Volume 24 · Number 2 · Winter 2007
Letters
Military Recruitment
The expression “cutting off one’s nose to spite one’s face” came to mind when I read in the spring 2006 issue that UC Davis’ senators voted 8-4 to denounce military recruitment on campus. An editor’s note in the fall 2006 issue further explained that the students were voicing their objection to the military’s “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy. I believe this denouncement done as such is counterproductive.
For four years I attended UC Davis while driving the causeway to CSU Sacramento for Air Force ROTC. When I was a sophomore, Sac State kicked our detachment off campus. I believe that was a mistake—as I do this denouncement. If the student government’s intention is to get the military to rescind “their” policy, they should not target the military recruiters.
First, the military did not create the policy they abide by: President Clinton did so in 1993. Thus, best to address the executive or legislative branches to change that policy, not the recruiters. Second, if UC Davis wants to effect change from within the military, who better to have in the military than UC Davis students? UC Davis “grows” some of the most diversified, accepting people known to man. Would we prefer the military recruit only from more “conservative” institutions? Think of the officer pool that would be created. Finally, the reason that Sac State reinstated their ROTC detachments and allowed recruiters back on campus was the passage of the Solomon Amendment of 1997. This congressional amendment made the “booting” of ROTC and recruiters result in loss of federal funding, to include student financial aid.
Readers, we have a “volunteer” military or, in other words, a “recruited” military. It is not an easy choice to decide to serve our country, especially in these challenging times. Having spent the last nine years in the Air Force, flying C-130s in and around the world, including Iraq and Afghanistan, I say to you, please welcome our recruiters to our campus. You want UC Davis students in the military. Maybe with enough of us in it, expressing our more accepting views, we can change the “no ask, no tell” policy.
In regard to your response to Patricia Lucker’s letter about the UC Davis senators voting to denounce military recruitment on campus (fall ’06): She had a good point, and you should be embarrassed. UC Davis Magazine is a publication that should be providing facts, not spreading rumors and making up incorrect excuses for the students. The magazine printed that the students were “voicing their objection to the military’s ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ policy.” This is not a military policy. It is a congressional law: Title 10, Subtitle A, Part II, Chapter 37.654. If the students have an objection to this law, they shouldn’t allow U.S. congressmen on campus! By the way, this happens to be one of the most misunderstood laws in the country, partly due to incorrect journalism. If you read the law carefully, you will find that homosexuals are allowed in the military, but there are numerous caveats governing their behavior. UC Davis Magazine should have recommended that the students read the law; it’s only three pages long.
Tree Roots
There’s a story behind the picture that accompanied the “Planned Giving” story on Bob Munyon (fall 2006). Bob and I are pictured in about 2004 in front of one of two ash trees in the courtyard of the chancellor’s residence. Bob tells the story of that tree more or less as follows:
“It was 1940 and I had just been elected president of the student body. One morning I received a call from Knowles Ryerson. As assistant dean of agriculture, Knowles was the highest-ranking officer on the campus at that time, and he lived in his personal home, a home that would eventually become the chancellor’s residence. Clearly, I thought as I biked over, we would talk about the future of the campus and how I was going to be an integral part of it all! When I got there, after the briefest of introductory comments, Dr. Ryerson told me that he had two ash trees that needed planting and he had just sprained his back. Would I help? Of course, I planted the trees. Eventually I did get to know Knowles well, but that first meeting didn’t go exactly as I had been thinking it would.”
Assistant Dean Knowles Ryerson is a renowned UC Davis figure. So too, as an alum, is Bob Munyon. We’ve been lucky to have them both in our UC Davis family.
Overlooked Co-Counsel
It is unclear to us how you obtain the information in articles you present in our alumni magazine. Is it sought out and researched by trained journalist/reporters, or brought to you by the parties presented? Of particular issue here is the “Trial by Fire” article in “Alumni Q&A,” the fall 2006 issue. Clara Levers, J.D. ’03, was co-counsel in the trial of Umer Hayat, which was not referenced in your article on the “world’s highest profile” cases.
In this case, the defendant (Hamid Hayat’s father, Umer) was acquitted. Clara was named as Patino Scholar in her graduating class and has pursued criminal and civil litigation since 2003.
Stealth Adviser
Congratulations on an incredibly well-researched history of the Aggie [fall ’06]. One point worth clarifying: I’m the Aggie’s adviser only because they drafted me to do so, and each year, I serve at their pleasure—in fact, I’m sort of the “stealth” adviser. Apparently a few ex-Aggie editors have wondered what the heck the Aggie was doing with an adviser.
AIDS Prevention
In the letter “On Aids” [fall 2006] the writer asserted that the “best prevention for HIV transmission” is abstinence and monogamy, and argued against a public policy of safe sex. It’s certainly true that abstinence is a flawless way to avoid HIV, and monogamy has a good track record (though nearly 80 percent of so-called monogamous marriages are not). But making these public policy for HIV prevention, on a world scale, have been failures. Take for example the various studies showing that in developing countries where the Catholic church preaches for abstinence and against condoms, the rates of new infections are increasing in proportion to the degree of involvement by the church, while in countries where this church is not active the reverse is true (except possibly for China, where no reliable statistics are available). Teaching safe sex and making condoms available, however, has an excellent track record. If reducing HIV transmission rates is the goal of public policy, rather than promoting a specific set of moral values, then teaching safe sex is clearly the better tool.
I was disappointed with your decision to publish unedited Donald R. Mull's editorial-posing-as-factual piece on the AIDS epidemic. The letter should have been cut to a simple critique. However, his second paragraph opined that "the best prevention for HIV transmission is not avoiding unprotected sex" but rather avoiding any kind of sex "except with a lifetime marriage partner." Publishing such moralizing opinions might advance this "teaching institution's responsibility" to provide equal airtime to conservative opinions, but it is risky when the facts go unchecked. Married women worldwide are being given advice such as Mr. Hall's, encouraged by the Bush administration. The message is that unprotected sex is safe with their lifetime marriage partners. But this information totally ignores the power imbalance between the genders and the average woman's control over her own sexuality and sexual health.
The U.N. reports that over the past two years, the number of women and girls infected with HIV has increased in every region of the world. In fact, the CDC acknowledges that marriage is actually a risk factor for HIV infection among women in areas where the prevalence of HIV infection among the general population is very high. This is because the male "lifetime married partners" engage in sexual activity with other partners and sex workers, unbeknownst to their wives. Mr. Mull puts too much faith in the institution of marriage by assuming that women should safely place their lives in the hands of their husbands instead of making decisions for themselves. Faith is an important value to aspire to, but the fuzzy feeling that comes from pretending it exists is not worth the consequences of denial. The best prevention for AIDS would value each individual's life independently, and encourage every guarantee, including protected sex, that those lives remain healthy.
Centennial Suggestion
On page 11 of the fall issue of UC Davis Magazine, Dave Jones asked for suggestions for the coming centennial celebration. I do have a few!
First off, jack up all the buildings on campus that have nothing to do with agriculture and ship them off to Berkeley. Next, give all the “egg-head” non-agricultural student dudes a one-way ticket to the same destination.
Davis is a “cow college,” for crying out loud . . . not a place for city slickers who can’t tell the difference between a chisel plow and a moldboard plow, nor tell you how many teats a milk cow has!
Let’s make that centennial celebration a shift back to basics . . . back to agriculture . . . back to what “The Farm” was 100 years ago!