Newspapers / Daily Tar Heel (Chapel … / Jan. 26, 1989, edition 1 / Page 10
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10The Daily Tar HeelThursday, January 26, 1989 Eh? Satlg (Far Ifleel 96th vear of editorial freedom Karen Bell, News Editor MATT BrVENS, Associate Editor KlMBERLY EDENS, University Editor JON K. RUST, Managing Editor WILL LINGO, City Editor Kelly Rhodes, Am Editor CATHY McHUGH, Omnibus Editor SHELLEY ERBLAND, Design Editor Jean Lutes, Editor KAARIN TlSUE, News Editor ' LAURA PEARLMAN, Associate Editor KRISTEN GARDNER, University Editor WlLUAM TAGGART, State and National Editor Dave Glenn, sports Editor LEIGH ANN McDONALD, features Editor BRIAN FOLEY, Photography Editor Kelly Thompson, Design Editor Meal plan is hard to swallow The mandatory meal plan for UNC students has never been a popular program. When the subject comes up in conversation among campus resi dents, one of the first comments made is usually "whatta ripoff," followed by a selection of other, more creative disparaging remarks about Marriott Corp., which runs Carolina Dining Services. But insults, no matter how creative they may be, have little effect on administrative policies. Since it was implemented four years ago, the plan has not been changed or even seriously challenged that is, until now. Student government has submitted to Chancellor Paul Hardin a well researched proposal which does more than argue that the mandatory meal plan sounds too much like a euphe mism for a prison dinner schedule. The real problem is the University's inability to retain food services three have come and gone in the last 10 years, none making a profit. While Marriott has increased its revenue by 36 percent since taking over in summer 1986, it is still losing money. The inability of food services to operate profitably on UNC's campus was a major factor in the UNC Board of Trustees decision to force students into buying $100 worth of campus cafeteria food. The only problem is, the mandatory meal plan hasn't solved anything. Despite the guaranteed source of revenue, campus food services are still losing money. The student proposal calls for consolidating the current Marriott contract with the contract for conces sions at athletic events, thus virtually guaranteeing Marriott (or whatever food service happens to hold the campus food service contract) an additional $1 million each year. With that new source of revenue, the mandatory meal plan would no longer be necessary. And it's important to remember that eliminating the man datory plan would not necessarily reduce the food service's revenue in other areas; many campus residents already spend more than $ 100 on food, anyway. The focus of the students' proposal is to give Marriott less competition on campus and more opportunity to make money, reducing the need for the mandatory meal plan and encou raging the company to provide the most efficient service possible. The plan certainly has its opponents, not the least of which is Ogden Food Services, which now operates conces sions at athletic events. However, student government's reasoning is sound and its suggestions are concrete. The proposal deserves serious consideration. At the very least, this move should prompt a dialogue between students, administrators and the food service companies about ending the manda tory meal plan. If administrators are responsive to this proposal, maybe "whatta ripofr will become "whatta deal." Jean Lutes Save cheers for Super Bowl He bludgeoned the poor girls All over the head. Now we Ye all ecstatic, Ted Bundy is dead. The execution of Ted Bundy in Florida's electric chair came more than nine years after his 1978 conviction for the murder of two Florida State University sorority sisters. For some families of the victims, the execution was a relief, a signal that perhaps a decade-long nightmare would end and wounds would begin to heal. For others, the execution was an excuse to throw a big party in honor of the execution of another human being. In a meadow near the Starke, Fla., prison where Bundy was executed, about 300 revelers gathered Tuesday morning, some wearing T-shirts read ing "Burn Bundy." One man claimed to have made a fortune from the sale of $5 electric chair lapel pins. The revelry dismissed the sanctity of another human's life by celebrating an execution. Even if Bundy did deserve the death sentence, his death will be small comfort to the friends and families of his victims. Cheering at his death is nothing short of barbaric. That we would turn the execution of a criminal into a three-ring circus is a sad commentary on American society in the last years of the 20th century. Those people were happy over Bundy's death in the way they're happy that San Fransisco won the Super Bowl. Following that philosophy, perhaps we should pit convicted criminals against lions in public arenas to make the death sentence not only an unfortunate necessity, but fun as well. It would save people the trouble of planning their own parties. The people who cheered at Bundy's execution, who waved at the hearse as it carried the body away from the prison and who made a fiesta out of that morning's gruesome events, are just as guilty as Bundy himself in one aspect their lack of respect for