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About Portland observer. (Portland, Or.) 1970-current | View Entire Issue (Dec. 16, 1976)
Page 2 Portland Observe- Thursday. 16th. 197« Prescription drug abuse We see the world through Black eyes NAACP: A time for ssity The NAACP membership come out m good numbers and overwhelmingly elected Reverend John Jockson president The turn out demonstrated that there is still interest m the NAACP in Portland Reverend Jackson begins his two year term of office at a good time. There will be a new mon in the Wh le House - one pledged to work for humon rights. There also w 'l be a new national director of the NAACP - one who is outspoken and vigorous and reody to leod. One of the highlights of Jackson's term of office will be the national convention to be held in Portland m the summer of 1977 In the meantime, there are the day to day problems that require hard work and vigilonce — discrimination m education, |obs, housing, the courts; police brutolify; etc. The three men who ran for the presidency ana ost have pledged their support and their participation. Each would like to hove served as president, but each has expressed the opinion that the goals and obfectives of the NAACP surpass the>r personal desires. We recommend that Reverend Jackson top this enthusiasm and concern by naming these men to his Executive Board, bringing them and their supporters into his administration to build the strong and unified NAACP that is needed in Portland. Justice not free Former-Senator Edward Gurney of Florida, who was indicted for election irregularities, spend a half million dollars and neorly two years proving his innocence. In the meantime, he lost his seat in the United States Senate. Gurney soys this is too high a price to pay for justice — that if he were still in the Senate he would introduce legislation to make the government pay the legal costs of those found not guilty. This is something we have been saying for a long time Anyone con be arrested and tried, but proving innocence con take a life savings or put a person in debt for the rest of his life - this besides the publicity and suspicion that will follow him. Justice is not free in this rtaherr — ft must be •bought. The^oils are filled with those who could not afford the ccBh Jordan to Supreme Court There is much speculation over which vabmet post will be offered *o Texas Representative Barbara Jordan. We predict that AArs Jordan will not be selected for the cobinet. It is well known that U S. Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall has resisted resignation due to his failing health, hoping to wait out the Nixon-Ford administration. He hoped a more moderate presi dent could moke the important appointment of his successor We predict that soon after the inauguration of Jimmy Carter, Justice Marshall will resign and Barbara Jordan will join the high court. Another Potat of View Land disposal in city Guest Editorial The Oregonian Flat, developable, desirable land is at a premium in Portland. Thus, when two motor owners of such property are simultaneously considering disposing of some, public interest considerations may be acute. This is particularly so when, as in the present instance, the property owners ore public ogencies - School District No. 1 and the Oregon Transportation Commission The Transportation Commission is seeking odvice from the City of Portland on guidelines the ogency might use in disposing of the immense amount of land in the former Mt. Hood Freeway corridor and in the abandoned Thurman-Vaughn corridor for 1-505 in Northwest Portland. The Portland School Board carefully sought city input for the guidelines it has developed to govern release of its surplus land. Those guidelines are on the School Board's business agenda for December 13th. The district has more than 20 ocres of land in seven sites that it will consider selling in the near-term future. Public ogencies — the Parks Bureau and the Housing Authority of Portland, for example — have expressed interest in some of the property. Residents of an area on S.E. Steele Street hove already organized to oppose possible sale of surplus school district land, 3.7 ocres, to the Housing Authority of Portland for placement of about 30 low-income apartments. Focmg a levy election in January, the Schoo< Board has shown no enthusiasm for getting cought in the middle of a fight between angry citizens of a middle-to-upper-middle-mcome neighborhood and HAP. However, there probobly is no way to avoid the fight, not should the public policy issues be evoded. For example, Portland has sought to promote economic, cultural and racial diversity in its schools. Simultaneuously, HAP has sought to spread its low-income housing around the city for a variety of socially defensible reasons. Therefore, is the public interest best served if HAP is given first chance at surplus school "district property in rnidcHe-and-high- income neighborhoods, when such a course would promote goals of both groups? Students ore already given administrative transfers and are bused, for educational reasons, from poor to more affluent areas. Is school district land disposal a legitimate extension of that process? Questions such as these are only the tip of the volcano that will erupt when public ogencies try to toke over surplus public land for low-income housing projects, jails, half-way houses or any of a variety of other functions that neighbors believe should be sited "anywhere but here." by Yvwaa Retiring Ccmausstoaer Alexander M. Schmidt of the Food and Drug Admtni straUon says be is appalled a t tbe ease with which physicians overpres.