4 - The Michigan Daily - Tuesday, January 13, 2004 OP/ED UlbAMchagan aftu 420 MAYNARD STREET ANN ARBOR, MI 48109 letters@michigandaily.com opinion@michigandaily.com EDITED AND MANAGED BY STUDENTS AT THE UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN SINCE 1890 LOUIE MEIZLISH Editor in Chief AUBREY HENRETTY ZAC PESKOWITZ 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. NOTABLE QUOTABLE Her wearing a hiJab (headscarf) did not prevent her from presenting the news in a savvy way." - The London-based newspaper Al-Haya yesterday on the announcement that Saudi Arabia will have its first female newscaster. BFORE WOEATION hF1C i -f AP'TRLl ~1ON f-lbo t 1 i COLIN DALY THE MICHIGAN DALY o 6 J ' .- ~1 ~ Manners 101: It's OK to disagree with blind people AUBREY HENRETTY NUROICAx M y roommate and I had a LYL brief encounter with an unpleasant lady last week at Meijer, and ever since I haven't been able to shake the feeling that I missed an opportu- nity to say something that needed to be said. Let me explain: Toting only a combined seven items (maple syrup, a broom, a jar of peanut but- ter, a dustpan, a gallon of milk, a griddle and some razor blades - use your imagina- tion), my roommate and I were waiting in the express checkout line at Meijer when a stout older lady (who will henceforth be known as "Irma") appeared behind us and demanded that we push some of our stuff forward on the conveyer belt so she could start unloading her cart. My roommate, slightly taken aback, said well, actually we couldn't, because see the broom was already poking the groceries of the woman in front of us, and there were none of those little plastic divider things left. Irma didn't have time for this. She gave our seven items a shove - nearly skewering the cashier with the broom handle - and set to work. My roommate, still baffled, noticed Irma's full cart and said that, ummm, this was the 12- items-or-fewer line. "Well," Irma snapped as she plunked a huge package of paper towels on the belt, "I'm legally blind and I can't see things like that." Oh. Well. Irma turned back to the man pushing her cart (her husband?) and said, loudly, "She was getting snippy with me." We gaped, conflicted. Actually, I think my roommate was more appalled than con- flicted, but I was definitely having a major, multi-layered moral crisis. Nothing makes my blood boil quite like unprovoked rude- ness, and under normal circumstances I would have had no problem giving Irma an extensive list of places where her attitude might best be stuck. But these were not normal circumstances. Half of my brain was all riled up ("You wanna see snippy? I'll show you snippy"), but the other half ("No, you must be nice to blind people at all times and under all cir- cumstances!") tackled it before it had a chance to seize control of my mouth. In Entitlement Euchre, no card - not the gender card, not even the race card - can trump the physical disability card. As soon as the words "legally blind" hit our ears, my roommate and I understood that our contri- butions to this conversation were no longer welcome. Irma offered this information not to inform or to explain, but to shut us the hell up and let her do what she wanted. And it worked. She won the trick. I couldn't say a damn thing to this lady because all immedi- ately available evidence suggested that her life was harder than mine. Also, and forgive me if this sounds insensitive, but I've been racking my brain for four days, and still I have no idea how being legally blind (a term that encom- passes a wide range of visual impairments) gives a person license to unload a full cart of groceries in the express lane at the supermarket - knowing full well that it is the express lane - while others (with 12 or fewer items) are waiting. I don't think it does at all, and I think most legally blind people would agree. Did I say any of this to Irma? In pub- lic? Ha! Sure didn't. Didn't want to call her out and cause a scene, didn't want the other people in line to think I couldn't appreciate the daily struggle of the dis- abled, which, regardless of how carefully I worded my objection, is what they would have thought. It's a societal thing. Americans love disadvantage - an integral part of the American dream - and they hate to hear its situational relevance questioned. I'd be lying if I said I didn't love it, too - if I said I didn't take some pride in telling people about the crappy jobs I've had to work to pay my bills - but I do think it's important not to let the big and small obstacles we may have faced turn us into pushy Irmas, not to develop victim com- plexes or cheat at Entitlement Euchre. People carry around all kinds of horrors inside their heads, traumas far worse than five years in the food service industry and - dare I say it - at least as difficult to live with as any other disadvantage you can imagine, physical or otherwise. But that's not what makes them great. What makes them great is that they don't use those horrors as excuses to be unprovoked- ly rude at the supermarket. Henretty can be reached at ahenrett@umich.edu. 0 I I LETTERS TO THE EDITOR Affirmative action is another frm of discrimination To THE DAILY: Today at lunch I sat down and read the opin- ion/editorial page, which is the first page I usual- ly read when I open the Daily. At first when I was reading Steve Cotner's column, (Hello, Mr. Connerly; goodbye civil rights, 01/12/04) I didn't have too many problems with it because I know there are a lot of pro-affirmative action people on campus. I was disturbed by a few things such as "most people of a well-cultivated conscience will oppose it." To begin, he isn't totally exclud- ing the idea that some people with a well culti- vated