Th
e Daily Tar
Gerald Unks
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- A
82nd Year Of Editorial Freedom
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All unsigned editorials are the opinion of the editors. Letters and columns represent the opinions of
individuals.
Founded February 23, 1S93
Thursday, February 13, 1975
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Dr. James Condie, . the director of University
Housing, is once again the center of controversy. Or
rather two controversies: one over the movement of the
International Student Center from Carr to Ruffin
Dormitory, and the other over a proposed room
consolidation in order to make more efficient use of
university housing space. " t
1. The first has been a chronic problem at UNC, but
one that was aggravated last spring when Condie's own
housing office took over the ground floor of Carr dorm
for use as office space. Last week, in a commendable
effort to improve ISC conditions, Ruffin dorm was
designated as the new home of the ISC. But Ruffin
residents have recently mounted a campaign to stop, or
at least delay, their eviction next year from "their" dorm.
They claim a special fraternal spirit, good intramural
sport teams, and a new TV and ice-maker as their
reasons not to move.
We support Condie's decision to grant higher priority
to the ISC. International students are guests of the
university and deserve at least equal treatment from the
hands of housing officials. They have been denied
comparable facilities for too long.
Ruffin was as good a choice as any for the move
because the displaced American students can move tp
one of the three adjoining mirror-image dorms (Manly,
Grimes, or Mangum), or break down and live with a
foreign student if they simply must stay in Ruffin. After
a housing contract expires, students have no right to any
particular room or dormitory. If, however, it would ease
the pain of transfer, they should perhaps be allowed to
take their ice-maker or their TV with them. And if some
dorm residents are really so very close, they should be
allowed to move en masse to another dorm.
The weakness of Condie's decision is in the fact that
the first floor of Ruffin will be for handicapped sutdents,
the second for foreign women, and the third and fourth
for international men. One might as wellreserve the attic
for left-handed Americans of Serbian descent. The
present plan will give Ruffin the stigma of a home for the
physically, socially, or verbally handicapped.
Disabled students, like international students, need
the freedom to live together if they wish, but also to have
access to the facilities available to "normal" students.
The university has learned to eliminate one kind of
housing segregation, it must not institute another.
2. Condie was right again in his room consolidation
plan. The 76 dorm students whose roommates moved
out last semester and who didn't find replacements
should a)have to find replacements, b)pay an additional
fee for the space they are using, or c)move in with each
other. Condie is correct to assert the principle that no
student should haye more dorm space than any other
without paying for it. In this case, Condie is only trying
to guarantee our own equality.
But Condie proposes that the vacated rooms be rented
out to visiting students, alumni, or public health groups
in order to pick up some additional revenue. This policy
seems to conflict, however, with the strict university rule
which even prevents graduate students from living in
undergraduate housing. The unpleasant Mike O'Neal
controversy of last semester should make administrators
think twice before renting out rooms to old alumni or
patients from a health clinic.
In conclusion, students of all nationalities and
physical abilities should be free to live in any dorm
normally set aside for their gender, or for co-ed living, as
long as they are living efficiently in that space, i.e. paying
the price of the services rendered. Non-students do not
have these rights, however, and if, in the spring, there is
extra space available it should be on designated floors
or wings of dorms. We must guarantee our freedom,
equality, and efficiency within the dorms, as well as the
lack of interference and confusion from without.
j
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'JUST A TEMPORARY ARMS-HALT, O, EXALTED ONE . . . UNTIL I CAN CONVINCE THE
CONGRESS OF YOUR MURDEROUS GOOD INTENTIONS!'
When you send your little Jack or Jill
off to school, you probably expect he or
she will rise or fall on the basis of his
intellect or some other academic-related
behavior, such as his classroom
conduct. This is a reasonable
expectation. Unfortunately, most of our
schools and teachers are unreasonable.
Expect little logic in their actions.
Let's begin with personal appearance.
That is hardly related to academic
success or is if? It is frightening, but
true, that marks received by a younger,
child are positively related to his
personal appearance. The more
attractive the kid, the higher the marks
he receives. The researcher who
conducted this grim study concluded
that many teachers seem to infer that
because a child is attractive, he is also
smart. He is treated accordingly and
receives higher grades. How's that for
dubious psychology and educational
malpractice?
Can you imagine a less achievement
related factor than your first name?
Well, never underestimate the ability of
some of America's school teachers to
unite the unrelated. A recent study
indicates that your name has a good deal
to do with your grades. If your name is
Max, Homer or Mable, you are more
likely to receive lower grades than
David, Steven and Pattie.
The tragedy of this face and name
game is that, in a self-fulfilling
prophecy, students tend to perform as
they perceive their teachers expect them
to behave. Further, they develop an
early conception of themselves as
learners. If they start out believing they
are less then good, the pattern is likely to
stay with them throughout their entire
school career. The obverse seems to be
equally true.
Let's return to Jack and Jill. In the
rhyme they get essentially equal
treatment. How about in out schools?
Guess again. Sociologist Patricia
Sexton indicts the schools for a pack of
sexist activities most of them aimed
at the boys.