-ribe and misprescribe drugs that can cause serious injury He noted especially the drugs pre scribed to women, postmenopausal and other estrogens, amphetamines and tranqu timers. A recent survey of 2.500 persons confirms Schmidt's statement. Fifteen per cent of the women in contrast to • per cent of the men w ere using drugs to control anxiety. T w en ty per cent of the women but only 8 per cent of the men used drugs that w ere both sntisaxiety and sedative. Eight per cent of the women compared to 1.5 per cent of the men relied on stimulants to get them through the day. Added to that. 4 per cent of women opposed to 2.6 per cent of the men took sleeping pills. D r. Linda A . Fidell reports that though women make 54 per cent of the visits to doctors, they get 67 per cent of the prescriptions for tranquilizers and anti depressants. Doctors are men. most often, who have tremendous responsibility and limited time They make decisions baaed upon medical knowledge, social custom and information furnished by the pharavaceu ticsl companies. Pharmaceutical companies advertise freely to make doctors sware of the drugs they manufacture. When we realize that a doctor's post graduate (duration most often is limited to the journals and advertnenfbnU that come across his desk, v e begin to sense the shifting sands upon which today's phvsician works. Fearful'’ Yes indeed M oreover, doctors' attitudes most often conform to the predominant social attitu de of male superiority. They tend to view women as em otim ai. childlike and dependent- They most often expect women to be neurotic, bored and frua Ira ted. And further, they do not consider a woman's time to be especially valuable. Women are viewed as nonworkers who have tim e to be sedated. The difficulty grows when women accept the male putdown. A woman strengthens the doctor's conviction when she accepts him as a father figure who is not to be questioned. Oftentimes she fits into the rote of wife and mother But when the children are gone and tbe house becomes meaningless. or when dinner is fixed for a husband who might not come home, feelings of inade quacy and depression surface. She has aches and pains that seem to be symp toms of disease yet to be diagnosed. She becomes a bother and an embar rasswent to busy doctors who are looking for “real" illnesses which they can treat successfully The woman gets no gui dance or honest treatm ent from her doctor. She gets a pat on the hand, a prescription for Valium and the doctor's silent prayer that outside conditions will change so that he doesn't have to see her again. The tragedy compounds when the busy doctor writes the prescription for the latest tranquilizer without really listen ■ng The symptoms can be of a serious illness that needs prompt and decisivd treatm ent. Yet diagnosis is delayed be ' cause the doctor has responded to a stereotype, rather than to a human being. We all know stories of such expert ences. Fortunately, more jw-ople recognize the injustice and waste of masking women's problems with drugs More women are going back to work and back to school More women are going into medicine The number of women in medical school has risen from 8 per rent to 20 per cent. Women doctors ran be expected to discuss more easily the underlying em o tions w ith women patients. In themselves they w ill be evidence of fulfillment which women are today realizing. Medical students, both men a n d / women, arc demanding more considera non be given to understanding women. But of more importance, women are banding together to talk about their problems and demand that changes be made. Women must confront physicians who are prescribing drugs and demand aceep table explanations before they take drugs. When women refuse to continue the stereotype, then doctors will treat them as equals and as individuals with whom they must talk honestly rather than merely scribbling a prescription as they hurry out of the room. A time for a new realism A 1 travel around tbe country and talk to people. especially in tbe Black com munity, about tbe coming C arter Admin istration. I'm increasingly disturbed by what appears to be a lack of realism. Conscious of the debt owed to the Black vote by President-elect C arter, too many people expect miracles to come to pass after January 20th. Some seriously be beve their local councilman. who's a nice fellow, will be named Secretary of State. Others think they just have to sit back and w ait until a golden born of plenty is emptied by Washington, full of money and programs that w ill end p ro ven y and discrimination overnight. It's not going to happen. This is not tim e for flights of fancy, it's a tim e for serious thought and developing strategies to get tbe programs Black people and all poor people need. And it'« a tim e fo r a new realism th at helps us understand the way our government works and the way w e can influence it. No m atter how concerned the Presi dent-elect may be about race relations - and there's ample evidence that he's very much concerned about improving it - the fact remains that once he gets to the W hite House he w ill lace the immense political pressures from various groups that w ili influence his decisions. And it's very possible that these pressures and the mises th at are f a r t of the democratic process may make it expedient for him to defer programs of vital importance to Black people. So thia is hardly the tune to relax and wait for the fruits of Black political support for the C arter candidacy to fall Instead, it is a time to bring pressure to bear on the President-elect and tbe key people around him to make sure that Cabinet, sub Cabinet