2BThe Daily Tar HeelThursday, August 31 , 1989
If f laxly (CarlftM
97th year of editorial freedom
Sharon Kebschull, Editor
WlLUAM TacGAKT, Managing Editor
MARY JO DUNNINCTON, Editorial Page Editor
JUSTIN MCGUIRE, University Editor
ERIK DALE FuPPO, Business Editor
DAVE GLENN, Sports Editor
CARA BONNETT, Arts and Features Editor
TAMMY BlACKARD, State and National Editor
JENNY CLONINGER, University Editor
Charles BRrrriAN, City Editor
Kelly Thompson, Omnibus Editor
DAVID SUROWIECKI, Photography Editor
JULIA COON, News Editor
3
Cleaning off the tarnish
Spangler shies away from strong stand
One of the
privileges of being
a new freshman at
Carolina. is feeling
legitimately able to
board
opinion
make fun of State. But the events at N.C.
State University of the last six months,
and the UNC system's response, leave
freshmen with little to laugh about.
The UNC Board of Governors'
meeting last Friday offered little hope in
the near future of substantial changes in
the system's attitude toward athletes and
abuses of the universities. President CD.
Spangler reported the results of the
Poole Commission's investigation at
State into allegations of grade-changing,
ticket selling by basketball players, drug
use and questionable academic
manipulations to keep players eligible.
Spangler recommended, among other
things, a mandatory drug-testing policy,
an end to freshman eligibility by the
ACC, removing basketball coach Jim
Valvano as athletics director and making
sure that no student-athlete is admitted
unless he is "deemed to have the
potential to complete the requirements
for a degree." The BOG, which acts as
Spangler's boss, accepted the
recommendations but took no further
action.
None of the recommendations, with
the exception of removing Valvano as
AD, was accompanied by any sort of
timetable, and most of Spangler's
proposals require action either from
individual schools' boards of trustees,
the ACC or the NCAA.
And so the system is barely better off
than it was before last Friday. State
remains tarnished because Valvano stays,
for now, as its basketball coach, one who
has little regard for academic integrity,
and the system's other 15 schools have
little incentive to check into and tighten
their programs in the near future.
Racism roars back
Violence recalls pre-civil rights era
It was a simple journey. Four young black
males were merely visiting a neighboring
New York City community in response to a
used car want ad in the newspaper. What
they did not realize was that the Bensonhurst
neighborhood is a self-proclaimed racist
community, professing hatred against
anybody non-white. The youths were
accosted by a group of aggressive white
teenagers holding baseball bats and two
guns, and the confrontation erupted into the
shooting death of one of the black boys and
the injuring of another.
What sounds like another horrible, racially
motivated killing of the "
1960s happened just mmm mmmmmmmm " BB " "
last Wednesday. The PW Vnrk Pitv
white suspects claimed "ACW- iUltV VllJ
they were waiting for officials have offered
euner a oiacK or
Hispanic man whom a
white girl of their
neighborhood . was
dating, a situation they
did not approve of.
only a half-hearted
response to the black
man's murder.
Their unsuspecting ' "
victim was a 16-year-old
boy named Yusef Hawkins, a youth who
was expected to achieve much in college.
When Hawkins and his friends walked by
the girl's home, the white gang assumed they
were the acquaintances of the girl and
prepared to take care of the matter. Since
then,, city officials have offered only a half
hearted response to what the white men did.
Immediately after the shooting, several
groups of both black and white mourners
held marches protesting the unjust death.
They were met by large groups of white
residents threatening the protesters with
racial slurs. Four white men were taken into
If you've read this whole paper, you know
we're asking for new writers- lots of 'em. But
just in case you missed it: If you're interested
in being a new writer, photographer or copy
editor, come to a meeting at 4:15 Tuesday in
Union 208. Unlike dropad, the DTH requires
no prerequisites if you can write a good
sentence or take a decent picture,; we'll teach
you the rest.
If you join the staff we have about 150
writers, photographers and editors you'll
be working for an award-winning paper. Last
year, the DTH won an honor rating of All
American from the Associated Collegiate
The BOG's reluctance to fire Valvano
as basketball coach may be
understandable, in light of the fact that
his contract stipulates a $500,000 payoff
if he is fired. That stipulation will be
waived, however, if the NCAA imposes
sanctions against the school, something
that seems inevitable.
But Spangler's avoidance of specific
recommendations is disturbing. As
president, he could have improved the
system's reputation greatly by proposing
much harsher rules, even if the BOG
chose to water them down. By taking a,
weak stand, Spangler only proves how
important athletics and booster clubs are
to the system, and how academics, while
they may get some lip service, must fight
for his attention.
