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E-mail: editor@dailyemerald.com
Online Edition:
www.dailyemerald.com
Wednesday, November 21,2001
Editor in Chief:
Jessica Blanchard
Managing Editor:
Michael J. Kleckner
Editorial Editor:
Julie Lauderbaugh
Assistant Editorial Editor:
Jacquelyn Lewis
Yesteryear's Editorial
Home for
a Holiday
Americans laugh at them
selves sometimes because
they have set aside a spe
cial day on which to be thankful
for all the good things that have
come their way during the year.
Thanksgiving is more likely to re
call to their minds a picture of a
University
of Oregon
125th
ANNIVERSARY
Originally
published on
Nov. 19,1945
table loaded
with tasty
dishes and of
a quiet day
spent with
close friends
and relatives.
Even if the
meaning of
Thanksgiving
is somewhat obscured by these
more present realities, the holiday
has an atmosphere that adds
something to American life. There
is some of the peacefulness and
good will of the Christmas season
without the frantic rush of gift
shopping. There is a recollection
of the historical past of the nation,
a memory of common people
building a new life in a wilderness.
It isn’t a day for pride in military
might or celebration of a victory.
Within its atmosphere we are
drawn more closely to family and
friends. “Home” seems more im
portant, and we center our atten
tions on its activities instead of
looking for outside excitement.
This year Thanksgiving will be
more heartfelt than it has since
the beginning of the war. Some of
the tension of the war years has
been released, and Americans
will give thanks with more faith.
For us as students, Thanksgiv
ing this year means a vacation
from classes and a reunion with
the family and friends at home.
In the years when traveling was
frowned upon, we learned to ap
preciate the privilege of spending
this particular holiday at home.
We may laugh at ourselves for
setting aside such a day, but we
have come to realize that it
means more to us than surface
impressions may indicate.
Editor’s note: This column was taken from
the Nov. 19,1945 edition of the Oregon
Daily Emerald.
Letters to? rand
Guest Commentaries Policy
Letters to the editor amt guest
commentaries are encouraged. Letters
are limited to 250 words and guest
commentaries to 550 words. Please
include contact information. The Emerald
reserves the right to edit for space,
grammar and style.
Clarification
I n Tuesday's column about the American
Red Cross (“Crossingthe red line,” ODE,
II /20), it was implied that only a portion
of the Red Cross' “Liberty Rind” would
be spent on families of Ihe victims of the
Sept 11 attacks. On Wednesday, Nov. 14,
the Red Cross announced that aff of the
money collected for the Liberty Fund ,
would be spent on families.
Letters to the editor
Commentator not given proper credit
On Oct. 22,2001, Oregon Daily Emerald re
porter Diane Huber sent an e-mail requesting I
reply the following day, outlining when and
why I joined the Oregon Commentator staff,
what posts I had held and what I thought of the
magazine. I answered most of her questions by
e-mail, but suggested she call my office to con
tinue the “interview.” She never called.
Huber’s belief that members of the campus
community don’t take the Commentator seri
ously must be the reason behind her lack of
interest in reporting on the story (“Commenta
tor celebrates 18th,” ODE, 10/24).
To clarify, editors of the Commentator have
taken on the University System and OSPIRG
in court over the mandatory student inciden
tal fee that funds political lobbying organiza
tions. They’ve spoken out against the irre
sponsible administration of the so-called
“overrealized fund,” they have covered U.S.
Senate races, they have served on the Associ
ated Students President’s Advisory Council,
and they’ve been covered by both The Ore
gonian and The Register-Guard for their vocal
stances on the use of student fees and illiterate
“liberal” reporting. They have, in short,
served as an important watchdog of campus
politics and journalism.
The Commentator has always been a viable
platform for dissent, as well as a place for ir
reverent humor. These are details Huber
would’ve discovered, had she placed a single
phone call. While the Commentator is busy
following the money trail as a student advo
cate and questioning the status quo, the Emer
ald has its hands full conducting “interviews”
by e-mail.
Farrah Bostic
Studio City, Calif.
Medicinal marijuana
should be left to states
When Senators Smith and Wyden vote on
the confirmation of John Walters for “drug
czar,” I hope they remember the desires of the
citizens of Oregon. By referendum, they over
whelmingly voted to allow patients to use
marijuana for medicinal purposes.
Our founding fathers feared a strong federal
government and spelled out the federal gov
ernment's responsibilities and restrictions in
the Constitution. The 10th Amendment specif
ically reserved all other responsibilities to the
states. Self determination, with regards to
medical use of marijuana, should be the sole
responsibility of each state and its citizens.
Steve Baggs Emerald
In an administration that prides itself on
returning power to the states, Walters’ drug
policies regarding medicinal use of marijua
na would do just the opposite and would
counter the wishes of the voters of Oregon
and other states.
