4A - The Michigan Daily - Thursday, March 9, 2000 $b Mirbiga ai &g ywe'e still a school of rich white kids 420 Maynard Street Ann Arbor, MI 48109 daily.letters@umich.edu Edited and managed by students at the University of Michigan MIKE SPAH Editor in Chief EMILY ACH'EN BA ' Editorial Page Eoitor Unless otherwise noted, unsigned editorials reflect the opinion of the majority ofthe Daily's editorial board. All other articles, letters and cartoons do not necessarily reflect the opinion of The Michigan Daily. Issues deserving MSA candidates' focus was in Houston, Texas, for just two days of spring break- but I only needed to be thcre for mintes before my repressed suspi- cions were awakened and confirmed. I need to get out of Ann Arbor, Sure, Ann Arbor has been great lately - throngs of gorgeous people, minus heir bulky coats, are coming out of the woodwork. Enterprising students could probably sell skip-class-and-spravwI patches of the Diag. Everything smells better. But Diag frolick- ing and Dominick's can't make me forget my true feelings: As much as I love this collegiate fantasy world, I want to be in Emily a city - not the City AChenbaum of Ann Arbor,' but a real one, with sky- * scrapers and ghettos. I .,R*gh want to be around a lot of people who look nothing like me. Thus the repressed suspicions: The only conspiracy theory I've ever believed in is the one that fools people into thinking Ann Arbor is a city, home to a University that is '"diverse." But both Ann Arbor and the Uni- versity's images are wannabe ones that will win you over if you stay here long enough. And it only takes a few minutes elsewhere - like Houston - to find out both are fak- ers. I walked across the University of Hous- ton's campus with my father. Home to more than 30,000 students, it is about 15 percent white - and their definition of white includes Hispanics. Read that again. Fifteen percent white. Put down your paper, look around you. I was genuinely astounded. Houston isn't even one of the traditionally black southern schools. Their admissions office does not bend over backwards to attract minorities. A short drive away is Rice University, which looks a lot more like our own Univer- sity: Southern-snotty rather than East Coast- haughty, but still blatantly rich and white. Rice is considered one of the nation's top schools; its tuition rivals the Ivies'. Like us, they tout their "diversity." Would Rice's campus look like Hous- ton's if they had an over-zealous affirmative action policy? Probably not. The problem here is not black or white: It's green. I have always had mixed feelings about affirmative action. Affirmative action was founded on the right idea - giving an advantage to the disadvantaged. It seems simple enough. There's no denying that racism is an unacceptable, intolerable and damaging part of society. Decades after the Civil Rights Movement, racism still lives on - be it in the form of David Duke being taken seriously as a politician, or suggesting a minority received admission to the Univer- sity solely based on their skin color, rather than merit. But greatest source of discrimination is against the poor. Take a look at the bigger picture. Minori- ties are statistically more likely to live in poorer areas and less likely to have health insurance. Racism and poverty both con- tribute to a vicious cycle, nearly devoid of opportunity. Class mobility and education go hand in hand. It's the stuff sociology departments are based on. Society is institu- tionally discriminatory against people whose only "fault" is their economic status. Although we live in a country of equal opportunity, injustices due to economic sta- tus, often affecting minorities, are ingrained in our culture. If affirmative action was W ith the MSA elections upon us, it is important to consider the issues among the propaganda spouted by candi- dates. Candidates should be focusing on issues that they can actually have an impact on or at least need to take a stance on. Here are some realistic issues - big and small - that warrant their consideration: Abolishig the code The Code of Student Conduct should be abolished. This ridiculously vague and overbearing code should be a top concern for all candidates. MSA hasn't done anything significant to combat the unjust policies of the Code, yet last year MSA passed a meaningless resolution condemning sanctions against Iraq. Can- didates can show with a plan to eliminate the Code that they have an actual con- cern for the students of the University by challenging the administration on a seri- 4' us issue. .. Tuition MSA can help fight dramatic tuition increases. Guaranteeing a tuition freeze is impossible, but a united MSA could apply pressure by lobbying in Lansing. Tuition, both in-state and out-of-state is already difficult to pay for many stu- dents. Throw in raises due to inflation, and many students are frozen out of attending school here. Student group funding MSA is the chief source of funding for many organizations, including minor- ity groups. Groups should not feel cheat- ed by the process, nor should it take long to fill out paperwork and determine the dispensing of funds. Last fall, a pro-life group initially received significantly less than a pro-choice group. Although this was eventually solved, it shows the flaws in the system. Regardless of personal beliefs, every organization that wishes to express itself according to its First Amendment rights should be able to do so. Candidates should watch the Univer- sity of Wisconsin's pending Supreme Court case which may end a student group fee in tuition. Pass/fail and drop/add deadlines With each just a few weeks into the "semester, students are pressed for time when determining whether to keep a class, drop it or take it pass/fail. Moving these deadlines back into at least Febru- ary would present students a greater opportunity to evaluate a class before acting on it. This semester's deadline (for both pass/fail and drop/add) was January 25 - only three weeks into classes. Wolverine Access It's a small detail, but