4A - The Michigan Daily - Monday, January 30, 2006 OPINION igh e lCic i ttt 3 tt'cl DoNN M. FRESARD Editor in Chief EMILY BEAM CHRISTOPHER ZBROZEK Editorial Page Editors ASHLEY DINGES Managing Editor i EDITED AND MANAGED BY STUDENTS AT THE UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN SINCE 1890 420 MAYNARD STREET ANN ARBOR, MI 48109 tothedaily@michigandaily.com NOTABLE QUOTABLE I promise from now on, two-and- a-half months of absolute sexual abstinence." - Italian Premier Silvio Berlusconi, pledg- ing abstinence until the April 9 elections to a popular TV preacher, as reported yesterday by the Associated Press. KATIE GARLINGHOUSE loUsE ARRET Google Spy iS NSA J7 4AUl :say el *I Unsigned editorials reflect the official position of the Daily's editorial board. All other signed articles and illustrations represent solely the views of their author. Bigger than Michigamua MARA GAY COONO SENSE al f Michigamua has reformed its ways, there's no way any of us would know. So when three University seniors were forced out of their student organiza- tions after being exposed as members of the semi- secret society, there was little outcry. After all, no progressive student group wants to be linked to a shadowy clique of elites that has been ostracized in recent years for its insensitive use of Native American rituals, artifacts and names. The three students, Brian Hull, Sam Woll and Neal Pancholi, claim they joined Michigamua in the hopes of reforming the society. "Anyone who knows me and my passionate commitment to working for social justice knows that I would never be a part of organization that would betray these principles," Woll said to the Daily a week ago (Michigamua members ousted from group, 01/25/2006). And if it is possible to reform Mich- igamua, there is probably no better candidate to take on the challenge than Woll, whose nearly five years at the University have been filled with a laundry list of worthy and progressive causes to which she has devoted herself fully, from affirma- tive action to the campaign against Coca-Cola. But in a viewpoint in the Daily last week (Mich- igamua speaks out, 01/26/2006), Michigamua charged that "any claims that Michigamua has a history of 'racism' are fundamentally misguided," revealing the society's stubborn refusal to fully acknowledge its racist past. The secrecy surround- ing Michigamua has proven to be an insurmount- able obstacle as well, making it nearly impossible to hold the society accountable. In short, Michigamua is not a worthy cause for would-be reformists. It is beyond redemption. Stu- dents Supporting Affirmative Action, the South Asian Awareness Network and the Coalition to Cut the Contract with Coca-Cola were right to deny membership to anyone in their ranks found to be affiliated with Michigamua. Still, it's no great feat to drown a sinking ship. By simply renouncing ties with some of their most talented and dedicated (if misguided) members, these student groups largely miss the point: Mich- igamua is an outdated club whose backward prac- tices - remaining exclusively male until the class of 2000, for instance - long ago sealed its own demise. Those who believe Michigamua is the only organization on this campus with a culture of racism or exclusion it has failed to acknowledge or address are sorely mistaken. Indeed, racism is no less sinister when it manifests itself in politi- cally correct and savvy student groups. The Greek System, for example, is essentially segregated by race, and The Michigan Daily just barely escaped another bout of boycotts last semester. Yet there are few who would advocate purging Daily news reporter Jacqueline Howard from her post as head of the University chapter of the National Associa- tion of Black Journalists and expect to be taken seriously. Michigamua is, in fact, little more than a red herring, and student groups interested in social change will have to look beyond scapegoating their wayward members to demonstrate their commitment to progress. The greatest threat to Michigamua, and all other organizations whose institutions and cul- ture allow racism to thrive on this campus, will not arise from student groups deflecting collective responsibility onto a few of their members. The greatest threat to Michigamua will come when the most dedicated members of student groups of all stripes come together to form a new organization dedicated to a progressive future. This campus think tank, this "brain trust" of sorts, is the only answer to Michigamua, and its creation will seal the fate of student groups who fail to reform their narrow-minded ways. The Roosevelt Institution was created less than a year ago by students at