Spangler's lack of support for the
faculty, however, was the. most upsetting
part of his speech. The faculty deserve
strong words from the top of the system
against pressure to change grades, to let
student-athletes slide, to let them take
only the easiest courses. Spangler's call
for faculty to keep careful attendance
records does little more than ask them to
babysit athletes. While faculty should be
encouraged to take attendance, that only
touches a symptom, not the cause, of
athletes failure to graduate.
The BOG meeting was the perfect
chance for Spangler to be a bit idealistic
in his requests for changes in the system,
to call for specific, slightly radical, badly
needed improvements. If Spangler and
the BOG would take a strong stand
against the abuses, with two powerful
ACC schools to back them up, the rest of
the conference would certainly take
notice and probably follow our lead. The
time for quick action passed long ago,
but the chance to take a stand that all
incoming students can be proud of
remains within reach for a short while
longer.
custody, and the girl, from whom all of this
supposedly stemmed, has stepped forward to
fully cooperate with the police. Yet even
these hasty steps are not enough.
New York City Mayor Ed Koch has
appointed a special prosecutor to investigate
the incident, but this may be an attempt for
political gain just before Koch engages in his
re-election campaign. Koch should have sent
in special investigating teams much earlier
when other forms of racial violence occurred
in the neighborhood in past years. In 1983,
three black men were beaten by a group of
white residents, and in 1987, two other black
; men were chased and
beaten in the
Bensonhurst
neighborhood.
Not only is this
incident shocking
because of the violence
and the injustice of the
killing, but also
because it has occurred
in the supposedly
open-minded society
of the 1980s, more
than 20 years after the racial tensions of the
60s. The 60s' protests did advance the status
of blacks in the United States by allowing
the black community to get a foot in the door
of accepted equality, but incidents like the
Bensonhurst one indicate that the black
community is losing that hold.
Many white communities cannot accept
racial equality, as proven by the threats at the
protest marches, and too few , white
communities that do accept it are making the
racial stand they should be. This country
must realize and resolve the racial injustice
that still exists before another Yusef Hawkins
is brutally murdered. Jennifer Wing
the last word i
Press for its fall issues, and a few weeks ago,
we again received an All-American rating for
the spring's papers. The DTH was awarded
marks of distinction for coverage and content,
writing and editing, opinion content,
photography, art and graphics. The award
noted that the DTH's coverage offers an "in
depth, broad range of stories," and that the
writing and editing are "consistently
outstanding."
So come join us. It's a great way to learn
journalism, meet neato people, maybe even
get sneak previews of cartoons. It's almost too
much to comprehend. Sharon Kebschull
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Keep supporting
Chinese students
To the editor:
Although time has separated
us from the bloody massacre in
Tiananmen Square, the memory
of those students must hot fade,
as the Communist Beijing
government wishes.
The students in Tiananmen
Square were peacefully seeking
the right to participate, the right
to speak openly their ideas, the
right to seek redress of
grievances, the right to be as
you and are in this country -the
right to be free.
The battle is far from over in
China. Each day the power
hungry government hauls more
of the country's democrats to
their gulags in an effort to
repress the movement for
freedom. We must stand
together with the people, of
China to prevent the suppression
and killing of people who long
to be free. We must stand
together to defeat this
government of a failed ideology.
We must stand in solidarity so
that these selfless patriots shall
not have died in vain.
A declaration drafted by the
Alliance of Chinese Patriots was
signed on June 7, 1989, by
thousands of Chinese in this
country. The Alliance is devoted
to the pursuit of individual
Small sorority
On May 15, I held back the tears as I
stepped out onto the porch of the Tri-Sigma
house and locked the door behind me. I was
the last to move out and probably the last in
the sorority to realize that all hope of
regaining our charter was gone. For the next
four years, there would be one less sorority
on UNC's campus.
What hurts the most is the large number
of people who say this is "the best thing."
The terms of our probation were many,
but the root of all evil was that we were too
small and were not financially secure. It was
the same message that had been passed
down, for many years. We set out to increase
membership and hoped to bring in more
money. Money stayed tight, but membership
grew. Unfortunately, what kept us happy
the friendship wasn't enough to keep our
national organization happy.
The groups we most expected to help us
keep our charter are the ones who turned
their backs and looked the other way.
Unfortunately, two of those groups were
UNC's own Panhellenic Council and Sigma
Sigma Sigma's national organization.
During the time we were on probation,
and even after we were notified that our
charter would be revoked at the end of the
school year, no one from the Panhellenic
Council took the time to call and offer to do
they could to help. All we wanted was to
know others wanted us to stay as much as
we did. Instead, they chose to support out
national organization's decision and stay out
Life
lab joke. Mine, is the lab itself.
Have you ever actually heard someone
saying along with the tape, "Me gusta jugar
al futbol"? No, what you hear is a whole lot
of fast forwarding to the written section.
