Opinion
UNMC revolution
Sexist practices have no place in class
Feminist Gloria Steinem called for a mini-revolution
Thursday flight in Lincoln. Two University of Nebraska
Medical Center students took her advice.
The students — Carey Nesmith and Jo Falkenburg — used
the question-and-answer period after Steinem’s speech to call
attention to sexism at UNMC.
Nesmith and Falkenburg said they and other women stu
dents were required to leave a living anatomy class while men
learned to perform rectal and pelvic examinations. The women
said instructors informed them that NU Board of Regents had
received complaints about men and women disrobing in front
of each other.
The women were told they could set up times outside of
class to learn the procedures, Nesmith and Falkenburg said.
NU Regent Charles Wilson, who attended the Steinem
lecture, said he had no knowledge of any regents’ policy
regarding male and female students disrobing in the same
room. He said he would investigate the charges of sexism.
Unfortunately, other officials are not as open-minded. Dr.
William Metcalf, chairman of the UNMC anatomy d partment,
said it was impractical to have male and female students
undress in the same classroom.
But it would be more impractical to have medical students
lack the knowledge to perfonn rectal or pelvic exams.
44W/Kot orr» n/o rrrvincr In \4otpalf InlH TTlA Omuha WnrIH
",v ^ ------ -
?• Herald. “Have females do rectal exams on males in an open
class or males do pelvic exams on females in open class?”
Would it be unreasonable to assume that a doctor — male or
j female — is required in his or her day-to-day practice to
perform rectal or pelvic exams?
Practicing the exams is voluntary and some male students
decline to do them, Metcalf said. But women students aren’t
given that option; they are merely shown the door.
Metcalf said Nesmith and Falkcnburg were “overreacting”
by protesting the policy.
If it’s overreacting to expect and demand equal and fair
treatment for all students, then Nesmith and Falkenburg
certainly fit the bill.
Bui they’re not blowing the incident out of proportion. By
the time students make a mature decision to attend medical
school, they should be free from childish concerns over the
differences in the male and female anatomies. They’re learning
a profession, not playing doctor.
The regents have set aside time at their April meeting to
address gender equality issues at NU. That would be the ideal
time to start Steincm’s mini-revolution right here in Nebraska.
— E.R.
^
-LETTERS™ EDITOR
Leaders, not troops, make war
Lisa uonovan wrote tnat sne can
not support the troops because they
conduct the war (DN, Feb. 19). Lisa,
arc you for real? Call me stupid, but it
usually is the military who conducts
war. I can’t believe that a senior from
this fine institution can hold such an
uneducated view. Listen up Lisa, I’m
going to leach you a lesson.
People, regardless of their stance
on the war, support the troops be
cause over the past 20 years, while
you’ve been sleeping, the rest of
America has learned something.
America has learned that when policy
fails, you pul the blame on the policy
makers, not on those who carry out
the policy. Twenty years ago, Lisa,
people in this country actually spaton
the troops when they returned. Amer
ica shit on the troops, Lisa, end of
discussion. There is no nice way around
that fact. But now, people have real
ized that the soldiers arc not the ones
who decide when to wage war. It is
the GOVERNMENT that determines
this policy.
The military is only an instrument
of that policy. General Colin Powell
did not go to President Bush one day
and say, “Is it OK if I go make war
today?” Soldiers are the ones who
detest war the most. They arc the ones
who have to fight and die.
Regarding the journalism depart
ment, shame on you! If Lisa Dono
van’s warped thinking is the quality
of thought your department produces,
than you really ought to review just
what it is your department is trying to
accomplish.
Lisa, it’s great that you don’t sup
port killing, but your view of the
troops is the same view that caused
Americans to blame our loss in Viet
nam on the vets. And it is the same
view that left those government lead
ers responsible for our involvement
in Vietnam unchecked. As one of my
teachers puts it, let me know where
you’re getting your drugs from, Lisa,
because I’m sure I can find you a
better dealer.
Richard J. Schmidt
sophomore
political science
-LETTER POLICY
The Daily Nebraskan wel
comes brief letters to the editor
from all readers. Letters will be
selected for publication on the
basis of clarity, originality, timeli
ness and space availability. The
Daily Nebraskan retains the right
to edit letters.
Letters should be typewritten
and less than 500 words.
Anonymous submissions will
not be published. Letters should
include the author's name, ad
dress, phone number, year in
school and group affiliation, if
any.
Submit material to the Daily
Nebraskan, 34 Nebraska Union,
1400 R St., Lincoln, Neb. 68588
0448.
is it Tootle to mo\
A RIDe. INTO SAUDI
TERRITORY ? -"__
JANA PEDERSEN
Games aside, a rose is a rose
William Shakespeare tried to
define what’s in a name
centuries ago, but the debate
still rages.
