America is 'melting pot,' self-sacrifice honorable

This is in response to Erik Flesch's Monday letter concerning objective reality.

Flesch claims to know what "good Americans" think: that rejecting the principles of "today's multicultural establishment" will, in turn, lead to truth. It's funny because I always thought of America as being a melting pot of different cultures, ideas and backgrounds. That is why we have freedom of religion, for example. It's also funny how a group of students that believes in objective reality all happen to be white and few in number.

It seems pretty subjective to me. John Malek Ahmadi's letter was a very refreshing opinion because it finally got to the heart of the matter: There is no universal truth, and everyone thinks differently. I most definitely agree with Flesch that slavery, murder and theft are universally evil, but I refuse to believe that voluntary self-sacrifice for the greater good of mankind is even remotely diabolical. In the early 1960s, for example, in the segregated United States, thousands of blacks participated in sit-ins, boycotts and open defiance of Jim Crow laws for just treatment. The injuries and deaths accumulated by those self-sacrificing young blacks paved the way for steps toward racial equality.

Their success can be measured by the fact that Erik and I (being a black woman) are both allowed to voice our opinions in the same school newspaper. Therefore the ends justify the means, thus proving that self-sacrifice is not evil. Clearly, Flesch and I disagree on the merits of self-sacrifice for a greater good, however; who is to decide whether Flesch's "Objective Reality" is universal truth, or merely a subjective, refutable opinion?

April Lacey
journalism sophomore

Civil liberties of students violated by drinking laws

Normally I read the Wildcat opinions pages and silently agree or disagree with the various people who take the time to write in. That ended as I read some of the latest rhetoric regarding underage drinking.

Whatever happened to civil liberty? Why are we continually being forced to take laws that were written for the lowest common denominator? The number of people who drink and get into trouble is infinitesimal compared to the number of people who partake in alcohol in a completely safe - and respectful - manner. People are entirely too comfortable with allowing their rights to be taken away for the sake of protecting the masses. The fact of the matter is that the legal drinking age of 21 does nothing to deter troublemaking minors from drinking and getting into trouble. All it does is make it more difficult for those who are fully capable of safely and responsibly drinking (the vast majority) to do so. On a side note, I use the word "rights" here because I feel it's my prerogative to do what I want, when I want, insofar as I cause no one else any harm. That's the whole point, of course: That underage drinkers cause harm. Well, I'd like some proof. One primary argument is that college parties are loud and leave a mess. Most of the parties I go to (and all I've helped throw) were done with the utmost care with regard to neighbor approval. Neighbors are contacted well in advance of the event and are provided with contact information in the event they feel the noise is too much to handle, etc. I've even had neighbors say that if the noise is too much to handle, they'll just come over and join the fun.

The other thing people are forgetting is that just because a rule is law doesn't necessarily mean it's "right." One Wildcat staff writer so eloquently informed us that drinking under 21 is against the law. While she is of course correct, that does not mean that those who are capable of responsibly drinking are inherently bound to follow this law. If we took that argument one could easily say that all of the feats of American history, wherein unjust laws were reacted to and overcome, should never have occurred because of the assumption that a law's existence was evidence of its moral correctness. Two modest examples: women's suffrage and black slavery.

Joseph Jaramillo
computer science junior

Fascism has foundation in western civilization

I was appalled by the opinion expressed by Erik Flesch claiming that we all must embrace and promote "western civilization's foundation of universal truth." Fascism, which Mr. Flesch rightly denounces, is firmly rooted in western civilization. The Holocaust came about in this "moral" western civilization. Slavery was defended and promoted by many of the founders of the United States of America, who according to Mr. Flesch's logic were inspired by the "universal truth" of western civilization. The United States, a western country, is the only country to have ever used a nuclear bomb, incinerating hundreds of thousands and leaving millions more to suffer the effects of radiation. Finally, capitalism does not defend "the moral right of an individual to life, liberty, property and the pursuit of happiness." Capitalism is the reason the United States fails to hold its trading partners accountable for abusing the human rights of their own people. Capitalism values profits over people. What universal truth condones the oppression, murder and torture of millions of people so that a few can prosper? Western civilization has flourished on the backs of millions of suffering souls. To claim that western civilization is the only rational and moral civilization is at best an ignorant statement, and at worst a thinly veiled racist statement that promotes an ideology similar to fascism.

Carrie Brown
Near Eastern studies graduate student