To the Editor:

The regurgitated dogma that the members of the Socialists on campus endlessly repeat within the pages of the Cynic is misguided; however, most of the time, it is entertaining in nature. However, in this past week’s edition, Kathleen Brown uses racism as a justification to overthrow capitalism.

While I can tolerate this tired rhetoric, what I cannot accept is the personal attack that was launched on Russel Henderson.

According to Kathleen, Russel wrote a “racist rant” that expressed racism and intolerance.

Clearly, Kathleen must not know Russel, because it is obvious that he is not a racist person, but that he has fallen victim to the same problem that anyone who questions politically correct issues does-that is, being demonized by the left because they cannot defeat his ideas in thoughtful discourse.

It is much easier for those like Kathleen to label someone as racist, homophobic or misogynistic, etc.

What Russel is advocating is the only solution to racism in this country, and that is that we get beyond the social construct of race, and evaluate people not on a particular race or special group that they belong to but that we evaluate them on the basis of themselves as individuals. Or as the Reverend Dr. King would have said, evaluate them on “the content of their characters, not the color of their skin.”

Now, we cannot deny the history of this nation in light of the fact that our original sin as a people is the slaughter of the Indians and the enslavement of Africans; we cannot undo history.

But constantly arguing about that history will do nothing but hold us back. I hope that I will see the day when we will no longer have hyphenated Americans, be it African-American, Chinese-American or in my case, Scottish-American because as Americans, we are united not by where we come from, but where we are going together as a people, and that is the dream of America. We must live up to this dream and to the principles of this grand experiment in human history, the grand ideal that “all men are created equal.”

Peter Morrison

Class of 2003