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Coca-Cola boycott must go on

Although the student initiative to reinstate the campus boycott of Coca-Cola fell short of the 66 percent needed to pass, LASG does not regard the vote as a failure. We believe it is significant that a clear majority of students—55 percent—voted in favor of the boycott. Over half the Grinnell campus has sent a message to Coca-Cola that its business practices contradict their values. Whether the boycott is officially recognized by campus or not, we encourage every student – and not just those who voted “yes”­—to uphold socially responsible consumerism by reducing their consumption of Coke products.

We’d also like to address some lingering misconceptions about the boycott and LASG that have been raised in recent issues of the S&B.

First, there are a number of concrete and reasonable actions that Coke can take to respond to the human rights violations taking place in its factories. Both Professor Lesley Gill of American University, in her presentation to the Human Rights Committee of the American Anthropological Association, as well as the New York City Fact-Finding Delegation, presented a number of possible actions available to Coke in their reports. These options include: formulating a coherent policy against the collaboration between any employee, contractor or agent of the company and the paramilitary forces; establishing the position of a human rights ombudsman or a human rights commission in each bottling plant in Colombia; creating a fund to compensate employees and their families who have been victimized by the paramilitary violence; and dropping retaliatory charges against employees who file complaints in court.

Second, we would like to respond to recent comments questioning the effectiveness of corporate boycotts as a tool for social change. There are countless examples of boycotts that have succeeded in the past, including boycotts directed at Coca-Cola. The boycott of Coke in South Africa in the 1990s played an important role in the abolition of apartheid.

Global boycotts, such as those during apartheid as well as the current campaign called by a Colombian union, begin with individual choices. When you drink a Coke you are sending the company a message that you approve of the wages, the working conditions, the union status and the management’s response to the deaths of workers that are embodied in that beverage.  As consumers, we have the power to create a more just world by supporting socially responsible businesses, and withholding our support from those whose practices are unjust.

Third, we would like to clarify some misconceptions about the activities of LASG. In the S & B staff editorial, “Ivory Tower to Trenches” (Nov. 11, 2005), the author states, “many students united to develop an ideological opposition to Coca-Cola do not investigate the exploitation of Latinos in Iowa.” Contrary to the author’s assumptions, LASG addresses issues affecting Latin America on the local, national and international levels. Currently, LASG is collaborating with student groups, professors and local activists to organize a symposium on Latin American immigration and Iowa to take place in January. Others have suggested that we should target the School of the Americas and U.S. foreign policy towards Colombia. LASG has worked and continues to work on these issues and invites anyone who is interested to contact us for more information.

The boycott against Coke is one small, yet significant, step we can take in fighting for justice as members of the global community. We urge students to use their power as consumers to send a message to Coke that their business practices are at odds with our values and that continued inaction is unacceptable.

­Jenny Dale ’06, Latona Giwa ’ 09 and Anna Murphey ’06, on behalf of Latin American Solidarity Group

SCIPE, SGA: No one’s voice silenced

Last Monday, Nov. 7, the Student Campaign for Increased Political Engagement (SCIPE) and SGA cabinet co-sponsored an open forum about the student initiatives. Unfortunately, rumors that the forum was unfair and biased are spreading among some students on campus. These accusations are baseless.

SCIPE and SGA Cabinet organized the open forum in order to foster student awareness about the initiatives, promote dialogue and increase voter turn-out. Therefore, we made sure that the initiative authors would have time to present and that the students attending would have the opportunity to make statements and ask questions.

Max Postman ’08 requested before the event to have time reserved to present his opposition to the Coke boycott initiative. SCIPE denied this request on the Nov. 3 and again on Nov. 6 because Mr. Postman was not sponsoring an initiative, but informed him that he would be welcome to make a statement opposing the initiative as a student-at-large. SGA Student Services Coordinator Priya Malik ’06 further clarified this decision to Mr. Postman in a series of e-mails on Nov. 6.

During dinner on the night of Nov. 7, Mr. Postman stood outside of Quad distributing fliers. His handouts accused SCIPE of silencing his voice and that of the opposition to the Coke boycott initiative. Mr. Postman’s fliers also asserted that SCIPE would not allow anyone from the opposition to present their views at the open forum.

SCIPE and SGA Cabinet did not silence Mr. Postman. As anyone at the open forum can confirm, he had the same privileges as every other non-author student in the audience. We understand that Mr. Postman was disappointed not to be accorded the status of an initiative author, but this decision was based upon the fact that he had not submitted an initiative for consideration by the student body.

The opposition to the Coke boycott, as well as to the other eight initiatives, was recognized to present at the open forum. Before the event began, the SCIPE moderators informed the audience that every student-at-large would have the option to make a statement or ask a question, which would be limited to one minute each due to time constraints. However, students were able to raise multiple statements or questions. During the time allotted for discussion of the Coke boycott initiative, Mr. Postman and other students opposed were recognized several times and made statements opposing the boycott. He had ample and extensive opportunity to speak, as did all the other audience members.

Because of the concerns we’ve heard from students, we felt it necessary to clarify the timeline of events leading up to the open forum as well as to counter misconceptions about what actually occurred at the event. Please feel free to contact SCIPE’s co-leaders or SGA Cabinet members if you have further questions or concerns.

