OPINION & EDITORIAL
Students must pop bubble to see unpleasant reality
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Also by Suchita Shah:
- At crucial juncture, invest in UW (March 12, 2008)
- Policy potholes halt AIDS progress (March 5, 2008)
- Top court race needs fairness (February 27, 2008)
- Mental health deserves parity (February 20, 2008)
- Dorms need open-door policy (February 13, 2008)
Related Stories:
- High quality city inspires progress (April 17, 2007)
- Sifting and winnowing (August 8, 2005)
- The mathematics of dissent (May 6, 2003)
- Campus safety starts with students (February 13, 2007)
- Despite worthy causes, activism lacking (April 30, 2007)
by Suchita Shah
Wednesday, March 26, 2008
“Madison: 76 square miles surrounded by reality.” I have often heard that line but usually shrugged it off without giving it a second thought.
That is, until I went home for break to Holmen, Wisconsin.
It doesn’t take long flipping through the newspaper to realize Madison filters out mainstream political thought. If we expect to make meaningful progress throughout the country in eliminating racism, homophobia and other vices, we need to move beyond our bubble to effect change.
Holmen is a small town near La Crosse, with a population of less than 8,000. An average Midwestern community, it is a blend of rural surroundings with a suburban sprawl and is largely inhabited by the descendants of early German and Scandinavian immigrants. And, like any other community, Holmen has its share of intolerance, which is easy for us on this isthmus to underestimate.
For instance, in 2006, only 24 percent of Madison voters were in favor of a ban on gay marriage. Yet, statewide, more than double — 59 percent — voted to restrict the rights of gay people. The people who voted “yes” on the ban are less likely to be the people sitting next to you in class than your neighbor back home.
In Holmen, several individuals recently demanded the school board oppose “allowing students to have a gay/lesbian vigil” at the high school, as The Holmen Courier quotes. This “vigil” that some students will participate in is the National Day of Silence on April 25 to bring attention to anti-LGBT harassment in schools. However, some concerned citizens lashed out, saying “schools shouldn’t be glamorizing homosexuality” and that the “school board should make an attempt to make sure this day is not recognized.”
It’s not as if the School District of Holmen were mandating student participation or even putting up posters for the event, but there is really no way of preventing any student from being silent for a day. It may be easier for us as college students in large lecture halls to sit in silence, but our protests are understood and probably even shared by those around us. Outside of this university town, such actions and observations are not only less likely to happen but also less socially acceptable.
At the same time as the Day of Silence drama, Holmen was hit with another controversy that would not even be an issue in Madison. Since 1960 there has been a lighted star at the top of a large hill in the village. During the 40 days of Lent, the Lions Club converts the star into a lighted cross. Five years ago, the village bought the land for a reservoir site, and, for the past five years, the public has been paying the electricity bills for the cross.
A relative newcomer to the community complained about the cross being effectively village-owned and operated. The Holmen Courier was flooded with comments lambasting the man who questioned the cross: “You’re the new kid on the block. You haven’t earned the right to start griping about a tradition.” “If you don’t like it, look the other way.” Even the village president was quoted in the paper as saying “We are a Christian community. There’s no getting around that.”
Most students probably recognize the inherent constitutional argument underlying this cross controversy. However, the residents of Holmen who wrote to the paper are not on the same wavelength. We must ask ourselves why this is and what we can do to change it.
And it’s not just Holmen that is outside the Madison bubble. It’s other small towns and villages and cities throughout Wisconsin and the rest of the country. On Monday night during his speech at Memorial Union, U.S. Sen. Russ Feingold, D-Wis., recalled a comment from an individual at one of his listening sessions: “If they have a name from the (Middle East), they should be imprisoned.”
We may not believe it in Madison, but there are people out there who honestly believe that all Middle-Easterners are terrorists. There are communities that embrace their religious symbols regardless of its constitutionality. And homophobia is still pervasive in our society. But we rarely notice this in Madison.
We, in this ivory tower that is a university, are surrounded by progressive thinkers, yet communities around us suffer from intolerance and a lack of understanding. Our society cannot afford for us to sit here, complacent in Madison, ignoring the reality that exists beyond these 933 acres of campus.
And we must not rest at simply recognizing this. My writing this column is like shouting in a vacuum. How can we convert what happens on campus and what we learn in our classrooms into change that will benefit greater society?
Combating intolerance won’t happen because presidents or governors will it to end. The solution is neighbor-to-neighbor, grassroots change.
Citizen diplomacy, as Mr. Feingold calls it, can build the foundation for progress not only in communities like Holmen but in other situations as well. We have been privileged to be in Madison for our education, but ultimately we need to do something with that education. We speak of the Wisconsin Idea, and now we must spread the progressive ideas from this bubble to the world outside of Madison.
Suchita Shah (sshah@badgerherald.com) is a senior studying neurobiology.
