Page 4- The Behrend College Collegian Thursday, March 27, 1997
Thoughts on Cheney's speech
by Nathan Mushana
Collegian Staff
Former chairwoman of the
National Endowment of the
Humanities Lynne V. Cheney
presented the lecture "Telling the
Truth: Why Our Culture and
Country Have Stopped Making
Sense" last Thursday night.
Her main message was that our
generation, especially those of us
currently attending college, needs
to be presented a more objective
view of the world around us. She
stated that too many people,
especially college professors,
journalists, and politicians, adopt
the idea that "the truth is
whatever you want it to be."
Cheney held a different view:
"The truth is out there," she said,
making reference to the popular
television show, The X Files. It is
too liberal to believe the new
notion that the truth is "not out
there. That it's in us." She also
dismissed the idea that "you
define and create the reality that
you want".
"What has happened to the
notion of truth has allowed
colleges to use classrooms to
promote politcal agendas. The
humanities are about more than
politics. They are about truths
For even longer than I can remem
ber, journalists have posed as some
thing they were not in order to
expose atrocious social abuses and
criminal offenses. They have feigned
insanity in order to give eyewitness
reports on snakepits passing as men
tal hospitals, and have joined the Ku
Klux Klan in order to enlighten the
public about violent manifestations
of racism. Such journalistic impos
tors have generally been hailed as
heroes.
But now comes a jury in North
Carolina, unduly influenced by a
judge of doubtful impartiality,
saying that ABC must pay Food Lion
Inc. $5.5 million for a 1992 telecast
accusing Food Lion stores of selling
spoiled meat, tainted fish and rotten
produce, and of other insanitary
practices.
The verdict in this ABC case is no
victory for Food Lion. The jury gave
it only $1,402 in compensation for
the wages paid the ABC pretenders,
and was inclined to order nothing in
punitive damages until the judge
pressured it to come up with some
thing. The $5.5 million settled on
was described by some jurors as "a
slap on the wrist," given the fact that
the possibility of a billion dollars in
punitive damages had been under
consideration.
Food Lion has not won a declara
tion by the jury or anyone else that it
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that can be transcended through
race, class, and gender." She
concluded this part of her speech
by stating that "higher education
should be about the pursuit of the
truth."
From this point on, Cheney's
lecture seemed to lose its
direction. Of course, she may
have been talking over my head,
but she seemed to be very
disorganized after speaking on the
topic of objectivity and truth.
Her topics of discussion
seemed to be selected at random,
and her discussion was
convoluted. Most of the time I
could not discern which ideas
were her own and which were
those of the people she quoted
during her lecture. This might be
because I had never listened to
her speak before. Apparently,
neither had anyone else sitting in
the Reed Commons with me,
because they also appeared to be
very confused during the question
and answer session following her
speech.
This is what I gathered from the
remainder of Cheney's lecture:
she dislikes the subjective
mainstreaming of the media.
"The notion that truth doesn't
exist is present in the media,"
is innocent of the awful practices mat
ABC charged in its television show,
which I personally found shocking.
But it is good that ABC is appeal
ing even this "wrist slap," because a
principle of great importance to the
nation is at stake. If it is unlawful for
a newsman to pose as someone or
something in a journalistic expose,
can it be lawful for a federal agent to
pose as someone or something in a
drug bust, or a pretended payoff to
kidnappers?
The cxxnments of some jurors are
instructive: "If the media are going
to do undercover operations, just do
them in a legal way." And "They
have to go about gathering the news
in a different way." Those are easy
sermons that could also be preached
to the law enforcement people who
know that without a bit of deception
they would never be a match for the
criminals and crooks who use every
ploy imaginable to prey upon in
nocent people.
I feel confident that an appeals
court will find that the American
people and the cause of truth were
the great losers in this Food Lion
decision, and that the court will give
the go-ahead for FBI stings and jour
nalists pretending to be insane or
whatever is necessary to protect the
people.
01997 by King Features Synd.