with so many students up past midnight nearly every night, Wolverine Access' operators should consider making this invaluable service run later than its current mid- based on socioeconomic status, it would W justly target the racial groups admissions office desire, as well as overlooked whites. Money is directly related to opportunity. To a certain extent, knowledge and experi- ence - in the form of SAT prep classes or foreign language club trips - can be bought. If universities choose to use special privileging in its admissions process, they should give it to students from poorer parts of the nation. It is the financially disadvan-@ taged that are victims of the most silent dis- crimination, and not everyone even considers it discrimination - while no one is blamed for being unable to change their racial makeup, the poor are often blamed for being poor. I felt like a minority on Houston's cam- pus, and it intrigued me. Persppctive is a funny thing: I grew up in Pittsburgh in an upscale but but urban - as in ethnic - neighborhood. My neighbors were real Greeks and real Latin Americans, not I'm0 "part Greek see how my skin is olive and look at my Kappa sweatshirt" or "Jennifer Lopez, you-only-wish Latin." Upon moving to Ann Arbor in the third grade, my parents claim I surveyed my new school playground and asked: "Where are all the black chil- dren?" I have no memory of this, but it's funny to think I was once used to not being in the overwhelming majority. With the exception of vain tears when my childhood friend's mother (who was black) informed me my hair was too soft and slippery for the braids and beads her daughter sported, I thought little about race as a child. We need affirmative action to make the University diverse. And this affirmative action must extend to special consideration for those from poor areas. Ann Arbor does not have the ethnic feel it wishes it does. - EmilyAchenbaum can be reached via e-mail at emilvlsa@umich.edu. i night time. Often, a student will need to check a class's availability, or his/her schedule, or use another service. Dining Hall Food Food service through the Residence Halls Dining Service has always been an issue in elections. While there have been small changes and improvements, there is a lot more to be done. The ability to swipe an M-Card through twice in one meal is a great addition, and we hope to see even more flexibility in the meal plans, such as meals on Sunday nights and carrying-over of unused meals from week to week. Some other issues that have been raised are: Quality of food hours of mealtimes and vegetarian options. MSA representatives could be advocates to the University, as some have to a small extent in the past, to change these things. Committees could also be formed to study dining services at other Universities, or to look at the possibility of hiring an outside corporation to take over food service. Michigamua The Tower takeover and the Students of Color Coalition demands are currently major issues at the University. It is possi- ble the administration will ask MSA rep- resentatives to decide whether or not to allow Michigamua to use the space in the Union. Candidates for MSA should make their views on this clear. Building Hours A relatively new issue raised by some candidates during this election is the possibility of extending the building hours of the Michigan Union, libraries and the CCRB to 24-hour schedules. Candidates should consider the merits and downsides of this. While keeping library open 24 hours could be very ben- eficial to students who study late hours, keeping the CCRB open 24 hours may not be feasible or make financial sense. Candidates should state both their views on this and how they plan to make their choices happen. Affirmative Action Affirmative Action will arguably be the most important issue MSA will have to deal with next year. Both lawsuits attacking the University's affirmative action policies are scheduled to go to trial next year. As the official voice of the student body, all candidates must make their opinions clear on this. Students complain about many of the issues listed above on a daily basis. MSA is also accused of being ineffective and inefficient. The only way to change this is for students to go and vote for candi- dates who have a clear stance on reason- able issues, and who have the ability and willingness to work to make them hap- pen. The most important thing students can do is vote. CHIP CULLEN GRINDING THE NIB Body shape and success have no connection TO THE DAILY: Michael Yung-Hsin Hu's March 7th letter ("Thinness does equal personal success") was truly misguided and so full of bigotry that I feel it brought shame on the Lni y To begin, many happy and healthy people feel that the "whole point Of life" is not "to succeed as much as you can. There are far too many aspects of life that are not subject to change to make their perfection a condition of mental well-being. In order to live happily, most people accept their own averageness or inferiority in areas that they have little control over. I wouldI point out that for many peo- ple, weight and body shape is such an aspect of life, one over which there is lit- tle control. While the genetics of obesity have not been sorted out, it has been demonstrated that obesity can be brought on by certain mutation-causing viral infections, and can be inherited. A few familial cases of obesity have, for example, been linked to a mutation in the lepyin gene. There is also clear evi- dence for the regulation of and misregu- lation of hunger and metabolism in the brain, and this regulation can not neces- sarily be overridden by sheer willpower, ie.. striving to meet a particular ideal. Moreover, the expectation that aver- age or overweight people should struggle in vain their entire lives to meet a very low weight goal which a few people meet MtCP~\GA STAGE SENAiPTOR MFVIA lxe M; ki UG"T OF HIS RECENT0.0.1.,1 EE T.Z RESIGN PROM u'r OFCE'1NDRU~1 FOR TNT MASACHUSETTSSENATE SEAT. effortlessly is unrealistic and unhealthy. And while