Newspapers / Elon University Student Newspaper / Oct. 20, 1994, edition 1 / Page 3
Part of Elon University Student Newspaper / About this page
This page has errors
The date, title, or page description is wrong
This page has harmful content
This page contains sensitive or offensive material
Letters October 20,1994 Letters To The Editor Student dismisses rascism To the Editor: Inequality is not limited to Jew ish and black people. Everyone, in someway, js a victim of inequal ity. Fema^es face it in the work force; males are victims of many feminists; you cannot escape in equality. In response to Terri Fletcher; you should be angry - with your self - for your ignorance and bad attitude. In my experience, Elon College has been far more equal than most schools in the south. There are plenty of cultural events to reflect that. Inmy opinion, Elon College is far too “equal.” People that carry the same atti tude as Terri Fletcher are trying to fight a force much bigger than they will ever be able to conquer. The sooner they accept that inequality is just something is just something that will always exist, in every walk of life, the sooner a better life and better attitude towards them will occur. Karyn Howard Housing not living up to expectations To the Editor: About a year ago, I moved into East Campus Apartments. Since that time, I have paid rent, like every good tenant should. The services I should receive in return for this outrageous sum have re mained scant at best, and non existent at worst. Exactly what do I mean? Well, maintenance requests that take up to three weeks and four or five weeks to gel fixed! Naturally, as a student taking eighteen semster hours I have plenty of time to spend on the phone repeatedly calling the housing office with the same probelm. Most recently, my building has had furniture piled in the com mon area. Has the housing asssitant been called? Yes, two or three weeks ago. Has the furni ture been removed? No. First of all, the residents of this building ' should be responsible enough to take care of their own garbage. That’s how the real world works, boys and girls, secondly, since I pay my rent on time, my mainte nance probelms should be fixed, promptly. That’s the way the real world works, land lords. Of course, as a student, I have no way of seeking retribution for this lack of service. I wish the Ad ministration would ack-nowledge this continuing lack of service and attempt to do something to fix the problem. While we’re talking about the Administration, I have a few more problems that I would like to discuss. I am a mem ber of ESA International, the ser vice sorority. This semester we’ve held several fundraisers for differ ent philanthropies. The first was for breast cancer. We followed the correct channels for gaining per mission, etc. Then at the last minute, we were told we could not | do this bccause another sorority , was raising money at the same lo-' cation. We re-vamped our plans, and raised the money anyway. Most recently, we sold tickets for another philanthropic event, only to find another sorority at the same location. This illusu^tes the double standard of the Administration. Elon, an institution of higher learning, therefore, is reflecting the same standards as society. Those groups with more “power” are al lowed to usurp the rules. Mean while, those of us with Jess “power” who are trying to do something constructive, run into road blocks all along the way. In addition, the bureaucratic process is ridiculously complicated. Need we ask why Congress seems to have difficulty accomplishing anything? The Ad ministration needs to wake up and start practicing what it is taught in the classroom. Let’s do better than society, not just reinforce the sta tus quo! Charitv Self Professor discusses life since "coming out" To the Editor: With National Coming Out Day set for 11 October 1994,1 thought I would take this opportunity to bring the Elon community up to date with how that process has pro gressed in my life. As many of you recall, I formally “came out" at a faculty meeting on 1 October 1993 and subsequently came out to the campus in an article in the follow ing Thursday’s Pendulum. The event changed my life at Elon pri marily because I no longer had to try to portray two separate perso nas (one on-campus and the other, off-campus)ormonitormy speech. I could finally be just who 1 am, not someone else’s idea of who I should be. I have found that the emotional benefits have far outweighed any or all costs, be they emotional or economic. This past summer I took two ad ditional steps forward in this pro cess. Since 1 was unable to return to Wisconsin to attend my 25th high school reunion, I wrote a long coming out letter addressed to “The Class of *69” and fed-exed it to the woman who was organizing the event. She was someone I didn’t really know well in high school, so I really had no idea what her reac tion would be. I asked her to take the letter to the reunion and invite any classmates who were interested to read it. Once I mailed the pack age, 1 let it go. Although 1 wanted to call her on the day of the reunion to follow-up, something told me to let go. About one week later I received a phone call from a high school friend 1 hadn’t heard from in 5 years. She told me the story of what happened. The woman who received my letter was so disgusted that she couldn’t finish reading my letter. She did not take the letter to the reunion. When my friend asked her, at the reunion, if she had heard from anyone who couldn t attend, she was told about my letter. The organizer said to my friend, “did you know she was a lesbian?” An other classmate, overhearing, was reported to have said, “1 don’t care if she is a lesbian, I liked her!” V When I spent a few days in my Wisconsin in August, 1 stopped to meet the woman who received my letter and thank her for passing it on to my friend (who then passed it on to other classmates). We spent about 20 minutes talking and she ended up saying she hoped I’d be able to come to the next reunion. 1 learned from this experience that things don’t always work out the exact way that we think that they ought to, but sometimes they work out the way that they need to. 1 also finally came out to friends of our family in my hometown as well as to members of my extended family at a family reunion. 1 was the most amazed at the support 1 received from the couple who have lived next-door to my family since 1959 (both are devout Catholics and about 80 years old). They even asked me questions abt)ut things that they didn’t understand, some thing my mother still finds difficult to do. At the reunion, my extended fam ily members who live in DC and Denver said what they couldn’t un derstand was why I would choo.se to live in North Carolina! Of course the answer to that is that I came to NCto work, at Elon College. But, more importantly, I have discov ered that 1 can’t solve a problem by running away from it (moving to a different state or city). While I may be different in some ways from other f>eople (like most of us), I m similar in many ways (also like many of us). And the more I love and appreciate my own differences and uniqueness, the more 1 can love and appreciate YOUR difference and uniqueness, wherever I am. Each one of us is making a differ ence whenever we are honest enough to simply be who we are Kathryn Larson Got any complaints!? Write a Letter to the Editor! The Pendulum welcomes your opinions with letters limited to 300 words. Letters must be signed with a phone number for verification. Deadline for submis sion is noon Monday. The Pendulum is not respon sible for spelling or grammatical mistakes in Letters to the Editor. Corrections; The Pendulum strives lo report the news accurately and will correct errors that come to its attention. Shannon Currin's home state was incor rectly stated in the Oct. 6 edition. She Is from New Hampshire. - - V.C. f « 8 111 11111 f J'ftl
Elon University Student Newspaper
Standardized title groups preceding, succeeding, and alternate titles together.
Oct. 20, 1994, edition 1
3
Click "Submit" to request a review of this page. NCDHC staff will check .
0 / 75