Newspapers / Daily Tar Heel (Chapel … / Feb. 28, 2002, edition 1 / Page 16
Part of Daily Tar Heel (Chapel Hill, N.C.) / 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
16 Thursday, February 28, 2002 Opinion GJljp ®aily (Ear 3M EstabHsM 1893 • 109 Ytanef MtoriaJ freedom mn.tWytMtwd.com Katie Hunter Editor Office Hours Friday 2 p.m. -3 p.m. Kim Minugh MANAGING EDITOR Russ Lane SPECIAL PROJECTS COORDINATOR Kate Hartig EDITORIAL PAGE EDITOR Lizzie Breyer UNIVERSITY EDITOR Kellie Dixon OTY EDITOR ' Alex Kaplun STATE St NATIONAL EDITOR lan Gordon SKIRTS EDITOR Sarah Sanders FEATURES EDITOR Sarah Kucharski ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT EDITOR Terri Rupar COPY DESK EDITOR Kara Arndt PHOTOGRAPHY EDITOR Beth Buchholz DESIGN EDITOR Cobi Edelson GRAPHICS EDITOR Jonathan Miller ONLINE EDITOR Michael Flynn OMBUDSMAN Concerns or comments about our coverage? Contact the ombudsman at mlflvTintwmail.unc.edu or by phone at R 4.3-5794 Readers' Forum Submit Nominations for Teaching Awards Online; Today Is the Last Day TO THE EDITOR: Do you have a favorite teacher that should be recognized for outstanding per formance in the classroom? Then nominate him or her for the Student Undergraduate Teaching Awards. SUTA was established in 1989 by a student referendum and is fund ed entirely by student fees to provide mon etary awards to exemplary professors and teaching assistants. The winners of these awards are nominated by undergraduate students whom they have taught, and the final selection is made by a SUTA selection committee composed entirely of under graduates. The committee actively encour ages nominations from all students, regard less of department or class/year. Teachers are chosen on the basis of exemplary classroom performance as well as dedication to students inside and outside of class. Applicants are chosen to be broad ly representative of the diversity of student life at this university. The winners are selected during the spring semester and are traditionally honored at the Chancellor’s Award Ceremony in April. The deadline for nominations is today, so submit your **^^s7 Board Editorials Keep an Eye on Campus Crime Recent thefts prove the need for more security and reinforce that the campus is not immune from crime Greek houses once again were crime tar gets this weekend. Two laptop computers and a green fleece jacket were stolen Saturday from the Chi Psi fraternity house on Cameron Avenue, and another laptop was reportedly taken from the Sigma Chi fraternity house in Fraternity Court. Breakins also occurred over the weekend at the Phi Delta Theta, Sigma Alpha Epsilon and Beta Theta Pi fraternity houses. While the suspect was caught Monday, that shouldn’t be the end of the story. Greek houses and all group student resi dences are prime targets for theft. They’re generally easy to enter, easy to move around in unnoticed and chock full of pil fer-able items like laptops and televisions. They’re a thief’s dream. Greek houses, unlike residence halls, don’t fall under any particular watchful eye. Each member is responsible for the house, and it’s generally accepted that everyone will do his part to take care of it. The problem is, sometimes they don’t. Tragic Misunderstanding Communication must be strengthened to ensure that Saturday's tragedy at Fort Bragg doesn't happen again In a grave misunderstanding that left one Green Beret in training dead and another seriously injured, the U.S. military was dealt a heavy blow Saturday - this time by a police officer who believed he was pro tecting his own life. Deputy Sheriff Randall Butler shot and killed Ist Lt. Tallas Tomeny and wounded Sgt. Stephen Phelps Saturday night when the men, who were engaged in a training operation outside Fort Bragg, tried to disarm him. Tomeny and Phelps, who were dressed in street clothes at the time, believed the officer was a part of the role-playing exer cise and were shot when they moved on Butler, who believed the men to be civil ians. What makes this tragic miscommunica tion worse is that it could have been easily avoided. Civilian law enforcement agencies rou tinely participate in similar role-playing nomination now at www.unc.edu/ student/orgs/suta for the teacher you think deserves to be honored for exemplary teaching. Wes Brinkley Jeff Walden SUTA Co-chairmen A Way to Fight Tuition: Expand Carolina Lobby Corps to Entire State TO THE EDITOR: To add to and support Monday’s column by Matt Jones, I feel that it is necessary to present an idea that could potentially strengthen the student voice here at Carolina and at schools across the state. We all know that the Board of Governors and the Board of Trustees pay no attention to the student voice or our elected officials, and furthermore, the General Assembly allows for such tax loopholes as Jones mentioned, which contributed to North Carolina’s bud get hitting rock bottom this year. Unfortunately, North Carolina’s politi cians, Democrats and Republicans alike, have little interest in subsidizing public education, and when they’re through with us, we’ll be paying the same as our out-of- And Greek houses don’t get patrolled by the Department of Public Safety and receive scant attention from Chapel Hill police. Every time a crime is committed or someone is assaulted on campus, the reac tion is the same - initial outcry, investiga tion, fade to black, just like the past few days. Remember BOLO? It technically means “Be On the Lookout,” but for UNC students in August 1999, it was a veritable threat. BOLO was the nickname for the suspect who attempted to sexually assault two female UNC students. Chapel Hill police eventually arrested a man, and the campus forgot about BOLO - typical of a campus reaction to crime. After a crime, the administration will claim the campus is safe and issue some