4 --The Michigan Daily - Friday, January 24, 1997 420 Maynard Street RONNIE GLASSBERG Ann Arbor, MI 48109 Editor in Chief Edited and managed by f, ADRIENNE JANNEY Students at the ZACHARY M. RAIMI University of Michigan Editorial Page Editors Unless otherwise noted, unsigned editorials reflect the opinion of the majority of the Daily's editorial board. All other articles, letters and cartoons do not necessarily reflect the opinion of The Michigan Daily. FROM THE DAILY vtuen4prtet hingsilence student prote st brings diversity issues to 'U' NOTABLE QUOTABLE,, 'She's the kind of person you can't talk about without smiling. I think it was a celebration of her life.' - Aditi Sharangpani, at a memorial service for her sister Arati, who died earlier this month in a Comair plane crash Jim LASSER SHARP AS TOAST otAE BUfLDINfr5 WED . -- c1 I iKE TZ 1 a SEAE a~4 l 1 I f I 1! 1 S tudents - gagged and dressed in black. They wandered in silence, though with obvious purpose, through Angell Hall and the Diag on Tuesday. Many students "heard" their powerful message; many more casually ignored it. And that's the problem they were attempting to bring to others' attention. A coalition of students of color declared Jan. 21, "A Day Without Diversity." The protest was not sponsored by any one mul- ticultural group, but by individual members of many groups who came together and sponsored the event out of their own pock- ets. The protesters wore gags to symbolize the silencing of honest discussion of race issues by students or administrators. The protest was not a plea for radical change, but a stand against the complacency and inaction that often embody methods to deal with racial issues on campus and across the nation. Protesters also highlighted problems with the general spirit of the University's Martin Luther King Jr. Day celebration. One protest pamphlet called the symposium "a masquerade for the persistent discrimi- nation against students." While the events surrounding King's birthday are commend- able for their academic value, they are only part of the spirit of activism that surrounds the inception of the holiday. The day's events should also encourage people to take part in honoring and reflecting on the histo- ry of the University's celebration - relent- less action that made the day possible. The symposium was born out of the Black Action Movement III, which pres- sured the University into observing MLK Day in 1989. BAM III, like its two prede- cessors in 1970 and 1975, pursued solutions to issues that concern black students. BAM was based in a strong, nonviolent activism State senate should i W ithin the hallowed halls of the Michigan's Legislature, a debate over the state's minimum wage is raging. Currently, the Senate is entertaining a pro- posal that would raise the minimum wage in two parts to $5.15 by September 1998, the first wage hike in 19 years. Many Democrats and Republicans agree that the minimum wage should be higher, but they .lave had trouble deciding on a specific neasure. Moreover, business interests and 9abor unions continue to clash over the pro- posed raise. Despite all the contending forces, the Legislature should raise the state minimum wage as soon as possible - it is long overdue, and it would help working families and students. Last year, the federal government raised the minimum wage from $4.25 per hour to eventually reach $5.15. The state proposal closely resembles the federal raise. Also, the state minimum-wage hike would only affect companies that do not engage in interstate commerce and that have gross teceipts of less than $500,000 per year. - The bill before the Senate's Human Resources and Labor Committee would Sallow employees who earn tips to receive ,$2.52 per hour, so long as the tips add up to the minimum wage. Moreover, the bill would provide for a $4.25 per-hour training _ wage that would benefit employees less than 20 years old for the first 90 days of work. Taken together, this proposal would undoubtedly help a significant amount of Michigan residents and employees - the Senate should pass it. - like that of King - and forced the com- munity to address issues of race that the University often glossed over. In 1994, the Black Student Union protested the MLK events on campus - members felt the activist spirit of BAM was not present in the symposium. Though the University's obser- vance of MLK Day improved significantly since, this week's protesters argued that the symposium ignored the activism King him- self lived and preached. Too often, the community reduces King's work to almost anecdotal reference. It seems easy to forget that his dream can only be born out of constant effort and pur- suit of progress. As King wrote from a jail in Birmingham, Ala., "Nonviolent direct action seeks to create such a crisis and establish such creative tension that a com- munity that has constantly refused to nego- tiate is forced to confront the issue." That spirit was present throughout all of King's work; in this spirit, BAM drove campus to come to terms with issues previously unno- ticed. This week's protesters focused on a vital point: Diversity does not visit once per year. Diversity does not come with a series of speakers, whose messages fill the space of a single day. Diversity is, however, a goal that requires vigilant attention and hard work. Denying of the existence of racial tensions, or sweeping them aside, fulfills no purpose. Most important, the protesters stressed that diversity is not an issue that only concerns minorities. The University must continue to increase its efforts to build an environment that is more comfortable for minorities. The University reaps innumer- able benefits from all its variances. Preservation and extension of diversity, therefore, is the responsibility of the entire community. aters raise minimum wage THE MADONNA