University Press (Beaumont, Tex.), Vol. 80, No. 16, Ed. 1 Friday, October 24, 2003 Page: 3 of 6
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University Press
Editor....................Patrick Gurskl
Managing Editor...........Holly Westbrook
The opinions that appear in editorials are the
official views of the University Press student man-
- agement as determined by the UP Student Editorial
Board. Opinions expressed elsewhere on this page
are the views of the writers only and are not neces-
_ sarily those of the University Press student manage-
ment. Student opinions are not necessarily those of
the university administration.
..............................................♦............................ ...............
UP Editorial
International
students need
longer orientation
While international students struggle to
figure out the idiosyncrasies of life and cul-
ture in America, the school’s administrators
and police department have been strug-
gling to balance a need for services both on
and off campus.
Both international students and admin-
istrators seemed frustrated despite positive
dialogue at Oct. 17’s safety meeting.
However, it seems that there are a few
things that could be done to prevent many
of these frustrations..
Before school resumed this semester,
there was a week-long orientation for
incoming freshmen, called “Week of
Welcome.” Students straight out of high
school were given a whole week to acquaint
themselves with life at Lamar and in
Beaumont.
That being said, it makes sense that, if it
takes a week to properly orient an
American student to the rigors and com-
plexities of college life and life in
Beaumont, it may take longer to orient stu-
dents who have come from the other side of
the globe.
Currently, there is only a one-day
“crash course” for incoming foreign stu-
dents who may or may not have an idea of
what life is like in the United States.
This one-day orientation, however, usu-
ally occurs the day a student steps off the
plane in America, and most of the informa-
tion they receive is not reinforced.
As anyone can see, this lack of informa-
tion is a problem, and its fallout can already
be seen.
The Lamar Police Department and its
chief have struggled for a way to protect
students both on- and off-campus, with little
increase in manpower.
Most students from the area realize the
state of the neighborhood in which Lamar
resides, but most international students
barely know where to buy milk, much less
how to call police when they’ve been
attacked.
The school should provide a week-long,
in-depth orientation for international stu-
dents dealing with the rigors of life in the
United States.
Someone has to realize that a pro-
active response is needed to curb the prob-
lems between Lamar’s international stu-
dents and the community of South Park
that surrounds the school.
Someone needs to teach these students
to lock their doors. Someone needs to tell
the students that the police can help them.
- Someone needs to show them how to ride a
bus to Wal-Mart. Someone needs to show
^ them American culture.
Someone needs to show them how to
be a good student at Lamar (the way we
show incoming freshman).
This is not going to get done in a day. It
will only get done when the school accepts
the responsibility it owes to its internation-
al student community.
■4.....—•-......-.....-♦............-.....-......-......-.....
Letters
to thf, Editor
Individuals who wish to speak out on issued
should send a letter fewer than 600 words in
length to Letters to the Editor, P.O. Box
10055, LU Station, Beaumont 77710, or
drop letters off at our offices in 200 Setzer
Student Center. The writer’s name, address,
telephone number and social security num-
ber must accompany each letter. Letters
received without this information cannot be
printed. Letters may be edited for length,
grammar, style and possible libel. Opinions
* expressed in letters are not necessarily those
of the UP student management. Letters by
the same writer on the same subject will not
' be published. Poetry, reprints, anonymous
letters and religious debates will not be pub-
lished.
University Press
Friday, October 24, 2003
General Boykin: Bush’s Bartman?
WASHINGTON — Osama bin Laden
has said he is engaged in a holy war with the
United States. For the general who is now
charged with finding him, the feeling is
mutual — and the general is not making
any secret of it.
Army Lt. Gen. William “Jerry” G.
Boykin has made several speeches — some
in uniform — at evangelical Christian
churches in which he casts the war on ter-
rorism in terms that sound downright apoc-
alyptic.
Islamic extremists hate the United
States, “because we’re a Christian nation,
because our foundation and our roots are
Judeo-Christian,” Boykin said, while
appearing in dress uniform before a reli-
gious group in Oregon in June. “And the
enemy is a guy named Satan.”
Oh, yes. That guy again. Some of us
remember when Iran’s late Ayatollah
Khomeini called America “the Great
Satan.” We thought he was being extreme.
Our “spiritual enemy will only be
defeated if we come against them in the
name of Jesus,” Boykin also said, which
surely must come as sobering news to our
Jewish and Muslim troops, among others.
In a Daytona, Fla., church in January,
Boykin said of an Islamic militant that his
Delta Force commanders chased in Soma-
lia: “I knew that my God was bigger than
his. I knew that my God was a real God and
his was an idol.”
That, too, will come as news to Muslims,
whose Holy Book says that Allah is just
another name for the God of Jews and
Christians.
Boykin has fired other inflammatory
attacks at Muslims in church speeches that
first were reported by NBC News and the
Los Angeles Times, but you get the idea.
The general’s comments certainly
sound heartfelt. But, with all due respect,
he needs to cool his rhetoric, at least in pub-
lic — and especially in uniform.
As a top Pentagon official, his outspo-
kenness in this instance is about as helpful
to the war on terrorism as beleaguered
Chicago Cubs fan Steve Bartman was to his
team's pennant hopes.
Bartman, you may recall, was the poor
sap whose interference with a foul ball
made him an instant scapegoat (unfairly, in
the view of this Cubs fan) for our beloved
team’s late-inning collapse in the National
League pennant race.
Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld
has charged Boykin with reinvigorating the
Pentagon’s plans for tracking down bin
Laden, Saddam Hussein, Mullah Omar and
other world terrorist leaders.
His church speeches risk causing more
damage to America’s cause than all of the
goodwill that his commander-in-chief,
President Bush, has been trying mightily to
build.