And I'd like to meet the designing genius
who put the tape player right in the middle
of the damn cubbyhole so you have to put
your workbook on your lap or else hire some
Readers9 Forum
liberty, economic prosperity,
political and cultural pluralism,
the rule of law and democratic
government - things we so often
take for granted.
We need your support. Help
us keep up the fight. Help us
keep the dreams of democracy
alive in China. Be proud of
being American and let the
world know just what it means
to be the "home of the free."
PING LI
Chief Executive Officer
Alliance of Chinese Patriots
Washington, D.C.
Year-long parking
permits unfair
To the editor:
The UNC Department of
Parking and Transportation
Services is guilty of deceiving
.students ... and of
; maladministering the issuance of
this year's parking permits.
First, in the parking
assignmentbill letters mailed to
students over the summer, the
department stated, "No personal
checks accepted" and indicated
that only cashier's checks or
money orders would be accepted
for payment. The truth is,
however, that the department
accepts all forms of payment for
parking permits, including
personal checks, credit cards,
and even cash.
The department lied to and
hid the truth from the students in
order to make the parking permit
fee collection easier on itself.
Many students, unaware of the
other payment options, spent up
to $3 - in addition to the cost of
a permit - just to buy a money
order.
Second, all parking permits
were sold on a 12-month basis, a
change from previous years,
when all student permits were
sold on a nine-month basis.
Now, all students needing
permits for only the nine-month
academic year will be forced to
wait in long, slow lines next
May in order to apply for a
refund corresponding to the
balance of time remaining on
their permits.
This new policy seems
especially ridiculous when one
considers that all resident South
Campus permit holders - those
in lots K, L and M - will
eventually have to apply for
refunds because no South
Campus dorm remains open in
the summer. In the meantime,
the Department of Parking and
Transportation Services will be
earning interest on the students'
money.
The department must answer
for this subterfuge and
ineptitude. First, it should
apologize to students for having
deserves another chance
Jannette Pippin
Staff Writer
of the fire. The biggest concern of the
Panhellenic Council seemed to be when and
how we were going to announce our
departure from campus.
Then again, the Panhellenic Council has
never been the one to come to our rescue.
Our guess is that that was because we were
small and never had the campus image other
sororities have not that it should matter.
UNC isn't geared toward the small sorority,
and Formal Rush is probably the biggest
example of why.
On average, about 900 to 1 ,000 women
go through rush. With only 20 members,
meeting and trying to convince a yard full of
women to pledge when there are 150 women
doing the same thing next door is a
challenge, to say the least. After a year's
absence, we chose to take part in Formal
Rush to prove we could do as well as the
other sororities, but we still could not erase
the stigma that small is bad. Proud of our
pledge class but hoping for more, rush left
us physically and emotionally drained. The
word from the national organization wasn't
congratulations, but rather not good enough.
To prove ourselves, we met all the
demands of probation except for doubling
circus freaks to balance your stuff.
And what's the deal with the smell of the
headsets? God, I hope they de-lice those
things.
And finally, have you noticed how they
seem to be forever taking sidewalk bricks
out and replacing them? It seems to be some
sort of ultimate battle of the wills between
Physical Plant employees. Do they replace
lied to them. Second, it should
declare all K, L and M permits,
valid only until May IS and mail
refund checks equal to the three
month reduction in validity to
holders of those permits. Until
then, the Department of Parking
and Transportation Services
really doesn't deserve the word
"services" in its name at all. ' " '
JEFFREY BEALL
Graduate
Library science
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our membership. With a semester left, new
officers and fresh ideas for informal rush, we
expected that to change. However, our hopes
and plans for the future were cut short when
our charter was pulled for four years.
Ironically, the announcement came one day
before we were to begin informal rush. As
we see it, we weren't given much of a
chance. To this day, we wonder if things
would have been different had out national
organization waited only another week to
see how rush turned out.
The pain of being told we are not good
enough by our national organization, the
Panhellenic Council and various others still
hurts. If there is a lesson to be learned from
all this, we found out that being a part of a
sorority means more to us than wearing
greek letters. Due in part to our small size,
we feel we share a sisterhood stronger than
any other sorority on campus. Our regret
now that we are gone is that others cannot be
a part of that.
We weren't perfect, but the blame for
what happened cannot be placed on us
alone. When financial security and size
begin to govern sororities rather than
friendship and sisterhood, the greek system
has taken a turn for the worst. Tri-Sigma has
the opportunity to return to UNC in four
years, but unless things change, I can't say
that it's for the best.
Jannette Pippin is a senior journalism
major from Jacksonville.
from page 1B
these bricks or just put them back? If they
put them back, why do they take them out in
the first place? Are they refreshing the sand?
And why replace them? They're bricks, for
god's sake. We're not walking around
campus in cleats.
Justin McGuire is a senior journalism
and political science major from
Hendersonville.