in lobbying organizations. One university might not influence policy, but the united calls of all state-schools in Michigan, as represented by the Michigan Collegiate Coalition (MCC), or the hundreds of schools across Simon is an LSA junior and Chair of the Michigan Student Assembly External Relations Committee. Barkow, a senior in LSA, is the vice-Chair. the nation represented by the United States Student Association [USSA] will certainly affect the votes of our representatives. It is with this thought in mind that the ERC participates in MCC and USSA con- ferences each year. This summer, the ERC needed approx- imately $1000 to represent the students of the University. The ERC needed $800 to attend the United States Student Associa- tion (USSA) conference, in order to repre- sent students at the federal level, and $200 to attend the Michigan Collegiate Coali- tion conference, in order to represent stu- dents at the state level. but MSA President Jennifer Van Valey and the MSA Summer Assembly did not find this to be a priority. Instead, $1000 was allocated to the Palestinian Solidarity Committee's (PSC) infamous "fact-find- ing" mission. It seems that the concerns of the PSC outweighed financial and edu- cational needs of the entire student body. If the ERC is not able to attend these conferences, it has no power to determine the priorities of these organizations. If we have no influence on their policy, these lobbying organizations will not represent the students at the University of Michi- gan. With this, we would lose our most Even without massive cuts in its funding, the ERC lacked sufficient funds to attend the USSA * conference. With further budget reductions, it will be impossible to attend either conference, leaving the ERC unable to represent students' concerns during the regular school year. The platforms for both of these organi- zations are set at these conferences. Even without massive cuts in its fund- ing, the ERC lacked sufficient funds to attend the USSA conference. With further budget reductions, it will be impossible to attend either conference, leaving the ERC unable to represent students' concerns dur- ing the regular school year. The ERC needed only $800 to repre- sent student concerns at the federal level, effective tools to influence the decisions of our government. What are the priorities of student gov- ernment? What are the priorities of MSA and of MSA President Van Valey? We 1 urge you to attend the next MSA meeting on Tuesday, September 18 at seven p.m., when this budget will be debated. Voice your concern to the Assembly during con- stituent time; make your elected represen* tatives accountable to you. -T Rackham too small Group self- f' a To the Daily: Catherine MacKinnon's talk (9/13/90) was a fitting introduction to the Univer- sity. I don't mean the content of the talk, which was no doubt extremely provoca- tive. It was a good introduction to the bu- reaucracy of the University, because as usual the event's schedulers did not antici- pate the overflow crowd at the Rackham Ampitheater. I planned my afternoon to go to the talk only to have to leave right away be- cause there was no possible way to hear the talk, even in the hallways and door- ways where many people were crowding. Meanwhile I noticed a larger auditorium in Rackham empty. I wish I could say this was just a mis- take, but I've been here six years and I have gone to only one Rackham event that met in a room large enough for its audi- ence. That one event was a panel of schol- ars on China. Since none of the scholars were that well-known to the public at-large it seemed that this event was well-scheduled. However, I don't know who the come- dian was that thought Liu Binyan, one of China's most noted dissidents, would draw a crowd smaller than the Rackham amp- itheater. The Political Science Department alone probably filled that itty-bitty place. For that matter I don't know why no- tables like Stephen J. Gould, Noam Chomsky, Ralph Nader and Clifford Geertz were at Rackham also. It's gotten so that when I know there is a big name speaker that is too big, I don't even try to attend. UestrucVLive To the Daily: I just wanted to thank you for includ- ing the article entitled "ACT-UP members protest anti-gay event" in the Daily (9/11/90) Although it was written in an unbiased manner, it did a world of justice to Jeff Muir's article in the September is- sue of the Michigan Review. Your article succeeded in exemplifying the point Mr. Muir made, that ACT-UP Ann Arbor is an organization (and I use that term very loosely) that "is only inter- ested in operating within a system which allows it to espouse, uninterrupted and un- challaenged, its particular views." In burning a copy of the Michigan Review, ACT-UP predictable reacted as they so often do, "with hostility toward anyone who questions any of its credenda." Please continue to give ACT-UP the publicity it so craves because this will only contribute to its own deterioration. Besides, ever since you took the funnies out of your paper, I've needed a good laugh. Jeff Luther Engineering junior ACT-UP 'Acts up' To the Daily: I read with horror the story in Wednes- day's edition about Act-UP intimidating a group of bigots out of a meeting. Granted, bigotry is evil, but theaConstitution guar- entees everyone the right to free assembly. Don't like what you, see? Tell our readers what you think. Write to the Michigan Daily at 420 Maynard Street, or send your letters ia MT5R to -I