PERSPECTIVES Friday, May 13, 1988 The Michigan Daily Page 7 Eve: The logic, lore, and legend By Veronica Woolridge She was a perfect woman - fresh, new, healthy, unscarred by the marks of time and age. She had a companion whose name was Adam. He was the first man and she was the first one of her kind - a woman. She was tempted by a serpent to eat a forbidden fruit from the tree of knowledge and of good and evil. She ate the fruit to be wise. She grew wise to the things that were evil. She lost her innocence and a little bit of her pride. So pride was gone and bliss was lost - suffering and ignorance were "in." Yes, heavy trials and tribulations like sin and death were "in." She had a heavy burden to bear. Because she sinned, death entered Woolridge is a Daily News staff re- porter. the world. So we are told. Now Science is telling us something different and opening a debate. The debate is not the United States against the Soviet Union. It is not Japanese imports against the U.S. trade deficit. It is not anti- abortion against pro-choice. And it is not Pepsi against Coke. The de- bate is scientific Fact against Leg- end and the wild card is Eve. Is Eve fact or fantasy - scien- tific reason or mythological tale? "The mythmakers spun their tales on the same basic assumption as the scientists: that at some point we all share a common ancestor," said a January issue of Newsweek. The Mythmakers work out of homes, schools and churches. The Scientists, trained in molecular bi- ology, work in air-conditioned American laboratories. The Myth- makers' tales are of God, creation, a lush green garden, and Adam and Eve. The research of Science has discovered the hot Savannah in sub- Sahara Africa or Asia, a fruitful woman scouring the plains for food, and her tribe spanning out over the globe. Science has introduced the world to a new, provocative anthro- pological theory. With reluctance they give it the same name as the weak-willed temptress in Genesis, Eve. "Scientists are calling her Eve, but reluctantly," said Newsweek, asserting, "the name evokes too many wrong images." One of these wrong images is one about our lineage. Mythmakers estimate our lineage began with a woman who lived about 5,000 years ago. Science says human lin- eage began about 200,000 years ago. observations. "Our cells carry the history of mankind's development, a path scientists followed toward Eve," said a report in Newsweek. Science has taken some bones, broken down the genes and traced the DNA to find a dark-haired, black-skinned woman who wandered the plains of Africa or Asia, and who was the mother of the human race. "It makes us realize that all hu- man beings, despite differences in external appearance, are really members of a single entity that's had a very recent origin in one place," said Stephen Jay Gould, Harvard paleontologist and essayist. "There is a kind of biological brotherhood that's much more pro- found than we ever realized." To the Daily: I'm Jewish. I grew up knowing that we were an oppressed people. For evidence, I didn't have to look any further than the bigotry of my neighbors. I remember being spat on for being Jewish. We looked around us and saw an immoral, op- pressive Goyische world. And we said, "We don't have power, so we're not responsible for the op- pression. But our culture has deep humanist values, so if we had power, we certainly wouldn't abuse it the way the Goyim do." Well, to and behold, some of "us," and I use the word with reser- vation, got power. Got a whole damn State. And it's not a pretty sight. I've known this for a couple of decades. Of course, I had I.F. Stone to help me figure this out. But most Jews seem to have no idea of this. At least not the ones who get quoted in the media. And certainly not Israeli public opinion. Let's talk about this for a minute. Jews seem to think that whatever kind of evil shit Israel is up to, it's self-defense. It's kinda hard to think this when you're sell- ing arms to Argentina, or in bed with South Africa building the Bomb. It's pretty slimy, for exam- ple, to throw Vanunu in jail for how long after a secret trial for blowing the whistle on a atom bomb program that "doesn't exist." But somehow, people manage to ignore this. This business about self defense is axiomatic. To put it bluntly, Jewish public opinion is paranoid. And not without reason. Any peo- ple that has gone through the Holocaust would carry those scars. So Israelis look at Palestinians and see Nazis. But Palestinians aren't Nazis. They're peopletwho have been driven out of their land. They're a people who have been forced into refugee camps and kept there for generations. No wonder they're not nice to Israel. But this current round of vio- lence is making it harder and harder for Jews to imagine that this is self defense. It's hard to imagine you're engaged in self defense when you routinely break into peoples homes in the middle of the night, beat them up and break their hands. The recent killing of an Israeli girl seems to point this up. It's taken for granted that her death is much more important than the Palestini- ans killed daily by the Israeli