Mirror - Vol. 10, No. 04 - April 24, 1986

              The
FairfieldMIRRORy Volume 10, No. 4 Our Tenth Year Thurday, April 24, 1986 The Image of Fairfield
Father Kelley gives introduction
Ferraro stirs Oakroom in Lecture Conclusion
Geraldine Ferraro, speaking to a sold out Oakroom Monday evening.
[Photo by Stephen Humes]
Boswell supports Gays
By Donna Savarese
The third of the Intolerance lectures was
'The Establishment of Social Values and the
Oppression of Gay People'.Dr. John
Boswell, Professor of History at Yale
presented the lecture on Thursday April 17.
Boswell began his speech by describing
social standards in history breaking the eras
up into three sections; the Ancient World,
Catholic Europe, and finally the Modern
World. He then posed the audience a ques-tion.
During the next portion of his speech
he would describe the way Jews and
homosexuals have fit into society (or ha-ven't
fit in) throughout history. The au-dience
had to figure out which group it was.
It turned out that the situations of both
groups were being related to show the
amazing similarities in discrimination
against the two groups.
Boswell continued on, defining the three
categories of discrimination in societies
against minorities. The first, the 'Different
but Equal' category holds the minority as
still a 'normal', simply different due to hair
color, intellectual ability, etc. A good ex-ample
of this in our society are the Protes-tants,
Boswell points out, for a Lutheran
can live right next door to a Christian Scien-tist,
yet still be the best of friends. The 'In-ferior
Insider' category also holds the
minority as part of the normal range but
relegated to lower standards. A classic ex-ample
is the caste system of India. Through-out
history and even today women fit into
this category, Boswell pointed out. Lastly
there are the 'outsiders'. Those falling into
this category are not guaranteed any place
in society and are running the risk ofpunish-ment,
exile, or death.
Interestingly, homosexuals and Jews in
Ancient times most often were considered
"different but equal". In Catholic Europe
they were usually "inferior outsiders", the
attitude being that they are not as good but
as long as they aren't harming anyone it is
alright. The modern standards are much
less tolerant than might be expected due to
today's social standards. Today people
strive to be "normal",one is or one is not.
There is no middle ground. In some places
progress has been made.
In comparison to Jews, Boswell stated
that the homosexual had not made it to the
"normals" despite their almost parallel his-tories.
He sighted several possible expla-nations
for this as the declining influence
of religion on the modern world, the procre-ation
theory, and finally the circular em-piricist
theory. That is, one acts as society
expects that person to. As an example,
Boswell said that people believe homosex-uals
are promiscuous and that they are un-able
to have long-standing relationships.
Boswell concluded by pointing out that
it is our duty to see that no one group is dis-criminated
against. It not only violates their
rights, it keeps their unique talents and abil-ities
hidden from general society.
By J. Thomas Draper
"Intolerance can only grow in the soil of
ignorance."said Dr. David C. Danahar,
Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences,
in his opening remarks to the conclusion
of the series on Intolerance presented by the
Humanities Institute in the College of Arts
and Sciences.
Father Kelley gave the introduction to
Ms. Ferraro. "The daughter of an Italian
immigrant who died at a young age. Geral-dine
Ferraro was instilled with values by
a mother who taught her the importance of
being self-sufficient and who urged her to
persue a college education."
Ferraro began her lecture by congradulat-ing
the Stag basketball team. "Making the
NCAAs is an honor, gaining the Nationals
isn't as good as winnging them but what do
I know about winning?"
In 1984 Ferraro was the Vice-
Presidential nominee on the Democratic
ticket lead by Walter Mondale. From a
three time Representative ofthe House from
the Queens she shot into the public eye only
to be scrutinized by a press confronting the
first female on the Presidential ticket of a
major party.
"I have mixed emotions when I think
back."she said,"but it was more then a step
for women. It shows that we're reaching out
for the best candidates, male or female. Fe-male
may not be better, but they can give
another viewpoint."
Addressing the feminization of poverty
Ferraro took a hard line against the Rea-gan
administration. "Not all women are
climbing the corporate ladder. By the year
2000 98% of the impoverished will be
women and children. There are now more
than 10,000,000 families that have no
fathers. I think that when Fritz (Mr. Mon-dale)
nominated me he did more in that sin-gle
act than Reagan had in four years,"for
equal rights.
Ferraro's spoke out also on the advances
of the "far right extremists. These idea-logues
feel that god wants them to bring
religion, their religion to Government. This
is a religious country but we have no state
religion. They are prepared to spend
$ 15,000,000 this year to support their can-didates
in Congress. The liberty of all of
us is at stake."
In conclusion she emphasized that while
her experience in running for Vice-
President was difficult but that she "did it
to encourage others to run."
Airband Saturday Night!
Not all was normal during this year's Airband. Frat took the title and an encore, and
$100. [Photo by Joe Draper]
Leadership Banquet a success
Mirror wins Award
Boswll compares the histories of Jews and Gays in his recent lecture.
[Photo by Andrea Whitehouse]
by Joseph Draper
Student leaders from many different or-ganizations
attended the Student Leadership
Banquet last Tuesday. The banquet honored
leadership of this year's academic year.
The banquet, which was sponsored by the
Council of Student Organizations
(C.O.S.O.) and funded by F.U.S.A., con-cluded
the year-long activity drive led by
Chris Ritchie, chairman of C.O.S.O. and
Director of Government Affairs for
F.U.S.A. This year's activity drive was
called "Operation Participation". >
During the banquet, five awards were
presented, a guest le *ure was delivered by
Jackie Durrell, First Selectman of the Town
of Fairfield, and F.U.S.A. presented a
check to Aloysius P. Kelley, university
president, for this year's "Drive for Five".
The Mirror received the Organization of
the Year. The certificate of recognition was
presented to Steve Humes, former Editor-in-
Chief. Other awards went to Pattie
PotuznikforF.U.S.A. member ofthe year,
Mitch Buonaguro for advisor of the year,
and Jogues resident hall advisors were
named RAs of the year.
John Mancini, former vice-president of
student life, served as Master of Ceremo-nies
and Jim English, former F.U.S.A.
president, made the awards presentation.
The Drive for Five, an annual effort to
increase F.U.S.A.'s scholarship fund, was
successfully completed, according to Ritch-ie.
Ritchie said that F.U.S. A. raised $5,000
through the recent Airbands event, other
small fund raisers, and a new accounting
method which showed F.U.S.A.'s budget
with at least $3,000 in surplus. The $5,000
will be added to last year's endowment fund,
which also raised $5,000. ....