The gamecock. (Columbia, S.C.) 1908-2006, January 30, 1991, Page 3, Image 3
Flags
USC should have more worries
than American flags in dorms
USC reversed its policy of a week ago by letting American
flags fly outside the Towers. The question needs to be asked, why
bother in the first place?
The Towers had a general ban against anything being hung outside
the balconies of the residence hall rooms. Many students decided
to show their support of the American war effort by flving
American flags outside their rooms, but were not allowed to.
It is a sign of bureaucratic stubbornness that the university officials
ordered these students to take their flags down. The logic of
the rule is that the students' banners or flags might be flammable,
might fall and hurt someone below or endanger students who hang
them. This was still a silly decision. These students were not
hanging anvils outside their windows; they were demonstrating
patriotism.
Interim President Art Smith should be praised for rescinding
this policy. A new policy allowing students "to hang signs that do
not endanger themselves or others" is to be developed by the Office
of Student Affairs.
With so many real problems on campus, it is good to see that
Smith is changing a ridiculous rule that needlessly hinders USC
students. The original decision to make students take down Old
Glory is the same kind of bureaucratic meddling that forces students
to sign in in order to enter residence halls.
Smith has set a precedent by not harassing students over minor
matters. Hopefully, his decision will carry over to the Palms administration.
I ISO must resist thp nrtrp tr> nvprlpaielafp thp ctnrlpntc
?- ? *e>w *** w ?- ??v?v*w.?n?.
A university is supposed to be a center of higher learning, not
Sing Sing.
We shall see if the new regulations will also protect the display
of anti-war protest signs. It would be quite hypocritical to force
students to take down peace slogans, for example, but allow U.S.
flags.
Students should be able to hang any banners, flags or signs that
aren't outright obscene. If a Soviet flag can be flown outside the
Towers with no controversy, that's progress.
Let's put things in perspective. Students should be punished for
killing each other, not flying a flag.
"HOLV THE COMMERCIAL"
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Letters Policy: The Gamecock will try to print all letters received. Letters should
be, at maximum, 250 to 300 words long. The writer must include full name, professional
title if a USC employee or South Carolina resident, or year and major if
a student. An address and phone number are required with all letters sent. The
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space limitations. The newspaper will not withhold names under any
circumstance.
Most import
There is a stupid Time magazine promotii
where you can get a free video of the Top T
Most Important People of the Twentieth Ce
tury. I will save you the price of a subscripts
to that rag by giving my own list of those
persons. It might not be as good as Time's 1
(I haven't actually seen it), but it is free.
This top ten list will not mention any athlet
or musicians. My list is of the people who ha
impacted most on the economic, political or s
cial values of the world during the Twentie
Century. As much as I admire some athlet
and musicians, none fit the above criteria (<
though Joe Montana comes close).
And now, in no particular order, the ten mc
influential people of the century:
Winston Churchill: His leadership durii
World War II cannot be overestimated. If Chu
chill had not been Prime Minister in 1940
rally Britain against the imminent German inv
sion, the history of the world would have tak<
a nasty turn. With Britain out of the way, Ge
many could have concentrated on the Russu
front, perhaps dominating all of Europe befo
America could intervene. Europe today mig
be in Axis hands.
Mahatma Gandhi: His passive resistance
British control of India was a model for all f
lure peace acuvisis, most importantly in in
country, the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. J
also created the largest democracy in the worl
Nice job.
Mikhail Gorbachev: The reforms begun ai
lately reversed by Gorbachev are the most ir
portant set of events in the '80s. Even if tl
USSR embarks on a new wave of repressio
LETTERS TO 1
Blacks suffer K1
i i j blacks v
under whites ^ts, d
anothei
To the editor: te
I would like to thank Octavia ..
Wright for her column from the W1 9r?r
Jan. 21 Gamecock. I found it very intellieei
interesting and positive. I would a^|e ^
like to focus my attention on whjte Co
Spiros Papleacos' letter to the edi- T 1Q,
tor on Jan. 23. , " ^
Despite the faults listed, which ^
have been stated over and over, was ^ ^
blacks continue to admire the Rev. ,.
Martin Luther King. If you want to 1 C.n]
wo- ot fn.tWo i~~t; i The stud
iwv/a. at lauild, 1UUK IlllU )UU ^
admire, especially past presidents. nated a
It is true that the idealism, such ... ? f
11 i- a u Wlth a ?
as we will live as one, side by Black Sc
side" is a "folly," because white From
society will never let blacks po.hpr h
achieve "what should have been
ours at birth." The civil rights ^ a"e tQn
movement did not accomplish all it Drou(j t0
wanted because again white soci- ^ V
ety and the FBI made sure blacks what ^
did not achieve their goals. f ,
Leaders like King, Malcolm X, wa^
John Kennedy and Fred Hampton .
were killed because they were seen wyj
as too powerful and influential in . .
the black community. While King, ^ CaCOfH
Malcolm X and Kennedy were as- cause
sassinated, Hampton was shot to
death by the police while sleeping Sock
next to his pregnant girlfriend.
