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Pete Says Goodbye
To Behrend
by Pete Weichlein
Collegian Staff Writer
Editor's Note: This
will be The Collegian's
last Pete's Perspective.
Pete will transfer next
semester to University
Park. We wish him all the
best.
Two years at Penn State-
Behrend have come to an end,
and if anybody was to ask me for
a parting remark it would be: "
Hey everyone, start living, get
involved, do something other
than drinking and studying!"
Granted this is the eighties
and in our day and age society
punishes those who take life easy
and not completely seriously.
But we're in college and life is
supposed to be wild and crazy and
we're supposed to find ourselves
and make all these weird
discoveries about our
personalities and all I see is
people running around like little
machines in pursuit of the big
4.0.
Perspective
These are your years.
Here's your chance. Four years
of complete freedom to find out
who you really are and what you
really want out of life. Freedom
to live, not just party. Freedom
to grow up. Freedom to drop
the high school attitudes and
mature into real human beings.
Freedom to discover and explore.
And left and right I see people
ignoring what I consider the most
important part of college. Left
and right my peers sacrifice their
shot at living so they have more
time for competing with each
other, for beating each other to
the top five percent, for getting
the job that pays more.
Remember Justin and Tom.
For the better part of a week
Penn State-Behrend was
passionate and then it was back
to business as usual. Or the big
fight against the smoking policy.
Megaphones and smoke-ins,
outrages students and apologetic
administrators. A couple of days
of Kent State and that was ii We
didn't want to fall back too far in
our studies.
Or here's a beauty. My
much loved colleague Rob. What
great opportunities we all had at
meaningful discussion. How
great a debate there could have
been between Rob and any of his
adversaries. But instead all the
Collegian and Love. Rob received
anion
were purposeless letters filled
with threats and profanities. He
dared to accuse but was perceived
to have offended. Our over
conservative Behrend society
reacted in true eighties style. And
nobody sees anything wrong with
that?
Then finally a ray of hope.
The Satanic Verses wa s
published and Behrend woke up.
Granted, if there hadn't been a
threat on the author's life,
Behrend, like the rest of the
world, would probably have
ignored the book. But there was a
death threat and we, as a
gathering of young, open-minded
Americans, decided to take a
stand. Well, WE is a little
exaggerated. Eighty of us. Eighty
out of over 2,000. That's a pretty
lousy percentage as all you
business majors can probably
figure out.
It's probably too late to
mention that I don't want to leave
Behrend ( and all my true friends
you know who you are) on a sour
note. The lack of passion and
involvement is a product and a
Pete's
plague of our times, and
unfortunately not a cliceace to be
found only at Behrend. But this is
college. This is where new things
can start to happen. This is where
we could all just take a little
breather from a hectic world.
Where we could slow things
down and relax. Where we could
decide not to worry only about
what kind of job we might get,
and how much it would pay, and
if we're going to be able to afford
all the niceties of being "well
off'. This is a place where you
should learn about life, and about
yourself, and have fun, and make
friends for life. This is not just
the place where you have to put
in four years before you get your
high paying job.
I'm a history major. Every
time I admit to being a history
major people get a dumb smirk
on their face and ask me what the
heck I'm going to do with a
degree in history. Who's going to
hire a history major. How far
can a history major go in life. I
don't know. But history is
something I enjoy. History is
something I want to learn and
study. And that's what college is
all - about. To learn the things you
want to learn and do the things
you want to do. Farewell
Behrend.
Love, Pete
LOVE R• B
Farrakhan And Tehran
by Rob Prindle
"Look at Jerry Falwell and Louis Farrakhan.
They both talk religion and the brotherhood of
man. They both sound like they belong in
Tehran." - Lou Reed.
Yeah, that fun loving Nation of Islam leader
is at it again. The Black activist has really said
some funny things lately. Before I go any further
I wold like to remind everyone that Mr.
Farrakhan was a calypso singer before he turned
into a black leader. I'm not sure what that says
about the man, but it is rather amusing.
Also, before anyone calls me a racist for
picking on this public figure, please refer to the
President Bush column published two weeks ago.
So, bow-tie clad with his hands clapping at
his own words, Farrakhan certainly left a strange
impression on the country as he spoke at the
African American Summit 'B9. I will hit the
highlights of his speech.
*Abraham Lincoln, according to the
outspoken Farrakhan, was a white supremacist.
This may be true, but I do tend to question the
timeliness of this remark.
*Blacks have greater right to Africa than
Jews have to Palestine. This man has never been
above picking fights with Jews. A few years ago
he called Adolf Hitler "wickedly great" and
Judaism a "gutter" religion. Kind'a' sounds like
if Farrakhan wasn't black he would make a great
Skin-Head supremacist.
I do think that blacks in
America need a better
representative than Farrakhan. I
believe that the man is more
interested in talking than in saying
anything. He knows that as long
as his views are radical enough
and as long as he continues to
receive death threats from whites
he can receive prime press
covera:e.
* Black prisoners, according to Farrakhan,
should be freed and allowed to "do their time...in
Africa."
Excuse me. Is Farrakhan implying that Africa
would take American prisoners. I don't think so.
Why in the world would they want our
criminals?
* The money that would be used to keep the
prisoners in the USA ($35000 a year) should go
to black leaders to promote general good.
I'm not sure exactly what Farrakhan would do
with all the money, but I should think that the
African Continent would want a great deal of it
as reparation for having been sent all the
criminals.
* "With our increased birthrate, black men and
women can breed ourselves into power.... It is
not something to laugh at. It can be a reality."
Well, Mr. Farrakhan may not think that it is
something to laugh at, but I bet that there are a
lot of Black South Africans who would laugh at
Farrakhan. The Black majority in South Africa
has had little success in dealing with the ruling
white minority. I think that America is a little
more liberal than P. W. Botha's machine, but
that situation does show that racism does not end
with a majority.
* Farrakhan also stated that the White House
and National Security Council has a secret plan
to keep blacks disenfranchised, and of allowing
weapons and drugs to be distributed to blacks.
This, according to Farrakhan is intended to
facilitate "black-on-black" crime.
The Collegian Wednesday, April 26
I semi-agree with this statement. I think that
there is a general feeling in America that inner
city crime is no real problem because "they are
only hurting each other."
A few weeks ago I wrote a column titled "It's
a White World After Air in which I pointed out
the almost exclusively white backgrounds of the
Behrend student body. An overwhelming
percentage of Behrend Students, according to a
school freshman survey, came from all white
neighborhoods. A good friend of mine
commented that there was nothing surprising
about that because of the very small number of
black people in the United States.
I'm not sure about the exact number, but I do
know that some projections have said that by the
year 2000, minorities will be a majority. My
friend was wrong about the very few blacks in
America because, for the most part, the inner city
hides them.
So, probably black America needs more
speakers. If most of the people attending colleges
in America feel the same way my friend did than
it is very easy to see that there will be a problem
with true racial equality. If the only exposure that
88 percent of Behrend students have with
minorities is the six o'clock news, then our
country is truly in trouble.
I do think that blacks in America need a better
representative than Farrakhan. I believe that the
man is more interested in talking than in saying
anything. He knows that as long as his views are
radical enough and as long as he continues to
receive death threats from whites he can receive
prime press coverage.
Farrakhan could probably get more
accomplished if he talked more about life and less
about the "wickedly great" Adolf Hitler. Louis
Farrakhan may talk religion and the brotherhood
of man, but like Lou Reed, I believe that he
would be better suited for the politics of Tehran.
Rob Prindie