Army and settlers, including the young Palestinians shot "because he was running away." The public rage and bloodlust brought on by her death was overwhelming. The Army im- mediately went out and blew up fourteen houses of Palestinian families "suspected of being in- volved." But now it seems quite clear that she was killed by her Is- raeli guard. This seems to me to be a very sharply drawn microcosm. Israel is not involvad ,in self. defense.It's What we realize is that many of New facts have been dug up the myths have been shattered and along with the old bones and Sci- gone is the milk-skinned beauty in ence is making some acute Renaissance Art. And gone is the tional ruling-class parameters im- involved in mass psychosis. posed on the progressive movement Israelis and Jews world-wide need by developing institutions and to wake up to this. If Israel can be- policies independent of the status gin to see and accept the fact of its quo. One person fundamental in the own political psychosis, it can be- creation of this strategy is Brian gin to disengage from it and per- Willson. haps find a livable future. Other- A Vietnam Veteran committed to wise, I'd like to say it's headed for preventing history from repeating disaster, but in fact, it's already itself at the expense of humanity, there. Brian has literally put his life on -Michael Shapiro the line to prevent the U.S. from April 14 the continued destruction of Central To the Daily: America, "Vietnam-style." Brian The Institute for the Practice of came into the public focus when he Non-Violence has challenged U.S. and three fellow veterans fasted for policy in Central America by set- 46 days on the steps of the Capital ting up a citizens' embassy in in1 .I ,B Nicaragua that ignores terrorist his legs when he was run over by a policy-makers like Elliot Abrams munitions train atithe Concord Naval base in Calif. while pas- sively protesting the shipment of weapons to repressive forces in Central America. Over the last year Brian has led many delegations of veterans to Nicaragua to drive am- bulances and rebuild communities destroyed by the contras in the war- zone. On Sunday, May 15, Brian Will- son and folksinger Rick Duvall (also a Vietnam Veteran) will be coming to Ann Arbor to reflect on their experiences and to discuss strategies to build a comprehensive movement for the development of alternative policies to combat Brian Willson will be on campus this institutional racism at home and Sunday to speak about U.S. terrorism abroad. They will be militarism in Central America. speaking at the Social Hall in the and Jeane Kirkpatrick by sending First Presbyterian Church on true U.S. representatives to express Washtenaw Ave. at 7:30 p.m. Ad- solidarity with the people of mission is free. Nicaragua. The citizens' embassy -Bill Gladstone uses astrategy ghatdefies-the radi- . MaMay12. voluptuous gardener in "Paradise Lost" who was all "softness" and "meek-surrender" and waist-length "gold tresses," as Science lays the facts - and the bones, on the line. Eve is thought to be everyone's 10,000th great grandmother as mother of the human race. Breaking the lines of distinction between ethnic group differences and racial differences is not such a difficult task. There are no racial differences as all people are all a part of the human race. A person's physical appearance may name that person a member of an ethnic minority. However, that person is still a part of the human race and is entitled to every right the position affords. Instead of marketing how very diverse the members of the University of Michigan community are, perhaps we can acknowledge, amidst our di- versity, the biological brother- and sisterhood that can be traced throughout our human lineage. To the Daily: I am a University junior studying this year at the Hebrew University in Jemusalem. I am writing to the Daily to express my concern over the portrayal of Israel in the American press over the last several months. From clippings I have read, it would appear that Israel is under siege. I wish to state cat- egorically that this is not true. I feel safer walking in Jerusalem than I do in Ann Arbor, even after up- risings. I am not writing home to tell people that everyting they read is a lie. Unfortunately, much of what they read is true. I do ask that people before criticizing Israel be- come educated on the Arab-Israel conflict. Learn the history, listen to all sides, and then judge ob- jectively. Quick condemnations are not fair by those reading biased news stories and watching carefully edited television reports. I urge people to visit Israel and find out like I have how complex the sit- uation is to solve. Above all, I ask people who have supported Israel in the past to work with her and not against her during these difficult times. Only through an understanding by everyone in- volved.will peace be achieved. -Stephen Pincus April 10 The Daily opinion page staff is actively seeking minorities and women interested in writing and discussing editorials. Staff requirements consist of one meeting, one editorial, and production work once per week.- Call 764-0552.