sort of study with numbers to prove it. Looking at the raw numbers, of course it seems that the campus and its outlying areas are safe. Crime isn’t a common occurrence. But it’s not rare. UNC is not in the bell jar, but when it comes to safety, students seem to think that exercises conducted by the Army and spe cial forces. But Butler didn’t know that the men, who he pulled over for having some one seated in the bed of their pickup truck, were participating in a training operation. Though it is encouraging to see that the Army has instituted new procedures fol lowing Saturday’s events, it is still bewil dering to consider why Buder was unaware that the men were Green Berets in training. Calling the event a “breakdown in com munication”, Army officials said soldiers engaged in similar exercises outside Fort Bragg will no longer dress in civilian cloth ing during their practice missions. There also will be no role-playing situations involving civilian law enforcement agen cies in the future. Why the Army would allow anyone out side of the force to participate in the secret training of some of their most elite soldiers is baffling. In the past, there have been local gov state buddies. I believe that Justin Young’s Carolina Lobby Corps is on the right track. However, like Jones mentioned, it needs more funding and also needs to be expand ed to represent more students. Funding can come from a number of places but most of all from students. I want next year’s student election ballot to contain a proposal put in a $lO or S2O student fee addition to fund Carolina Lobby Corps -1 am sure it would be voted in by a high margin. Most of this money should go to lobby ing and campaign contributions. There is no way we can be heard by “rising above” other interest groups; rather, we must sink to their level and play dirty dirty dirty. In expanding CLC, I mean changing the name to North Carolina Students’ Lobby Corps. North Carolina has one of the highest numbers of public universities relative to its population in the country. This means that students are spread out thinly across the state. If students across the state unionized, and more importantly, all financially con tributed to this interest group, we would be cooking. Sure, it’s easier said than done, but I am sure every student in North Carolina would pay $lO a semester to fund a powerful inter est group fighting on their behalf than pay a S4OO tuition increase! It’ll take time and they’re in a utopia. It shouldn’t be that way. Campus crime is a viable threat, one that should be mon itored and remembered by every student. DPS and Chapel Hill police should work more closely to patrol Greek houses as well. While the houses are private resi dences, the houses are home to many UNC students whose tax dollars foot the police bill and whose money also helps pay for DPS services. Students shouldn’t have to live in fear simply because they don’t live on campus. Choosing to live in a residence hall or a Greek house means that you accept respon sibility for the safety of others as well as your own security. So take care of your roommates. Lock the doors, close the windows, and be on the lookout for suspicious characters that lurk around or enter your building. A watchful eye is often the best defense against crime, and residence halls and Greek houses are no exception. ernment officials who have sought to become involved in the role-playing exer cises as if they were some sort of game. Certainly, the military does not need to be reminded that, now more than ever, it is dealing with matters of life and death. Disallowing civilian law enforcement agen cies from participating is a good move, and it seems that if anything, the training of spe cial forces such as Green Berets should be more secretive. But as these practices continue in areas outside of military bases, the Army needs to make sure that adequate communication ensures a mistake like this does not happen again. In addition to action taken by the Army and police departments concerning this accident, the Army Special Forces issued a statement saying it will conduct an internal investigation to determine how to prevent a similar situation. Butler will return to active duty shordy and will not be charged. effort, but it will pay off, so Jen Daum, please give it a thought, I think it could work. Nathan Young Junior Business and Slavic Linguistics Student Refutes Notion That American Journalist Pearl Was a CIA Agent TO THE EDITOR: The world Vietnamese and French press are awash in outrage and sorrow over Daniel Pearl’s execution. Me too. I would like to add this observation to this particular audience. One of the rationales proposed by Pearl’s executioners has been that he worked for the Central Intelligence Agency. It’s a slur that can be floated about any white man working outside the conti nental United States. There are people who have known me all my adult life who think I work for them. What else is a Westerner doing here in Vietnam? Why else would a Duffy from New Haven get Ford Foundation support to publish Vietnamese literature? Why is the French government paying this guy to hang around in bookstores? Uncoding the Idea of Honor By Example What is honor? That is the question (although my English professor might suggest otherwise). Our everyday life is filled with stories of scandals and unethical behavior, and yet, as we sit around in our naive college world, we wonder how we are involved. So I thought I’d perhaps look at the all-time best movie scene, A1 Pacino’s final speech in front of the Baird Committee in “Scent of a Woman,” to gain some insight I have selected a few key quotes to relate honor to our every day lives. Perhaps the fictitious char acter of Charlie Simms can indeed teach us something about honor in real life. “He doesn’t need to be labeled ‘still worthy of being a Baird man. ’ What the hell is that? What is your motto here?” I was T-shirt shopping downtown last week when I came across one of those dorky college “top 10” shirts. The list was of the top 10 lies told at UNC, and the first item listed was “I have neither given nor received any unauthorized information on this examination” from the Honor Code. This royally pissed me off. First, I was annoyed that such a T-shirt was even pro duced. I know this is a generic college shirt sold at numer ous other institutions, but really, why make such crap? Is the Honor Code really such a joke? This is not the image that students should promote. 