SCHOOL OF MVSIC f THE CHRIS WEBER 5000L OF TIME MA06EMErJT d ANN* O NG !tIEK-TY O I SFOo ,L. F!EL STEVE AND EMY'S SCHOOL THE TED kACZVNSKI SCHOOL Or: PYRTEHICSANOYIN'C. ADVERT 153 NC, OF LETTERS TO THE EDITOR to $4.75 in July and then to $5.15 next September would greatly benefit working families. Many low-income families rely on minimum-wage jobs as their primary and/or secondary source of financial compensa- tion. As the cost-of-living rises, so must the minimum wage to help such families stay financially solvent. As AFL-CIO Director Tim Hughes said recently, raising the mini- mum wage is "a basic issue of fairness." Moreover, many college students work in part-time, minimum-wage jobs. Often, they work in small stores in small college towns - the same enterprises that the Senate bill directly affects. Hence, a raise in the minimum wage would possibly benefit college students and help them afford spi- raling tuition costs. The bill's other provisions, besides the main wage hike, contain responsible public policy. For example, even though a person who collects tips may earn only $2.52 per hour under the proposal, the legislation guarantees that the individual would never make less than the minimum wage. This important provision not only is consistent with the spirit of the wage hike, it would ensure that this segment of the population receives raises as well. Both Republicans and Democrats have acknowledged that some form of a mini- mum-wage hike will pass soon. The bill before the Senate is a sound proposal - one that would benefit workers and would not adversely affect businesses. The Legislature should pass this bill, or a simi- Daily misses statistic about faculty TO THE DAILY: I would like to call to your attention a mistake that occurred in the Jan. 8 edition of the Daily. In this edition, there was a front page article titled "Minority faculty num- bers climb." In the second paragraph of that article, it was stated that there has been "a 31.3- percent increase during the past five years" in minority faculty at the University. However, upon looking at the graph placed to the right of the article, the caption reads, "the percent of minority fac- ulty at the 'U' has risen 3.1 percent since 1991 ." There is obviously a dis- crepancy in this article. When you study the num- bers, it is in fact that minority faculty has only risen 3.1 percent in the last five years at the University. I feel that an error as great as this one cannot be allowed to go unnoticed or uncorrected. A newspaper that is so widely read and visible on this cam- pus, such as the Daily, must always do its best to avoid such errors. When a mistake is made, it is my strong belief that action on behalf of the news- paper must be taken to cor- rect it. In keeping with the purpose and principle of informing the public correct- ly, I ask that as a newspaper you address this error in an upcoming edition of the newspaper. PONNI PERUMALSWAMI LSA SENIOR ADVOCACY CHAIR, UNITED ASIAN AMERICAN ORGANIZATIONS Daily sports coverage is too negative TO THE DAILY: I would like to comment on the coverage of athletics, especially concerning gym- nastics and track and field. First, I commend the Daily highly for its promptness in printing. The Daily has done an excellent job of running arti- cles shortly after the events they cover. I would also like to praise the Daily on the quantity of coverage for the sports above. It is good to see such an interest in the non- revenue sports. Nevertheless, it appears as though recently the Daily has been preoccupied with rpnrt, nv norccinn r misquote of a team member that we would "kick ass and take names" ("Windy City gusts too bitter for men tum- blers," 1/21/97). The meet was a positive stepping stone for building up a stronger team. Michigan athletics remain an excellent institution. The sportsmanship and class learned through the school's sports last a lifetime. Sports such as track and gymnastics work hard to create an image of the utmost standard. Some articles (such as "Despite negative publicity, Blue women gymnasts praise sport," 1/22/97) are good influences because they accu- rately portray the positive experience of sport. Please keep up this latter kind of work. ED LEDGARD LSA SENIOR, MEMBER, MEN'S GYMNASTICS TEAM ITD's 'funny' business TO THE DAILY: As a student on North Campus, I enjoy some of the benefits of having a CAEN account, including free print- ing and disk space. (Of course, this is all built into our tuition, so technically, it's not free). However, I still have to rely on the Information Technology Division for modem use, as well as some basic services that I cannot get away with- out having. Often, I need to be online to check on simulations, e- mail or other documents from home, and I usually need to do this at night, dur- ing prime-time hours. ITD is charging my funny money account $.44 per hour for modem use. Given that I can use all $10 dollars of my allocation to modem use, this is only 22 hours of online time, and sometimes I need to be online for one or more hours at a time. Sure, ITD suggests that you try to use the off- hours to reduce the rate, but this is not always possible. And this is considering that I have CAEN access as well - just think what the ITD users have to do along with disk space and printing! This $.44 per hour is just too high; either it must be reduced, or more funny money must be given to each student. ITD tends to forget that North Campus people exist. In their letter, they mention their campaigns in the Daily and the University Record, as well at various ITD comput- ing sites ("ITD looking for snuiionn i cmnutino nroh- But I have received noth- ing about this change, and have had to go to the Daily to find out. The idea behind the new policy - where you can go negative on your balance while you are online, but you can't