Anonymous (March 26, 2008 @ 5:01am):
"We may not believe it in Madison, but there are people out there who honestly believe that all Middle-Easterners are terrorists. There are communities that embrace their religious symbols regardless of its constitutionality. And homophobia is still pervasive in our society. But we rarely notice this in Madison."
And we may not believe it in Madison, but there are terrorists out there who want to kill us, angry thugs who want to rape us, and Republicans who don't hate gay people.
Cuts both ways.
Anonymous (March 26, 2008 @ 5:58am):
Well put and completely true. The UW-Madison (as with many other colleges and universities) barely resembles reality in the least...
Anonymous (March 26, 2008 @ 7:12am):
I hope the "Wisconsin Idea" isn't dead in this great state and that we (alumni) can open the eyes of all those. I don't mean convert them, but at least show them something more than Packers football, Hamm's, Korbel Brandy, and high-cholesterol niblets. Maybe Favre retiring will be good...
At least the Packers will be less of a distraction
Beer and Packers = Bread and Circuses
Anonymous (March 26, 2008 @ 10:09am):
Typical liberal drivel as university students purport to speak for the people at large. Madison is a liberal center but they're the ones that need to be changed - not the conservatives that make up the majority.
Anonymous (March 26, 2008 @ 10:35am):
and Liberal elitism continues... the problem is that, while here, we have opportunity to varying viewpoints, outside of the cities, most discourse is shaped by local political and economic elites, conservative newspapers, and traditionalist churches. In many ways, rural Wisconsin is different ideologically than elite conservatives--they vote Republican because that's who listens to them--but their values are quite different. Yet upper-class liberalism is even more impractical for them. As Bassey's article also shows, the parties in this country are parties of the rich and ideological, and the poor of any race or region are alienated, and only vote because there's no other option.
Anonymous (March 26, 2008 @ 12:35pm):
Maybe the Reverend Wright could talk some sense into those Holmen folk?
Anonymous (March 26, 2008 @ 4:35pm):
there is nothing wrong with the way of life in Holmen, WI. I wish Madison, WI was more like that.
Anonymous (March 26, 2008 @ 5:34pm):
"Typical liberal drivel as university students purport to speak for the people at large. Madison is a liberal center but they're the ones that need to be changed - not the conservatives that make up the majority."
Do you have any facts to back up this opinion, or were you just looking to shout meaningless nonsense?
Anonymous (March 26, 2008 @ 6:09pm):
Suchita,
Your letter makes it sound like we should stop believing what we do just because other people around us don't agree with us.
I am proud to be from the Madison area, and I have lots of friends that don't agree with me on everything, but that is what makes Wisconsin a great state. People can have a difference of opinion and still get along.
I am going to continue to fight for gay rights, so my gay and lesbian friends can get married. Why should my friends be treated any different because they watch a different kind of porn then me?
Even though I am Christian, I am going to continue to fight for the seperation of church and state. Why should my Jewish friends be forced to observe my religious holiday's when I am not forced to observe theirs?
You are speaking as if Madison is out of touch with the rest of the state. Why can't it be the other way around? Maybe Madison is trying to push forward and dare I say, be progressive, and communities are dragging their feet.
I am not going to stop believing what I believe just because some 6th generation farmer and his family in Crawford county disagree with me. Through questioning the thoughts of others, we can improve ourselves as a state.
Anonymous (March 26, 2008 @ 6:57pm):
When you're in college, you live a jaded life. You exist in an unreality of reality, a world that both is and isn't real...real in the minds of the students...unreal in the minds of everyone else in the City of Madison.
Madison is temporary for most students, they're only going to be here for four or five years...so they think that they don't have to care about the city, what goes on in it, or what it's about. They just have to care about the things that affect their lives and because of that, they unconsciously ignore some of the things that go on in this community and the world around it.
College is a fantasy world where hopes and dreams exist, where learning and parties are all the rage, and where the "real world" is a distant destination that students rarely have to contemplate....but when they do....and when they step outside this bubble of unreality....boy, is it ever a kick in the pants.
Anonymous (March 26, 2008 @ 8:45pm):
Suchita,
Obviously all Middle-Easterners are not terrorists. But most of them are. That alone justifies all of the policies that you are subtly criticizing in this article.
Anonymous (March 27, 2008 @ 1:49am):
6:09, you completely missed her point. What you're saying is exactly what she said. See the last paragraph: "now we must spread the progressive ideas from this bubble to the world outside of Madison."
To this person:
"Madison is a liberal center but they're the ones that need to be changed - not the conservatives that make up the majority."
So you're for discriminating against someone based on their sexual orientation and for government funded religion? Let me guess, you're still into Jim Crow laws too. Oh, and women, they shouldn't have the right to vote. Don't get me started on black people, they belong back on the plantation!
I'm sure you'd love it if the government sponsored Mecca's call to prayer five times daily from every state Capitol building. That's the equivalent of what that village-owned cross represents.
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