4A
Tuesday, April 16, 1996
OPINION
UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
VIEWPOINT
University needs person to oversee recycling programs
The University of Kansas needs to create a post that oversees environmental programs on campus. One specific area in need of attention is recycling.
The University used to have an environmental ombudsman who created, implemented and coordinated environmental programs on campus. Because of a hiring freeze, the position was not filled after the original ombudsman left the University. A concerned student kept the office functioning for six months until she graduated.
Since then, the University has continued to recognize the position but will not fill it. The position cannot be officially closed until another position is opened to replace the already existing — but empty — position.
An attempt is being made by the department of environment, health and safety to establish an environmental specialist position within that department that would replace the empty environmental ombudsman's position and revitalize and coordinate campus environmental programs.
THE ISSUE:
Recycling programs
Campus buildings have recycling receptacles to collect recyclable goods and a few environmentally conscious campus groups run some small recycling efforts.
A campus as environmentally conscious as the University of Kansas needs to have a position to oversee and coordinate environmental programs. The establishment of this position within the department of environment, health and safety will allow one individual to oversee and manage all of these efforts and find ways to improve them and to better facilitate the recycling done on campus.
CHRIS VINE FOR THE EDITORIAL BOARD
Students should take advantage of less-popular language classes
Taking a second language is a requirement that many students at the University of Kansas need to satisfy. Many departments at the University offer a wide range of foreign languages. An unequal enrollment exists, however, between the most demanded languages, such as Spanish, and less popular languages, such as Dutch or Hausa.
Of course, the usefulness of a language might influence students' choice, but many students aren't planning to become fluent in the language they are taking. Many people are just interested in fulfilling the language requirements. For these students, taking a less-popular language would be a good solution. These classes usually have few students, and teachers have more time to spend individually with each student.
Many times, for instance, students with no special interest in Spanish will have to wait for a week just to get into Spanish 104. If these students are lucky enough to get a
THE ISSUE:
Foreign languages
closed-class opener, they still will end up in a large class. By choosing a less popular language, these students could avoid the hassle. Unfortunately, not enough academic advisers propose this strategy to their advisees.
Academic advisers should promote the less popular languages among their students more often, especially if their advisees are not motivated to learn a language.
Taking a less popular language could expose students to a completely different culture. It also could be an enjoyable learning experience because most of these classes have few students.
This semester, for instance, only six students were enrolled in Portuguese 104. It is really a shame that not enough students take advantage of opportunities like this one.
Maybe this could change if academic advisers could suggest more than just Spanish or French.
HENRI BLANC FOR THE EDITORIAL BOARD
In fairness, Rep. Peter King of New York, the prime mover behind the Farrakhan hearings, was quick to call on his fellow Republicans to condemn and distance themselves from extremist militias in the wake of the Oklahoma City bombing.
Shawn Trimble / KANSAN
But few of King's colleagues showed as much enthusiasm as he did. Why does Congress so eagerly probe Black militants while leaving white bomb throwers to be investigated by the proper authorities? Maybe it depends on whose security is being threatened.
Investigating Farrakhan should not be a top priority of Congress
All of this must bring Farrakhan great delight. It enhances his efforts to portray himself to a big audience as a victim of the white power structure. It anges Justice and Treasury Department officials in the Clinton administration who fear the heat surrounding the billion-dollar gift Libyan President Moammar Gadhafi promised him.
With enemies like those he has in Congress, the Rev. Louis Farakhan doesn't need friends.
With hearings underway to investigate possible illegalities or security threats posed by the Nation of Islam leader's recent tour of at least 18 cities in Africa and the Middle East, major leaders of both parties have indicated their support for a resolution to condemn Farrakhan, even without hearing his side of it.
That is great news for Farrakhan. Even well-known Farrakhan critics like me are asking ourselves why congressional leaders are so eager to put this man in the spotlight. Congress never has shown similar concern about the security threats posed by David Duke's racist associations, the militant Idaho militias' heavily armed excesses, the neo-Nazis who are infesting the ranks of U.S. military or the series of Black church firebombings that have erupted across the South.
SYNDICATED COLUMNIST
All of those pressing questions suddenly
were pushed to the background as House hearings into Farrakhan's controversial trip erupted on April 9 into a televised circus. Farrakhan's congressional critics virtually asked for it. For reasons of their own, investigating committee staff members decided not to let Nation of Islam representatives give Farrakhan's side of the story except in writing.
In the midst of this verbal mud wrestling, a voice of uncommon good sense was heard from Rep. Cynthia McKinney. In a magnificent moment, the Black Georgia Democrat quiet declared, "Minister Farrakhan is not above the law, but neither is he beneath the protections of the Constitution."
