Mirror - Vol. 25, No. 20 - April 13, 2000

              TheMirror
FAIRFIELD UNIVERSITY
Volume 25, Number 20 The Image of Fairfield Thursday, April 13r200<L
In for a 'jamming' weekend
By Chris Dara
STAFF WRITER
Clam Jam 2000
Beer. Bands. Buffalo Tom. Clam Jam
2000 continues Fairfield's highly antici-pated
spring weekend tradition. Saturday,
April 29 begins May Day, formerly
known as Spam Jam, Clam Jam's bold
predecessor. The events will take place
on Alumni Field from 12pm to 6pm.
There will be a DJ, bands, field events,
volleyball, badminton, Frisbee art, an 80
foot inflatable obstacle course, rock
climbing and Velcro walls, a joust and
even a Mr. Fairfield contest.
"I think May Day is a great idea so far
but its lacking one thing, what
about Mrs. Fairfield?" said Jim LaPlaca,
02. Food will be served by Sodexo from Photo: Mirror file
Students prepare for the best weekend of the year, to be held April 29th and 30th
BobJones University:
Promoting prejudice and discrimination
12-6. Students need their student IDs to
take part in the activities. Guests will be
charged a $5 fee.
"May Day is creating better activities
on campus to prevent problems at
the beach," said Mike Franco, 03, mem-ber
of the FUSA Senate.
"This is not a FUSA or university
sponsored event," said FUSA President
Kevin Hayes, "We look at this as an event
that will happen anyway and we are con-cerned
about the safety of students first."
The main band this year at May Day
will be Buffalo Tom, beginning at 4pm.
Buffalo Tom is a rock/alternative band
from Boston. More information about
the band can be found at
www.buffalotom.com. Opening for
them will be Blue Collar Heroes, an on
campus band whose concert will begin
all.
The beer tent, known as the "Beer
Garden" will be on the field and open
from 12pm to 5pm during which time
See "May" on page 4
By Lori Rizzo
NEWS EDITOR
"Garbage in, garbage out," is the com-ment.
The speaker is Bob Jones. Jones is
the president of a South Carolina univer-sity,
the size of Fairfield, and his com-ment
is referring to gays.
Is there an explanation? Jones claims,
"his university would not keep a gay stu-dent
in school, just as it would not keep
an adulterer or thief," according to The
Washington Post. Sadly enough, The Post
also says that the university feels so
strongly about "the Bible's judgment
against homosexuals that it threatens gay
alumni with arrest for trespassing should
they try to visit the campus." And yes, the
year is 2000.
"It is a very long way from the typical
American college. Young men wear neck-ties.
Young women wear skirts with hem-lines
at the knee or ankle. No one is smok-ing.
This is a place where life is shaped
by fundamentalist Christian beliefs, and
by a great many rules as well. Classes
begin with prayer. Rock music is forbid-den,
as are alcohol, tobacco and hold-ing
hands during dates," says The
Plain Dealer. In addition to these
rules, of course, is the ban on interra-cial
dating.
Founded in 1927, Bob Jones Uni-versity
in Greenville, South Carolina
has had a reputation for being an ex-tremely
conservative, religious school
which "considers all non-Protestant
religions sinful." But, until Governor
George Bush decided to make it a
campaign stop, that is probably where
the public's views of the university
ended.
It was not until after Bush's speech
that the problems began to surface,
and a majority of the problems were
ignited by Bush's rival, Senator John
McCain, ofArizona. McCain pointed
out that Bush did not denounce the
university for its ban on interracial
dating nor did he comment on their
strong anti-Catholic views.
The media happily ingested the
news of a Bush/McCain rivalry, and
exposed the interracial dating rule
nationwide. The rule began back in
1970s, when the university began ad-mitting
non-white applicants, "be-cause
it could lead to interracial
marriage and what he [Bob Jones]
called 'genetic blending' in an
article in The Washington Post.
Still, the article explained that the
university only began admitting
black students after the Reagan
Administration denied its request
for tax exemption due to its ra-cial
discrimination policies.
The media and the nation were
not about to let Bob Jones and his
university blatantly insult, dis-credit
and humiliate the Ameri-can
public and openly promote
discrimination and intolerance.
And although that is a positive
step for racial relations, the fo-cus
of the media was not that
Bush had spoken there, but that
he did not use the opportunity to
enlighten the students and ex-press
concern and disagreement
with their lifestyles and policies.
In fact, presidential candidate
Alan Keyes also spoke at Bob
Jones University, but few people
knew about it. What was the dif-ference?
The most noticeable dif
See " Jones" on page 2
In the spring of 1970, The
Grateful Dead visited
Fairfield's campus and stu-dents
began to rebel against
the strict rules confining
them. See "It's not the 70s
anymore" on page 3-
Thiis
week:
'ampus Life:
Earth day info.
seepg. 7
commentary:
CommentaryEditors'
finalwords
seepg. 10& 11
"Keeping the Faith"
reviewed
seepg. 14
House ofPayne's
final parting
seepg. 19