To print this page, select "Print" from the File menu of your browser salon.com > Letters May 19, 1999 URL: http://www.salon.com/letters/1999/05/19/email Letters to the Editor Re-waging the battle of the sexes; vouchers won't fix our schools. - - - - - - - - - - - - Letters to the Editor The humiliation of Bryan Winter BY GENTRY LANE (05/11/99) As a heterosexual male, the phrase "archetypically arrogant male brush-off" got me steamed. Yes, the story sounds like a hoax, and yes, Gentry Lane grasps the craziness of the medium quite eloquently, but I'm offended how all judgment on the women who fervently condemn Bryan is brushed off. They have a lot of nerve sitting on their moral high horse and rallying around their "sister" just because she cries "foul" at a guy during courtship rituals. These women should be told loudly to grow up. If "overworked young professional" women are so persecuted in the club scene, they should stop going so there's more room at the bar for me and my friends. In the meantime, try building substantive personalities instead of dolling up the role of "victim" in the battle of the sexes. I understand this sounds harsh. I know you can give me 1,001 reasons why women have it worse, but I am absolutely fed up with the bashing of the male as this brutish, emotionally barren engine of destruction, incapable of giving or seeking fulfillment, and out to break women's hearts and ego. It is easily as insulting as saying "you're just a girl" or "all women cannot drive." -- Jeff Patterson Hartford, Conn. Thank you for the piece about Bryan White's humiliation. I found it viscerally satisfying and therapeutic to hear what happened to this egomaniac. It's not spiritual or kind of me, but I hope he's real. I have received messages that make this one, real or fictional, sound like something written by Emily Post. I did the personal ad thing and could not believe the lack of couth that is out there. One fellow offered to send his photo and I received a lovely visual of a gigantic male appendage. -- Theodora Knight Ventura, Calif. Giuliani flunks school-voucher test BY SAMUEL G. FREEDMAN (05/12/99) The most profound trouble with the school voucher issue is that it has not been thoroughly analyzed for its long-term effects. Clearly, our urban public schools are in trouble. Vouchers, however, will only serve as a short-term fix for a much larger problem. Taking some students out of the poorest schools will not help the troubled schools to improve. The "poor" schools will not receive more money for their smaller student populations -- in all likelihood these schools will lose money and teachers due to lower enrollments. Those students who do attend private or parochial schools through vouchers, will not necessarily receive better educations than their public-school cohorts. Have we forgotten that different students can and do receive very different types of educations within the same classroom, often based upon social factors such as race, class and gender? Students get tracked. Are we naively assuming that private schools are above such discriminatory behavior? We must also ask what will happen to these private and parochial schools, once voucher students are admitted. The white flight that occurred during the advent of de jure desegregation could just as easily occur within private schools. It is entirely possible that those parents who pay private-school tuition will not want their children attending a school where voucher students are admitted. It seems terrible, but reality is not always pretty. We need to heal our ruptured public schools, not euthanize them. -- Hilary Lochte Buffalo, N.Y. Freedman writes, "Hillary Clinton could easily be assailed as a symbol of the class inequality that vouchers seek to correct: She sent her daughter Chelsea to posh Sidwell Friends at the same time her husband was rejecting legislation to give vouchers to Washington's most destitute and maleducated children. Is Freedman saying that someone other than the Clintons paid the fees at Sidwell Friends? He makes a parallel with President Clinton rejecting vouchers for D.C., but the proper parallel would be if the president supported legislation barring parents from sending children to private school. The president has little or no responsibility for schools in D.C. To the extent any federal organization has responsibility, it is Congress. -- David Margolies Oakland, Calif. Quake, Doom and blood lust BY WAGNER JAMES AU (05/12/99) Au is right to say that some of the defenses of gaming are overblown, but what he seems to ask for reminds me most strikingly of the Comics Code, introduced in the 1950s. In response to shock at the gore in the horror comics of the day, the comics industry agreed "voluntarily" to limit not only particularly gory visual imagery, but any depiction of society that wouldn't be approved of by Ward and June Cleaver. Heroes always had to be good, the police were always honorable, and drug use was never depicted even to disapprove of it. While this helped ensure that comics were nice and wholesome for youngsters, it also helped ensure that no one over 12 could have any interest in the medium whatsoever, because it was impossible to provide any characterization or nuance unsuitable for a Disney movie. Video games currently have relatively little aspiration to be high art, but that doesn't mean that the entire medium needs to be dumbed down and replaced with Tipper Gore's idea of what children should be doing with their time. And just as banning horror comics didn't lead the children of the '60s and '70s to be more innocent and wholesome than the kids of the '50s, it's unlikely that stifling creativity in video games will do much more than disappoint and anger people who enjoy spending their free time gaming. -- Andrew Norris Austin, Texas Wagner James Au's equating of his own personal experience with some sort of universal truth is an obviously problematic way to approach the subject. For a select few, such as Mr. Au, this prolonged effect may well be the case. And it is obvious that some lack the ability to differentiate between the virtual and the real. But it is not a universal truth. As evidence, I can only offer myself and my many co-workers [at GameSpot], who spent countless hours playing Quake, only to return to our lives unaffected. Whether it is Ozzy Osbourne songs or a game of Quake, products meant for entertainment have played a factor in any number of tragedies. The question is whether they are the cause, or just small elements of a much deeper, individual problem. I do not claim to know the answer, but I know that for me, personally, the truth is very different that the scenario Au describes. If a simple death match really does cause such dark urges in the author, I hope those close to him keep him away from the keyboard. -- Ron Dulin If games were created that rewarded players with images of erotic and sensual loveplay were created, a howl of protest quickly followed by legislation to ban sales of such products to minors would inevitably follow. Interesting that a slap is considered less harmful to view than a caress? -- Rayner Garner She's all chat BY MARY ELIZABETH WILLIAMS (05/04/99) I like Oprah just as much as the next girl, but comparing Oprah with God? Have we fallen off our rocker? Not only do I find that offensive, but the reference to Oprah with the phrase "if she's not God" is sacrilegious and downright ridiculous. Furthermore, closing out the article by insinuating that God is a woman simply shows that the writer is full of New Age ideologies. The writer of this article could have gotten her point across without shoving her offensive references to the Almighty God down our throats. Those of us who have a personal relationship with Him are extremely offended when He is misrepresented. -- Sanya Brown salon.com | May 19, 1999