human life. The party-goers weren't rapists or murderers, but their lack of respect for the sanctity of human life is chillingly similar to Bundy's. Those who attended the "party" and sang to the loss of a human life need to step back and consider the source of their celebration. Of all the inmates on death row, Bundy certainly ranked among the most despicable. But whether or not Bundy deserved the death sentence, the revelers should have kept their sick victory to themselves. Cheering for the sake of a good time is acceptable at a football game, not at an execution. Laura Pearlman D ave's safe responses to his viewer mail The Daily Tar Heel Editorial Writera: Louis Bisscuc, Sindy Dimsdale, Mary Jo Dunnington and David Stamcs. Assistant Editors: Jenny Cloninger and Justin McGuirc, university; Fclisa Neuringcr, managing; Myma Miller, features; Cara Bonneii, artr, Andrew Podolsk y, Chris Spencer and Jay Reed, sports; David Minton, photography.. News: Lynn Ainsworth, Crandall Anderson, Kari Barlow, Jeanna Baxter, John Bakht, Crystal Bernstein, James Benton, Tammy Blackard, Charles Britain, James Burroughs, Sarah Cagle, Brenda Campbell, James Coblin, Daniel Conover, Staci Cox, L.D. Curie, Karen Dunn, Erik Flippo, Laura Francis, Lynn Go wick, Susan Holdsclaw, Jessica Lanning, Tracy Lawson, Dana Clinton Lumsden, Helle Nielson, Glenn O'Neal, Dana Primm, Thorn Solomon, Will Spears, Larry Stone, Laura Taylor, Kathryne Tovo, Amy Wajda, Sandy Wall. Amy Weisner, Leslie Wilson, Jennifer Wing and Nancy Wykle. Sports: Mike Berardino, senior writer. Neil Amato, Mark Anderson, John Bland, Robert D'Arruda, Scott Gold. Doug Hoogervorst, Bethany Litton, Brendan Matthewi, Jamie Rosenberg, Natalie Sekicky, Dave Surowiecki, Lisa Swicegood and Eric Wagnon. Features: David Abemathy, Cheryl Allen, Craig Allen, Jackie Douglas, Jackie Greenberg, Hart Miles, Cheryl Pond, Leigh Pressley and Ellen Thornton. Arts: Randy Basinger, Clark Benbow, Beth Buffington, Ashley Campbell, Andrew Lawler, Julie Olson and Jessica Yates. Photography: Steven Exum, David Foster, Becky Kirkland and Dave Surowiecki. Copy Editors: James Benton, Michelle Casale, Yvette Cook, Julia Coon, Whitney Cork, Erik Flippo, Joy Golden, Bert Hackney, Susan Holdsclaw, Anne Isenhower, Gary Johnson, Angelia Potest and Steve Wilson. Editorial Assistants: Mark Chilton, Jill Doss, and Anne Isenhower. Amy Dickinson, letter typist. Cartoonists: Jeff Christian, Adam Cohen, Pete Coison, Bryan Donnell, Trey Entwistle, David Estoye. Greg Humphreys and Mike Sutton. , Busineca and Advertising: Kevin Schwartz, director; Patricia Glance, advertising director; Joan Worth, classified manager; Chrissy Mcnnitt, advertising manager; Sabrina Goodson, business manager; Dawn Dunning, Beth Harding, Sarah Hoskins, Amy McGuirt, Maureen Mclntyre, Denis e Neely.Tina Perry, Pam Strickland, Amanda Tilley and Joye Wiley, display advertising representatives ,'Leisa Hawley, creative director; Din Raasch, marketing director; Stephanie Chesson, Alecia Cole, Genevieve Halkett, Camille Philyaw, Tammy Sheldon and Angela Spivey, classified advertising representatives; Jeff Carlson, office manager tni Allison Ash worth, secretary. Subscriptions: Ken Murphy, manager. Distribution: David Econopouly, manager; Newton Carpenter, assistant. Production: Bill Leslie and Stacy Wynn, managers; Aniu Bentley, Stephanie Locklear and Leslie Sapp, assistants. Printing: The Village Companies. Tast week, I went to Burger King for lunch and noticed a most disturbing JLL-Jsign on the entrance door. It read: Supervisor Cannot Open Safe. This seemed very strange to me and I must admit, without explanation, it bothered me for the rest of the day. In fact, I found myself studying and analyzing the message all week. After a long and grueling period of time, I came to the conclusion that if this is true, that he or she cannot open the safe, they should get someone that can. Fire that boob! But why, I kept asking myself, should they advertise such an embarrassing thing? Why hold the poor sod up for ridicule? Besides all that, wasn't this affecting business? After all, I would never enter an alterations shop that featured a sign, "Seamstress Cannot Sew." This is not to imply that I wanted the safe opened I don't even get french fries. But for argument's sake, let's just say I did. Let's say I ordered a Whopper Jr., onion rings and the safe opened to go. The result would be chaos. Confident I had come to the right conclusions about the whole thing, .life went back to normal. But soon I wasn't able to sleep, and my days became interminable. It dawned on me there was a whole other way to interpret this sign. Perhaps the supervisor can open the safe. Could it be that Burger King had posted this message to tell a potential burglar that his efforts to rob this establishment were in vain, for the supervisor cannot open the safe? They assume no one would rob a place that could only hand over a bunch of Whalers. Most currency exchanges won't even accept them! But it occurred to me to ask, how do I know the supervisor cant open the safe? For all I know, he might love to open the safe. He might do it on his break, just for kicks, and then stick around after closing, practicing it behind his back. They might say, "Here