Letters

Affirmative action should help low-income
students

I wanted to comment on “Affirmative
action proponents still face uphill battle“ by Michael
Weiner (Daily Bruin, News, June 11), as well as on the whole
affirmative action debate in general.

Discriminating against whites and males with affirmative action
programs is just as wrong as the anti-minority sentiments that
supposedly make such programs necessary. The obstacle facing
disadvantaged people in university admissions and employment is not
race; it is socioeconomic status.

The quality of a student’s primary education is dependent
upon how much money the student’s family has, not the color
of their skin. I acknowledge that these two factors tend to be
intertwined, but they are not cause-and-effect. Affirmative action
should benefit poor whites as well as poor minorities.

These disadvantaged children go to the same inner-city schools.
Why should minority students be given preference over whites and
certain Asians who suffered the same obstacles and life
experiences?

Access to higher education is virtually nonexistent for
economically disadvantaged students of all races. If “the era
of affirmative action [is] coming to an end,” we need to
formulate a plan that will provide all disadvantaged children with
the opportunity to succeed.

Monique Vanaman Third-year Women’s
studies

UCLA should ban identity-based graduations

I find it absolutely ridiculous that your university actually
allows gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people to have their
own graduation ceremony. (“Celebrate
good times,” Daily Bruin, News, June 11).

Do you also have a “heterosexual” celebration? If
not, that’s biased! You are selling out to homosexuals and
legitimizing their personal sexual preference at the expense of
those who are opposed to and ashamed of their behavior.

At the cost of “inclusion,” you are alienating the
heterosexual majority of this country. I personally abhor what your
institution is doing and I would never recommend anyone to attend
your university!

Israel Talavera, Jr. Biblical Studies Online Bible
College

Diversity among whites needs to be
recognized

In regards to Howana Lundy’s comment, please don’t
take this the wrong way, but we “whites” come in all
shapes, colors and religions, too! (“Speaks
out,” Daily Bruin, Viewpoint, June 25).

I went to UCLA when the affirmative action program was in full
swing. In my opinion, it didn’t help anyone. People of my
religion are a minority, too ““ but we don’t and never
have gotten any “affirmative action.”

Perhaps you would like to fight for “female rights”
like we had to do, way back when, in the long lost days of the
Vietnam War, when women were referred to as “girls” at
UCLA. If you want to talk about being invisible, we were! We worked
our rears off to make a difference. No one handed anything to
us.

The “blacks” had their own special place down by the
“old” Student Union. Please don’t get me wrong,
but discrimination is wrong. Call it what it is: discrimination.
Giving people “special” places on campus or hand-outs
due to color is wrong, whether it is black or white. If you want to
be a part of the real world, you will have to realize that most of
us are discriminated against for something.

Get off your high horse and realize that you can make a
difference on your own if you try. Quit waiting for someone to hand
it to you as a blue-plate special. Get on with your own life and
live it. Life doesn’t come “cheap” or easy.

Terri Brooks UCLA Alumna

Zero-tolerance policy ultimately protects
students

Thomas Soteros-McNamara, in his viewpoint submission
(“University
drinking policy is unfair to students,” Daily Bruin, June
25), attacks a system meant to protect the UCLA community by making
the argument that “it’s not fair.”

But the zero-tolerance alcohol policy does not concern itself
with what’s fair. By design, the rule is meant to protect
students from themselves, whether they be below or above the legal
age limit.

What the rule is saying is that the University does not support
the consumption of alcohol by students, either because it is
harmful to themselves (the binge drinkers), to their education or
to the community at large (drunk driving takes thousands of lives
every year).

What Soteros-McNamara fails to observe is that laws which
restrict one’s behavior cannot, by virtue of their design, be
“fair.” Often, the majority is forced to give up what
may seem a right in order to protect the minority, and themselves,
from abusing that right. Such is the case with drugs, including
alcohol.

Most people are capable of drinking in moderation, realizing
their limits and staying within them, but some people are not as
fortunate, and thus pose a danger to themselves and to others if
left to their own devices.

Thus, the legal-age students must give up their right to consume
alcohol on campus in order to protect younger students.

Howard Chernin Second-year Spanish
linguistics