Letters for 12 Nov

TO THE EDITOR:

Boo me all you want, Wolfpack fans. When I walk through your student tailgating section wearing baby blue, hiss until your hearts content. You can issue the “dose of class” we UNC fans need (as noted by NCSU Technician columnist Benton Sawrey on Friday). I understand and appreciate rivalry– it’s what makes college football so great … so boo away.

But what I experienced on Saturday afternoon went far beyond my daily dose of humility. Walking around the fairgrounds I continually was approached and told to “Go back to Brokeback Mountain, faggot”… to “go fuck myself”… and “to go home, bitch”. Not for taunting or teasing the red storm, but for just walking by in a blue shirt.

And the Wolfpack’s comments weren’t contained to me. They were hurled at a young elementary-school aged boy and at an elderly couple. I was chased down inside Carter-Finely by two young Wolfpack gentlemen in front of my mother (who was wearing Wolfpack colors) to be told to go fuck myself.

Maybe we UNC fans could use a dose of humility, but maybe some State fans could use a dose of class. I will deny into the ground that I was stereotypically born with a silver-spoon in my mouth. But I would rather be thought of as a stuck-up Carolina girl than a classless State fan any day of the week… and that includes game day.

Claire Williamson
UNC Class of 2008
Journalism

TO THE EDITOR:

I write in response to the article titled “Trustees move up tuition vote” (Nov. 9). While student government officials and the Chancellor may not always agree on issues related to tuition, I do want to assure the student body that Eve, Lauren, and I are working closely with the Chancellor in an effort to ensure that tuition increases for nonresident undergraduates and both resident and nonresident graduate students are kept to a minimum.

Although the decision to accelerate the tuition process may have caught some by surprise, student government officials and the Chancellor have maintained a close working relationship throughout the tuition process.

 

We commend the Chancellor for his efforts to seek student input and we will continue to work with him and the Board of Trustees to explore ways to improve the tuition process for future years.

In the meantime, please visit www.unc.edu/studgov to learn more about the tuition process and opportunities for you to make your voice heard before the Trustees vote on tuition proposals during the BOT meeting on Thursday.

 

Mike Tarrant

Student Body Vice President

TO THE EDITOR:

As a fellow organizer for workers’ rights at the University of Southern California, I was disappointed to read the article “Students Lobby for Workers” (11/9/07), which omitted significant facts and details regarding the sweat-free campaign at UNC Chapel Hill. The article failed to mention that the campaign is advocated by a broad base of support at UNC with ten student groups formally endorsing the campaign. The writer also cites Moeser’s letter that “There is more momentum among the very top public universities licensing programs to pursue alternatives to the DSP,” but totally omits the fact that 60 other American colleges and universities also held actions on their campuses in solidarity with UNC’s action- misleading readers to believe that the DSP is a marginal program compared to Moeser’s proposal.

Lastly, this is not an isolated incident – students at UNC Chapel Hill are not simply refusing to leave the chancellor alone until he signs onto the DSP, but have been engaging with him for nearly two years within the university licensing committee – whose members support the DSP!

The struggle to hold our universities accountable for profiting from sweatshop labor is an international movement, and not a lone effort at UNC.

Teresa Cheng
University of Southern California
Class of 2009
Political Science

TO THE EDITOR:

Jeff Soplop’s column, What to do about the doobie: part one (Thur, Nov 9) was… interesting. A tad off base, but interesting.

Soplop did get some things right, like when he said “it would be ridiculous if the government outlawed those (alcohol and cigarettes).” Yet he is so, so wrong when he says “because marijuana is no more harmful than cigarettes or alcohol doesn’t mean that it should be legalized in the United States either.”

Cannabis (marijuana) is a lot less harmful than either tobacco or alcohol. Monumentally less harmful. 5,000 years of recorded historical use without one fatality from consumption compared to 400,000 deaths each year for tobacco (in the US alone) and another 100,000 from alcohol. Should every one consume it? No. Should those who do be labeled criminals? No.

The Prohibition of alcohol failed for very specific reasons. The Prohibition of cannabis (and all the other illegal drugs) suffers from the same failures. After 70 years of government efforts to eliminate cannabis as a drug, it is now our nation’s #1 agricultural commodity, worth more annually than soybeans and corn combined. THAT is failure, to the nth power.

It is not whether pot should be illegal but whether Prohibition is a viable policy. Consider the history of cannabis Prohibition and you will see a policy founded on lies and xenophobia. Prohibition is the problem, not pot.

Allan Erickson

Drug Policy Forum of Oregon