Her analysis goes something like this:
A culture socializes its males and
females in quite different manners. In
America, Jills are brought up to be
docile, quiet, submissive, neat and
polite. "Sugar and spice and everything
nice." Jacks get the "rats and snails and
puppydog tails" treatment. They are
expected to be rambunctious, down at
the heels, aggressive and boisterous.
These are ideal typicals, and Sexton
places no valuation on the. roles. She
also notes that many children differ
from the ideal role she describes, a role
learned very early in life and reinforced
Tim Murphy
often.
Nonetheless, take a look at our
schools... if you can stand the sight.
What sort of behavior do they reward?
Docile or aggressive? Quiet or
boisterous? Polite or assertive? Is it
accidental that little girls receive higher
marks than little boys? Is it mere chance
that most "discipline problems" are
males? Probably not.
A little boy often succeeds in school to
the extent that he can adopt the overt
behavior of a little girl. He must stifle
behaviors he has learned as he grew up
and was socialized to our society's male
role. But that is only half the battle he
faces. During recess or after school, he
must switch back to his natural, socially
dictated behavior. After all. would you
want your little boy to behave outside
the classroom the way he is expected to
act inside its walls? If he did. would you
wonder whether you had a flowering fag
for a son?
This switchie-changie game is hardly
psychologically beneficial. Yet our
schools demand a singular set of
behaviors most of which are overtly
female, according to Sexton's role
definition. Is it just an accident that
three-quarters of all underachieving
students are male? That is, they are
learning at a rate well below what can
reasonably be expected of them. No, the
school system and unbending, witless
teachers have rigged it to produce such
gruesome data.
Soon you will turn your precious little
six-year-old over to the tender mercies
of Miss Carriage. Let's hope the child is
a beautiful girl named Elizabeth.
1975 Gerald Ur.ks
Gerald Unks is an associate professor
in the School of Education.
Ooin' the 'Condie shuffle
9
King Condie has done it again. With a cry of "head 'em up
and move 'em out," Dr. Condie has devised a scheme to
"consolidate" Hinton James residents. It all sounds nice on
paper. But beyond the facade, the proposal is deficient for
several reasons.
First, the proposal is blatantly inequitable. The ultimatum
served on affected residents asks that they either a) cough up
an extra $70-80, b) find themselves a roommate, or c) move
out. The proposal is unfair in its own right. But the inequity is
compounded by the incomprehensible timing of the measure. '
Had King Condie and his klan unveiled this scheme in say,
December, students would have been afforded the time to
consider the alternatives and act on them. But instead the plan
was sprung only last week. It is hard to find extra cash,
especially $80 worth, after the semester's expenses have
begun. It is equally hard to find anyone needing a room. And
it is disruptive to move. The proposal is unfair.
Second, the proposal is inconsistent with the avowed
philosophy of the Department of Residence Life. The profuse
propoganda that spews forth from Residence Life, via their
"room to live" booklets and other material, constantly stresses
that dorm life is a living-learning experience, a significant
social encounter. Yet by this consolidation plan, Condie and
Klan treat students as if they were only so many pawns on a
vast bureaucratic chess board. Their actions belie their words.
Residents are not really human beings involved in a "living
learning" experience at all. They are just red ink on the
bureaucratic ledger,.
Third, the proposal is economically dubious. The
maximum revenue to be generated by allotting the School of
Public Health 30 spaces in dorms would be $6,000 less than
3.6 per cent of our $170,000 deficit from fuel increases. Is a
miniscule 3.6 per cent contribution to eradicating our debt
worth the human price involved? Even if we cannot do
without the $6,000 how does King Condie intend to reconcile
the fact that graduate students will be plopped into an
exclusively undergraduate dormitory? When the intangible
human costs are compared to the scrawny financial benefits
this proposal would generate, the illogic of the scheme
becomes obvious. Dr. Condie needs to lay his economic cards
out on the table even the ones up to his sleeve.
Fourth, the proposal is deficient because it seeks to remedy
a situation that housing officials, through their own errors,
have allowed to happen. If single rooms are the financial
danger they are portrayed to be, why did housing officials
allow some residents to transfer into other dorms or move out
in the first place? And why did they allow the situation to
persist for, in some cases, five months before plotting this
"solution"? The wheels of bureaucracy move slowly, but they
grind exceedingly fine.
And finally, the proposal aggravates still further the vast
credibility gap King Condie and klan have created. Last
spring we were told there were far too many applicants for
UNC's spartan, overpriced dormitories. Now we are told of a
plethora of half-empty rooms. We were told Residence Life is
concerned with the personal growth and development of its
residents. Now we see students capriciously shifted across
campus like so many pawns, all to make a nearly
imperceptible dent in a deficit. And all this is touted as being
"for the sake of everyone." No wonder disbelief runs high.
But beyond all this wrangling over arguments is the fact,
pure and simple, that this scheme will hurt people. Suitemates
will be ripped away from their friends, and will be shunted off
to some other room, all so that affluent and prosperous UNC
can pick up an extra 200 bucks. The intangible, yet significant,
violence King Condie's plan does to the social fabric far
outweighs a 3.6 per cent reduction in the deficit. The King and
his klan should reconsider.
