Toy guns can stay home; school not the place

This is in response to "Man with toy gun surrounded by police at Old Main," a story that ran yesterday.

I love (sarcastically) how Servant Bishop Chicago automatically assumed that he was racially profiled when the incident occurred - despite the fact that he had a gun in a holster and was walking around campus. When any normal person sees a gun in a holster, he or she naturally assumes that the gun is real. Just because the gun was a fake doesn't change the scenario - a person on campus had a gun in a holster.

I mean, why would anyone have a toy gun on campus? This isn't grade school, where you can bring toys to class. Grow up, Chicago, you're in college now. The toys can stay home until school is over.

After the five-year anniversary of Columbine and, more recently, the College of Nursing shootings, what was he thinking? Carrying around guns on campus, even fake ones, is an idiotic thing to do.

I'm all for the Second Amendment, but there is a time to display your weapon. School is not one of those times.

Ross Richard
environmental sciences senior

People should become educated about world

I applaud Dr. Kunnie for his column, "U.S. must learn to forgive, but not forget, Haiti." As a Florida native, and someone who has been exposed to Haitian culture for most of my life, I am often disgusted by the lack of knowledge so many people have about the island and the greater Caribbean in general. I decided to call some Haitian friends of mine in Florida to see how they were feeling with the news of the coup in Haiti. I think most of them were just hoping all the violence would end so their families back home would be safe, no matter the political outcome.

The fact is that for far too long our nation has accepted with open arms the arrival of Cubans, who supposedly flee "political persecution," while we reject wholeheartedly the arrival of Haitians, who instead flee only "poverty." It might as well be the same situation, considering the extreme poverty and food rationing that goes on in Cuba. I'm drawn to the conclusion that we are much more willing to accept brown-skinned people fleeing Castro - with whom we have had a grudge for more than 40 years - than to accept black-skinned people fleeing AIDS, repression and extreme poverty. My point is not to devalue Cubans, but instead to point out the racial hypocrisy of our nation's immigration laws.

Tom Douglas

senior majoring in anthropology and Spanish literature

Type of dress can increase women's risk of rape

After a series of straw-man arguments that assailed my recent letter regarding rape and responsibility, I decided clarification was in order.

The issue of clothing is fairly simplistic. Dressing scandalously attracts attention. Your appearance becomes a public good in which you cannot discriminate between who finds you attractive and who does not. We use this example because dressing like a "slut" (Warzecka's language, not mine) is indicative of a myriad of other lifestyle choices that, when evaluated as an aggregation, increase the risk of rape. Let me make that clear: increase the risk. If we really wanted to get specific, consider Warzecka's statistic that 78 percent of victims know their attacker. That should suggest an overwhelming correlation between the social blueprint of rapists and victims. Undoubtedly, the best way to avoid rape at a fraternity party isn't dressing conservatively; it's not attending the party. Sure, incidents occur at home, but you have substantially decreased the risk. I understand the inherent variability, but exceptions are red herrings in this argument because we theorize based on probabilities, not exceptions.

Wendy Watters brings up a good point that rape is about "power and control," but fails to make the next logical connection. From an intuitive or a Darwinian perspective, the predator chiefly attacks the weakest prey. While both Stephanie Slater and Watters seem to agree that there should be a certain of level of responsibility, both seem unsure as to why. Acting in a way that is socially responsible decreases the chance of being perceived as weak and vulnerable. That is why.

While I implored readers not to juxtapose emotional analogies with a systematic discussion of the issue, it happened anyway. To my bewilderment, it was even suggested that "1-in-4" women get raped in their lifetime, a statistic so flawed that it was ranked by the Independent Women's Forum as the "Number One Myth" perpetuated by feminists (and supported by a wealth of evidence too extensive to explain).

Why are women so intent on proving that they are victims? I write an article that argues women can lessen the odds of rape by taking more responsibility. Women write back to convince me that they are, in fact, currently, and going to remain, victims - whether I like it or not ... That is extraordinarily bizarre.

Jon Knutson
management information systems and operations management junior

Animals underground for protection, safety

I am writing in response to the article "Students protest animal testing at UMC labs" published on Wednesday. Gary Vella, coordinator for the Tucson chapter of the Animal Defense League of Arizona, says that the conditions in the animal facility at UMC are "sickening" because the facility is "tucked away ... hidden in corridors." I doubt he stopped to wonder why the animal facility has to be tucked away. The animals used in research at this university are cloistered not for secrecy, but for protection from people like Vella and his colleagues. If the UMC animal labs were aboveground, it would be all too easy for animal rights extremists to break into labs to "free" the animals housed within. Do animal rights activists ever think about the consequences of their misguided actions when they release laboratory mice into the wild? These animals are unused to the outside environment and their pale fur acts as a bull's eye, causing the "freed" animals to quickly die in the claws of hawks. If these groups would speak to researchers on campus, they would hear about the compassion and gratitude felt for the research animals. But hey, that kind of emotion complicates things. It's much easier to just demonize scientists and make no effort to find out why the research is being conducted. Vella, you can hide behind a "not tested on animals" product label, but know that every chemical in that "not tested on animals" product was approved for human use because of animal testing. Tell a friend with rheumatoid arthritis that she should make do with an icepack. Tell the 43,000 women who die from breast cancer every year that their lives could have been saved by better treatments, but hey, you think animal testing is wrong. If you should suffer from a stroke, know that the only way to save your brain is to use drugs that were developed and tested on animals. You should feel gratitude for the animals and scientists who have given so much to develop these treatments that will save your life, not contempt.

Melissa Drake
molecular and cellular biology sophomore