4Thr; Daily Tar HeelTuesrtay lary 18. 1983
Conservative column has errors. . .
tuj. mar nm
90th year of editorial freedom
John Drescher. Edim .
Ann Peters. Mamoino Editor
KEN MlNGlS. Associate Editor
Rachel Perry. university Editor
Lucy Hood, aty Editor
JlM WRINN. State and National Editor
SX.VKICE, Sports Editor
LAURA SE1FERT. News Editor
GELAREH ASAYESH. Contrihutitns Editor
Linda Robertson. Associate Editor
Elaine McClatchey. Projeas Edim
Teresa Curry. Featum Editor
LEAHTALLEY. Arts Editor
Jane Calloway. Weekend Eduor
AL STEELE. Photography Editor
Direct democracy?
If you're one of the 2,931 students who signed a petition calling for a
referendum to vote on the 1983 Student Government Spring Concert,
you certainly expected a chance to vote on the bill.
Guess again, kid.
If the Campus Governing Council passes its own concert bill tonight (a
bill that also would give the CGC the power to cancel the spring concert)
students may not have the option to vote on the concert even though
they have met all the conditions stated in the student constitution to hold
a referendum. For that reason, the CGC should not vote on their own
concert bill and the referendum should be held next week.
If the never-ending saga of Chapel Thrill 83 sounds confusing, it is.
Last semester, the CGC Finance Committee ruled it would not fund a
1983 Chapel Thrill. On Jan. 10, in an effort to overturn that decision,
enough signatures were collected to call for a student referendum on the
concert.
"This is an excellent opportunity to practice direct democracy," said
Student Body President Mike Vandenbergh, who was a driving force be
hind the petitions. "We'll find out what the students want on a major
issue that's important to them." The referendum, required to occur within
15 days, was tentatively scheduled for Jan. 25.
But then the CGC unwisely became involved with Chapel Thrill again.
With the support of Vandenbergh, the CGC Finance Committee passed a
bill allocating money for the concert even though it knew a student refer
endum on the concert was upcoming. By doing so, the Finance Commit
tee and Vandenbergh undercut 2,931 students who had signed a petition
calling for a campus-wide vote on Chapel Thrill.
The bill, which goes to the CGC tonight, contains a clause that enables
the CGC to cancel the concert if it likes, thus giving the CGC more con
trol over the spring concert than if students had approved it through a
referendum. If the bill is approved, Vandenbergh probably will cancel the
election, although the constitutionality of that action would be very ques
tionable. The referendum section of the constitution was not created to
give presidents the option of holding elections; in fact, it was created for
students who disagree with the policies of a president or CGC.
Vandenbergh is a strong supporter of staging a spring concert. By sup
porting a concert bill in the CGC, he knows he can use the upcoming
referendum as a bargaining chip in the CGC; if the CGC won't pass the
bill, they know students probably will, and then the CGC will have less
control over the concert. Encouraging the Finance Committee to pass a
concert bill was a smart political move on Vandenbergh s part, but one
that could drag Chapel Thrill down with it. If the CGC passes the bill
tonight, Vandenbergh cancels the referendum and the CGC later cancels
the concert, nearly 3, (XX) students will be asking why they didn't get the
chance to vote on Chapel Thrill '83 when they should have.
The CGC knows that a concert referendum should be held next week.
The CGC did not pass a spring concert last semester and students, as was
their right, have attempted to override that decision. Enough signatures
have been collected; a campus-wide vote should be held. For the CGC to
vote on a Thrill bill would be to make a farce of students' constitutional
right to petition for referendum.
