MONDAY MARCH 2, 2018
4A • THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
OPINION
MONDAY, MARCH 3.2003
EDITORIAL BOARD
Protest overkill clouds issues
Add the national campaign the "Taco Bell Truth Tour" to the list of causes of late: war with Iraq, the legalization of marijuana, the legalization of same-gender sexual acts, animal rights and sufficient pay for GTAs. It's important to protest for the right reasons. Think about whether the issue will be taken seriously. Will the protest be forgotten in a week or less?
The idea behind the Taco Bell protests is a noble enough cause: Twenty colleges around the country are uniting with the Coalition of Immokalee Workers, made up of farmers who pick the tomatoes for Taco Bell, through a campaign called "Boot the Bell." The farmers want the packing company that supplies Taco Bell to pay them a penny more per tomato picked to double their yearly salaries of $5,000 to $7,500. "Boot the Bell" and the Student Farm worker Alliance are trying to get Taco Bell products off of college campuses.
So what happens in Lawrence?
Protests were held Feb. 22 at the Taco Bell on 23rd Street and the Taco Bell on 6th Street. The protests here did not coincide with the "Boot the Bell" campaign, but they were inspired by it. If the goal was to scare a few people away from a Taco Bell on a Saturday and make them go to Jimmy John's, for example, then the protest was a success for the protesters and for Jimmy John's.
So the next time a person wants a chalupa, will the message stick, or will hunger supersede everything? The hungry person could boycott Taco Bell and go to McDonald's for a Big Mac. Then he starts worrying if the people making the secret sauce are being mistreated or if the farmers picking the lettuce are getting paid enough.
The farmers picking tomatoes may well have a cause that's worth fighting for. But is the public supposed to value one protest above another? Let's prioritize and concentrate on protests that aren't just a silly exercise of our right to freedom of speech.
There are just too many things to worry about. Before you know it, he's retreated back to Taco Bell for a chalupa, forgetting why he boycotted it in the first place.
University of Maryland
Jon Ralston for the edithiary board
Rail Station for the edithiary board
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REALITYCHECK
PERSPECTIVE
Counter-protests oppose rights
ered to protest Taco Bell on Feb. 22, they were joined by unusual company: KU's College Republicans.
While the former groups protested the working conditions of Taco Bell's tomato supplier, the Republicans displayed their love for the restaurant and capitalism.
When Lawrence Anti-Imperialists and Lawrence Industrial Workers of the World gath-
Industrial Workers of the World and the Anti-Imperialists were protesting the poor working conditions of tomato pickers, specifically that they are only paid a handful of change per large box of tomatoes filled. The conditions were even likened to slave labor.
The Republicans, ostensibly, like capitalism. In fact, Matt Flynn, vice chairman of the organization, said the group was present to support the idea. Capitalism is represented by any business, local or national. But there's no reason to single out Taco Bell.
The members of the group are probably not so hooked on Mexican fast food that they felt compelled to gather on a weekend and hold up signs proclaiming their love for the business. I am only left to conclude that they were present to protest the protest.
COMMENTARY
So were they there to protest the groups or the message? If they were protesting the message, apparently they agree with the exploitation of low-end workers. "Capitalism Rulz," a T-shirt slogan, would then be an endorsement of the pure capitalist system, before ethics, where those on top stay there by any means necessary.
But I'm willing to give them more moral credit than that. I must conclude that they were there to protest the groups. It's easy to see how self-proclaimed pro-capitalists would stand in opposition to groups such as 'International Workers of the World,' that are quite Marxist-influenced. But if that is their message, the Republicans need to find a better way to express it.
Sam Lane
readersrep@kansan.com
An event aimed at human rights is not the place to attack the organizing groups it makes the disrupter appear to be anti-human rights.
The juxtaposition of the protests really did give the appearance of the Republicans being pro-exploitation, and that makes all republicans look bad. If tomato pickers could have been there, I doubt they would have appreciated the Republicans attempting to undermine their advocates.
