Category Archives: Letter to the editor

A Letter to the Editor responding to one of the course Op-Eds.

Letter to the Editor

Letter to the editor

Re: “A Tragedy that Highlights Kids’ Plight” (04/03/2015) by Xiao Lixin

Xiao Lixin’s Op-Ed identifies the plight of Chinese children and urges teachers and parents to relieve their pressure. But he fails to see that, while the enormous pressure from school is the underlying problem, the major cause for this particular tragedy was the adults’ disregard for the child’s emotional needs.

Most Chinese parents are used to scolding, taunting, and making fun of their kids without even thinking that these actions can traumatize the young minds. Adults seem to forget that when they were children they too wanted to be respected and understood. Once people become old enough to have authority over the younger generation, they start to depersonalize children, doing just as their elders did to them. Even at school, where educators should know better than parents, berating and public shaming still remain in the repertoire of teachers who want to make their students behave.

I wonder what the 11 year-old was feeling when the teacher asked her parents to bring her home to finish homework. The headmaster said that no one thought the girl would take any drastic action, since the teacher and the parents “communicated in a friendly manner.” But the young girl’s emotional state was not mentioned. Nor would the adults have paid any attention. To them, she was simply being difficult.

Chinese adults must break this habit if they want to prevent more tragedies from happening. They should actively seek to recognize and understand children’s emotional needs instead of treating them as non-existent. The tragedy in Hangzhou will hopefully serve as a reminder to all teachers and parents that children’s minds are not computer disks that can be formatted again and again after being hurt. Their delicate hearts should be treated with respect and care.

Letter to the Editor

Letter to the editor

http://www.slate.com/articles/life/food/2015/03/mcdonald_s_in_decline_the_chain_wants_to_be_more_like_fast_casual_restaurants.html

RE: Turn it around, McDonald’s (March 12, 2015)

Justin Peters coined the term “sloppy locavore” to describe people who purchase their fast food from Shake Shack, Chipotle, and Five Guys rather than McDonald’s. He argues that McDonald’s is the food of “the people” and that places like Shake Shack are treading on McDonald’s, an establishment that serves “the poor” and customers that want convenient, empty calories. What Peters’ defense seems to ignore is that McDonald’s steep decline in profits shows that people are simply not interested in buying dessicated hamburgers anymore. Worse, he seems to equate cheap food with poor quality and glorifies it in the article. To him, the great danger of Shake Shack and McDonald’s decline is that the golden arches will be replaced with a place whose food is edible and slightly more expensive. Yet he doesn’t consider the possibility that consumers deserve a better product from McDonald’s.

Peters derides “sloppy locavores” in his argument. So I’d like to bring in a similar phrase to describe his argument: sloppy populism.

Re: “The Brilliant Weirdness of Die Antwoord” by Eve Fairbanks

Letter to the editor

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/29/magazine/die-antwoord.html?_r=0

Though Fairbanks begins to address the criticism Die Antwoord faces from black South Africans, she tiptoes past one glaring problem: “How dare a white band hit the jackpot by imitating a community whose own musicians were still largely stuck in apartheid-created slums?” Fairbanks wonders. Yet, she never answers her own question. Instead, Fairbanks takes the approach of humanizing Ninja and Yo-Landi. There is no good answer to Fairbanks’ question: catchy though their music may be, the group’s persona is undeniably racist and appropriative.

In response to Die Antwoord’s wild collage of an identity, many fans have questioned whether or not the band’s image is an act. Die Antwoord has addressed this question in their song, “Fok Julle Naaiers,” rapping snidely, “Is it real? No, it’s just a big black joke.” Fairbanks’ article clearly illustrates that it is, in fact, a joke, but what she fails to mention is that, whether or not it’s real, it is a blatant exhibition of white privilege. “After apartheid fell,” Fairbanks writes, “white artists were free to explore a wider range of personas.” But this right to self-exploration does not, by any means, give white South Africans the right to try on other racial and cultural identities—identities whose authentic owners have been oppressed by colonialism—as though they are mere costumes. Die Antwoord’s flagrant use of blackface and senseless appropriation of a “ghetto” aesthetic are simply inexcusable. No matter how much I strain to find a progressive social statement behind Die Antwoord’s appropriative persona, I just can’t do it: cultural appropriation is cultural appropriation, no matter how much we might wish it weren’t.

