4 - The Michigan Daily - Wednesday, December 8, 2004 OPINION 01 4U+420 MAYNARD STREET ANN ARBOR, MI 48109 £p tothedaily@michigandaily.corn EDITED AND MANAGED BY STUDENTS AT THE UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN SINCE 1890 JORDAN SCHRADER Editor in Chief JASON Z. PESICK Editorial Page Editor Unless otherwise noted, unsigned editorials reflect the opinion of the majority of the Daily's editorial board. All other pieces do not necessarily reflect the opinion of The Michigan Daily. NOTABLE QUOTABLE 44'Reaching the point of an agreement in principle has been completed between Egypt, Israel, the Palestinians and several active international parties." - Excerpts from a report by MENA, Egypt's official news agency, which announced that it had learned of a tentative agreement between Israel and the Palestinians, as reported yesterday by the Israeli newspaper Haaretz. SAM BUTLER :A+ Q 477 Y f N &d+ t 0 False assumptions SUHAEL MOMIN AN ALTERNATIVE PIN Apparently, college campuses, and the professors who teach at them, are liberal. Who knew? The Center for Responsive Politics released a study last week, in which it found that employees of the University of California and Harvard were, as groups, the two largest contributors to Sen. John Kerry's presidential campaign. That's insightful - I for one never thought that residents of Boston and the San Francisco would support a liberal, Massachusetts senator. Of 1,000 social science and humanities professors polled across the nation, seven out of eight were Democrats. Groundbreaking. While this study is useless in providing new insight into how to resolve the lack of political diversity on campus, it has been used to bolster the ridiculous assertion that diverse opinions are sim- ply not encouraged on campus. Armed with the study's statistics, conservatives are clamoring that they are systematically excluded from academia. George Will, a conservative columnist at The Washington Post, said universities seek diversity "in everything but thought." David Horowitz is once again pushing his absurd "Academic Bill of Rights," which will - get this - force universi- ties to hire and promote faculty members with "a view toward fostering a plurality of methodologies and perspectives." Do we really need affirmative action for underrepresented conservatives? To argue ideological discrimination is the only expla- nation for such political homogeneity is simplistic, and acting on that assertion is irresponsible. It is necessary to explore other reasons for the observed political uniformity. Is it possible that conservative academics simply do not want to be affiliated with major research institutions? Numerous conserva- tives with doctorates have left college towns for Washington; take Condoleezza Rice, who prior to becoming National Security Advisor, was the provost of Stanford University. In Washing- ton, the Heritage Foundation and Project for a New American Century are machines run by conservative Ph.Ds who crank out policy briefs instead of journal articles. Many conservatives who remain in academia have purposely isolated themselves at small, private and openly con- servative colleges such as Michigan's very own Hillsdale College. Studies that analyze the politi- cal environment at large universities miss these small colleges, and thus many coveted and rare conservative academics. It's also worth nothing that while most cor- porate executives vote Republican and church officials tend to be predominantly conserva- tive, nobody has argued that these institutions are insufficiently diverse or suggested that they discriminate against liberals and Demo- crats. Instead, there is an understanding that those environments foster conservative politi- cal beliefs. Executives tend to vote Republican because highly paid individuals who have to cut through government red tape have a personal incentive to vote for anti-tax, anti-regulation candidates. Looking the other way, individu- als who disagree with the Catholic Church on issues of abortion and gay rights are uncommon within the Church's leadership - not because the Church intentionally discriminates against them, but because such individuals do not wish to rise within the Church. The problem of political homogeneity among college professors might not be the result of intentionally biased hiring prac- tices. Rather, as Fortune 500 boardrooms foster Republicanism, universities discourage it. Of course, I have no proof for any of this, and I could be completely wrong. But certain "struc- tural characteristics" of the academic world can be used to explain its apparent uniformity. In the past, many conservatives opposed the equality of races; today, they reject the equality of sexual orienta- tions. However, academic institutions, committed to the free dissemination of thoughts and ideas, have encouraged tolerance and acceptance of differences. Religious conservatives base beliefs on faith. Academia, on the other hand, demands that intellectual beliefs are based on facts, fig- ures and proof. These "structural characteristics" of academia conflict with the nature of political conservatism, and those who follow the tenets of academia might find it difficult to follow the tenets of conservatism. Thus, just as most liberal Demo- crats don't become high-ranking religious figures, most conservative Republicans don't teach at uni- versities. So, for those who are using this study to sug- gest that universities discourage political diver- sity, it is worth noting that it only points out that homogeneity exists. It provides no causal explanation, and using it to substantiate a vast liberal conspiracy is premature. A deeper look is required before we rush to solve the problem of ideological uniformity. Momin can be reached at smomin@umich.edu. 0 Fighting capitalism, one cup of coffee at a time ELLIOTT MALLEN RRATNALE EXUBERANCE 4 his summer I ful- filled the activist dream. I traveled to the Mexican state of Chiapas where, in 1994, the indigenous Zapatista National Libera- tion Army rose up to oppose to the implementation of the North American Free Trade Agreement. Their revolution resulted in the seizure of large parts of the state, re-invigorating the global Left and raising questions about