4 - The Michigan Daily - Wednesday, April 17, 2002 OP/ED abz ffirbiguu Dul 420 MAYNARD STREET ANN ARBOR, MI 48109 letters@michigandaily.com NOTABLE QUOTABLE CHIP CULLEN GRINDfNG TiHE Nm T"rW To1.0 fu1-rM CAT, 9ACY.otW... N~k t3W EDITED AND MANAGED BY STUDENTS AT THE UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN SINCE 1890 JON SCHWARTZ Editor in Chief JOHANNA HANINK Editorial Page Editor 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. The university has offered us a ludicrous policy, so we are responding in kind." a --, . r _ . . AN ~I4NKYov~J. WP1.-F WV4T MORE C AN i s5Ay? 1lLouc '5eV**Y, Auk4 I-ijLtULLC- - fbP. yoio- 'Ccctrce- KINM 55M - PkA~ I LLR -9 i-tiecE 1 °u' ti T You o -- f i PtMl %A :3FF, ( g~pR -: 1 ~ '4~~t 0" t yo %*t ' CV 1 g$4 S fbA R?'PI NJ& F aw,- YEA RS " I -- West Virginia University student Matthew Poe, on response to the establishment of 'free expression areas" at the university, which require official permission slips and 24 hours advance notice, as quoted by CNN. The students responded by drafting 365 permission slips; reserving the space for each day of the year. &vLLEN 4 17 6 2 OC. rt; , \C'? YMt . o.. Four brief thoughts to leave you on NICK WOOMER BACK TO THE WOOM it's time to bid adieu to humanity hasn't quite gotten over the how-many- they're inversely proportional. This is because the death threats - at angels-can-dance-on-the-head-of-a-pin? ques- the policies that make economies grow can also least for now - because tions. The world doesn't need religious tolerance make our lives worse. For example, getting rid you're reading my last col- - it needs a heavy dose of secular humanism. of a lot of our emissions standards would be umn for The Michigan Daily. good for the economy since companies could Law school and a life dedi- JOBs allocate resources away from emissions control cated to redistributing B- A certain little fucker who now works on and toward other areas, like research and School graduates' wealth to Wall Street wrote me last year to tell me that development. But just because stockholders are the people who sweep their companies should not compensate workers seeing the shares climb in value doesn't mean floors awaits me. injured on the job because "this is inefficient and that all of the extra pollution that made that As you may have goes against most logic" (whatever that's sup- stock climb isn't giving their kids asthma. guessed, during my tenure as the Daily's token posed to mean). Clearly he had never done a job Think about how many marriages are socialist columnist, I've received more than a few that required him to actually produce something destroyed due to high consumer debt, or how e-mails from smart asses who think they're the with his hands, the character of much of small-town America first person to deliver unto me the Econ. 101 Well I have: I've worked in a metal file cabi- has been degraded by the arrival of cheap gospels: Incentives?! Efficiency?! Say what?! net manufacturing factory where metal shavings megastores like Walmart ... These are also part Trust me, I'm well aware of what free trade- were blown up under my safety glasses and into of our economy's "success story." topia is supposed to look like and how it's sup- my eyes three times in three months because of posed to work; I'm just not buying into the hype. an illegally-positioned fan. Working in a factory ALTERNATIVES TO CAPITALISM So since all these people have spent the last two is grim, hard work - much harder than any job Just because we know that Soviet-style years sharing with me how they see the world, I some punk graduating from the Business School planned economies don't work doesn't mean we felt like indulging myself a little and sharing a lit- will ever do - and instead of just moving some- have to live with capitalism (or at least the kind of tle of myself with my learned readership. The fol- one else's money around, factory workers actual- capitalism we live with today). Anyone who has lowing aren't arguments per se, they're just a few ly produce something. studied the work of the prominent radical econo- ideas that have shaped my thinking over the past For lack of a better word, this kind of work mists knows that there are several very plausible several years. sucks. In the United States a lot of workers are and very pleasant alternatives to the political and Irtunate enough to be able to sell their long-term economic status quo. What people say about cap- GOD health and (it makes me cringe to use this word) italism today, they were also saying about repre- If Marx's statement that "the criticism of reli- "souls" to hopefully relax for two days of the sentative democracy 300 years ago. gion is the premise of all criticism" wasn't uni- week. In the developing world, workers sell their The point I've been trying to make for the last versally true, it was certainly true for me. I've health (often not just long-term) and their souls to two years is that we should be cynical apropos of been reaping the intellectual fruits of virulent, survive - barely. money and power, but optimistic about the insensitive atheism going on eight years now. A more humane society would strive to make prospects of seeing a genuinely superior altema- Ridding my thoughts of afterlife delusions these jobs a lot easier and compensate workers tive arise to counter the system we currently changed my worldview pretty profoundly. First I fairly for their labor and a good start towards this "enjoy" at the expense of much of the rest of the leamed to appreciate the quality of life that I had, kind of society would be to organize powerful, world and at our own.peril. Hopefully, I've at and then I realized that most other people weren't militant and democratic unions. least managed to get a few people to think about doing quite so well and a good part of the reason some of the things we tend to think of as givens. why they weren't was because of their or others' SOCIAL HEALTH VS. ECONOMIC HEALTH stupid spiritual pretensions. I realized that a lot of A strong economy does not always mean a This is Nick Woomer's