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Lynne V. Chaney says too many
professors impose political
agendas in the classroom.
Cheney said. "The problem with
the media is that many journalists
do not think that objectivity has
any place in journalism".
I suppose that she would hate
this article on her lecture. Cheney
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went on to seriously deride
politics and the lack of truth
present in the political arena.
At one point, she said that
politicians "don't want to bother
people with the reality of the
situation. They just want to fix
the problems that don't really
exist." Now there's a harsh
comment, especially when it
comes from the wife of a former
U.S. Secretary of Defense,
Richard Cheney. Sorry about
that, Dick.
One of Cheney's ideas that I did
agree with was her concluding
remark. She said the young
people are presented with a very
negative outlook of America and
their future in this world. She
recognizes that there are "bad
things" in this world, but "too
much negativity is being
presented to young people today."
My only question to her is
what if negativity is part of the
truth, as it often is? But I didn't
bother, worried that I might blow
her whole theory.
She wrapped up by
stating that everyone needs to
present a more optimistic picture
of the world to the next
generation in order for them to
succeed in the future.
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EDUCATION TODAY
by Teresa Thorne
There is no question that parents
need some form of help in order to
put their kids through college. Tui
tion, room and board, and books are
at an all-time high, making a higher
education difficult to attain for many
familim.
When the federal government got
into the business of making low-in
terest student loans, the intent was
exactly that to provide aid for
those who wanted a college degree
but had trouble paying for it. Unfor
tunately, that program has been a
disaster. The government did a shod
dy job of collecting on those loans,
leaving literally billions of dollars in
bad debt. This isn't a good thing for
taxpayers, who are stuck footing the
bill.
• Now the president has proposed
more spending on education, includ
ing a plan to extend high school to
include the first two years of college.
In theory, that sounds like a great
idea. In reality, it's just not feasible.
Adding two years onto the current
system means creating more
bureaucracy, more of a burden on
taxpayers, and more socialization, if
you will, of the education system.
There is much to be said about the
ineffectiveness of continuing to
throw money into the education sys
tem in order to fix it. As I've said
until I can't even stand to hear myself
anymore, money is NOT the answer.
Money isn't going to solve the
problem of teachers who are more
interested in a child's self-esteem
than correcting his papers or grading
his work. For example: A teacher
asks a student how much 3 plus 2
equal. When the student replies 6, the
teacher then asks how he came to that
conclusion. ThFre is no attempt to
in a service on Sunday, April 13, 1997
2:00 p.m.
Reed Union Building Commons
Following the service, the family will greet
students, colleagues, and friends
Penn State Erie
The Behrend College
will celebrate the life
of longtime Athletics Director
Herb Lauffer
1941-1997
correct the student, since that may
damage the child's self-esteem.
Throwing dollars at the system
isn't going to change the fact that
many children aren't taught the cor
rect spellings of words or the use of
grammar. It isn't going to help those
students who aren't learning basic
history. (I'm appalled to report that
in many high schools, history is an
"elective.")
If the solution were as simple as
throwing more and more dollars into
the system, why are parochial
schools so much more successful at
educating their students at a fraction
of the cost?
Quite frankly, I don't know what
can be done about the astronomical
costs of a college education these
days, other than tax credits. I do
know that further institutionalization
of the system, requiring more tax
payer dollars, is going to be more of
a disaster than we already have on
our hands.
By the way, on a related subject,
the president proclaimed in the State
of the Union speech that everyone
should be entitled to a college educa
tion. That is a nice platitude but just
not true. College is not for everyone
and lowering the standards to ac
commodate "remedial" courses has
already significantly "dumbed
down" our children over the past 30
years!
Share your views with us. Send
them to Education Today, King Fea
tures Weekly Service, 235 East 45th
Street, New York, N.Y. 10017.
Manuscripts must be no more than
520 words and will not be returned.
There is no remuneration for this.
We simply solicit your opinions.
01997 by King Features Synd
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