That condition justifiably outraged Nation members. After listening quietly to several foreign policy experts accuse the Clinton administration of leniency toward Farrakhan's trip, two Farrakhan supporters loudly protested and had to be ejected. Others tried to follow committee members to their offices at the end of the hearings, but were stopped by Capitol Hill police in a confrontation captured quite dramatically by news cameras.
Indeed he isn't. Farakhan deserves to be criticized roundly for his rhetorical excesses. He deserves to be criticized for his cavorting around with sponsors of terrorism such as Libya, Iraq and Iran. He deserves to be criticized for turning a blind eye to the Black slavery his pals in Sudan have allowed for more than a dozen years, according to refugees and human rights groups. He deserves the criticism he has received from TransAfrica for winking at the Black-on-Black tyranny in Nigeria, which TransAfrica has urged the world to boycott.
But Farrakhan also deserves to be protected by the Constitution the same as any other citizen. His so-called "Friendship Tour" might be immoral on several levels, but it is not necessarily illegal. His alleged failure to register as a foreign agent refers to a law that has only been prosecuted three times in 30 years, according to the Los Angeles Times, and none were successful.
Congress should butt out of the Farrakhan case. There is no need for this highly political body to upstage and, perhaps, impede agencies like the State, Justice and Treasury Departments in conducting the investigations that it is their job to conduct.
Yes, with enemies like these, Farrakhan doesn't need friends. He only has to keep the waters stirred.
Clarence Page is a columnist at the Chicago Tribune.
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
Kansan uses poor word choice in caption
Overall, I have been very impressed with the high quality of the University Daily Kansan.
The dictionary defines sulking as a state of being "sulently cross; doggedly or resentfully ill-humored."
who lost the bid for a Nunemaker seat, the caption stated that he was sulking about the loss.
However, I must take issue with the wording of a caption in Friday's issue reporting the outcome of the Student Senate elections.
Under a front-page picture of Kevin Yoder, a Senate candidate
In common language, the word "sulking" has a very negative connotation.
It is understandable, after all the time, effort and energy invested in campaigning, that a
candidate would be disappointed if he or she were to lose the election.
To label that personal disappointment as sulking is unfair to Yoder, and frankly, is not indicative of the personal and unbiased perspective that I have come to expect from this publication.
I think the Kansan owes rover an apology for its very poor choice of words.
Debra Snider Leavenworth senior
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No wonder. Wilson dared to challenge the well-entrenched idea that liberals have hijacked higher education and are smothering conservative ideas. The attack from
ASHLEY MILLER
Editor
VIRGINIA MARGHEIM
Managing editor
ROBERT ALLEN
News editor
TOM EBLEN
General manager, news adviser
In his book,
The Myth of
Political Correctness: The
Conservative Attack on Higher
Education,
Wilson documents examples
It is almost as if the right is demanding ideological affirmative action. I never would have expected such sniveling from those tough guys.
WASHINGTON — John Wilson, a bearded graduate student at the University of Chicago, faced a hostile crowd in the auditorium of the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank here.
Conservative correctness wreaks havoc on universities
the right isn't as well publicized but is just as insidious, he told the audience of mostly conservative students.
At one point during the debate, Thiel brought up an interesting hypothetical: If conservatives outnumbered liberals in higher education, would they behave any better?
The answer is no. They would behave much worse, because they don't even pretend to value the pantheon of ideas. But we can at least take comfort that liberals, when they have control of the dissemination of ideas, are exposed as the hypocrites they are.
of "conservative correctness:"
A state senator in Ohio threatened to cut funding to Kent State University if a class on the sociology of homosexuality was offered.
David Wilson is a Kansas City, Mo., senior in Journalism. This semester he is an intern for the Washington D.C. bureau of the Cloverland Plain Dealer.
Students at Stanford University, upset about having to watch a short film on the plight of migrant farm workers before a Student Union Activities-type feature film, yelled, "Beaners, go home." The aftermath was negligible.
An English professor at Nayack College in Nyack, New York, was fired for displaying a "support gay rights" button on her briefcase. When the college president defended her, he too was fired, Wilson said.
Wilson's opponent at the forum, Peter Thiel, conceded that yes, there are examples of conservative correctness. And yes, we should condemn them.
You would think that conservatives, with their zeal for the free market, would accept that however it came to pass, the left rules the universities.
But Thiel, himself author of a book on the issue of political correctness of campus, favors the more familiar view that liberal correctness is more rampant than conservative correctness.
On that point, he wins. Feminists, homosexual activists, socialists and multiculturalists do hold court at the University of Kansas and elsewhere.
But so what? The American ideological slugfest has to have one winner and one loser. In Congress, the left is down for the count. At the academy, it is the right that needs the smelling salts.
Such an effort would result in ridiculous balancing acts and inevitably, infringe upon academic freedom.
Besides, how could administrators possibly solve the "problem" of liberal orthodoxy?
HUBIE
By Greg Hardin