it is true that on the whole America has a serious weight problem, declaring only the very thin to be true strivers and deserving of success is igno- rant and unfair. Secondly, I think it is dangerous to think of thinner people as being generally superior. Since when is waist size inversely proportional to character and worth? These ideas sadly remind me of the eugenics movement, which supported and excused genocide on the part of the Nazis. The inherent "inferiority" of certain groups, according to this line of thought, recommended their ostracism and eventu- al elimination from a "superior" society. It is sad that Hu feels average-looking or overweight people do not deserve to "get ahead in life" or be in the spotlight. Apparently Hollywood feels the same way, or there would be more average and overweight people playing leading roles in films and on television. Thankfully, however, Hu happens to be wrong about weight determining suc- cess, because outside of Hollywood, peo- ple tend to judge one another on true merit. What truly determines if people are exceptional, and whether or not they'll succeed, is all on the inside of a person, not on the outside. Perhaps Hu would do everyone on campus a favor, and send a picture of himself'to the Daily, so that we could all see what makes him fit to judge the worth and ability of others solely based on appearance. He must be very secure about his own appearance if he can judge others so basely. SARA ATON LSA SENIOR Guns don't kill people, Keanu kills people Fair game Candidate spending et the races begin. Michigan Student Assembly elections are two weeks away and the candidates are in full force. It is always interesting to see the extremes MSA candidates go to so they can win a few more votes - free T-shirts, buttons, coupons and professionally made posters and flyers. When it comes to elections, how much is too much? Candidate spending must be carefully monitored. The candidate or party with the most money can afford not only a larger mass of endorsement materials, but as well as the opportunity to win over their fellow must be monitored students with free pizza and ice crcAm coupons. Name recognition can be bought. An enforced cap on MSA elections i a necessity is order to keep all candidats on an equal playing field. The cost of campus life is already at a level of near extortion. A student who comes to the University on scholarships and is on financial aid probably could tot finance a campaign the way a student o is backed by wealthy parents coujd. oi- sions must be made to make elections qual and fair. Candidates should compee o a merit base level instead of a monetary one A fter those chaps blew the roof off of -iCoiuumbine High School before slaugh- terina themselves, the national media tried to piace the blame for their behavior on mov ies and video games. I thought that the blame was misguided, and unfair. I've seen Babe 2: Pig in the City, and I've played Fro ger. and there is nothing in either of those two tremendously amusing medium of entertainment that would incite me to commit a violent act.r The pig sings. for Christ's sake. But I guess I've been w'atching the wrong miovies, and phDlagv the wrong game. ute over the pfirst break I had the chancee to take in TheStC s atrx f_ the first time, andnDaydn p lay H louse ot' t he Dead 2 for the first Horn time. \\hoa. Hrn grpy Tou know how w hen ou were hitte you had a tough ime distinguish ing reality from make- bel iev (like Keanu). Santa Claus, Snuffle- upagus and Kelsey Girarme r - you never Cancun's central Pennsylvania's many glori- ous shopping malls, and found myself in the old arcade while waiting for my Sbarro's pizza. I usually stick to the comfortable con- fines of the Classics section - where Frog- ger and his buddies shine - but this House of the Dead caught my eye, and I had recalled hearing a paranoid mother speak out on the news against this particular game. So I changed my dollar bills to quarters and began playing, as my pizza got cold. Holy zombies, batman! The game is fun, no doubt. It's addictive, too, and eerily graphic. There is a plethora of these games out there - in arcades, on PCs and on Playsta- tion/N64 - and they put a gun in the play- er's hand, allows him to shoot at remarkably real-looking characters (yes, even the zom- bies), and provides a reset button, as well as a pause and a power off button. There are no consequences. Death and slaughter are shown in a favorable light. And for the most part, that's all fine. But a 6-year-old boy doesn't understand. This latest incident of violence among the unbe- lievably young happened right here in Michigan, and for a kid whose pop is in the slammer and whose legal guardian - his uncle - is a drug dealer, a lack of proper parenting and family support rendered his first supported prosecuting the boy as a adult. It's not like he found a gun and wa waving in around the playground, showing it off. He walked to school with it in his pock- et - clearly understanding, at the very least, that he needed to conceal the weapon, as what he was doing was wrong. Youth killings are not going to end any time soon. You know, there was once a time when you had to be really strong physically to kill another person. As comedian Chris Rock affirms, "the best part of having a gun is not having to work out." Well, that's a litb tle unsettling. There should be absolutely n possible way for a 6-year-old to be able to kill anyone they please. The same should apply for 30 year olds, but one step at a time. Guns are portable killing machines that give unwarranted power to those indi- viduals who possess them. The point is sim- ple and obvious: Guns are scary as hell. I am not a proponent of censorship of video games and movies, nor am I in favor of repealing the Second Amendment to the United States Constitution. A mature, responsible adult can do whatever he or she pleases, whenever he or she pleases. But gun ownership and parent status are so great a responsibility. Video games and movies are not evil - they're fun - but