comes old pick-a-safe" when he comes into work. When his wife tells David Rowell Pardon Me him about her day at the office, he pretends to be interested, but secretly plots to sneak out of the house later on, so he can get a good two hours of safe opening in before dawn. He does it blindfolded and in a tank of water. He does it with his toes! By God, I could sue Burger King for everything it's worth! So what we have here, in retrospect, is still a cloudy, mysterious character sketch of the supervisor, daring crime to a battle of wits. It's the Burger King vs. the Burglar King. Now that I got that off my chest, I'd like to take some time and answer some mail that's been piling up. Dear David, My roommate is no fun anymore. He hasnH gotten out of bed in a week now, nor has he said so much as two words to me. All he wants to do is sleep. What should I do? Worried Roomie Dear Worried Roomie, I am uncomfortable with the position you have put me in, but since you have written for advice, I suppose it's my job to help. Your roommate is dead. Judging from your description, I suspect he has been dead close to a week now. Go ahead and get him out of bed I imagine he is starting to smell. Call the proper authorities and get all his belongings together. You should be more observant in the future. Dear David, I feel like I would make a great columnist because I see the world so differently from everyone else. To me, the sky is brown and the birds are little creatures that want to take over the world. How can I break into the newspaper business? Twisted View Dear Twisted View, You do. not need a column. You need around-the-clock psychiatric care. I can assure you the sky has never been brown and there are no take-over plans for the birds as far anyone knows. It may interest you to know they're making wonderful breakthroughs with electroshock therapy. Please get help. Dear Mr. Pardon Me (ha ha), I have a very serious problem. I am a ventriloquist and bring "my dummy to classes. However, when I speak up in class, it's the dummy that does all the talking. I can't even stop him, sometimes. All the students love him, but they don't pay mt any attention. What should I do? ". Troubled Entertainer Dear Troubled Entertainer, I am torn between two different things' to tell you, and unsure which is better advice. Number one: Quit school. You are obviously one of the great geniuses of our time. You could be playing Vegas instead of wasting time in classes. Number two: Your dummy should continue his educa tion, because he sounds very intelligent. Perhaps you should enroll him in law school. Whatever the case, he ought to have the sense to leave you. You're slowing him down. Dear David, All my girlfriend wants is sex. Sex sek sex! That's all she talks about, that's all she thinks about. I like her, but I want a girl I can respect. Please tell me what to do. Unhappy But Sexed Dear Unhappy But Sexed, I'm sorry to inform you that there is nothing you can do. It's best you leave the relationship now. I was deeply con cerned about your girlfriend, however. Please leave her name and address, with my office so that I can begin counseling her immediately. David Rowell is a senior RTV MP major from Fayetteville. Readers9 Foram Chauvinist pigs in space To the editor: I must take exception to at least one statement made by Winston Lloyd in his review of "Star Trek: The Next Gener ation" in the Jan. 19 Omnibus. While the new series has its faults, the change in the open ing monologue from "where no man ..." to "where no one has gone before" is not one of them. It saddens me that even in the media's most imaginative visions to date of a possible, positive future, minorities and women of power or intelligence are still seen as somehow "exceptional." It took two series, three movies, and two decades before we finally saw (in "Star Trek") that a black woman could "even" become a starship captain even then, she and her ship are neutralized within the first half-hour. The changes in language reflect the changes in its users' attitudes, Mr. Lloyd, not devolutions in their "intelligence." I, for one, hope it will not take almost four centuries before our world grows beyond seeing "man" as the definitive thematic term for our species and "wo"man, linguistically or otherwise, as a mere "variation." CLIFTON TOTH Data entry staff Student Health Services All races, same standards To the editor: Mark Pearce's essay ("Affir mative action a self-defeating policy," Dec. 6) is based upon a misunderstanding of the facts based on a lack of understand ing of the terms he is trying to deal with (affirmative action, reverse discrimination) which is oil; North . "Y rZg i ' kh. Wrvre. House" I buttressed by ignorance, bias and racial prejudice. Pearce claims, "Affirmative action calls for giving admis sion to blacks who otherwise would not have been able to attend UNC." He successfully shows his ignorance of under graduate admissions proce dures. His entire article is based on a policy he knows very little about: affirmative action. Affirmative action calls for the University to make a con certed effort to include those persons, theretofore, excluded from a population. In doing this, the University attempts to define and increase the poten