THE Daily Crossword by Lee C. Jones
ACROSS
1 One of the
3Bs
5 Greek
letters
10 Baby's bed
14 Flaxen hue
15 Nautical
term
16 Singer
Cantreil
17 Hand:pref.
18 Wilder
Radnor film
20 Ships'
backbones
22 Frozen
23 Mythical
maidens
in trees
28 Sandra or
Rcby
27 "a Jolly
good. J'
30 Bakery
item
32 Orderly
plan
34 Ha needs
sunglasses
37 Borne by
the wind
33 Impel
33 Potato
41 Prehistoric
chisel
42 Seed covers
44 Trivial
48 Deep valley
48 Bulba"
49 Mel of
baseball
50 Devotee
52 Overindulge
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57 Sound
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59 Barrel
organ
64 Grotto
65 Indigo
68 Funny Fudd
67 Amerindians
68 Carry on
69 They color
cloth
70 Mailed
DOWN
1 Call's
companion
2 Yearned
(for)
3 Newscaster
of olden
days
- 4 Uproar
5 Scornful
exclamation
6 AGabor
7 Sharp
taste
8 Invited
9 Designs
10 Dressed
11 Competed
in a heat
12 Sign on the
dotted line
13 "The Green -Tree"
19 Quiit
section '
21 Delhi robe
24 Fender
mishap
25 Took notice
27 Reddyof
song
23 Zola
29 Faction
31 Bookkeep
ing entry
33 Deception
34 Fish
35 One of five
33 Brief
summary
33 N.H. river
40 avis
43 Tufts or
Bono
45 Sweet
potatoes
47 Poked
gently .
51 Indeed
53 Maternally
related
54 Glossy
bird
55 Run in neu
tral gear
58 Weapon, to
Napoleon
53 Remainder
59 "Turn left"
60 Actress
Merkel
-61 Tractor-
trailer
62 Alte
63 '82 and '83
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1S33 Tribune Company, Syndicate, Inc.
All Rights Reserved
11883
By DA VID POR TERFIELD
I read with considerable interest the two-part column
"On Being Conservative In America" (DTH, Jan. 12-13)
and found it to be enlightening, well-written and very
much in concordance with my impression of the general
conservative outlook. For a statement which purports to
dispel pervasive false assumptions, Shadroui's article is
riddled with them.
One of the most disturbing of these assumptions is that
which characterizes the political left as the pinnacle of
adolescent idealism and its proponents as angry, hysterical
maniacs who have neither the desire nor the capability to
cope with the grim realities of life. People who don't
know what they're talking about or why they believe what
they espouse so fervently exist on either side of the
political spectrum, and they usually evoke embarrassment
and chagrin in the more perceptive thinkers whose views
they attempt to emulate.
Jerry Falwell's farcical attempt to impose a monolithic
value system on a socially stratified and diverse society is
as absurd and unrealistic as Abbie Hoffman's scheme to
change the world by giving everyone LSD.
Facing the facts is a matter of maturity, not of political
affiliation, and most serious campus liberals (as well as
those who managed somehow to miraculously survive in
the "real world" Ezra Pound, Alan Alda and Paul
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
Green spring to mind) would likely take offense at being
depicted as a bunch of overgrown, dreamy-eyed
teenagers.
Shadroui also implies that while serious conservatives
allow their political demands to be shaped by moral con
siderations, liberals never do. Legislation of absolute
equality among individuals is indeed folly; but it is
preposterous to deny that the goal of a true democracy
should be to accommodate existing physical, intellectual
and financial disparity among its constituents in order to
attain a more just consensus and better provide for the
common good.
If compassion and respect for the needs and aspirations
of our fellow human beings constitutes a spiritual
vacuum, so be it.
It is difficult to discern a higher moral order of any kind
in an administration elected and supported by, ardent
conservatives which has sought to bolster corporate
profits at the expense of consumer protection and en
vironmental safety, attempted to defund its opponents in
order to render them politically ineffectual, clung
tenaciously to the myth that any American who works
hard and does his best must surely succeed while record
numbers of such Americans crowd the unemployment of
fices, perpetuated the view of education as consumption
rather than production and individual differences as
qualities to be tolerated rather than rejoiced in, accepted
contributions from fundamentalist religious leaders whose
actions help pervert a doctrine of love and fellowship into
a pernicious and oppressive political tool, and amassed a
staggering deficit to finance a sensely orgy of nuclear pro
liferation that threatens to level the world in the raceless,
sexless equality of atomic dust.
As author Alvin Toffler has observed, most people
have difficulty dealing with a dynamic, changing society in
which the mores and traditions that benefitted one era
may be useless and even destructive in the next. There is
comfort in stability and solace in the familiar; such is the
appeal of the conservative point of view. But Thomas Jef
ferson noted that "... laws and institutions must go hand
in hand with the progress of the human mind ..... As new
discoveries are made, new truths disclosed, and manners
and opinions change with the change of circumstances, in
stitutions must advance also, aid keep pace with the
times."