A drug czar should work with the states,
not in opposition to them. It should not be the
policy of our federal government to arrest,
prosecute and incarcerate patients whose
only crime is attempting to alleviate the pain
and suffering that results from cancer and
AIDS treatments.
As the primary sponsor of medical marijua
na legislation in Maryland, I commend the
legislature of Oregon for giving the voters a
voice on this issue. Don't let the nomination of
the new drug czar silence them.
Donald E. Murphy
Annapolis, Md.
Iran has been misjudged
I would like to correct some inaccurate and
misguided comments made by Tony Biz
(“U.S. must overthrow Iran's rulers,” ODE,
11/09). First, Iran has two rulers. One is Presi
dent Mohammad Khatami, a moderate cleric
with popular support. The other is Ayatollah
Ali Khamenei, an ultra-conservative who is
Iran's supreme religious leader. He lacks pop
ular support but has the power to veto legisla
tion by the reformist government.
Iran is a theocracy, but it is also a republic.
Americans should not lump it with the Tal
iban. Iranian women can vote, drive cars, at
tend universities and run for public office.
Many professors are women, as well as
twelve members of the parliament. A
woman, Dr. Massumeh Ebtekar, is vice presi
dent in charge of environmental protection.
According to The New York Times, two
thirds of Iranians were bom after the 1979 Is
lamic Revolution, and they dislike fundamen
talism. Along with many women and some
dissident mullahs, they support Khatami,
who was re-elected last spring with 77 percent
of the vote.
The “mass demonstrations” numbering
“hundreds of thousands” that Biz cites reflect
their enthusiasm for democracy and freedom.
The United States should support them by
normalizing relations with the moderate gov
ernment. We should stop calling a whole na
tion “terrorists.” Finally, we should refrain
from supporting repressive leaders like the
Shah, whose bmtal policies and unchecked
corruption resulted in the Islamic Revolution
in the first place.
Philip Huang
law student
Emerald facts misrepresented diversity issues
We are writing in response to the
misrepresentation of facts in the
Emerald article “University
outranks state system on staff diversity,”
published on Oct. 15. The problems are
apparent in at least two places, including the
“minority faculty” chart and quotes taken
from interviews with us. In particular, we are
concerned the article conveys the sense that
lack of diversity on campus is not a critical
problem at the University, a message clearly
communicated by the title.
In fact, the number of faculty and students of
color at the University is appallingly low,
showing that the institution engages in prac
tices that contribute to the exclusion of under
represented groups — African Americans,
Asian Americans, Chicana/os and Latina/os,
and Native Americans — in the University
community and the broader society.
The first problem in the article is that the
University numbers in the “minority faculty”
chart are greatly inflated and bear little rela
tion to the actual situation. The most recent
official source for this information in the Ore
gon University System is the OUS Fact Book
2000, which is'available online — and this
source indicates that the Emerald’s numbers
of “minority” faculty are roughly doubled in
Guest Commentary
each category. While the numbers the Emer
ald us’ed indicate that 213 of the University’s
faculty members are people of color, OUS
shows that the figure is 110.
When you consider that the OUS Fact Book
numbers are themselves inflated because they
include temporary faculty (including some
students) and employees who do not have
teaching responsibilities, the situation be
comes even more serious. Compare these
numbers with population figures from the last
U.S. census (using national figures to com
pare, since faculty members are hired nation
ally and not locally), which indicate that peo
ple of color comprise approximately 30
percent of the population, and it becomes
clear that there are deep-rooted structural
problems within U.S. society that exclude
people of color from educational institutions,
including the University of Oregon.
Next, we would like to reemphasize the
points we were trying to make in our inter
views, which we feel were not presented
clearly. We both insisted that the University
must hire a more racially diverse faculty in
every unit, including (but not limited to) Eth
<• Ut. ». W h », >4 i. ‘ A.». kt-i, •. i,
nic Studies. In addition, the article omitted
parts of the interviews indicating that we,
along with many of our colleagues, under
stand the lack of racial and ethnic diversity is
an extremely dire problem at the University.
Although some individual departments have
recently undertaken efforts to address hiring,
recruitment and curricular issues, the Uni
versity administration has never generated a
coherent and comprehensive plan to re
spond to these urgent problems. We call on
them to do so.
The University of Oregon must address
these problems for the sake of white students
as well as students of color. Education on di
versity issues, including power and inequali
ty, js essential to understanding the increas
ingly heterogeneous society we all inhabit. If
we fail to address these issues in the class
room and to combat discrimination in the
institution, we are not fulfilling our responsi
bilities as educators. Before we undertake
these tasks, however, we must understand
the nature of the problems. Regrettably, the
Emerald served to obfuscate, rather than clar
ify, these issues.
Shari Huhndorf is director of the Ethnic Studies Program
and an associate professor in the Department of English.
Mario Sifuentez is an ASUO Multicultural Advocate.