I suggest you watch "Eye on the y
Prize" to educate yourself on how 1 ;Pt l
blacks were and still are being
oppressed. irrp
Not all blacks blame their condition
"totally" on white society.
However, who controls the money To the ed
in society? Research the effects of Spiros
Reaganomics on the black com- 23, 1?91
mnnitv. Who hnlHc thp hptfpr inhc Octavia \
despite the educational level? 21, comp
Blacks used to be the economic on l^e sta
backbone to America. Now blacks ^ U.I
are treated like the Indians of yes- hons and
teryear by being confined to the ^ne' r^et
ghetto just as Indians were con- p,
fined to reservations. Blacks face jointed TQ
the possibility of genocide if they tempting
resort to rebellion against whites thinking
(Blacks in White America, 1983). thwart he
Unemployment for blacks, espe- Martin Li
cially young black men, is up, cuiarjy th
therefore a lot turn to selling drugs on Afrjca
to survive or to enjoy pleasures rections I
they feel they deserve. Is it really and dange
hard 'for blacks to "Just Say No?" His dai
ant nien of cen
* DAVID BOWDEN
ve Eastern Europe has been permanently freed and
o- Germany is now reunited thanks to his liberalith
zation. Gorbachev might not last, but he has
es certainly shaken things up.
d- Adolf Hitler: Easily one of the most hated
men in history, his actions bringing about
,st World War II and the Holocaust have had more
effect on the modern world than almost any
other leader's. Hitler's infamy should never be
ir_ forgotten, as should this fact ? he was freely
to elected to office.
a_ John Maynard Keynes: This British eco
"? nomist went against an conventional wisdom Dy
r* saying that government spending in times of rein
cession helps the economy. His economic theorre
ies, for better or worse, are the root of today's
ht massive government intervention in all sectors
of the economy,
to Vladimir Lenin: Simply put, without this
u- man, there would be no Soviet Union. If a more
is democratic government had succeeded in Rusfe
sia after the Czar's fall, the whole world would
d. be radically changed. Unfortunately, however,
Lenin was a brilliant leader that led his Bolsheid
viks to control.
n- Franklin Delano Roosevelt: Any man in
le power as long as he was had to have an impact,
n, President Roosevelt started off a series of
"HE EDITOR
more, who brings drugs as a "womanizer," a
country? I don't know any and a plagiarizer are n
vith their own airplanes or relevant to a present-c
o you? I look at drugs as sion of racism but a
r way to keep blacks stance of freshman I
;d. hominem reasoning,
does my I.Q. have to do Following this, Mr.
social and economic prog- devotes several short pa
iel no matter how high my quick discussions of h
ice level, I will never be sights on this comple;
get an equal job as my King's views on non-vi
unterpart. social consciousness are
SO, the U.S. Census reve- reduced to the status of
t the unemployment rate alisms." Wright's use of
\r mdlp reroHllOtan "nnn..!nn /./...nlU.. "
>v ixuiv vuuvgv giauuaiLU g^/UUllK/ JJ1k.
percent while the rate for der for Mr. Papleacos'
ales was only 1.6 percent archical chart of the (
y also showed blacks with cultures,
education were discrimi- Yet Mr. Papleacos' pr
ainst more than a person swers to the question c
ligh school diploma (The nomic plight of man)
holar, Vol. 15, 1984). Americans are perhaps
Spiros Papleacos' letter, I simplistic and the most
e had more on his mind features of his letter. W
g. Regardless, I will con- port and without much e
celebrate MLK Day. I am he theorizes that "im
be black, and I have been from cultures "with c
love all people no matter written histories . . . fu
color of their skin. A lot fectively in a high
^ need to be educated as I democracy."
Is Mr. Papleacos assi
i one black American who Africa does not have t
let people like Spiros Pa- history of its cultures ar
ceep from my goals. Be- is somehow the reasor
omie Don't Play That!" economic status? Can
Stanlev Wardlaw "high caPitalist democrai
Stanley wardlaw j am led lQ wonder t
il work graduate student gives ?0 furlher insigh
statements, which are I
l"pr writ pi* ously gross seneralizati
ICI WI HCl selves not only as app
if immigrants from Europ
SpOnSlDte tries but also as they are
applied to those fr
tor. European countries.