and regulatory agency poets go to appointees who will favor social reforms And it's a tim e to prepare program proposals and public policy positions to present to tbe new Administration, and also to start now to build the alliances that w ill get those proposals passed The new realism also should recognize that government action is not enough. Even if everything Black people want passes the Administration and Congress, w e ll still face formidable barriers W e can't let ourselves fall into the same trap as in the 1960s when federal activism resulted in raised expectations followed by deepened bitterness and frustration. W e ea n t look to Washington alone when tbe private sector has so far to go to satisfy legitimate economic needs. I f we dump it all on Washington, that just helps get the private sector off the hook And Black people have to keep our own house in order too. Yes. the President and the Congress have to pass job erea tion legislation, but realism demands that the President and the Congress can t go to the employment centers for us. they can't take the jo b tra in in g for us. and they can't learn the skills for us. Wishful thinking has to give way to a new realism that understands the need for exercising our responsibilities to ourselves and to our communities. W e've got to organize the Black com munity to improve the schools our child ren go to. dean up the neighborhoods we live in and make our streets safe from crime again. T hat w ill take help from Washington and state and local govern ments in tbe form of funds far education, housing and community crime proven tion. but is also requires community involvement and responsibility. The public and private sectors ran do much to remove the structural harriers to our progress to help end discrimination and partially compensate for it. and they o n provide a framework in which M ark people ran finally bury tberr chains, but they can't - and won't - do it all. So Black people, armed with a new realism that demands the utmost from government, from the private sector, and from ourselves, must retain the initiative. W e did it in the 1960s when our insistent demands led to the civil rights laws. Now we must do it in the 1970s by keeping up the pressure on policy makers, by taking every opportunity to get the skills and schooling and jobs w r need, and by getting our communities together Black Caucus demands asylum investigation (Continued from p. 1 cot. 41 of these "mental patients" have been confined without benefit to due process and competent and professional medical diagnosis. W e have been advised that patients are responsible for maintenance, have been used to build some of these institutions, are subject to non professional sdminis tenng of anesthesia and relaxing drugs, the use of shock treatm ent, and most disturbing that 8000 Black South A fr i cans have been hired as slave labor to outside firms on contract to Smith M itchell & Company. Such accusations, if borne out. would constitute violations of the "Supplemen tary Convention on the Abolition of Slavery, the Slave Trade, and Institu lions and Practices Similar to Slavery". TH E BLACK enacted on September 25th, 1926. the "Supplementary Slavery Convention of 1957”. and the Preamble and Articles 13. 55. 56 and 68 of the United Nations Charter. The operations of these mental institu lions also appear to be in violation of the basic principles of human rights and freedoms as delineated in the Universal Declaration of Human Righta. specifically A rticle 4:"No one shall be held in slavery or servitude, slavery and the slave trade shall be prohibited in all their forms." I t is our considered judgment that these charges are clearly a m atter of international concern as evidenced by the aforementioned charter and conventions to which our government is a party. Like you. we believe that the internal structure of the Republic of South Africa PRESS— OUR FREEDOM is "incompatible with any concept of human dignity." lake you. we believe that "the United States must be true to its own beliefs." I t is w ithin this context that we urge to you investigate these alleged psyrhiatrie abuses in the Republic of South Africa. If they are proven accurate, we urge you to honor your pledge to "bring about peace ful change, equality of opportunity, and basic human rights in South Africa.” by utilizing the moral, political, and econo mic power of the United Stales of America to end any such violation of human righta. Thank you for your attention to this m atter Sincerely. Vvenae B. Burke Chairperson DEPENDS ON IT ! la t i Portland O bserver a r Á l- O N P A 1973 ■published every Thursday by Exie Publishing Comps»./. 2201 North Kilhngsworth. Portland. Oregon 97217 M ailing address P .0 . Box 3137. Portland. Oregon 97208. Telephone: 283 2486 b * < Subscriptions: 57.60 per year in tbe Tri-County ares. 58.00 per year outside Portland The Portland Observer's official position is expressed only in its Publisher's column We See The World Through Black Eyes) Any other material throughout the paper w tbe opinion of tbe individual w riter or submitter and does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the Pwrtlsa ‘ ~ - York MEMO« I Publishers Association 5th Place Best Editorial N N P A 1973 k Editorial Aw ard N N A 1973 eat Editorial * 3rd Place uafcy Lead O N P A 1975 A LFR ED L HENDERSON E d ita r/ Oregon Newspaper la t Place (eat Ad RebuR. O N P A 1973 fwe ìw p A p ER $2.50 of your r o w subscription to Tbe Portland Observer will go to the Oregon Black History Project Tri-County a rea $7.50 other areas $8.00 Moil io; PorMond Observer P.O Box 3137 Portland, Oregon 97206
