Editor in chief: Laura Cadiz
Editorial Editors: Bret Jacobson, Laura Lucas
Newsroom: (541)346-5511
Room 300, Erb Memorial Union
P.O. Box 3159, Eugene, OR 97403
E-mail: ode@oregon.uoregon.edu
Tuesday
February 29,2000
Volume 101, Issue 107
Effiefald
In my last column I made a plea to you,
the students of the University, to give
me your advice in my pursuit of being
a better columnist. Much to my dis
may, I only received five letters in re
sponse. I had allotted countless hours to
read all the wonderful ideas that you had.
Instead, it took me five minutes. Mind
you, that is not counting the time that it
took for me to beat someone’s Tetris chal
lenge that I received in the batch.
I am very grateful to those people who
did actually take the time to write me. But
to all you other peo
ple, tsktsk tsk.
I have feelings too,
you know. And so,
like a dog with my
tail between my legs,
I turned to the
columnists of yester
year to guide me.
And there I found
Robert Funk.
Who is this Robert
Mason Funk, you ask? I’m
West not reallysure’ ^ut
-judging by his pic
ture I’m sure he was
a hit with all the ladies. I stumbled upon
his column in the Sept. 17,1950, issue of
the Emerald. This was the beginning of
that school year and Bob’s first column of
the year (as it says under his photo). Coin
cidentally, that was also the day that the
EMU opened its doors for the first time.
Bob wrote his column about what a
columnist typically writes his first col
umn about. He tells how we comment
about how odd things must seem for the
new freshmen and about how he will give
them comforting words of wisdom with a
certain paternal authority. Bob then goes
on to say that the words of wisdom are a
bunch of hooey and that college is hard.
I’ve got to go with Funky on that one.
Even though I am but a lowly freshman, I
too have been feeling the pressures of 10
page papers and 300-level classes.
Bob also speaks about how in his previ
ous year writing for the paper, he made up
lots of new words to suit his purposes. I
didn’t know we could do that! So in light
of this new ability, whenever I think that
something is really cool I will call it “boo
ley.” And although I’m a little hesitant to
ask you for anything again, if you want to
use the phrase here and there I’m sure that
would help it catch on.
According to Bob, we columnists typi
cally lay out the kind of things that we will
be writing about for the rest of the year. I
was quite relieved that Bob agreed with me
on the foohshness of this. He acknowledges
the simple nature of columnists when he
says, “You forget what you said you were
going to write about, and can’t find the pa
per you said it in, and people stop speaking
to you at breakfast because they think
you’ve been trying to mislead them."
Well, I certainly don’t want to get the
silent treatment while I’m eating my Count
Chocula. That would be very “rutny,” which
is another word—meaning "lame”—that I
have just invented. Hee hee, this is fun.
After we have dispersed with these for
malities, Bob states that “we will become
rash and say something untraditional. ”
Well, I wager that saying something untra
ditional for Bob was something like, “I
think we should let girls wear pants! ” Well,
I’m going to have to do a little better than
that. Here we go: Could we eat criminals
who are sentenced to death? No, really! It
would save cows and reduce our crowded
prisons while solving world hunger to
boot! Now that’s what I call repaying a
debt to society. Think about it.
Bob closes up with a humorous an
ecdote about his trip to the circus be
fore coming back to school. He re
members when he was little
and wanted to join the cir
cus. His mom, however,
wasn’t too enthusi
astic. But Bob did
n’t want to be an ac
robat or a clown. He wanted to be
one of the elephants.
Whether you want to be an elephant or a
columnist or a nuclear physicist, you have
to respect your roots. There is untold wis
dom in the voice of the past. Luckily, Bob’s
was preserved in print. I wonder if Bob
ever thought that he would have this influ
ence on the present? I hope that in another
50 years some confused columnist will
look back through the gigabytes of elec
tronic information at my columns and
find wisdom. Although it is much more
likely that anyone looking back on my
columns would ask themselves, “How did
thi3 idiot get the job? He’s totally rutny!”
Mason West is a columnist for the Emerald. His
views do not necessarily represent those of the
staff. He can be reached at
mwest1@gladstone.uoregon.edu.
1
Ensuring diversity is in our best interest
On Thursday, Feb. 24,2000,
the ASUO Executive re
ceived the incidental fee
recommendation passed
by the ASUO Student Senate. The ini
tial budget recommendations were
put together by the Athletic Depart
ment Finance Committee, the EMU
Board and the Programs Finance
Committee. The budgets will now be
approved and signed by us, the
ASUO Executive, and sent to Univer
sity President Dave Frohnmayer.
We are approving a total student inci
dental fee of $6,011,174 for the 2000
2001 academic year, not including up
coming ballot measures. Our budget
provides endless services and pro
grams that improve our educational ex
perience, such as subsidized sports
tickets, EMU services and more than 90
student programs.
One of the major highlights of this
year’s budget is the inclusion of a full
time director in the Multicultural
Center. In the past three years, the
MCC has been one of the most effec
tive programs in the ASUO. This
Commentary
MCC director, which is long overdue,
will provide continuity within the
MCC, empower studenfs to advocate
on the local, state and national levels
and enhance the students’ efforts of
ensuring diversity on our campus
through the ASUO.
The MCC has played an invaluable
role in enhancing diversity here. It
has brought nationally renowned
speakers to our campus, such as
Yolanda King (daughter of Dr. Martin
Luther King Jr.), Arun Gandhi (grand
son of Mohatma Gandhi), educator
and activist bell hooks and civil rights
activist Tim Wise. This spring the
MCC will be bringing in activist and
actor Edward James Olmos and for
mer leader of the Black Panther Party,
Bobby Seale, to honor retired profes
sor Dr. Edwin Colman. Along with ex
ceptional programming, the MCC has
advocated for policy changes within
our University. MCC staffers are also
currently working on the base for an
institutional plan for diversity that
will set goals and a vision for the next
five years.
The MCC director is vital to the bet
terment of the ASUO and the en
hancement of diversity on our cam
pus. The director will be able to
provide the necessary tools to sup
port the MCC through expansion and
growth, which in turn will improve
our entire campus community.
In addition to the MCC director
budget expansion, the Oregon Stu
dent Association (the organization
that represents students at the state
level), has increased its budget to in
clude an Oregon Students of Color
Coalition Field Organizer on its staff.
The position will provide statewide
support for students as we advocate
for the issues of students of color.
As the ASUO Executive, we be
lieve that we must enhance and em
brace diversity on our campus to help
each other grow and learn in order to
achieve the best intellectual and edu
cational environment at the Universi
ty. We believe that the aforemen
tioned budget increases supports
student ideals.
We are genuinely excited to ap
prove a budget that, for the most part,
supports the student needs on cam
pus. It is our objective every year to
provide an incidental fee budget that
ensures “the cultural and physical
development of students. ” We are
confident that the 2000-2001 budget
testifies to our credence and is in the
best interest of the student body.
These are the opinions of the ASIJO Executive,
Wylie Chen and Mitra Anoushiravani. They
can be reached at 346-3724, asuopres@glad
stone.uoregon.edu or
asuovp@gladstone.uoregon.edu. Their opin
ions do not necessarily represent the opinions
of the Emerald.
CORRECTION
In the Emerald’s
endorsements for
ASU 3 ballot meas
ures (ODE, Feb.
28), the reasoning
behind the "no”
endorsement for
Measure 5, Inter
national Resource
Center, should
have read, “The
Programs Finance
Committee only
gave the Interna
tional Student As
sociation $3,345
of the $6,045 it
was requesting for
the International
Resource Center.”
The Emerald re
grets the error.