SPOTS A & E
Bdarly a game Box office bodhisattva October 13,1997
Nebraska rolled up 410 yards rushing en route to Brad Pitt plays Heinrich Harre — an Austrian -f
a 49-21 victory over the Baylor Bears Saturday mountaineer who tutored the young Dalai Lama SWEATER WEATHER
rnght m Waco, Texas. PAGES 6-7 in the ’40s — in “Seven Years in Tibet.” PAGE 9 Chance of showers, high 53, Cold tonight, low 27.
VOL. 97 COVERING THE UNIVERSITY OF NEBRASKA-LINCOLN SINCE 1901 N0. 35
Diversity retreat opens eyes
By Erin Gibson
Senior Reporter
For University of Nebraska-Lincoln junior
Eddie Brown, it wasn’t die easiest way to spend a
weekend.
As a participant in the university’s 10^ annu
al Diversity Retreat, he spent many hours silent
ly trying to accept other students’ views on the
hot-button topics of racism and discrimination.
“It’s very hard to sit and keep your mouth
closed and listen to somebody else” with differ
ent cultural views, Brown said.
It’s much easier to discount others’ views as
wrong or ignorant and “ jump on the defensive
side,” he said.
But the retreat, held at Camp Kitaki near
Louisville, challenged its participants^© learn
and grow in other cultures, as well as their own,
he said.
For 10 years, the university has sponsored the
retreat to fight prejudice and cultural ignorance
on campus through two days of honest discus
sions, which participants keep confidential.
This year, about 40 students from many cul
tural backgrounds and campus organizations
gathered at the camp to listen and learn from
each other’s experiences with discrimination and
injustice on campus.
Many participants said they chose to attend
the retreat to express their disgust with recent
incidents of hate speech, including Tuesday’s
slurs against the gay community on campus side
walks and Sigma Chi fraternity burning a 6-foot
cross during a pre-initiation ritual in January.
Brandy Nath, a UNL sophomore who attend
ed the retreat, said she arrived at the retreat with
some very solid opinions on such cultural misun
derstandings on campus, but her opinions
changed while listening to others at the retreat.
“I feel that our campus has a lot of problems
that are hidden,” she said.
When the problems manifest themselves in
hate speech or other incidents, they are most eas
fcfc-—
We have the ability; if we can move past the rhetoric,
to be genuine in our desire to see people
come together... ”
John Harris
special assistant to the vice chancellor for student affairs
ily recognized, she said. But students, faculty and
administration cannot ignore those problems
during the rest of the year, she said.
Nath and Brown said students must take
action to prevent incidents of cultural hatred and
band together on behalf of oppressed groups in
the aftermath of such incidents.
They said retreat participants pledged them
selves to these goals by planning to become
active members in UNL’s Diversity Council, a
student group that formed last spring to educate
and expose campus members to different cul
tures.
John Harris, retreat organizer and special
assistant to the vice chancellor for student
affairs, said he believed the energetic students
who attended the retreat will fight injustice on
campus.
They surprised him in their willingness to
“take the heat from one another,” and acknowl
edge cultural indifference and biases, Harris
said.
“Each person had the chance to be very can
did,” he said. “And people were challenged.”
On the retreat, students looked at past cultur
al conflicts on campus, how they arose and how
they affected the campus community, Harris
said. As a group, students said they were unsatis
fied with the campus’s reactions to ihjustice.
“Things have happened on our campus that
have not been rectified,” Harris said. “The reso
lutions presented were slow in coming and not
satisfactory”
Students remembered Chancellor James
Moeser, during his State of the University
Address in August, saying he wanted not just tol
erance of diversity, but acceptance of diversity
on campus. They questioned whether his
demands for a new campus climate were rhetoric
or reality after almost two months, Harris said.
They also questioned their own beliefs and
recognized they each held unwarranted stereo
types against students from other cultural back
grounds, he said.
In the end, students asked if, in spite of their
differences, they could move forward together to
fight cultural ignorance and injustice, Harris
said.
Most students pledged themselves to take
action, looked at their neighbors and said, “I’m
willing to be your ally. I’m willing to join forces
with you, and I’m not willing to sit back and
watch anymore,” he said.
Harris said the retreat participants wanted to
send a message to administrators that, although
wounds of past injustices still fester on campus,
student activism has created the potential for a
diverse, accepting campus.
“We have the ability, if we can move past the
rhetoric, to be genuine in our desire to see people
come together... and work at it over some time,”
he said. “That doesn’t mean we have to agree on
everything; it’s the principle,” he said.
“I would pray in my heart of hearts that we
can become an institution of principle,” Harris
added. “It’s time.”
PARTICIPANTS RON through the rain and puddles Sunday on their romp around East Campus to kickoff the University of Nebraska-Lincoln
Homecoming Week. An estimated 250 people ran in the Fun Run despite the rain. Please see story on page 3.
Radio show
to feature
gay forum
By Brice Sullivan
Staff reporter
The hosts of the KRNU-FM 90.3 radio
program “Three Men and a German” will be
joined by two members of the gay and les
bian community on Monday night’s show,
one of the show’s hosts said.
Klaus Marre said the topic of discussion
would ^e students’ attitudes toward the
homosexual community.
The guests will be Alison Knudsen of the
Gay Lesbian Bisexual Transgender
Resource Center and Brian Franz, a member
of Someone You Know.
Knudsen and Franz were invited in
response to anti-homosexual messages that
were written after the program’s Oct. 6 show,
in which the hosts provided three students
with chalk to express their feelings toward
the National Coming Out Week chalkings.
“I believe that the hosts have responded
beautifully to what happened,” Knudsen
said. “They’ve taken full responsibility to
rectify the situation.”
Marre further explained the intentions of
the hosts of “Three Men and a German.”
“We feel that we need a dialogue on the
issue,” Marre said, “not writing on side
walks.”
Knudsen said the graffiti has caused the
student gay and lesbian community to pull
closer together, and in response, several peo
ple have come out of the closet since the
incident.
The show will air tonight from 11 p.m. to
1 a.m. tonight. Listeners are urged to express
their opinions either by calling the program
at 472-5768, or by e-mailing at
ThreemenandG@hotmail. com.
Police caution
UNL students
about con man
By Matthew Waite
Senior Reporter
His actions aren’t criminal, for the most
part, but police and victim services are warn
ing people of a smooth-talking con man
they’ve been tracking.
University of Nebraska-Lincoln Police
Sgt. Mylo Bushing and Director of Victim
Services Lisa Cauble said they have been
talking to several UNL students who have
been taken by the man. Because his game is
not criminal - until the victims try to end
their relationship with the man - Bushing and
Cauble only can warn people to beware.
Because they cannot charge the man with
a crime connected to the con game, his name
was not released.
Bushing and Cauble described the con
man as a likable fellow, a smooth talker who
easily fits into a crowd.
He hangs out with people, asks women on
Please see CON on 3
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