Stanford University. The first student think tank, the Roosevelt Institu- tion is designed to organize student activists and intellectuals into an effective lobbying voice in national politics. The ethos of the new think tank can be found on its website, rooseveltinstitution. org: "We're young and ideologically unburdened, we understand the changing nature of society, and we know we have a bigger stake than anybody else - we're talking about what sort of a world we want to inherit. Other think tanks have Nobel laureates and former secretaries of state. We have future Nobel laureates and secretaries of state in training." The University's chapter is-just getting started this month, and the Institution could not have arrived on our campus at a better time. Eradicating racism, sexism and other symptoms of the small mind from this campus is as daunting as it is important, and it demands more of us than we are currently giving. If student groups on this campus are truly interested in change, they will put their commitment where their mouths are. They will dare to generate the new and big ideas that make the University great. Gay can be reached at maracl@umich.edu. VIEWPOINT BAMN exposes MCRI deceit Editorial Board Members: Amy Anspach, Andrew Bielak, Reggie Brown, Gabrielle D'Angelo, John Davis, Whitney Dibo, Milly Dick, Sara Eber, Jesse Forester, Mara Gay, Jared Goldberg, Ashwin Jagannathan, Mark Kuehn, Will Kerridge, Frank Manley, Kirsty McNa- mara, Rajiv Prabhakar, Matt Rose, Katherine Seid, Brian Slade, John Stiglich, Ben Taylor, Jessica Teng. THE BOONDOCKS A.A RON MCORU DER By KATE STENVIG, MONICA SMITH AND BEN ROYAL The viewpoint (Stop BAMN, by any legal means, 1/24/2006) and the letter (Group wants to hold BAMN accountable, 1/25/2006) by the "new" anti- BAMN group contained only falsehoods and irrel- evant trivialities. BAMN is slandered all the time, and none of these slanders are new. We don't have time to sort out the falsehoods and trivialities each time they surface. We will note only that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. The deceit of the Michigan Civil Rights Initiative - the passage of which is the primary aim of this group - however, is worth taking the time to expose. The MCRI is a proposed state constitutional amendment that, if successfully placed on the November ballot and passed, would ban affirma- tive action in college admissions and in state hir- ing and contracting for women and minorities. If MCRI passes, it would nullify the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling that upheld affirmative action in Grutter v. Bollinger. Over the last half of 2004, MCRI petitioners can- vassed the state, lying to voters in majority, minor- ity and progressive white voting districts about the aim of their proposal. MCRI petitioners system- atically led signers in these districts to believe that they were signing a pro-affirmative action peti- tion, not one whose purpose was to ban affirma- tive action. On this basis, more than 120,000 black voters signed for MCRI to be placed on the ballot. Our investigation is turning up a growing number of white voters, already in the tens of thousands, who were also deceived. This fraud alone is reason enough to bar MCRI from the November ballot. The examples of MCRI's fraud are numerous. In our investigation into its petitioning, we have come across people from all walks of life who were deceived: city of Detroit workers, university professors, union activists, judges, news reporters, civil rights activists, school teachers and even some of MCRI's own petitioners. One example of MCRI's fraud is Ruthie Steven- son's story. Stevenson is president of the Macomb County NAACP. An MCRI petitioner approached her near her local post office. The petitioner told her that the president of the Macomb County NAACP supported his petition. She informed him that she was the president and that she did not support his petition, but she still continued to receive reports from NAACP members that they had heard MCRI petitioners claiming she supported their initiative. The executive board for AFSCME Local 207, a city of Detroit workers union that has actively supported the defense of affirmative action and BAMN in particular, found that more than one in 10 of their members signed MCRI's petition. Upon hearing that their names were on MCRI's petitions, union members were outraged because they had been deceived and defrauded. To proceed with its attack on the progress that women and minorities have made towards equal- ity, MCRI has resorted to lying to voters. To draw an analogy, suppose there were a petition campaign in the state that, if successful, would