Padeacos' letter of Jan. 'asl P^ase ?f
, written in response to ^r* Papleacos offers
Vright's column from Jan. dangerous answer to the
lains that Wright's views African-Americans, h
itus of African-Americans explicitly state this as h
S. suffer from generaliza- ^ut severa^ paragraphs or
[ from the use of "party wor^ Charles Murra
0Ijc chard Herstein, lacking
ment on Mr. Papleacos'
ipleacos' somewhat dis- why he has included t
>sponse appears to be at- must serve as an illustrai
to correct Ms. Wright's own position on the matti
by offering evidence to Being only slightly far
;r convictions concerning the two scientists, I can
uther King Jr., and parti- criticize their work, thrc
e effect* of discrimination this pat description i
n-Americansv Yet his cor- highly questionable enter
themselves seem general their work is not at issue
;rously simple. Papleacos' short descr
lining references to King Lack of intelligence as I
turyr^ealed
social-welfare reforms, particularly Social Security,
that have helped and/or plagued America
ever since. He also got us into World War II,
which got us out of the Great Depression, and
he presided over the Allied give-away of Eastern
Europe to Stalin at the Yalta Conference.
Joseph Stalin: One of the few leaders in history
with as much blood on his hands as Hitler.
His horrific administration of the USSR, including
the forced collectivization of Soviet agriculture
and the purging of any that opposed his
rule resulted in the deaths of 20 to 40 million
Soviet people. Stalin is largely responsible for
the sad shape of the Soviet Union today.
Mao Tse-tung: The leader of the Chinese
Communist Party that founded the People's Republic.
His cultural revolution set China back
decades in technological growth. The fates of
the 1.3 billion Chinese people might be a whole
lot better if Mao had failed.
Woodrow Wilson: His attempt and subsequent
failure to achieve a new world order is
one of the great might-have-beens in history.
Had President Wilson had the political support
in Washington to back the newly formed
League of Nations and give it some teeth,
World War II and all of its horrors might have
been avoided.
As the preceding list demonstrates, I think
World War II was the international event of the
century that shaped the course of human history.
That is why four national leaders of that
era make my top ten.
I also hope this intellectual flatulation wasn't
too unbearable. Good day. '
cult leader for the economic inequality of millot
only ir- lions of people is not a theory to
lay discus- be offered or taken lightly,
classic in- Slipping this in as a somehow
snglish ad rational response t5 Octavia
Wright's supposed oversimplificaPapleacos
tions is irresponsible, offensive and
ragraphs to outrageous,
is own in- . Daniel Dowe
t problem. English graduate student
olence and
summarily . .
static ide Peace protests
the phrase # K # #
vides m quite patriotic
quick hier- m. r
equality of
To the editor:
oposed an- There has been a growing senti)f
the eco- ment l^at being opposed to the
j African- current war is somehow unpatriotic
: the most an(^ un-American. The anti-war
dangerous position is not necessarily an antiithout
sup- troop sentiment. When so-called
elaboration "peace" demonstrators burn cars,
migrants" destroy private property and
rmtinnrmc scuffle with police, thev are beinc
v/u klllUVU J 4 ' ' w
notion ef- untrue and unfaithful, to the entire
capitalist anti-war movement.
War equals violence; anti-war
jming that equais non-violence. Non-violence
1 r(?COr , is something that many preach, but
f h 'S ^ew ^"ow* What d^s world needs
1 lJ?cir is not a few non-violent men and'
he^deiine womeri) 5ut an army, navy and
marine corps of non-violent resis>ecause
he ters. Non-violence should become
it into his . f . .
hen obvi norm society rather than a
. pleasant idealism. The philosophy
?ns ,, of Gandhi and King needs to be
?ica e o demyStified and brought into the
ean coun- . J - ? 6
... hearts of all.
indirectly
om non- Concerning this conflict, I am
opposed to the reasoning, morality
this letter, an(j justification of asking one
his roos1 million men and women (both
prob ems sides) to fight in an unjust war.
e does not Kuwait and Saudi Arabia do not
is answer, stand for American ideas of demoi
scienti lc cracy, neither are they the embodiy
an 1_ ment of Islamic faith and laws.
anv mm
part as to The most patriotic action Amerihis
work, cans can take is to oppose any notion
of his tion by a government to send
er. troops to fight in an unjust war to
niliar with perpetuate undemocratic regimes,
inot really We must not follow governments
)ugh even in blind faith. No government is
eveals a beyond reproach; no government is
prise. But beyond the collective conscience
here. Mr. of humanity,
iption is. Srinadh Rao
he reason Biology senior