The Bush administration, to its credit,
has emphasized repeatedly that the “war on
terrorism” is not a war against Islam but a
by clarence PAGE
war against people “who have tried to
hijack a religion.”
In fairness, Boykin similarly has distin-
guished between the Muslim majority and
the radicals who are not representative of
the Islamic faith, according to the Los
Angeles Times. But, as the general also
should know, it is not his qualifying state-
ments but his inflammatory statements that
will be covered most widely and heard by
the largest audience, here and abroad.
Predictably, some of Boykin’s defend-
ers say he is speaking for himself and
charge that his “free speech” rights are
under assault by the liberal media and
other PC thought police. Forget it. Take it
from me, a Vietnam War critic who was
drafted anyway: There is no absolute right
to free speech for members of the military.
Up until now, the Pentagon has banned
political activism by uniformed personnel,
but shied away from religious expression.
Unfortunately, the world has changed.
Today’s geopolitical realities merge religion
with politics in ways America has not previ-
ously experienced or expected. We’d better
get used to it.
You don't have to be biased against
anyone to realize how damaging Boykin’s
statements can be to the public diplomacy
side of America's war against terrorism. It’s
hard to win the hearts and minds of people
after they have heard you trash their reli-
gion.
It is not always easy for people in our
young, fast-paced and forward-looking cul-
ture to understand how we are perceived by
others who measure time in centuries, not
weeks. But that’s who Osama is talking to
when he refers to the U.S. and Europe as
“crusaders.”
Regardless of one's faith, it is aggravat-
ing to have foreigners march across your
soil and try to run things, no matter how
noble their intentions. The more we speak
like crusaders or behave like imperialists,
the more resonance the words of Osama
and other “evildoers,” as Bush calls them,
will have.
Diplomacy is best left to the diplomats.
I am certain that Boykin and other generals
probably do not want State Department
bureaucrats to start ordering troops around.
The generals should similarly avoid declar-
ing their own holy wars.
Reach this writer at
cpage@trlbune.com
Letter to
the Editor
Student
responds to
‘Chicks’ rebuttal
Editor:
I am writing in regards to KYKR
program/music director Mickey
Ashworth’s rebuttal to the UP’s
excellent Oct. 3 editorial, “Nix Hicks,
not Chicks” as there are several
points I feel need to be made con-
cerning the entire Dixie Chicks con-
troversy.
To begin with, I believe the ini-
tial editorial made clear that the
“hicks” dig was not aimed at the
country music audience as a whole
(considering the author was defend-
ing a country music group himself)
but at the intolerant reactionary ele-
ments that pushed the censorship of
the Dixie Chicks’ music.
Next, Mr. Ashworth seems to
have mistakenly, if understandably,
included America’s military action
against Iraq as part of the “war on
terrorism.” Although it took him
months of making contradictory
claims to the American people, even
George W. Bush has finally admitted
that there is no link between Saddam
Hussein and the Sept. 11 attacks.
(Bush’s success at spreading misin-
formation is illustrated by the fact
that a majority of Americans, as
demonstrated by national polls, cite a
link between the two, in addition to
believing the 9-11 hijackers were
iraqis.) It should also be stressed that
no credible link exists between
Saddam and al Quaeda.
Mr. Ashworth cites the problem
with relying upon easy-to-manipulate
online polls to make decisions, but
seems oblivious to this factor when
describing KYKR’s decision to cen-
sor the Dixie Chicks’ music. Appa-
rently, the stations that banned the
Chicks because of “listener backlash”
failed to realize that a major portion
of this “backlash” came from right-
wing Internet sites and groups that
rallied in contacting any radio sta-
tions they could, regardless of locali-
ty. Many of these “concerned” Amer-
icans weren’t even country fans, but
simply watchdogs ready to bark
down anyone who dared to sleight
their beloved master, Bush.
Even if one assumes that those
contacting KYKR were simply out-
raged local fans, does it follow that
those contacting the station, even if
in sizeable numbers, should compel
the censorship of a very popular
group? Those who call radio stations,
write “letters to the editor,” etc. are
not only a small minority but gener-
ally represent only the extreme views
on a particular matter. On any issue,
there are extremes on either side, but
generally there is a majority who is
either uninformed about or has no or
little opinion on the issue. If a major-
ity of those who contacted KYKR
supported censoring the Chicks does
it necessarily follow he majority of
KYKR’s listeners held that view? If
so, I suppose it can also be assumed
that if I am the only one who re-
sponds to Mr. Ashworth’s letter then
it follows that I correctly represent
the views of 100 percent of the
10,000+ students who attend Lamar
University on the issue of the Dixie
Chicks controversy.
Additionally, Mr. Ashworth
implies that a lack of requests by lis-
teners for the Chicks’ music after
KYKR’s ban illustrates that they
have no desire for them to be rein-
stated. I can only ponder about why
he would expect requests to KYKR
for a group whose music the station
has made clear they won’t play!
Mr. Ashworth indicates that he
considers it a positive trait to “trust
[one’s] president to do the right
thing.” If history has taught us any-
thing, it’s the danger of this sort of
unconditional support of a leader. A
president should earn the people’s
trust, and when one considers the
multitudinous ways Bush has misled
and lied to us on everything from war
to his domestic policy, I hardly con-
sider him qualified for of deserving
of such honor.
Richard Lindsey
Lamar junior
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Gurski, Patrick. University Press (Beaumont, Tex.), Vol. 80, No. 16, Ed. 1 Friday, October 24, 2003, newspaper, October 24, 2003; Beaumont, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth500932/m1/3/?q=stolen%20land: accessed April 27, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Lamar University.