Letters 4/10
Bodies exhibit exploits dead for sensationalism
TO THE EDITOR:
Bodies: The Exhibition, the new exhibit at The Streets at Southpoint, consists of bodies that have been flayed and plasticized is very controversial, and for good reason. According to Premier Exhibitions their exhibit consists of unclaimed bodies supplied by the Chinese police. One could easily conclude that the bodies are those of the poor and the disenfranchised. Perhaps they are the bodies of prisoners, even of political prisoners. Clearly the deceased did not give permission for the use of their bodies.
After processing, the bodies are 70 percent plastic. Real bodies help sell tickets and bring in the crowds. But real objects are never necessary to teach. That’s why we have Hollywood, textbooks and newspapers.
The exhibit claims that seeing it is good for your health, and that people will stop smoking and eat right when they see the consequences. We see people who cannot breath because they smoke and are morbidly obese. Nothing could be more real, yet we continue to smoke and overeat.
Even if permission had been granted that would not make this and similar exhibits acceptable. Bodies should be treated with dignity and respect, in honor of the deceased. Their unnecessary use here crosses that line.
The ends here do not justify the means. The cost to human dignity and to the human spirit does not justify the questionable educational benefits. It is fascinating, but so is an auto accident. And there’s the rub. There is nothing real about this plasticized version of humanity, except the use of real bodies.
See the Web site I have created for more information: dignityinboston.googlepages.com/durham.
Aaron Ginsburg
Sharon, Massachusetts
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Registering early does give athletes advantage
TO THE EDITOR:
Despite what has been said by varsity athletes to the contrary, registering early does give them an advantage. These athletes have made a decision to participate in that sport, and they should be held to the same standards as all other students. If this system were put in place, who says that we shouldn’t give people with afternoon jobs early registration? Or maybe even people who participate in IM or club sports?
As students, we all make important decisions on how to use our time. We all have a responsibility to represent the University in our own ways, and just because you choose to represent it on the field or court doesn’t mean you are entitled to anything more than what other students receive.
So toughen up, because it may mean more of those early morning practices followed by those dreaded 8 a.m. classes. But then again, you chose your path.
Travis Hall
Sophomore
Journalism
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Campus groups should aim beyond simple awareness
TO THE EDITOR:
I wholly encourage causes that need community awareness to have awareness weeks, for example Transgender Awareness Week, but Jesus Awareness Week? I’m pretty sure they already had that and it was called the Crusades.
I have no problem with “Jesus Week” or “Jesus was a Cool Guy Week,” but it seems to me that people are already pretty aware of Jesus. In fact, the vast majority of “awareness” related activities are for causes that most people already know about.
Another example is the Wall of Stereotypes, which was great at raising awareness for middle-schoolers who hadn’t yet learned how to discriminate against their classmates, but for UNC students it merely encouraged creativity among campus bigots.
Either organizations are not descriptively labeling their events, or awareness has become the ultimate goal for all clubs. Since both options stink, I propose we create a new event to have meaningful discussion on this topic. I propose the Awareness Awareness Week.
Nathaniel Gindele
Junior
Philosophy and Biology
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Collective bargaining gives reward to sub par workers
TO THE EDITOR:
In response to the April 8 editorial “Better than Beijing,” to say that permitting slavery 142 years ago gives North Carolina a bad track record on worker’s rights is both erroneous and irrelevant sensationalism. Your comparison of slavery to North Carolina’s ban on collective bargaining for its employees is fundamentally flawed for one very basic reason: No one is forced to work for any employer at any wage.
Allowing collective bargaining would reward sub par employees by increasing their pay and job security while giving the state less incentive to pay and otherwise reward employees who show better performance. In the case of the state’s schoolteachers, the likely result would be that we’d get stuck paying underperforming teachers more and lose better ones to private schools that will pay more for the cream of the crop. In a more extreme scenario which your editorial board seems to favor, it results in the teachers going on strike, and kids learning nothing at all. Either way, the people of the state lose.
The state shouldn’t be forced to pay its employees a dime more than they’re worth. If it pays them less, there is nothing to stop employees from quitting and seeking work elsewhere. That they don’t leave in larger numbers is evidence that no egregious violation exists.
Thanks to North Carolina’s booming economy, better opportunities shouldn’t be hard to find for capable employees as overburdened and underpaid as those in Chinese factories.
Nathan Barber
Senior
Business Administration