TO THE EDITOR
ideas. Our community in general also
needs to start addressing the actions of our
police force. The badge should not be a
symbol of intimidation and fear.
Eugene is a hub for social change. We
should not let something as trivial as law
enforcement smother our messages. I urge
everyone who feels a need for social
change to remain in an active voice. Let’s
no longer allow our police department to be
a demoralizing presence.
Moriah J. Demers
Eugene
JUST WANT A HOODIE
How many of you teenagers have gone
to a clothing store to try on clothes, and as
you are browsing through the rack you no-
tice a store employee about 20 to 30 feet
away from you? As you continue on your
way through the store, so does the em-
ployee. Coincidence? I think not. I am so
sick of being followed based on just three
things: I’m a teenager; I wear baggy
clothes; and I have facial piercings.
People are always talking about how we
shouldn’t judge other people on outward
appearances, but I guess that doesn’t apply
to teenagers, does it? I have many more
adult friends who steal than teenage friends
who steal. And you don’t notice the preppy
teenagers getting followed nearly as much;
but since I have baggy clothes on, I must be
there to steal.
The way that store employees look at
me makes me feel like I did something hor-
rible when all I wanted was a new hoodie.
Getting followed makes me feel like a
two-year-old, so grow up, get over your
stereotyping and quit following me.
Laci Stevens
Eugene
LIFELESS MEMORIAL
I understand the best I can the NAACP’s
desire to honor Martin Luther King Jr.
Why, however, honor such a great figure
with a road, a lifeless strip of asphalt?
What is the honor in remembering a man
with the infrastructure for community and
ecological destruction, the place that causes
the most deaths for males between the ages
of 16 and 34? Roads divide and destroy
wildlife habit, kill people and animals, speed
the destruction of streams and wetlands, re-
lease toxins into ground water, and provide
the means for automobiles, the greatest sin-
gle pollution source in the U.S.A.
The irrationality of honoring MLK Jr.
with a road is more so, the deeper you
study history. Road development caused
the exodus of city centers by the middle
class, leading to the economic death of
downtown areas. Highway expansion
through poor neighborhoods led to isolated
ghettos; hence, “white highways through
black neighborhoods.” This type of devel-
opment was a major factor in riots in the
Watts neighborhood and Detroit. Has the
NAACP forgotten already the most visible
moment in civil rights history, the Rosa
Parks refusal and the Montgomery bus
boycotts? Road-related, both of them.
The NAACP should realize the naming
JUNE 26, 2003 5