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Monday, March 1, 2004
Oregon Daily Emerald
COMMENTARY
Editor in Chief:
Brad Schmidt
Managing Editor:
Jan Tobias Montry
Editorial Editor:
Travis Willse
EDITORIAL
Oregon takes
backward step
by scheduling
Illinois game
As students at a progressive school, we should expect —
in both the senses of expecting and demanding a certain
degree of ethical coherence — that the University adopt
stances that foster the right to free individual expression
while, as an institution, honoring tolerance and respecting
group and cultural traditions.
This expectation has become particularly germane in
the realm of collegiate athletics in recent years, as many
long-standing American Indian mascots have come un
der fire as politically incorrect, culturally insensitive or
just downright offensive. But this particular issue tran
scends the usual ideological gobbledygook that is politi
cal correctness: Rather, many of these mascots present
specific harmful caricatures of entire cultures that tran
scend the bounds of good taste.
This contentious issue, a dormant one at the Universi
ty for most of the past year, has been rekindled by the re
cent announcement the Ducks would play the Big Ten
Conference's Illinois this December in Chicago. In ex
change, Illinois will face off against Oregon in the 2005
06 Pape Jam.
The move has disappointed some locals, who contend
the agreement is tantamount to sanctioning racist and de
meaning caricaturing. And rightfully so.
For some, though, the University's decision to schedule a
game against a school that uses an American Indian mas
cot goes deeper than an implicit validation of a tasteless
practice — it smacks of perfidy.
In summer 2002, law student Frank Silva and others
presented University President Dave Frohnmayer with a
resolution asking the University to not schedule games
against such teams.
"(Frohnmayer) agreed to take it into consideration with
a wink and a nod that it's not going to be an issue," Silva
told the Emerald.
University Executive Assistant President Dave Hubin
said there was no implicit consent to refraining from
scheduling games, however, adding, "I think that there
was a commitment that was retained to work with the
NCAA (on the issue)."
Whatever was actually agreed to is beside this point:
Crude stereotypes are bad not only for the groups they
portray, but they reflect poorly a society that permits
the perpetuation of the unfair characterization of some
of its members.
The Emerald Editorial Board calls on the University
administration to cancel, if possible, the upcoming
games against Illinois, unless the school first changes its
embattled mascot. Moreover, the University should
commit to not scheduling any sports games against any
teams who offensively use a name or mascot of any eth
nic group. This includes not only teams with American
Indian mascots like Illinois, but of other races, such as
Notre Dame's mascot — which crudely caricatures an
ethnicity and exacerbates that stereotype, calling the
Irish combative.
Hubin argues the University is not the appropriate
place to address this issue, suggesting instead, "The prop
er forum is the NCAA."
If this were purely an athletic issue, maybe. But this is
sue reflects, too, on the cultural sensitivity and social re
sponsibility of the University itself — and that's not an is
sue to export to distant athletic program bureaucrats.
EDITORIAL POLICY
This editorial represents the opinion of the Emerald
editorial board. Responses can be sent to letters
@dailyemerald.com. Letters to the editor and guest
commentaries are encouraged. Letters are limited
to 250 words and guest commentaries to 550 words.
Authors are limited to one submission per calendar
month. Submission must include phone number and
address for verification. The Emerald reserves the right
to edit for space, grammar and style.
Steve Baggs Illustrator
Why, oh why...?
Why.
It's a word I'm rather fond of, and I've
used it a lot over the years to understand
the world around me.
I got my first inkling of the power of
"Why?" at an early age. Like most kids,
I hit my mother up with standard
questions like "Why is the sky blue?"
"Why is the grass green?" and "Why are
my goldfish floating in the top of
their bowl?"
She did pretty well explaining the prop
erties of light, the importance of chloro
phyll and the hazards of over-feeding your
fish. For a brief period, I thought she was
the smartest person in the world. I also
thought that "why?" was better than three
wishes from Aladdin's lamp.
Alas, my faith in both her and "Why?"
began to fail almost as soon as it was
formed. She could not tell me why we use
red for stop and green for go. She couldn't
tell me why we flip light switches up for on
and down for off. Nor could she tell me
why we drive on the right side of the road
instead of the left.
Gradually, I began to understand that
the problem lay less in her dwindling in
telligence and more in the nature of my in
quiries. It's easy to explain facts (they are
reasonable, consistent, and they make the
same sense everywhere you go). Light,
chlorophyll, and goldfish are the same all
over the world.
When it comes to explaining choices,
however, things get trickier. After all, red
and green are arbitrary choices, and pur
ple and yellow or blue and orange
would work just as well. Light switches
are just as effective if they're wired to go
on when flipped down. And nations
ONLINE POLL
Each week, the Emerald publishes the
results of the previous poll and the
coming week’s poll question.
Visit http://www.dailyemerald.com to vote.
Last question: What’s your vice?
Results: 260 votes.
Jessica Cole-Hodgkinson
Huh? What? Reaily.
like England and Japan seem to roll
along quite handily with their vehicles
on the left side of the road.
My most recent foray into the world of
unsatisfactory-answers-to-why occurred
last week. A friend of mine is pregnant.
Through the miracle of modem technolo
gy, she knows that she will give birth to a
boy in a few short months. When it came
up that her soon-to-be son was going to be
circumcised, before I could help myself, I
asked "Why?"
I wasn't tiying to challenge her decision;
I simply wanted to understand it. Cutting
off body parts has always seemed a bizarre
practice to me, and it's not easy to find
people willing to discuss it. Here was
someone — a mother — willing to explain
the rationale behind it.
She explained that for her secular self,
circumcising her son was necessary for
health, hygiene and social reasons.
She had been told that having her
son's foreskin removed would reduce
the likelihood that he would develop
urinary tract infections, lessen his
chances for penile cancer later in life
and help protect him from sexually
transmitted diseases.
She was told that uncircumcised boys
• Violence: 52.3 percent or 136 votes.
• Online porn: 21.2 percent or 55 votes.
• Reality TV: 4.6 percent or 12 votes.
• Music: 3.8 percent or 10 votes.
• Starbucks: 3.8 percent or 10 votes.
• Other: 14.3 percent or 37 votes.
often neglected to wash properly, some
thing that could lead to infections of a very
unpleasant nature.
And she candidly told me that she did
n't want him to be made fun of in the lock
er room or feel uncomfortable with his
body in sexual situations.
Put like that, it seems logical and rea
sonable to cut off a troublesome body part
shortly after birth, doesn't it?
Well, I'm not so sure.
Health-wise, sewing our four littlest
toes together would significantly reduce
our chances for athlete's foot later in
life, but I don't see anyone proposing
that as a minor modification on na
ture's design.
Nor do I see anyone suggesting that we
pull the teeth of children who are unlike
ly to brush and floss properly in order to
save them from the potential trauma of
a root canal.
And, call me cynical, but I have this
sneaking suspicion that embarrassment in
the locker room and self-consciousness in
the bedroom are rights of passage we must
all survive to reach adulthood, and no
amount of nipping and adjusting will
change that.
So, I gently explained my concerns to
her with all my usual tact and diplomacy
— like I said, my aim was not to challenge
her decision, but merely to understand it.
Now, I find myself contemplating a new
"Why?"
Why hasn't she called?
Contact the columnist at
jessicacolehodgkinson@dailyemerald.com.
Her opinions do not necessarily
represent those of the Emerald.
This week: Should the Take Back the
Night march have separate sections
based on gender identity?
Choices: Yes - It will help people be more
comfortable; Yes—It will attract more
participants; No - It alienates people trying
to support the cause; No - Segregation is
hypocritical in a march for equal rights.