Edmund Burke, incidentally, opposed the French
Revolution more because of its frightening proximity than
its frightening methods, and he certainly was aware that
the revolt in America constituted more than an abstract
philosophical disagreement. The British didn't send
troops to the colonies to organize debate teams.
Yes, Shadroui, conservatism, like any system of
thought held by one or by one million, deserves better
than careless, thoughtless disposal. I hope that this letter
will not be brushed aside as merely another "shrill denun
ciation" from the mindless, fanatical left.
David Porterfield is a graduate student from Burlington.
. . .and more on Shadroui columns
To the editor:
Kudos to Shadroui he has grown up,
matured into the respectable conservative
his superego no doubt wants him to be. I
hope he won't mind if I pick apart a few
points in his first "On being conservative
in America" column.
Some liberal he was Jerry Ford in
'76?
So the "sophistry was unrelenting"
on the liberal-riddled DTH' staff sorry,
George, but people on the left have no
monopoly on that vice.
. So "it isn't difficult to be a liberal in
college"? Is it "difficult" to be a conser
vative (all it takes is shutting your mind
and buying all kinds of rationalizations for
elitism)?
Let me see if I have it straight:
because "for many students money con
siderations don't exist," because "the real
world. . .is an unwelcome intruder on
most college campuses," "because the ac
ceptance of harsh realities is anathema to
most students,", because of all these
things, "liberalism thrives."
Let's try another version: this is, as the
"responsible" conservatives I know agree,
far from the best of all possible worlds (or
haven't you heard, George, of racism, sex
ism, war, intolerance, insane arms races
that choke off the fulfillment of human
needs, terrible- squandering of .human
resources oh the misery of unemployment,
gross disparity of income and opportunity,
etc.?).
Is it strange, George, tiiat young people
throughout history, not yet worn down by
the all-too-harsh world that people created
and people can change, have often agi
tated for and demanded solutions to these
problems, or at least progress toward a
more just and humane society? Is idealism
a crime, a deviation to be dismissed as an
indulgence of irresponsible youth?
The answer is hell no, not now, not
ever. Up with righteous indignation, up
with the burning anger at injustice that has
wrought so many beneficial changes
throughout the world. I know this is hard
to believe from your lofty perch a year and
a half out of college, George, but idealism
need not be thrown out the window in the
"real" world. Take it from a 32-year-old
veteran of a number of social struggles
who is now in law school in order to in
crease his effectiveness in the fray.
No socially conscious college student
need feel ashamed of his or her idealism.
Damn the defeatist attitudes of the world's
Shadrouis. George, the old farts who run
this society love to see your sort of craven
rationalizations in one so young ("such a
responsible young man"). But nobody
should be . under the illusion that that
outlook will prevail. Many will go on
struggling for a society where people come
before profits until it is achieved. Happy
Birthday Martin Luther King! Long live
Alex Charns!
RobGelblum
Chapel Hill
BLCOM COUNTY
Calvin crusader?
To the editor:
After reading George Shadroui's two
part series on conservatism (DTH, Jan. 12
and 13), two quotes come to mind. The
first concerns Mr. Shadroui's sentence that
said:
"Striving for it (equality), we are bound
to fail. . . " and that quote is:
"It is better to have tried and failed,
than not to have tried at all."
The second quote concerns the entire ar
ticle, and that quote is: "Rubbish!"
If George really wanted to extol the vir
tues of Calvinism, why didn't he just say
so, instead of wasting one whole article
and half of another getting to the point.
Charlie Voliva
Carrboro
Letters?
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ject to editing.
' Column writers should include their
majors, and hometowns. Each letter
should include the writer's name, ad
dress and phone number. Unsigned
letters will not be printed.
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Miami riots
Heroes and scapegoats easily made
By ANN PETERS
The patrolman fired a single shot. The bullet lodged in
the skull of a 20-year-old. One day later that man, Nevell
Johnson Jr., died.
Johnson, shot in a Miami video arcade three weeks ago,
was black. Luiz Alvarez, the Miami patrolman who fatal
ly shot Johnson, is white. Overtown, a predominantly
poor black neighborhood in Miami, erupted after the inci
dent. Nineteen hours after the shooting, Rosemary Usher
Jones, a judge for the Florida Industrial Commission,
drove through the neighborhood, searching for a route
onto 1-95. It was poor planning on her part concrete
blocks and rocks crashed through her car windows.
