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November 23, 2004
“Hamline flock” is fundamentally flawed
Regarding “Quit following the Hamline flock,” a letter to the editor by Rachael Young published in the Nov. 16 Oracle:
Ms. Young, I completely disagree with your article, for it has hypocritical, fundamental flaws.
You write, “We chose to perpetuate [victimization] by not saying anything. Then we write about it.”
This is hypocritical. In writing, as we are doing now, we are saying something, our own opinions. The very action of writing your initial letter goes against your attack on writing as communication.
If the problem “lies not in the individual but in the institution,” why are you attacking those who assault institutions of racism, reverse racism, political correctness, and oppression?
If the problem is with the institution, imagine if there were no device to question the authority of the institution. The press’ First Amendment freedom, if not present and enforced, would lead to a totalitarian regime.
Have you ever read George Orwell’s 1984 or Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451? The ideology of control
Bradbury and Orwell present is such a regime. By mandating how information reaches the public, these stories show what a world without a free press would be like. Everyone would become a victim of the institution without a voice to question it.
Also, Hamline has not one, but two forums to question administrations: the Oracle and HUSC. I attend HUSC every week, and I am not afraid to let the entire assembly know what I think on a resolution. I can do this because the institution taught me not to be a victim, but rather to be an activist.
Last year, as a rookie to college life, I learned to think critically and stand up for my own opinions and question ideas which appeared flawed. Institutions, while they may suppress the concept of individual thought, have no control over it, like you are saying.
Institutions cannot control your thoughts, speech or any other tool you possess to question such an institution.
You lack even a single piece of evidence to support your claim that institutions teach us to be politically correct and forget our commonalities while making us victims.
The institution cannot hear you if you don’t speak up and make your voice heard.
Are you a victim? Are you politically correct? Are you a member of the flock? I know I am not. Baaa.
Posted by msveum at November 23, 2004 11:07 AM
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