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About Oregon daily emerald. (Eugene, Or.) 1920-2012 | View Entire Issue (Jan. 19, 1999)
“ © r egonW€meraUr NEWSROOM: (541)346-5511 E-MAIL ode@oregon uoregon.edu ON-LINE EDITION: www.uoregon.edu/~ode EDITOR IN CHIEF Ryan Frank EDITORIAL EDITORS KameronCole StefanieKnowlton The Dream As we celebrate Martin Luther King Jr., we need to recognize how far we have to go to reach the ideal of racial harmony Monday we cel ebrated a great Ameri can hero whose contributions to the ideas of tolerance and racial equality have been unparalleled. What would King think of to day’s society in which people of all races and ethnicities are accepted and valued as important aspects of American cul ture? Do you think he would, at first glance, be fooled by the language of our leaders, friends and even ourselves, into thinking the previous statement is fact and not just wishful thinking? Yes, education and higher wages are more ac cessible to minorities than they were in the ’60s when King was fighting for civil rights, but is that enough? There is still a significant difference between wages earned by African-Americans and Caucasians. Even now, as liberal as we believe ourselves to be, we still have a hard time knowing what expression to use to describe ourselves without worrying about the implications of those words. It is like all the races are standing at different sides of the fence looking out at one another, each seen as “us” and “them.” We may be making progress in the battle of equality in terms of edu cation and wages, which is debat able, but at least it is an open fight. know it is there, and we can do something about it. What isn’t clear is what social equality and tolerance mean in our soci ety. One doesn’t have to go too far to find examples of inequality in our community. A University professor, John Gainer, was asked to exit a city bus twice in the last year as a police suspect even though the man they were looking for had only one thing in common with Gainer — he was black. The mayor’s office offered an offi cial apology only after the media covered the story for a month. As everyone at the University gasps and exclaims racism, they shouldn’t point fingers before they look at their own campus communi ty. Of 16,780 students less than 2,000 fall into the minority category. For all its good intentions, the University is only an extension of die predomi nately Caucasian commu nity that it resides in. Therefore, all these speeches and assemblies to commemorate Martin Luther King Jr. can only talk about equality and racial harmony as a hypo thetical, considering that in Eugene there is not a lot of practical experience. Eugene, in fact, only had three black families living in the community as late as 1940. Three fam ilies. ¥ Bryan Dixon/Emerald But no one ever dis cusses that and what it means to Oregon and the idea of racial equality. We need to discuss it openly and dispel the “us” and “them” men tality that pervades every conversation regarding equali ty. The very fact that it is an issue shows that we have a lot of work to do. King’s vision of racial harmony is not regulated to education, wages and material possessions. Harmony refers to relationships, not merely co-existing with little conflict. In stead of looking back at Martin Luther King Jr. and thinking how things are a lot different now, we need to be thinking about where we need to go from here. This editorial represents the opinion of the Emerald editorial board. Responses may he sent to ode®oregon.uoregon. edit. Letters to the Editor No stamps for you Once upon a time, police/fire officers were her alded community figures. The postal worker came to the door with mail only to be greeted by the milk man on the way back down the walk. Today, we en counter a new type of public employee, the disen chanted postal worker. I refer to the mean guy at the University Post Of fice. I will not disclose his identity for I believe that too may of us know of whom 1 speak. Far too often I have gone in for a stamp only to watch others be reprimanded by this man for their lack of postal knowledge. I watch, tensely awaiting my turn and hoping for the other window to avoid a conflict over a simple question about rate changes or a quick pur chase. Unlucky to get his window, 1 painstakingly make it through the interaction without giving my opinion of how customer service works. I have worked many customer service jobs where I gave that insincere smile to the annoying customers and moved on to the next customer in line hoping to find that smiling face in the line. I ask the readers for help. The next time you get the mean guy, give a warm smile and offer him a greeting. Hopefully we can gain back his faith in the American public and get back to a simpler time; one when the simple exchange of a stamp for a few cents doesn’t knock minutes off our lives because of the stress we presently encounter at the counter. Jonathan Ward Department of Molecular Biology A Promise Forgotten Last September, The Register-Guard editorial page editor, Don Robinson, decried opinion page letters that could be interpreted to incite violence as he assured Eugenians that “their local newspaper will not serve as a forum for hate mail.” In December, an Oregon Citizens Alliance spokesman and Republican Party state delegate was allowed to vent his odium and rancor in a mailbag letter that characterized gays as immoral, unnatur al, syphilitic, self-destructive, AIDS-infected and drug-addicted. Presumably, editor Robinson is prepared to assure his readers that the sadistic killers of Uni versity of Wyoming student Matthew Shepard were not incited to violence by a lifetime diet of the same sort of venom currently being spewed by Barry Dean Williams and his OCA-GOP coalition of ho mophobes and hate mongers. Ron Black Junction City Thumbs THUMBS UP U.S. District Judge Robert Jones' response to a question about truthfulness posed by a wit ness in the abor tion trial with "Truthful means truthful. ...This Is not a Clinton de position." To Ducks in the Super Bowl: Former Oregon football players Tony Graziani and Derek Loviiie and former head coach Rich Brooks will be part of the Super Bowl on Jan. 31. Graziani is the At lanta Falcons’ third-string quar terback, Loviiie is the Denver Bron cos’ second string running back and Brooks is the Falcons’de fensive coordina tor. THUMBS DOWN To Greek stu dents: In central Athens student riots erupted after the education depart ment changed its requirements for college entrance. By launching fire bombs into the crowd, the stu dents injured po lice and by standers. To tuition: England’s presti gious universities can no longer support a free ed ucation system. Students wiil be gin paying tuition this term, which amounts to less than $2,000 per year.
