LETTERS: The football player stereotype

To the Editor: We have a weekend story based on hearsay, something that belongs in 34th Street. I am by no means holding the occurrence as fabricated; however, by itself, the humdrum occasion does not qualify as an article. That is, the article exists solely because football players are involved. However, the fact that the students belong to the same varsity sport is completely irrelevant to the event. What if the students played a different sport, shared some common hobby, or were all fans of Beavis and Butthead? It makes absolutely no difference; the Office of Student Conduct applies the same procedure whether one plays a sport or not. If classifying the students is not irrelevant enough, the coach is also questioned and pointlessly cited in the article. If the students were all English majors with the same advisor, would the advisor be questioned? None of the students directly involved commented; instead the story is based on shady sources. "Friends of the victim," "one student," "[a]nother resident of the house," one resident of the house whose name is cited, and "[t]he witness" are the sources for this article. So, now we have a report on a lukewarm weekend event, juiced up because football players are involved. Apparently, the DP finds this story more important than other articles that are placed below. I guess Hillary Clinton speaking on campus in about two weeks is less important. Or the article about 13 Penn students robbed at gunpoint, even though walking with friends, is not as important for students to know. There is a more serious issue than the error of exploiting the students in association to a sport; that is, what if the article were titled, "Asian students suspected of assaulting student" or "English students suspected of assaulting student?" The latter headline is absurd and the former would cause an uproar. There is a problem with stereotyping athletes, specifically football players. Of the 10,000 undergraduate students, most don't have one to one contact with the football players, especially if the athletes are balancing 20 hours a week to their sport, school, maybe a job and whatever else. Therefore the closest relationship Penn students have is via word of mouth and the DP. Any substitution of a group; such as Asians or English majors, is flagrant enough, but using football is also picking on team unfairly. All for a lousy front-page article that only qualifies as a blurb in 34th Street. Grace Huang College '99 An issue for freshmen UA candidates To the Editor: An article which appeared in the DP ("Frosh campaigns: Colorful slogans, little real talk," DP, 10/6/97) reported that this year's candidates for Undergraduate Assembly do not know what the issues are, and for that reason have chosen to focus on flashy posters and funny slogans. I wish that these candidates had made a greater effort to learn more about the issues earlier in the campaign process. For instance, one problem that is facing the student body at Penn is the fact that performing arts groups on campus are suffering because of a lack of rehearsal space. The closing of Irvine Auditorium, because of the construction of the Perelman Quadrangle, has aggravated this problem. Unfortunately, it is too late now for candidates to consider whether this issue is important to them, and therefore too late for voters to find out the candidates' positions and vote accordingly. Nonetheless, I urge all the candidates to consider this problem, and to do all they can to make the Administration aware of it. Daniel Stoller College '99 Communications Chairperson Student Theatre Arts Board Penn's alternative political magazine To the Editor: It was with great interest that I read Daniel Fienberg's very thoughtful opinion in last Tuesday's DP, ("Losing its conservative edge," DP, 9/30/97). He wrote wistfully of the days that The Red and Blue was a "bastion of campus conservatism," and characterized it as a magazine that is "losing its conservative edge." Please allow me to respond to his qualms that we ought to find a "target audience," and that he has not seen "any real demonstration of which path [The Red and the Blue] is leaning toward." Basically, Fienberg wants to see a consistent "statement of principles." I am not certain as to what the policy is on the editorial board of the DP, but I am quite sure that the most arrogant thing I could do is demand my staff members all agree to obey the rigid doctrine of one party line, be it the right, left or center. Unlike many of the publications on this campus, The Red and Blue does not ever ask its staff to conform to one way of thinking; all we ask is that they share our desire to explore ideas based on liberty, freedom of speech and students' rights on the Penn campus. Are we conservative? Yes. Are we centrist? Yes. Are we liberal? Yes. That is why we are Penn's alternative student magazine. My apologies if the thoughts and ideas represented on The Red and Blue's editorial board do not fit neatly into one single stereotype, but we will never sacrifice our integrity to toe a party line. However, I would like to wholeheartedly thank Fienberg for asking these important questions. I hope they will continue to be more thoroughly answered in our upcoming issues. David Kalstein College '99 Editor-in-Chief, The Red and Blue