the merits of neoliberalism. I flew there with other students to learn more about fair trade coffee by living with coffee farmers and visit- ing their cooperatives. The end goal of the trip is to expand fair trade coffee in Ann Arbor by creating direct links between impoverished coffee farmers in Mexico and socially conscious consumers in Ann Arbor, ensuring that the symbol of resistance to global capitalism can be commodified and consumed to the benefit of all parties. The Zapatistas held their uprising the day after NAFTA went into effect to protest the marginal- ization of indigenous populations that tends to goes hand in hand with free trade. On New Years Day in 1994, their irregular army made itself known by seizing the state's capital in a scream for social jus- tice. Their rebellion was brutally put down, forcing them to retreat back into the Lacandon jungle, where they have since pledged to resist nonviolently. Their spokesman, Subcommandante Marcos, instantly became an international celebrity cast in the mold of Che Guevara. It wasn't important that he is (alleg- edly) not an indigenous farmer, but is in fact a for- mer college professor. The mystique provided by his ubiquitous black mask injected sexiness and intrigue into the struggle. His masked face became the mar- ketable embodiment of revolution and social justice, ensuring media attention and global sympathy. The capital of Chiapas, San Crist6bal de las Casas, is an activist Mecca plastered with consum- able images of revolution made popular by Marcos. There are hip nightclubs with names like "La Revo- lucin" featuring murals of Emiliano Zapata painted behind bottles of Bacardi 151. Among the ancient colonial city, one can find opportunistic street ven- dors selling keychains exhibiting Marcos's masked face and one of his out-of-context quotes idealizing revolution. Not to be outdone, the Zapatistas them- selves are capitalizing on these images. After driv- ing by countless military bases on gutted mountain roads to meet with the Zapatista governing body in the autonomous community of Oventic, we were sent to wait in the Zapatista gift shop to peruse the CD selections and purchase inspirational T-shirts. This commodification of the revolution plays directly into the hands of the Zapatistas, as it allows them to spread their image as well as their message. When student activists from the University buy violent Zapatista T-shirts, they are both projecting their own edginess and expanding awareness of the Zapatista struggle, even if the awareness is limited to romanti- cally vague notions of rebellion. The concept of fair trade coffee uses these flashy images to find market solutions for problems caused by the market itself. Instead of selling coffee to conniving middlemen who will then sell to coffee shops, farmers have the option of selling directly to Ann Arbor coffee vendors, guaranteeing them a fair price for their coffee and providing Ann Arborites an inexpensive way to soothe their liberal guilt. Everyone wins. It is easy to be cynical about fair trade coffee. After all, it is based on the somewhat contradictory idea that you have to use capitalism to fight capital- ism. Then again, it's easy for me to gaze into my cup of fair trade coffee and feel ideologically uneasy about the commodification of rebellion when I'm not the one whose stomach is swelling due to malnutri- tion. My privileged position lets me claim the moral high ground, but it's insulting for me to demand that impoverished, oppressed coffee farmers conform to my concept of rebellion in order to make me feel bet- ter about my own consumption habits. According to the Higher Grounds Trading Com- pany, fair trade directly benefits the coffee farmers of Chiapas by paying them almost three times the current market price for coffee. In Chiapas, more than three out of every four indigenous children under the age of five are malnourished, and nine out of 10 indigenous homes do not have running water, meaning that any boost in income is crucial to their survival. According to a report release by Oxfam, an international nongovernmental organization focusing on sustainable development issues, world- wide coffee prices have plummeted to about.25 per- cent of their levels 40 years ago, meaning farmers are often unable to cover the costs of production, let alone the costs of food and healthcare. Farmers who sell their coffee to fair trade vendors are guaranteed to make enough to cover the cost of production as well as living expenses, but these vendors can only buy as much as they are able to sell. That's why Brewing Hope was established. Brewing Hope is a cheesily titled organization con- sisting of students and community members trying to expand the availability of Chiapas fair trade cof- fee into Ann Arbor. A city that strives as hard to be considered socially aware as Ann Arbor is fertile ground for something that can so quickly and easily satisfy a desire for social change. All you have to do is spend a dollar on a cup of coffee, and you're doing your part to change the world. Sure, it's a perfect example of self-fulfillment through passive con- sumption. At least in this case it has very concrete positive results. Mallen can be reached at enmmallen@tumich.edu. LETTERS TO THE EDITOR I Reforms to LSA more complicated than advertised TO THE DAILY: I would like to applaud the Daily in its efforts covering the potential reforms to the College of Literature, Science, and the Arts, as it is very necessary for students to be informed about the changes that could affect them. However, focusing on the political and economic distinc- tions. LSA-SG has supported this, and both the College of LSA and LSA-SG are hopeful that these will be implemented by the Fall 2005 academic term. However, there are no proposals for other minors at this time. I noted that LSA-SG has just begun its research on the possibility of minors in chemistry and religion and increas- ing opportunities for LSA students in kine- Cal alum wants Blue to run Texas into the ground' TO THE DAILY: Michigan and ... Texas. The Rose Bowl pits a Pac-10 team against a Big-10 team. It is the only bowl with any real history. And now, based on six com- puter rankings, the Longhorns of Texas have 4