7 don’t know who went to this place.... Their spirit is dead, if they ever had one; it’s gone.... Because 1 say you are killing the very spirit this institution claims it instills. ” Just last semester, several University of Virginia students were expelled or dropped out for violating Mr. Jefferson’s hallowed code. Apparendy, a professor made a computer program to match phrases and sentences on papers with downloads from the Internet or other sources. When more than 150 students’ work matched, he demanded their dismissal. “Here’s Charlie, facing the fire. And there’s George, hiding in big daddy’spocket. And what are you doing? You ’re gonna reward George and destroy Charlie. ” UVa. was only partially willing to comply with the pro fessor’s request; the university couldn’t expel more than 100 students, especially their precious athletes and their big donators’ children. We’ve grown not to expect universities to act with integrity. But where is the honor in these students’ work? And if these are college norms, it’s sad that these are the basic ethics people might carry into the workplace after graduation. “As I came in here, I heard those words, ‘cradle of leadership. ’ Well, when the bough breaks, the cradle will fall, and it has fallen here, it has fallen. Makers of men, creators of leaders, be careful of what kind of leaders you’re producing here.” Our society OKs a lack of morality even at the very top of our government. What a disgrace former President Bill Clinton made of himself and American values with his infa mous line, “I did not have sexual relations with that woman,” and later, “That depends on what ‘is’ is.” And Enron top executives are just as guilty of fumbling honor. You’re not saving face if you betray honor in the process. “1 don’t know if Charlie’s silence here today is right or wrong. I’m not a judge or jury, but 1 can tell you this: He won’t sell any body out to buy his future. ’’ Even my lowly place of employment is not removed from honor issues. Two weeks ago, a headwaiter resigned at my workplace because he was caught charging beer and food to a bill knowing that these regulars trusted the restaurant and would never notice the addition to their bill. And when other waiters were questioned about it, most of us refused to “sell out” the guy who had lacked any morality by steal ing and then lying in the first place. Again, I don’t know if we were right. But I do wonder if it is honorable to remain silent when you know something wrong is occurring. “Now l have come to the crossroads of my life. I always knew what the right path was. Without exception, I knew. But I never took it. You know why?lt was too damn hard. Now here’s Charlie; he’s come to the crossroads. He has chosen a path; it’s the right path. It’s a path made of principle that leads to character. Let him continue on his journey. ” So I leave you with Mr. Slade’s conclusion. We all can learn a lesson from his perspective on honor. Johanna Costa's feelings are hurt that her student body president-elect wouldn’t dance with her at the UNC Dance Marathon last weekend. E-mail condolences at costa@email.unc.edu. What can you do? Poor people and police everywhere are ignorant of the actu al machinery of power here in the metro pole. They are busy surviving. They don’t know enough about the real CIA to know how close I am to that milieu and how far my life decisions have taken me from it. What always stardes me, like hearing a racial slur, is to hear this kind of insult float ed and accepted by educated people in our milieu. I don’t think Daniel Pearl was a CIA agent It would have been superfluous; he was so interpellated by our world order that to have him running informers and doing drops would have only gummed up a good thing. I think it is bad form to complain about the petty annoyances of being a white man, flak from the people who assume that you got whatever you have by the color of your skin and you have never thought or heard about their particular grievances. But this one is life-threatening, terrifying to my timid, world-traveling soul. Calling an American intellectual working overseas a CIA agent is vicious racism and should not be tolerated by people of good will. Thanks for your attention. Dan Duffy Doctoral Candidate Anthropology 311;? Daily (Tar UM Jfc JOHANNA COSTA FLANK VIEW / g ■ The Daily Tar Heel wel comes reader comments and criticism, letters to the editor should be no longer than 300 words and must be typed, dou ble-spaced, dated and signed by no more than two people. Students should include their year, major ami phone num ber. Faculty and staff should indude their title, department and phone number. The DTH reserves the right to edit letters for space, darity and vul garity. Publication is not guaranteed. Bring letters to the DTH office at Suite 104, Carolina Union, mail them to P.O. Box 3257, Chapef HHI. NC 27515 or e-mail fomm to: editdesk@unc.edu.
Daily Tar Heel (Chapel Hill, N.C.)
Standardized title groups preceding, succeeding, and alternate titles together.
Feb. 28, 2002, edition 1
16
Click "Submit" to request a review of this page. NCDHC staff will check .
0 / 75