Tim Murphy is a junior history f education major from
Charlotte. .
Rorin Piatt
Western civilization is eroded by secularism
Amidst the present Age of Apostasy,
one can still find remnants of the
distinction between the sacred and the
profane. I happen to have stumbled
upon such fortune at the Newman
Center several evenings ago. A Mass of
the Holy Spirit was sung in Latin with
the help of the Early Music Ensemble.
A disinterested observer might, in his
bewilderment, wonder why the Mass.
would be said in Latin instead of in
English. The motivation for such an
"innovation" remains unknown to this
writer. But 1 welcome such"innovation"
in the name of a decaying civilization
that is devoid of beauty and mystery,
and full of the cheapening effects of
secularism. It is this secularizing
influence coupled with the effects of
radical theology, which led the greatest
institutionalized symbol of Western .
civilization, the Roman Catholic
Church, to discard the Tridentine Mass
of Pope Pius V and subst itute the Latin .
for the vernacular (part.; of the Mass
were also altered), thus keeping droves
of spiritually hungry Catholics away
from their Sunday obligation.
Only the most primitive mind oculd
fail to acknowledge the eternal beauty,
the mystifying sanctity of the Gregorian
Chant which has been the official
liturgical music of the Roman Catholic
Church since the 6th century, A.D. Only
the most incompetent analyst of
historical mindedness could deny that
. the Roman Mass the essence of
Catholicism transcends all Western
faiths in its effect upon Western
civilization. The avalanche of classic
literature, art, music and philosophy
derived from the fertile fields of Western
Christendom was molded by the same
institution from which entire nations
would structure their codes of morality
and societal forms. Having such a great
impact upon a common heritage, men of
all faiths must share in the tragedy
befallen an entire culture the demise
of the Latin rite.
Perhaps such tragedy as this vulgar
vernacularization of the Mass is
symptomatic of our decadent 20th
century society. If unborn children can
be legally murdered then surely the
liturgical prescriptions of the Novus
Ordo Missae are in order. Interestingly
enough, in both cases a widespread
popular demand for such tragic
"reforms" was limited to a miniscule
minority. Abortion was sanctioned by a
court of Caesars ruling in splended
isolation of Divine Law. The new Mass
was the creation of a powerful elite
which sought to partially free itself from
the Vatican. While Pope Paul's attempt
to make the liturgy more intelligible to
modern man has made man more
unintelligible, the Supreme Court's
abortion decision which was intended to
make the law more humane, has instead
made society more inhuman.
Today's preoccupation with
"revelance" and "informality" in the
sanctuary and classroom has developed
into a nihilistic attitude which rejects all
traditions, established institutions and
respect for authority. The young are
being instructed in the arts of sexual and
social permissiveness which cannot co
exist with the precepts of the Judeo
Christian heritage. Did this dismantling
of the very fabric of our society begin
with the substitution of "Thou" for
"You" and "Holy Ghost" for "Holy
Spirit"'? Has the present emphasis on
humanistic celebration of divine
worship left the worshiper without the
traditional awe of the Supernatural?
The spirit of this "progressive era," so
solidly embodied in the Playboy
Philosophy and relativist morality, is
one of "anything goes as long as no one
is hurt." Well, the entire spectrum of
Western civilization is at stake in this
war against militant atheism and
materialism and to say that the reform
of the law decade have underminded the
reassuring values and traditions of our
common culture is a gross
understatement. Today, people seem
alienated from their roots, lost in a sea
of sweeping change and unable to cling
to a common unity. The drop in
attendance at Sunday Mass from 71 per
cent to 50 per cent in the last decade
illustrates this point among the Catholic
populace. Catholics can no longer view
the central celebration of their faith
the Mass with the same warmth and
attachment that existed before the
Novus Ordo.
The eminent Catholic scholar, James
Hitchcock, explained this profound
sense of loss and uncertainty when he
wrote that "the Latin is so close to the
Church's liturgical and theological well
springs that its abandonment has left
many people badly out of touch with
their traditions."
A sense of the sacred is lacking not
only in the Catholic Mass, but in our
society, our communities, our homes.
our world. The warmth, beauty,
mystery and sense of belonging
emanating from the Gregorian Chant
are universal blessings which men of all
faiths can appreciate. If men of all
religious persuasions could feel this
unifying experience, then perhaps the
sense of sacred ness we all so desperately
need could translate itself into one of
being, not becoming. The dignity and
simple nobility of the Latin Mass is not a
sectarian possession of the Catholic
Church or of a dying era. It is instead
symbolic of this sacredness of life
hidden in a world presently corrupted
by the sins of mankind.
While Caesars have been dethroned
and entire nations destroyed, the Mass
of Pius V and the music of the Great
Masters have perservered. If the
Tridentine Mass can no longer remain
within the realm of Western civilization,
what hope is there for the classic
treasures of Bach and Mozart?
Rorin Piatt is: a junior political
science major from Greensboro.
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