conscience will oppose it, but who is to say what a well cultivated conscience is and how is he to know that most people with one will do so? I consider myself a pretty liberal per- son. Those who know me will agree and if you ever saw me, I'm sure you would have the same preconception just from my looks. I am not one for affirmative action. I think it worked back when it was first started, but as times change, so do policies. I would also like to point out that Cotner said that the rest of the state of Michigan "won't listen to Mary Sue because they don't like the University. It's full of liberal sodomites." I can see why he would have the idea that the conservative people of the state would have this vision of the University, but what are they going to vote for, as pointed out in the article. The same action that was taken in California a few years ago - California being one of the most liberal states in the United States. So if the state didn't want the liberalism, wouldn't they vote in opposition to following the West Coast lead? I also know that one of the black kids who lived on my hall last year told me that he would like to think that he was accepted into the Uni- versity due to his achievements and not by the color of his skin which he was born with and has nothing to do with his ability, which I believe is the achievement that Connerly is trying to achieve with himself also being a black man. I am not saying that most black people think this way for I don't really know, and I know that a lot of black people support affirmative action as well. When Cotner states that they're "ruining higher education" I would like to know how. Higher education is for those who achieve the prerequisites by academic skills, not by the color of their skin, totally voiding those requirements. There needs to be a new form of anti-discrimi- 01/12/04), I urge opponents of the Michi- gan Civil Rights Initiative to ponder this: The Michigan Daily has long been known as a fervent, proclaimed supporter of all things democratic. How can you possibly justify, then, your efforts to influence the University to oppose an initiative that is in and of itself the epitome of democracy - a grassroots initiative that would allow taxpayers to vote on what policies are enacted by their hard-earned tax dollars? Your beliefs are undeniably hypocriti- cal, in that you want popular consensus in so many policies, i.e. presidential elec- tions, but not in another. The University is funded by taxpayers, why shouldn't those taxpayers be given a choice in whether their money is used to enact an inherently racist policy? I ask Mr. Cotner to try implementing a coherent argument against the MCRI next time he writes about it, rather than simply ranting and falsely claiming that the people of Michigan are socially ignorant, racist and afraid of minorities. KYLE BURLESON LSA sophomore Viewpoint gives too much credit to BAMN TO THE DAILY: Yesterday's viewpoint (Now is the time to defend Grutter, 01/12/04), shows the misguided and pompous attitude of BAMN. For the past few months it has been claiming that their presence in Wash- ington directly affected the U.S. Supreme Court's decision to uphold affirmative action. In this column in particular, it claims that "Without the mass mobilization to Washington on April 1, victory would not have been possible." Sadly, this is not true. The Supreme Court does not function like a middle school election. It does not vote for what is popular. It is the Supreme Court's job to decide what is constitutional, not what is popular. BAMN's presence in Washington showed support for affirmative action, but could not have influenced nine Supreme Court justices to support affirmative action. Also, Cordor and Stenvig make the out- rageous claim that anyone who does not ate a diverse environment, as does the Uni- versity, but in doing so it oppresses the political thought of those who disagree with it and slander those who voice their opinions. TED BALL LSA junior Shaman Drum is critical Ann Arbor institution To THE DAILY: What drew me to pick up Friday's copy of the Daily was the prospect of reading why someone would say "Shame on Shaman," referring to one of my favorite book stores in Ann Arbor. In his column (Why I am a capitalist: Shaman Drum Bookshop, 01/09/04), Daniel Adams reveals his narrow conception of what makes a good bookshop. He says, "When I see the words 'book- shop' on the outside of a building, I imme- diately think of a place where one trades money for books - a book store, right?" Wrong. The last time I checked a book- store - at least a really good one - is not just one which sells textbooks. What makes Shaman Drum stand out as an institution in Ann Arbor is not so much the fact that it is a locally owned business, but that it is a genuinely good bookshop. I wonder if Adams has ever hazarded to step into Shaman Drum for any other reason than to buy textbooks. The fact that he has only described the two-level setup of the shop tells me that he has not been inside the other section where the real books reside. Intimate, well-arranged and stocked with a rich array of solid classics, exciting new writings, as well as alternative gems, Shaman Drum is a bibliophile's heaven compared to the mega-book marts where a plethora of New York Times bestsellers and self-help books abound. I've only encountered intelligent and helpful staff members who are not only helpful, but more importantly, knowledgeable enough in their trade to give good suggestions on a good read. Shaman Drum's identity as a bookstore transcends merely selling textbooks. It sells books. Period. And if Adams ever decides to step outside his utilitarian notion of what makes a good store, he 0 .0