reduce the enrollment of white male stu- dents at the University by 75 percent according to the administration's own estimates. Suppose, too, that while circulating this petition, white vot- ers were told either that the petition's goal was to increase the enrollment of white students or to ensure educational opportunities to everyone. If this scenario were to transpire, every politician, every judge, every news pundit and every busi- ness leader in the state would stop at nothing to prevent such a duplicitous proposition. However, it's taken BAMN eight months of campaigning to get the beginning of an official investigation into MCRI's fraud. In spite of the overwhelming evidence that's come to light exposing MCRI's fraud, the state courts have so far taken it upon themselves to rail- road the proposal through the official electoral pro- cess. BAMN will not sit idly and allow such a clear disregard for the rights of the black community of this state. BAMN pledges to work tirelessly to expose MCRI's fraud, to defend affirmative action and to build the new civil rights movement. a IS OSAMAGONNA AMAVE TE l OOI? YEAH .. 1GUESS HE SH~OULD Of IN THEREE IT'S JUT .. AZ HES O AS T MTE I' A ' irca HATOOTSAP THE 80x. WX(Th'Y tf i':f } The writers are member of BAMN. Stenvig and Royal are Rackham students, and Smith is an LSA senior. LETTERS TO THE EDITOR Send all letters to the editor to tothedaily michigandaily.com. a Overreaction of student groups 'absurd and foolish' TO THE DAILY: Congratulations for punishing perfectly good people for sins of the past. Let's be real here: The people being evicted from their posts are not responsible for the con- troversial history of Michigamua. Anyone aware of their campus activism knows that they would not promote racist groups or practices. And, if anything, by being a part of Michigamua they can help steer it away from its negative past. But let's ignore all that and condemn them because Michigamua did some really bad stuff before chose to join Michigamua knowing full well of its horrible past. They couldn't possibly be try- ing to better the group. They couldn't possibly be doing any good through the group. Clearly, since they joined this notorious group, they must support its past practices. So let's just forget that they weren't around during Michigamua's con- troversial past and try to pin the blame on them, and let's be as intolerant and exclusive as pos- sible while we accusing them of being racist. These actions are absurd and foolish. We have a bunch of activists doing good deeds and reforming an offensive society, and rather than applauding their efforts, we criticize and black- list them. Great job, people. I'm proud of your nearsightedness. of Illuminati willing to steer us towards a New World Order. How are we to know? Some rumors of Michigamua's doings include curing cancer, erasing Third World debt and establish- ing a hotline to the Vatican. Of course, due to secrecy we have not seen the benefits of Mich- igamua (yet!), but if they threw pebbles at your window one dark and stormy night, you'd be hard pressed not to join. Just think of it; Gerald Ford was a member, as was Jed Ortmeyer! To paraphrase the T-shirt, Skull and Bones is the Michigamua of the East. I don't person- ally know any members of Michigamua, so I'm not sure if they're also a bunch of deceivers and windbags. However, until Michigamua comes into the open, this will certainly be my impres- out as a pile of flat, self-referencing jokes that I'm sure everyone in your editing room thought were hilarious. Do yourselves a favor and stick to your strength - being a vehicle for the Los Angeles Times crossword puzzle, disguised as a poorly written and amateuristic student publication. I don't mean to be negative, but I was sorely dis- appointed with every single article I read, which was five to be exact. Cameron Dingwall LSA senior Center should bring athletes and other students together help our athletes achieve academically? Oh, that's right - the visiting recruits will think they're sweet. And sure, it might keep a few blue-chippers from flunking out, but has that ever hurt mighty Michigan athletics before? Also, this furthers the longstanding and oft- identified segregation of athletes and students on campus. Athletic Director Bill Martin hails the academic excellence of the University and then sequesters his athletes in exclusive dining rooms, training facilities and now academic centers. Ostensibly, this is done because the athlete has special demands on his time not faced by the rest of campus. To a self-sup- porting Michigan student, for instance (see Without parental help, students pay for col- I