This is not the first time such a thing has happened. Much worse transpired about a year ago, when KU Greens held a fast to raise awareness of the plight of Afghan civilians. The KU Objectivists, an antagonistic group I'm happy not to have heard from recently, attempted to crash the event by distributing free cake
The Republicans need to learn from the Objectivists' mistake and express their views without attempting to trivialize others' reasonable grievances.
decorated as the U.S. flag, at the same place and time as the fast.
Words fail me to express the depth of its blatant rudeness and insensitivity. Suffice it to say it was immature.
They celebrated gluttony literally in the face of those attempting a small act of compassionate asceticism. Not agreeing with the Greens is its choice. Not agreeing with the message is its choice. But the group should at least have enough respect for the choices of others to avoid holding events in such poor taste.
It is true the Objectivists exercised their constitutional rights to freedom of speech and assembly. I have the right to stand in the middle of a snowy parking lot half naked on a cold night and hit myself on the head with a hammer until I pass out. That does not make it a good idea.
A real protest happens when people see something, such as human exploitation, as such a problem that they are compelled to take to the streets and voice their discontent with signs and chants.
Protests are serious.
Their importance is the reason the rights to free speech and assembly are in the Constitution. They should be treated with maturity. Perhaps that the Objectivists failed to do so is the reason they no longer appear in the public eve.
Lane is a Leavenworth senior in psychology.
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
Says here in the local newspaper that the University of Kansas is putting on a play about vaginas, The Vagina Monologues.
Muddled monologues
Says here the play raises questions, like what would a vagina say if it could talk. Well it can't talk. That's why the play is called Monologues. Not that a lot of people try that.
The play also explores "where the vagina is." Well, folks where I come from have no trouble on that. Fact is, half the folks in town have one, everyone know where it is, and the other half of town is always trying to get its hands on it.
But that was all back in the days when vaginas were reasonable. Now-a-days just to look at one you have to have it all in writing and notarized.
Nor do the vaginas in my town seem to need much "empowerment." Seems to me they're already the most valuable things in town. That's why they keep them hidden, so no one can steal 'em.
Says here the play also explores "why it is so seldom talked about." Now that is serious. I'm simply stunned at how women clam up when I ask, "And how is your vagina today?"
Leonard Magruder, president, Vietnam Veterans for Academic Reform
Opinion page needs balance
My biggest complaint about The Unit
The last thing a paper wants to be is biased. Every time the paper only prints the left side, it puts the Kansan that much closer to biased. The times that the Kansan does print both sides builds its credibility.
versity Daily Kansan is that there is rarely balance in the opinion section. Most of the time there is only one article about a topic, and it is almost always to the left.
All I want is both sides of an issue. You want to publish an anti-war article, fine, but there should also be a pro-war article as well.
As I said, I have no problem with antiwar articles (although I disagree), but they need to be balanced.
Russell Warren, Lawrence senior
American ethnocentrism
In response to Nathan Clark's letter to the editor, "Ridiculous anti-Americanism"(The University Daily Kansan, Feb. 21), I would just like to say thank you. Thank you for strengthening my argument that America has become an even more ethnocentric, vile place to live. Clark responds to Dunavan's article with a suggestion to "go live in Iraq for a couple of years and tell us if you still think there is a moral equivalence between them and us."
Moral equivalence between "them"
and "us?" This close minded, outright
redneck ideal is going to determine the fate of this nation and whether we are viewed globally as a lynch mob with unthought out principles.
The issue I'm addressing is not whether Saddam Hussein is an evil lunatic, but rather how gung-ho and quick ournation is to place blame on "the other countries" without even thinking.
Perhaps Mr. Clark should review the definition of cultural relativism so he might know that it is unethical to judge a society that he is not a part of. In the future, please choose your words more carefully to get your point across without the ethnocentrism.
Eric Schaumburg, Prairie Village sophomore
Protests not just about war
The recent guest commentary, "War opposition eliminates need for censorship" (The University Daily Kansan, Feb. 26), attacking the anti-war protesters is yet another weak apology for the unilateral imperialism of the U.S. administration.
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Concerns that oil is this administration's cause for an attack on Iraq is dismissed by the author as a "conspiracy". But it does not take a KU professor to see that the last 50 years of American and British foreign policy have been inti-
CONTINUED ON PAGE 5A
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