Column humilates Western

This letter is in response to Herald Sports Editor Danny Schoenbaechler’s?installment of “Playground Notes” on Feb. 3. My question is this: Is the sports section in the Herald a place where Western students, alumni, staff, and fans can read?about the University’s?many student athletes, or is it a place where they are going to be humiliated? If it is up to Schoenbaechler, it is obviously the latter as his Feb. 3 column was nothing more than degrading.

In this column, Schoenbaechler deems Western supporters ignorant and even writes that Topper fans have a “love for ignorance.”?This is because university supporters found fault with the way he demeaned Western in the Jan. 27 installment of “Playground Notes,” an article in which Schoenbaechler portrayed Western as having an “inferiority complex,” said Patrick Sparks got a “promotion” by leaving Western for UK, and inserted “Western will never be UK.”

It is sad that the Herald?sports editor is not a Western supporter and it is worse that he considers his audience ignorant, but neither of these issues matches the level of patheticness in which Schoenbaechler’s professionalism resides. To use his sports column as a launch pad for personal attacks on his audience, and to do so with sarcastic barbs and immature taunts, Schoenbaechler proves his education in journalism was for naught.?After almost four years of college, Schoenbaechler has managed to produce a column that requires no more skill than that required to produce the Internet message board traffic he condemns as ignorant.

Lt. j.g. P. Elliott Porter Jr.

United States Navy

Jacksonville, Fla.

Older voters are uninformed too

I am responding to the letter by Eric Wolfe in the Feb. 5 edition of the Herald. I agree with his point that voters need to be informed before choosing a candidate. What I don’t agree with is his generalization that most young voters are not aware of the problems in our communities, and that they should stay at home and not vote. I do not agree with this statement for a couple of reasons.

First, people of all ages make bad voting decisions by basing their decision on reasons that really do not determine whether or not a candidate would make a good president. This includes people who choose a candidate based on the impression, personality, or even how good-looking they perceive that candidate to be – all uninformed reasons. This is clearly displayed in the current democratic primaries. The number one reason people say they chose the candidate they voted for is because they believe that candidate can beat the current president. Not whether or not they believe in his policies, his voting record, or even if they believe that he cares about them.

Second, to say that young people do not know the problems that face our community is an ignorant statement. Many older people are just as oblivious to the real problems in our country as the younger people are. Maybe since we are young and have fresh views and ideas, we might know how to deal with the so-called “problems” you don’t believe we are capable of making important decisions about.

Christopher Burkhead

Louisville senior

Giovanni comment ‘off-base’

After reading the coverage of poet Nikki Giovanni, I was disturbed by her comment, “The trip to Mars can only be understood by Black Americans.”

The last time I checked there are no black Americans alive today that remember being put on a boat and shipped to America. So how can black Americans be the only ones who can understand a trip to Mars? Anyone with a pulse can imagine exploring a new planet. Does a refugee who was forced out of their home and country not understand what it’s like to have to move to the unknown and establish a new home? Does a child who has to move to a new home and/or city not understand the fear of a new place? Does an unemployed person who has to move to find work not understand what it’s like to not know where their next home or meal will be?

As someone who had to move to another country after graduating college, I understand more than some people, no matter what color they are, what it’s like to move into and live in the unknown without even knowing the home language. Giovanni’s comment was one-sided, ethnocentric and just plain off-base. Or should I say planet?

Rachel Taylor

Wuerzburg, Germany