Letter to the Editor

Letter to the editor

Re: “Down and out in upscale Japan” (10/26/14) by Tom Benner:

Benner addresses Japan’s precarious rate of unemployment. However he focuses too much on the economic decline to notice the real problem: the lack of government aid for the homeless. The Tokyo Metropolitan Government survey on the homeless population is incomplete, a poor reflection of recently elected Tokyo Governor Yoichi Masuzoe’s strong stance on social welfare issues. Hiroshi Ito cites the government’s investment into job training programs as the key to the decreased recorded population. However, what Ito ignores is that the majority of the homeless population face discrimination in the workplace for being older.

In fact the majority of Japan’s population is 60 and above. In contrast to the situation of the rising middle class, there is no long-term plan in place to provide security for the elderly population, who due to the economic decline may lose their jobs. Instead of pouring money into social security for the elderly, the government focuses on the welfare benefit tied to seikatsu hogo, the livelihood protection law. While the welfare benefit provides shelter, citizens are expected to find a job and leave after 3 months.

In a park in Osaka the number of homeless people has grown so big and self-sufficient that they’ve founded their own association. They put their once-paid skills to use as gardeners and scavengers. It looks more like a homeless commune than a government shelter. This community of blue tarps tied to nearby trees is not a permanent one, but until the government actually steps in, it’ll have to do.

RE: Burying the Hatchet

Letter to the editor

Letter to the Editor – RE: Burying the Hatchet (3/13/15) – Katherine Jordan

Katherine Jordan’s treatment of the issue of comfort women highlights a cardinal rule of politics: Do as much as you can get away with doing. Or – in this case – do as little. By assuming a meager compensation given in 1996 was an adequate apology, the Japanese government has shamelessly shirked its responsibility to the victims of war crimes perpetrated by the Imperial Japanese Army. Jordan says “identifying and compensating former comfort women” must be the first step, but money is a poor substitute for a true acknowledgement of responsibility. There cannot be a price tag for suffering.

Even if Prime Minister Shinzo Abe were to authorize additional compensation tomorrow, the money would not heal the deep wounds felt by many Asian Pacific Rim communities that suffered from Japanese imperialism. More outrageous than viewing the reparations given in 1996 as sufficient, Abe now seeks to erase the victims’ histories from his country’s textbooks – effectively ending any chance for Japan to face its own history.

Only a sincere expression of atonement can begin to resolve the pain caused by these war crimes. Since its 1996 apology letter – which is not acknowledged by Abe’s administration – the government has inadequately addressed the issue of cultural trauma. Monetary compensation can be an easy step in Japan’s responsibility toward its victims, but that is not a sufficient solution to the problem.

You cannot use money to bury a hatchet, especially not one of this size.

 

Letter to the Editor

Letter to the editor

RE: This is not a study abroad blog post (3/18/2015)

Writing for the audience back home does reinforce the mentality of viewing life abroad from an American perspective, but it’s a symptom, not a cause of this “ ‘traveler’ mentality.” We students are so comfortable in American culture, and we have easy enough access to it even when abroad thanks to the internet, that we lack the desire or impetus to try on another culture for size. Not keeping a blog doesn’t necessarily mean we’ll become part of the local culture.

The issue is that we learn to live as Americans surrounded by a foreign culture instead of assimilating into that culture. When I was in Japan, it was hard enough for me to eat an unfamiliar cuisine, communicate in Japanese and adjust to communal bathing, let alone abandon the comfort of my American self for a new set of cultural values and way of thinking. Culture shock after culture shock wears down our endurance and ability to integrate, and we fall back on our American point of view, regardless of whether we’re keeping a ‘study-a-blog’ or not.