do anything else once you have done so - is unrea- sonable! The instructions for how to check your time left online are hidden in ITD somewhere, and so I don't expect the average computer user to know how to do this. I know it is possible to set up some e-mail warning that would be sent out if your account slipped past a certain amount, which should be implemented. Users should be allowed to go to a certain negative amount so that they can still use services when theirs runs out; the amount that the user is in debt would be taken from their allocation the next month. Twenty-five dollarsras a minimum alloca- tion for these accounts is too high! I understand the need to keep the number of trans- actions (down), but I doubt that reducing this minimum allocation to $5 would cause any problems. I am dissatisfied with ITD's handling of the alloca- tions. I have located an Internet service provider in the area for only $20/month for unlimited usage, with no restrictions on times. Unless ITD wants to see its user base turn to this option, I'd suggest they reconsider their policies to make them more usable to the student body. MICHAEL K. NEYLON ENGINEERING GRADUATE STUDENT 'Sexy' server entertains Bursley residents TO THE DAILY: Almost everything printed in this section is someone's angry diatribe against this or that. In lightsof this, I would like to offer something a bit more positive (since you won't seem to print my angry diatribes). I would like to call attention to and praise Sexy Grandpa. Bursley residents past and present know who I am talk- ing about. He is the cheery food server with the red hat that bears his nickname. Unfortunately, I don't know his real name, but I would like to thank him anyway. Here's a guy that comes to work everyday with a smile on his face, and a pleasant demeanor that is contagious. All of the SHAKING THE 'TREE And out of thReE tree came a few overripe frits ather than write some sappy, tear filled reflection on my years a the Daily for this - my last col umn, I thought I'd share with yous of the exciting e-mail I've gottenun nuts on campus this past year. Sure, I've gotten a lot of compli- ments, but the far more interesting messages come from those who think I should be spayed..>. It's hard to <. choose a favorite, because the KATIE loonies who can't HUTCHINS take a joke write " such articulate, logical and well-inten. tioned thoughts: "Your article on women being able to talk themselves out -of a (traffic ticket, bull ... Thank you very mud from one woman to another, youus fixed our wagons, even if we l 'tear' our way out of a ticket, after thai article it certainly won't happen again Couldn't you simply write about poli- tics?" Well, I tried writing about politics Either nobody read my boring politica columns, or College Republicans sen1 messages calling me an "extremist' and a perpetuator of "hate-filled big. otry." But moving back to attemp t. humor columns got me in trouble tt both meat-eaters and animal rights activists. Check out this lovely message fron an animal lover: "Take a look in the mirror and I bet you will see in'your self the negative traits you attribute tc this cat: selfish, nasty, rude and stuck. up. And then this one from a meat eater: "If you think by not eating anm i brings you closer to nature, it doei 't In fact, it moves you farther away because humans are by nature crniv- orous." Huh? This yo-yo sent me a particularly long and fun-filled message, so I'll give him a little more space: "Also, ii you want spiritual, take the Native Americans for instance. They were about as close to nature as any people could get, and they were carnivo us And don't give me the old it's~ for the environment' argumeni because I'm in SNRE, and I no exactly what's up. Third, as for 'in a politically correct world,' fuck roliti. cally correct because if that's not the dumbest shit to have come around in the last 20 years, I don't know whal is." Okaaaaay. Sure. And in response to my advocacy o family farms, not factory farm e offered: "Besides not being cost-ec tive or efficient, it's just leading the animals on. They're being raised to be killed. It's like pampering and sooth- ing a death row inmate before he is about to be executed." And in case you missed it, I'm goin to be spayed, put to sleep or convicted of a felony, according to this recent let. ter to the editor: "An old adagestates that spaying and neutering makes an animal less aggressive and re friendly. It's unfortunate that 'h Humane Society can't expand its scop of operations. Katie Hutchins would be a perfect candidate for its first human spay patient" This reader is about to b laughed out of the Humane Society foi submitting my cat column to the cruel- ty investigations unit. And some people just can't handle my potty mouth: "Nice language in your editorial. Did you send a co&tc your grandmother? A good journalisi should be able to make a point withou, using four (seven) letter words.' Journalist? Me? Who is this guy kid- ding?4 Of course, not all the weirdos send me hate mail. Some of them actually like me. In response to my pro-smok. ing column last spring, I received this advice: "You didn't consider actually EATING your smoke while waiti to eat. ... For a fun Sunday brea sl (especially if you're drunk at the time) it is fun to ash into your pancakes as ii the pancakes were your ashtray. They are called 'ashtray pancakes'... sort ol like 'blueberry pancakes'... only"with- out the blueberries. Try it some time." And we can't forget the amount ol play I've been getting in The Michigan Review lately. For those of you who've never heard of it, it's a forum for e bonehead Republicans who coo n't make it at the Daily. In their most recent issue,- they called me the "Pretend Environmentalist Chick *Who Nonetheless Wants to Kill Cute .Little VK. r..", Ac f.n m . h a i.*t.