last column for the Daily, people get killed all over the world because higher standard of living - in fact, oftentimes he can be reached at nwoomer@umich.edu. LETTERS TO THE EDITOR Daily's criticism of Dean recommendations of these several committees is Proposed SI y Mile will now well underway. She has instituted a strate- Neuman irresponsible, gic long-term planning process for all College preserve tradition, possibly departments and programs that encompasses innaccurate, unbalanced close scrutiny of the current undergraduate become one of its oum offerings and visionary planning to enhance them, including the hiring of new faculty in TO THE DAILY: departments under heavy enrollment pressure. TO THE DAILY: Responsible journalism requires accurate She helped facilitate the removal of barriers to The editorial published yesterday by the representation of the facts. The Daily's editorial interdisciplinary study by supporting changes in Daily, Naked Overhaul, which expanded on regarding Dean Neuman (Not another Neuman, the faculty code that allow LSA students to Nick Noreus' ideas to run the formerly Naked 4/11/02) failed in this regard. apply a greater number of course credits from Mile in underwear, is simply the best idea in The Daily's readers deserve a more compre- units outside of LSA toward graduation and that relation to the situation. hensive and accurate perspective on Dean Neu- establish a new category of "interdisciplinary" I, like many students, believe that the Uni- man's commitment to undergraduate education. courses as area distribution courses. versity and local law enforcement agencies During the three years of her leadership of the A new series of committees now being should focus their energy on stopping those who College of Literature Science and the Arts, Dean formed will take stock of the undergraduate ii- turn the Naked Mile into a free-for-all grope- Neuman developed new rigorous, interdiscipli- tiative 10 years later, review the First Year Sem- fest. However, our embarrassed administration nary undergraduate programs in Organizational inar Program and the pedagogy of is unlikely to do this. So, while a "Skivvy Mile" Studies, the environment (jointly with the School undergraduate language instruction, and devel- would not be as cool as the original Naked Mile of Natural Resources) and Health Sciences. op a curricular component to meet the "thinking it would be the very best compromise in this sit- The College also coordinated and delivered globally" mandate of the Commission on the several new life science courses, team taught by Undergraduate Experience. Finally, she has uation. faculty across several of the university's schools made significant contributions to the future of Hundreds of students would probably turn and colleges, for first and second year stddents. undergraduate education at the University as a out for such an event, due to the fact that the The dean initiated reviews of several undergrad- member of the President's Information Revolu- police would have a very difficult time arresting uate programs and centers, including the Honors tion Commission and Commission on the anyone who is not actually naked. A great cam- Program, the Language Resource Center, the Undergraduate Experience. The cumulative pus tradition would be preserved, and the Science Learning Center, the Program on Stud- effect of these contributions is both impressive administration would (hopefully) stop its crying. ies in Religion and the Office of International and far-reaching, and will benefit current stu- 'he Skivvy Mile was probably introduced too Programs. dents as well as those to follow. late to make an impact this year, however, let us She initiated a faculty-student committee MARJORIE HORTON remember this wonderful idea for 2003! Long charged with the "Re-invention of Honors" to LSA Assistant Dean of Undergraduate Education live the Naked Mile! develop a flagship program that will attract top ROBERT OWEN KYLE METEYER scholars to enroll in LSA. Implementation of the LSA Associate Dean of Undergraduate Education LSA sophomore VIEWPOINT In Mideast conflict, too much energy given to rhetoric l i 0 BY JASON RADINE As the violence between Israelis and Palestini- ans continues, observers around the world and on this campus have rightly spoken up about it, but not necessarily against it. While a wave of anti-Arab prejudice has grown in this country since Sept. 11, Palestinian rhetoric against Israel has all too fre- quently crossed the line into outright bigotry and hatred against Jews worldwide. The flames of vio- lence in the Middle East are fanned by hateful pro- paganda and demonization of the Other. Much of this rhetoric is fueled by a story- offer to accept the Barak offer, or one close to it. This may coax the Israeli electorate into reelecting a Labor government that could renew Barak's offer of a way out of this. Hopefully it is not too late. Israelis are frustrated, having had their peace pro- posals answered with intifada as well as suicide bombings from organizations committed to Israel's total destruction. Arafat, or a future Palestinian leader, must offer Israel a plan it can accept. In the meantime, Sharon has allowed the violence to con- tinue by not accepting the Tenet and Mitchell plans, on the grounds that its stipulation that Israel freeze settlement construction would be a concession made under fire. Despite that stipulation, Sharon should cannot pretend that its military incursions occurred in a vacuum, as if the recent string of suicide bombings either didn't happen or were somehow justified. Any country faced with murderous terror organizations committed to its destruction and opposed to negotiation would understandably respond with force, although Israel all too fre- quently responds in excessive ways that torment the Palestinian population and injure Israe"s image abroad. The demonization of Israelis and bigotry against Jews that emanates from much of the Palestinian rhetoric has undermined the Israeli Left, putting the Israeli public on the defensive 0 ' a-xw.::aisrwa w . .. ......... Ad