Two young black girls tried to help tier escape. One of
them ran to the arcade where Johnson had been shot. As
she did, Jones' pursuers reached the car and tore open the
doors. They ripped off her jewelry and took her credit
cards and driver's license. Then they began to drag her out
of the car.
Willie Watkins, the arcade owner, and three friends
grabbed Jones away from her assailants. Until her rescue
by Miami police, Jones haven became the arcade, the
scene of the shooting that ignited more than two days of
sporadic violence.
In an interview with The Miami Herald, Watkins
blamed looters for the continued violence. "The looters
really keep things going. They use it to profit," he said.
"They're really not interested in it (the Johnson shooting).
This isn't the way to express it if they are."
Not all residents of Overtown raced, through the
200-bldck community. Many tried to calm the angry
crowd. Howard Gary, Miami's first black city manager,
directed efforts to control the situation. Gary was raised in
the slums of Liberty City, the scene of Miami's May 1980
riots. Those riots followed the acquittal of white officers
in the death of Arthur McDuffie, a Libery City resident.
Gary said he could sympathize with the frustrations and
concern oi blacks. Overtown residents came to city hall.
They complained of injustices after Johnson was shot.
The key to Gary's strategy: give' Overtown residents an
opportunity "to vent their emotions and concerns" and
then draw from them some solutions. It's the old attitude
of self-help.
The roots of Miami's problems go deep beneath the
surface of hoodlums on the loose on a destructive free-for-all.
Problems simmer beneath a plane of high unem-,
ployment, low standards of living and the lack of a
middle-class community of black residents and mer
chants. About 50 percent of Overtown's 12,000 residents
are employed in low-skill jobs, 25 percent are unemployed
and another 25 percent receive welfare. The median in
come is less than $8,000 a year.
The deterioration of one community is a warning signal
to other communities with similar qualities. Miami is not
falling into the Atlantic, but it is slipping not too quietly
into a fog. The ghettos and the suburbs are divided by
more than a few miles. And one person's death is not the
only reason why violence marred the streets of Overtown
with blood and broken glass.
A slow burn of racial injustice, perceived and actual
police insensitivity and low self-image fanned the fire of
this volatile situation. The only course of action is to ex
tinguish the next fire before its first flicker. To forget the
events of the 1960s Watts, Chicago, New York and
the recent examples of metropolitan violence is to be too
easily swayed into a cloud of passivity.
Police, complete with riot gear, who patrol checkpoints
around a cordoned black ghetto will not eradicate the dif
ficulties the people within the rundown area must deal
with each day. The black community in Miami is suspi
cious of the establishment predominantly white, pre
dominantly male. Approximately 60 percent of the of
ficers assigned to the area that includes Overtown,
downtown Miami and Wynwood, largely a Latin neigh
borhood, have been with the department for 18 months or
less and are officially on probation, statistics show.
' So the Miami Police Department has assigned a rela
tively inexperienced and predominantly Latin group of of
ficers to patrol Overtown. But Miami Police Chief Ken
neth Harms and Miami Police Sgt. Eddie Smith, president
of the black Miami Community Police Benevolent Asso
ciation, reject the consideration that black neighborhoods
be patrolled by black officers.
"Twenty-five years ago we rejected the theory that it
was proper to patrol a black area with a segregated
force," Harms said. "People in all communities want
professional, sensitive police officers regardless of color."
How then can . police in a major city patrol black
communities?
Miami officials, federal authorities and experts on
police practices wonder:
Should Miami police walk beats?
Should more black officers be assigned to Overtown?
Do officers need extra "stress" and "sensitivity"
training?
And is there a quick remedy for the department's
severe imbalance of rookies?
Officer Luiz Alvarez, with 21 months of active duty,
was training a younger officer when the shooting oc
curred. Alvarez was assigned to Sector 30, a predominant
ly Hispanic neighborhood. He left his zone presumably on
his own initiative, in violation of police procedures.
Those are the facts. Investigations continue. Police
community dialogue must be opened. Competent police
need to work with neighborhoods. Beyond that, employ
ment and self-worth among the lower-class must be im
proved. These are not fantasies.
Heroes and scapegoats are easily made in volatile situa
tions. Construction rather than destruction is the key.
Neither should Johnson nor Alvarez be made pawns to
further violent acts.
Ann Peters, a senior journalism and political science
major from Miami, Fla. , is managing editor for The Daily
Tar Heel.