Opinion
Jana Pedersen, Editor, 472-1766
Alan Phelps, Opinion Page Editor
Kara Wells, Managing Editor
Roger Price, Wire Editor
Wendy Navratil, Copy Desk Chief
Brian Shellilo, Cartoonist
Jeremy Fitzpalrick, Senior Reporter
Walk, not talk
Regents’ words aren’t solving problems
University officials are taking about diversity. Again.
Regent Nancy O’Brien of Waterloo said Wednesday
that the Regents’ Committee on Minority Affairs has
discussed increasing diversity on campus by the establishment
of more financial incentives.
O’Brien said the financial incentives might include giving
departments extra funds to hire minority faculty members. She
said that although the budget is tight, members of the Legisla
ture could be willing to approve more money for diversity
projects.
“It may be foolish, but I’m kind of assuming the Legislature
may be willing to help us increase diversity,” she said.
Other goals she said the committee set were to provide -
diversity training for faculty and students, to improve the
university’s environment for minorities and to enhance recruit
monl minnrit\i foonltt/ onH ctuHontc
She said the committee would try to have a recommendation
for the board by the end of the summer on how to achieve these
goals.
While the regents’ apparent concern for increasing diversity
is admirable, English professor Joyce Joyce expressed what is
probably the opinion of many university students and faculty
members.
“There’s too much talking and not enough progress,” she
said.
O’Brien and the rest of the committee has taken a first step
toward a more diverse university, but first steps don’t cover
much ground. Some members of the university community are
getting tired of trodding those same first steps over and over
again.
Unfortunately, beyond the first step the long journey re
quires money. Even more, it requires commitment from the
regents to see these goals through to the end. The Legislature
won’t be convinced easily of the need to throw additional funds
this way.
The regents have shown they can talk. But we have yet to
see them walk.
-LETTERS™ EDITOR
Cartoon portrays Israel fairly
I am writing in response to Profes
sor Bcrkowitz’s letter published on
March 17 (“Cartoon shows Israel as
terrorist not victim,” DN). I do not
think there is any need for the DN or
anyone else to apologize for printing
the cartoon in which Israel is por
trayed as a terrorist slate. It is true
Israel is a terrorist state whose gov
ernment consists of ruthless hypo
crites who do not care for anyone
else. .
If Israel has been the victim of
terrorism, what about the occupied
territory where nearly600,000people
have died so far trying to fight for
their religion and freedom of their
homeland? The Western media never
show what happens in the occupied
territory, but even if a single person
dies in Israel it is shown with extreme
exaggeration. This kind of coverage
has resulted in a surge of hatred for
Israel. Do you know that people liv
ing in the occupied territory are not
sure if they will come back alive after
buying bread? Do you know that the
youth of the occupied territory have
gone? This all was designed to break
the will of the population, but it has
bonded them more. I would suggest
Professor Berkowitz go to ETV if
lime permits and watch the movie
“The Sword of Islam.”
I do not have anything against Jews
or Amcrican-Jcws, but what I hate is
the Israeli government. They have
made Muslims hate them by their
shameless behavior. They are not the
victims — the people of the occupied
territory are the real victims. I am
very proud to write that Pakistan,
where I am from, has not accepted
Israel on the map. I know no one
cares, but still it is a kick for me.
Arshad Altaf Shaikh
junior
pre-pharmacy
Liberals uphold immoral views
i tnougnt i would start on mis
letter by praising Mr. Fahleson’s truly
conservative values. Since Mr. Fahle
son decided to take off bashing the
bleeding-heart liberals for Lent, I
decided there needed to be another
true conservative voice heard; that’s
why I’m writing this. That small radi
cal group of bleeding-heart liberals
and Nazi-feminists in our country arc
trying to destroy us from within. They
want to throw their immoral views on
the rest of us because they believe
society needs to be more open minded.
Those liberals and Nazi-ft minists
support homosexuality, r moral
funding of the NEA, and an other
cause they find controversial to the
mainstream of society. Thost same
liberalsclaim they’re lough on * rimi
nals, but when it comes to pui up or
shut up, those bleeding hearts won’t
expand the death penalty like is needed.
We need to expand the death penally
to a mandatory death penalty for all
murders except in cases of self-de
fense or involuntary manslaughter.
i ms would send criminals a message.
And those who consider themselves
above the law will pay the ultimate
price. These people are nothing but a
hindrance to our society. They can’i
be reformed — once a criminal al
ways a criminal, so let’s, clean the
scum out of our jails. They get out of
jail and rc-commit crimes at a rate
above 80 percent. Let’s make our
streets safe again; let’s expand the
death penalty and make it mandatory.
For all you bleeding-heart liberals
who arc going to respond critically to
my position, it’s you who are helping
these criminals. You whine and
complain that it’s society that cor
rupts these people. You all need to
wake up and figure out criminals aren’i
going to go unless we take charge,
take our streets back, and pul these
sCum out of their misery.
Malt McDonald
junior
political science
PAUL SOUDERS
Shaving proves hate of body
American women of virtually
all races, ages, creeds, relig
ions and sexual preferences
endure a certain ritual, a deeply and
mysteriously feminine act that involves
the regular removal of body hair.
As far as 1 know, this is a largely
American habit, to painfully and
sometimes forcefully remove hair that
must have been put there for some
reason or another.