tial target of ethnic minorities from which it will receive applications. All applications, black and white, must meet the admission standards in order to be accepted to UNC. The University does not admit anyone who does not appear capable of earning a degree. It is an absolute fallacy that the standards for admission of blacks are lower than the standards for whites. It is, therefore, an erroneous opin ion that black students have an advantage in college admission. I will also have you know that it is a common, yet spur ious, presumption that the University must admit a certain percentage of minorities each year in order to receive federal support. Because of landmark civil rights legislation, all major institutions are required by law to prohibit discrimination on the basis of race, sex, creed, etc. There does not need to be a specific percentage of minori ties admitted, but no school may receive federal funding if it has been proven that discrim ination has occured. Pearce states, "the University should be color blind in edu cation." To argue that regula tions regarding education should be color blind suggests a thinly disguised racist view of society because it presupposes an equality of the races which never has and still does not exist. This would have the net effect of a given advantage or perpetuating preference to the group that currently enjoys the advantaged position in our ? society. We cannot allow such ignor ance and racial bias to go unchallenged. People of color, and other persons who are concerned about racial equal ity, should fight racial prejudice by any means necessary. ALLAN YOUNGER Junior Industrial relations Letters policy ;.; H The DTH reserves the right to edit letters for space, clarity and vulgarity. Remember, brevity is the soul of wit. B Students should include name, year in school, major; phone number and home town. Other members of the University community should include similar information. : Tempers flare over bike path violations As a perennial bike-rider on the well travelled strip of Cameron Avenue between Merritt Mill Road and campus, I have noticed a curious socio logical phenomenon, which although amusing in the insight it provides into human nature, is not without serious ramifications. The right-hand shoulder of the road, designated as a "Bike Lane" between 7 a.m. and 9:45 a.m., is more or less completely filled with cars by 9:30, prime transpor tation time for anyone with a 10 a.m. class. This morning as I pedalled into campus, cursing (as usual) the loss of my lane to the encroachment of imperialist parkers, I noticed for the first time that there were people huddled in virtually each and every automobile. The scene evoked images of a Carolina ticket distribution gone amok: people were camping out for parking spaces! Amazing! Most of them were spasmodically checking their Seikos to see if the letter of the law had indeed been observed, that it was past (or at least close to) the 9:45 cut-off, and the threat of towing had once again been safely eluded. Being a part-time car driver myself, I Bruce Bennet Guest Writer understand the allure of a first-come first serve parking opportunity like this one: Chapel Hill is certainly not the best place in the country to own a car. However, as a bicyclist, this one morning's experience convinced me that the situation poses a considerable threat to bikers. As potential parkers jockeyed for the spot closest to campus, I was cut off three separate times and nearly swatted down two others by ill-timed door openings. The only "safe" place left for me was . . . The Road, unfortunately swarmed at this hour by modes of transportation far heavier and more capable of crushing a human body than I. Still, I'm sure I and my trusty Peugeot together have a fair capacity to do damage to the unwary individual creeping out of his (illegally) parked car a theory which I almost had the chance to test on that bluish blur of a man who tried to save several seconds by darting in front of my path. ine creation oi tne uiKe Lane is a fantastic and essential idea; yet limiting it to less than three hours of operation seems a questionable choice. Considering the sheer number of bikers in Chapel Hill, it seems reasonable that there should be some sort of full-time Bike Lane on high-traffic roads like Cameron. Students do not ride their bikes only between 7 and 9:45 a.m. (or whenever cars start arriving and effectively ending the existence of the bike lane). However, needs must sometimes take a back seat to resources, and space obviously remains a limiting factor in Chapel Hill; then the police should at least enforce the existing regulations. In other words, ticket those cars! Or, we could attempt a little psycho-; logical experiment: push the theoretical "Towing Enforced" time back to 10:30 or so. Maybe then the cars would start camping out at about 10, and bikers woujd be able to start off their mornings graceij with a precious gift: a greater chance of getting to class in an un-smushed form. ; Bruce Bennet is a senior French major from North Palm Beach, Fla.
Daily Tar Heel (Chapel Hill, N.C.)
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Jan. 26, 1989, edition 1
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