Now people argue about what to
call other people and whether the
names they call each other are prod
ucts of ethnocentric, racist, sexist
thinking. Sometimes the arguments
are legitimate, but more often they’re
irrational.
The latest name game is being
played in the Soviet Union, where
residents of Leningrad want their old
city name back — St. Petersburg, or
Petrograd.
According to The New York Times
Magazine, the biggest blockade to
the name change is its cost, which
will be millions of rubles to switch
highway signs, maps and government
letterheads.
But residents already are calling
their city “Pete” because the name
change ill go into effect as soon as
the city can afford it.
And while Soviet President Mikhail
Gorbachev is attempting to deal with
various independence-minded Baltic
stales, another name change has been
proposed, one that would give greater
recognition to the individual repub
lics.
Soon the Union of Soviet Socialist
Republics may have to give up its
Soviet or Socialist to save its Union.
Discussion in the Soviet legisla
ture last month weighed the option of
changing the country’s name to “Union
of Soviet Sovereign Republics” or
“Union of Sovereign Socialist Re
publics” to appease the republics’ calls
for more individual recognition.
Some wanted to throw out the old
acronym altogether and adopt the
Americanish “Union of Sovereign
Socialist States.”
The Congress of People’s Depu
ties voted the switch down last month,
and rightly so.
Trying to change the name of the
Soviet Union may have been a partial
appeasement to the country’s dissent
ers, but it would have been just a
change for change’s sake. The Soviet
Union’s internal strife still would have
smelled not as sweet.
It doesn’t even take international
politics to make people excited about
changing roses’ names.
The problem with
euphemisms is that
even thoueh they
mavsoundbetterto
those offended by
the original name.
they don’t ohsme.
the offensive stuff
they’re supposed to
represent.
At the University of Nebraska -
Lincoln, too, the name changing game
is played. Students here live in “resi
dence halls,” not “dormitories.”
Apparently there was too much
bad baggage associated with the word
“dorm.” But that baggage — all the
stuff about dorm s that residents didn ’ t
like in the first place — eventually
will tiansfer to the word “hall,” send
ing the housing department back to
find another euphemism.
At the Daily Nebraskan, editors
debate what to call groups of people.
Are people of African descent blacks
or African Americans? Are the people
who lived in this country long before
Columbus “discovered” it American
Indians or Native Americans? Our
stylebook says one thing while our
sources often tell us otherwise.
It would be simplest to just call
people what they want to be called.
But if an African American man wanted
to call himself an Asian American, it
could lead to confusion, especially if
the label was necessary to assert the
person 's particular knowledge of an
area.
If a Native American woman were
speaking about her youth on a reser
vation, it would be important to point
out her ethnicity. So labels some
times are necessary, if not always
purely accurate.
This week — Disability Aware
ness Week — renews the debate over
calling people what they want to be
called. Our slylcbook says people with
disabilities are '‘handicapped,” and
the title should be used only if rele
vant to a story.
But some people with handicaps
prefer the label “physically chal
lenged,” which is itself a challenge to
interpret. A person climbing the side
of a mountain also is physically chal
lenged, but may or may not have a
handicap.
The problem with labels is that
they often are devised without con
sidering the point of view of the per
son, organization, country or what
ever being labeled. In order to be
more considerate, then, we develop
euphemisms that may not have the
connotations of more descriptive labels
but aren’t so offensive.
Thus, we come up with physically
challenged for handicapped. Some
feminists call for us to use womyn for
women and hystory for history.
The problem with euphemisms is
that even though they may sound better
to those offended by the original name,
they don’t change the offensive stuff
A hall is still a dorm and all the I
baggage that comes with it.
The dictionary cites ‘remains” as I
a euphemism for corpse, but both the I
words mean something is dead.
And the Vietnam conflict really 1
was a war.
Putting both “Union” and “Sover- R
eign” in the Soviet country’s name H
would only create another useless 1
euphemism and possibly confusion. I
Union means united. SovereignJf «i
means independent. Putting them I
together makes a paradox, but that’s
what euphemism-making isall about.
And, more than likely, a Union oft".
Sovereign Socialist Republics stillg
would send its army to quell riots in 1
Lithuania.
Pedersen is a junior advertising major, a
Daily Nebraskan associate news editor and a |j
columnist.
-—EDITORIAL POLICY-j§
initialed editorials rcpresentot
ficial policy of the spring 1991
Daily Nebraskan. Policy is set by
the editorial board.
The Daily Nebraskan’s pub
ushers are the NU Board ot Re
gents, who established the Univer
sity of Nebraska-Lincoln Publica
tions Board to supervise daily pro
duction of the paper. According to
me regents policy, responsibility
for the editorial content lies solely
in the hands of ihe newspaper’s
student editors.