So 1 did a little research and spoke
to two actual women, who of course
asked to remain anonymous, like
everyone else I interview, about hair
removal methods, to balance the ar
ticle and give my fellow sexist pig
brothers some sort of perspective on
the issue.
This doesn’t mean that women
should slop reading at this point and
skip back to “Calvin and Hobbes,”
however, so don’t do it.
What, 1 wondered, arc some of the
fabled hair removal methods actually
about? What is waxing like?
“Pretty painful,” one woman said.
“Like using trillions of tiny tweez
ers to simultaneously yank out your
hair at the root,” the other said.
Neither had actually used the Epi
M * 'w uiui uj/pui viiuj 111 vii
gained widespread use in Turkish
dungeons during the Crusades. The
contraption is “sort of a coil or spring,
which vibrates or rotates or some
thing and pulls your hairs out.”
One woman speculated that it
probably would feel like “getting body
hair caught in a zipper, maybe.”
(Ouch!)
The other said that “if you do it
enough it wonThurt anymore, proba
bly because you pull out all the pain
sensors in your leg.”
Then there’s Nair, which is “some
sort of chemical that removes hair,”
according to one source.
“It actually disintegrates hair, I
think, like Alien blood,” said the other.
It also leaves large un-bald patches
that must be shaven anyway. Nair is
painless, but the user runs the risk of
irritation or an allergic reaction. Gee,
1 can’t imagine having an allergic
reaction to using a toxic chemical
that dissolves body hair.
That leaves good old-fashioned
shaving, which both my sources agreed
is the easiest method.
“You can control where you shave,”
one said, “versus other methods that
leave big hairy splotches like a grassy
plain.”
“You have to watch the danger
spots,” the other said, “like knees and
shins and ankles. I’ve got cuts all over
my ankles.”
Gee./ can 7 imagine
hams an ailersk
reaction to usias a
toxic chemical that
dissolves body hail.
So why do these women shave?
One was very practical about it.
“It’s very itchy, especially to wear
pantyhose (if I don’t shave),” she
said.
The other said it was “very social
— people would curl their lips at me
(if I didn’t shave) and men don’t like
hairy women. If I had ever wanted a
date in my life, I’d better damn well
shave my legs.”
Both women said they would stop
if it became socially acceptable not to
shave, or if they were living in Eu
rope or some other part of the world
where going about unshorn is the
norm.
This pretty much confirms my
suspicions that Americans (and I guess
I’m lumping Canadians in here, too)
absolutely hate the way the female
body is supposed to be.
Yeah, I know that a few guys out
there are chuckling, “Hch, heh, I don’t
hate the female body, nudge nudge.”
These are the same sorts of guys who
tend to tuck in their monster truck
racing T-shirts.
I’d venture to say their objectifica
tion of the female form is merely a
way to remove the flesh from the
person inside, so that they can di
vorce what they hate — women —
horn what they like—sex with women.
That’s a pretty rotten concept.
But mostly we just hate women’s
bodies. Few (actually, almost no)
people would object to a Chippen
dales dancer, who makes his money
more or less naked. But we all know
how up in arms blue-nosed moralities
get about some woman taking her
shirt off for money. Apparently there’s
something filthy and disgusting about
female bodies, which is why I am
never, ever allowed to look at one,
especially if I’m paying for it.
Some of this must be related to the
way boys and girls are bro'j^ht up in
this country. Little girls are given to
idolize a doll whose proportions would
be, if she were life-size, something
like 40-22-34. They are bombarded
with images of borderline anorexics
in fashion magazines and told that
this thoroughly unrealistic body form
is beautiful.
Boys, on the other hand, sec sex
symbols like Scan Connery, who is
balding and aging and developing a
gut, or Harrison Ford, who has all
kinds of scars and a pretty bad com
plexion.
By the time we’re all twentyish,
women thoroughly hate their bodies.
They’re loo fat or too hairy, not blonde
enough or tall enough. Men com
pletely love their bodies, no matter
how fat and hairy and unsexy they
are, and they love to sit around in
their underpants and drink beer and
not exercise.
Lots of guys I know — no kidding
— even name the spare weight they
carry around their midriffs. (Phil is a
popular option.) And plenty of men
with a bit extra in the gut department
rationalize that “if I’m ever stuck in
the Gobi desert, I can last three weeks
without food.”
Women, on the other hand, are
made to conceal particular portions
of the body for no good reason other
than that’s what society expects.
Why is it I can take my shirt off at
the beach, thus exposing my pale and
flabby chest, but if a woman did the
same, especially in Nebraska, she’d
get arrested, or at least some unpleas
ant stares? The only difference be
tween a woman’s chest and mine is a)
a little subcutaneous fat and b) hers
works and mine doesn’t.
Hairy, heavy or otherwise, there’s
something just generally nice about
anyone’s body. Think, at least, of
what a feat of engineering all the
interrelated systems are, or that more
bodies don’t shut down or switch
suddenly into reverse like Pintos.
Even the bodies that don’t work
quite so well, with a minor malfunc
tion like a disease or disability, still
do a pretty good job of staying alive
and keeping the brain working.
Just because a body isn’t “perfect”
because of some excess hair here and
there doesn’t mean it isn’t worth
something. Try getting along without
it sometime.
Souders Is a Junior English m^Jor and a
Dally Nebraskan columnist.
