Friday, 4/18/97 LETTERS
Setting it straight We would like to propose a moratorium on the
logical fallacies presented weekly by J. Jioni Palmer. Every
article that he writes is based upon the presupposition that his
skin-color is the sole determinant of his fate. From his past
article on the need for reparations to his many columns calling for
the support of affirmative action, he continually mistakes his
membership in a racial group as an impetus for demanding a free
ride. On one hand, he claims the need for monetary reparations and
preferential treatment by virtue of his African heritage while on
the other hand he is enraged when anyone else projects a racial
classification upon him. In his April 16 Viewpoint article he makes
reference to "rights and entitlements that should be afforded to
African people as matters of promise and principle." To our
knowledge, J. Jioni was never actually shackled by the bonds of
slavery, yet feels the ability to speak as an authority on the
matter. In his memoirs titled, "Up From Slavery," Booker T.
Washington, a former slave and black America’s foremost spokesman
writes, "I have always been made sad when I have heard members of
any race claiming rights and privileges, or certain badges of
distinction, on the ground simply that they were members of this or
that race, regardless of their own individual worth or attainments.
I have been made to feel sad for such persons because I am
conscious of the fact that mere connection with what is known as a
superior race will not permanently carry an individual forward
unless he has individual worth, and mere connection with what is
regarded as an inferior race will not finally hold an individual
back if he possesses intrinsic, individual merit. Every persecuted
individual and race should get much consolation out of the great
human law, which is universal and eternal, that merit, no matter
under what skin found, is in the long run, recognized and
rewarded." In issues concerning slavery and its aftermath, we’re
more inclined to grant adherence to the opinion of a former slave
than J. Jioni Palmer. Patrick Strader Junior Political science
Matthew Clifton Senior Physiological science Absolving sins Some of
us have called for an apology for past injustices; yet others have
opposed this for sundry reasons. I would like to settle this once
and for all: I, John Beck, do apologize on behalf of all those who
forced people into bondage against their will. Further, I wish to
apologize abjectly to humanity for the evil deeds of all villains,
past, present and future. To my knowledge, only once before has an
individual accepted the burden of the misdeeds of all humanity, but
it needed to be done again. In case any of you doubt my sincerity:
I solemnly swear to never again rape, deal in slavery, commit
genocide or invade small neighboring countries rich in natural
resources. I sure hope this makes up for all that stuff in human
history. John G. Beck Recent Ph.D. in astronomy Howl for error This
letter is in response to the April 14 Viewpoint article "Columnists
have been there, idealists have done that." It took me only 10
seconds to realize that something was dreadfully wrong. My hands
grew limp as my heart plummeted into the abyss of English terror.
Unable to believe the Daily Bruin could do such a thing, I
consulted the nearest poetry anthology, desperately hoping it would
allay my fears, only to find that my original instinct was true.
For those of you fellow Bruins who did not notice this glaring
error that was repeated four times in perhaps the single worst
piece of writing Viewpoint has ever printed, I will give you a clue
from Michael Donley himself. "Unless you have been living in a cave
… you probably know that the above excerpt is from Allen
Ginsburg’s book "Howl," and that Mr. Ginsburg died this weekend."
This sentence is screaming for a thick red marker to help bleed out
the myriad of glaring grammatical errors, and I will chime in with
the name of one of America’s most highly regarded poets, Allen
Ginsberg. An occasional typo in journalism is forgivable, but
ignorance of how to spell is not. Donley apparently thinks he is a
better poet than Ginsberg, as he takes many liberties in his
quotation, such as adding and subtracting commas, periods,
capitalization, line breaks and dashes. There is no excuse for this
kind of sloppy writing that does injustice to Ginsberg’s original
work and insults readers from Los Angeles to Nebraska. It shocks me
that the Daily Nebraskan would print this, that Viewpoint spent
time seeking out columns from other university newspapers instead
of utilizing the talent that abounds on our own campus, and that
the Daily Bruin would print this. Not only was Donley’s writing
style on par with the newspaper published in my junior high school,
but his content suffered from sheer unoriginality and incorrect
assumptions: "It is true that we do have almost everything that Mr.
Ginsburg was fighting for – drugs, literary freedom, drugs, sexual
experimentation, drugs, a strong anti- censorship movement and
drugs." I have never heard such a litany of causes attached to any
poet’s name, possibly because poets write to express their
observations of the world around them and in them, not to advocate
their stand on a specific cause. Donley creates juvenile cause and
effect relationships by a literal reading of the text, instead of
looking for underlying meanings. Wake up UCLA and demand that the
Daily Bruin only print writers who display mastery of the English
language, and that editors do their job to ensure that their
readers will never be subjected to such trash as they were with
Michael Donley’s article. Leah Green Sophomore English/creative
writing