­SCIPE Leadership: Linn Davis ’08, Claire Patterson ’08 and Christina Reynolds ’08. SGA Cabinet: John Bohman ’06, Chris Ochoa ’06, Megan Goering ’08, Matt Cleinman ’06, Julia Bottles ’08, Priya Malik ’06, Mary Powell ’07, Brendan Baker ’06 and Chris Forster-Smith ’06

Manipulating the data

Jim Sumner claims that Grinnell College is not dishonest in how it presents data. A cursory look at collegeboard.com indicates otherwise.

The College Board collects and presents standardized test score data. According to the data the college submitted, 60 percent of Grinnell students submitted SAT scores and 39 percent submitted ACT scores. So absolutely no one took both the SAT and the ACT? Unlikely. Carleton College reported 80 percent of students submitted SAT scores and 55 percent submitted ACT scores. Oberlin College reported 89 percent and 32 percent. Emory University reported 95 percent and 30 percent. Yale University reported 96 percent and 20 percent.

Of all the colleges I’ve checked so far, not one reported submission percentages that add up to 100 percent. In fact, any institution that requires either the SAT or the ACT will almost certainly have a few applicants who submit both SAT and ACT scores. Grinnell College requires either the SAT or ACT for virtually all applicants.

The fact that Grinnell’s data adds up to nearly 100 percent strongly suggests that the college has chosen to select the stronger of a student’s ACT and SAT scores and drop the poorer score from consideration as a “submitted score.” Such a definition is not consistent with the consensus interpretation of “submitted score.”

—Samuel Lee ’07

“Salad” petition misleading

Recently, a petition was created to ensure that the Student Publications and Radio Committee (SPARC) would adequately fund “The Salad,” a magazine dealing with multicultural issues, to publish two articles next semester. In the petition, it is stated that “The Salad” is severely under-funded this semester. SPARC would like to refute this statement in that we came to this budget in agreement with the editors of “The Salad” and we approved the budget in a manner suitable for a new publication. It is unfair for them to say that they are under-funded when no requests for extra funding were made.

SPARC allocated “The Salad” sufficient money to print an issue due to the fact that “The Salad” originally proposed a budget for only one issue this semester. It is also unfair to compare the budgets of individual publications due to the different nature of each publication.

SPARC was impressed with “The Salad”’s first issue and hopes to be able to fund it adequately next semester, but we have not yet started our budget application process. SPARC would like to express its frustration with the manner in which “The Salad” voiced its initial complaint; we hope that, in the future, publications will talk to SPARC directly before expressing previously unarticulated grievances concerning their publications.

If there are any questions concerning the issue of SPARC funding, please send us an e-mail at sparc@grinnell.edu.

—The Student Publications and Radio Committee

Unwarranted sensationalism

As someone who has worked for over a decade to help establish Japanese studies at Grinnell, I was truly dismayed to see the dire and totally inaccurate headline (“Two-thirds of Japanese faculty cut for next year”) on page three of the Nov. 11 issue. Indeed, the accompanying article, full of strange syntax and false and misleading information, makes no justification for such sensationalism. The staff editorial on page nine repeats the uninformed rumors of cuts and faculty “leaving without replacements.” While I can only assume that these were well-intentioned calls for wider campus debate on the college’s curricular offerings, I do not believe that lazy and inflammatory reporting or commentary will add a useful voice or perspective as the deliberative process unfolds.

Rather than try to correct all of the mistakes and inaccuracies in the article or the editorial, I will state simply and clearly that no positions in the Department of Chinese and Japanese (note the correct name of the department) have been “cut” for next year.

While one position remains dependent on temporary funding, staffing decisions for next year and beyond have not yet been made. At the same time, the fact that staffing of the Japanese program includes both tenure-track and non-tenure track positions has nothing to do with whether Japanese language and culture classes will be offered next year. (For the record, they will.)

The reason that a major in Japanese has not been instituted is simple and honorable: it would be irresponsible for the college to promise students a curricular option that could not at this point be guaranteed.

Still, the option of an independent major in Japanese studies does allow students to craft a four-year plan utilizing coursework both in and outside the department that fulfills reasonable requirements for a major in Japanese studies. There have been and are now underway a number of such independent majors.

The Japanese program at Grinnell is not simply a “language sequence,” and it is equally untrue that “there are no permanent non-language classes” that could be applied to an independent major. Prof. Andrew Hsieh and I have both been teaching regular courses on Japan for years and there has been a steady stream of literature and culture classes offered by the Department of Chinese and Japanese for years as well.

A number of different scenarios for the future of Japanese studies at Grinnell are still on the table and students do have a legitimate stake in the outcome of these deliberations. But snide and arguably racist allusions to the relationship between the Chinese and Japanese programs on campus, or to the relative “importance” of various foreign languages being taught at Grinnell, serve only to hurt feelings and distract attention from the real issues that need to be debated openly and respectfully. I call on everyone who is seriously interested in participating in that debate to take a deep breath, get informed and then join us in the responsible discussions that are underway.

­Edmund T. Gilday, Religious Studies

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