Letters to the editor: do it now in your own home - USM Forum -- Message Board

Date: Mar 6, 2005

Letters to the editor: do it now in your own home

Date: Mar 6, 2005

Date: Mar 6, 2005

Those who intend to withdraw
their business should consider making their displeasure
known to the appropriate targets on Monday. It would be helpful if those
people knew the business consequences of further faculty bashing before they
attend the meeting on Thursday.

Date: Mar 6, 2005

A request from us who'd love to be there but simply can't since we felt forced to leave USM beginning but not limited to April 2002: Pictures, news, thoughts, ideas - we are there in spirit even though many of were forced to take other jobs. No Quarter. Please sit in the Coca Cola Public Area and take pictures, capture thoughts etc. We depend on them!!!

Date: Mar 6, 2005

To my sympathetic but silent colleagues in other colleges:

First, let me say that just as sometimes the car ahead doesn't pull into traffic because there may be a 18-wheeler bearing down that only the driver can see, just so you all must weigh your own reasons for silence and inaction and live with the results.

But having said that, I will add that I know that many lurk on this board and don't even post under a pseudonym, to say nothing of actually going public with your own distress at the ongoing demolition of the university. You say that speaking up isn't your style, or that you're working behind the scenes, or that it won't do any good anyway. But please remember that your lack of action is actually action, and it is action in favor of those who say that most faculty love Dr. Thames. Yes, we voted no confidence, and did so overwhelmingly, but people forget. Have you provided any recent evidence that the university community is miserable?

I've even heard it suggested that the liberal arts types should be writing the letters, because they are the articulate ones, but surely anyone with a Ph.D. can put together 5-6 effective sentences. (We publish, don't we?)

Think: if you could have stopped March 5, 2004 by speaking up on March 4, wouldn't you wish you had? That time is past, but March 6, 2005 is still yours.

Here are some thoughts that keep me going and keep me visible:

Better is open protest than love kept secret (Proverbs 27.5).

I cannot praise a fugitive and cloistered virtue, unexercised and unbreathed, that never sallies out and sees her adversary, but slinks out of the race where that immortal garland is to be run for, not without dust and heat (John Milton, Areopagitica).

We may be relatively safe on the actual asphalt road, but the virtual 18-wheeler of academic disaster is bearing down on all of us now. Please safe yourselves—stand up, be heard, and stop the coming wreck.

No quarter, but get off the dime.

Jameela

Date: Mar 6, 2005

Erratum: Please save yourselves.

Date: Mar 6, 2005

RE: Letters to the editor: do it now in your own h

Date: Mar 7, 2005

RE: Letters to the editor: do it now in your own home

Date: Mar 7, 2005

The address didn't appear the first time.

----- The following addresses had permanent fatal errors -----
letters@jacksongannett.com
(reason: 550 Host unknown)

Date: Mar 7, 2005

quote:
Originally posted by: oops! (trying again)
"The address didn't appear the first time. ----- The following addresses had permanent fatal errors ----- letters@jacksongannett.com (reason: 550 Host unknown) "

letters@jacksongannett.com

Works for me. It should work for you too. Must be your computer.

Date: Mar 7, 2005

Here are links directly to the submission pages for letters to the editors:

http://www.hattiesburgamerican.com/apps/pbcs.dll/section?Category=CUSTOMERSERVICE03

http://www.clarionledger.com/news/about/letters.html

http://www.sunherald.info/forms/letter.htm

Date: Mar 7, 2005

quote:
Originally posted by: Jameela Lares
"To my sympathetic but silent colleagues in other colleges:

First, let me say that just as sometimes the car ahead doesn't pull into traffic because there may be a 18-wheeler bearing down that only the driver can see, just so you all must weigh your own reasons for silence and inaction and live with the results.

But having said that, I will add that I know that many lurk on this board and don't even post under a pseudonym, to say nothing of actually going public with your own distress at the ongoing demolition of the university. You say that speaking up isn't your style, or that you're working behind the scenes, or that it won't do any good anyway. But please remember that your lack of action is actually action, and it is action in favor of those who say that most faculty love Dr. Thames. Yes, we voted no confidence, and did so overwhelmingly, but people forget. Have you provided any recent evidence that the university community is miserable?

I've even heard it suggested that the liberal arts types should be writing the letters, because they are the articulate ones, but surely anyone with a Ph.D. can put together 5-6 effective sentences. (We publish, don't we?)

Think: if you could have stopped March 5, 2004 by speaking up on March 4, wouldn't you wish you had? That time is past, but March 6, 2005 is still yours.

Here are some thoughts that keep me going and keep me visible:

Better is open protest than love kept secret (Proverbs 27.5).

I cannot praise a fugitive and cloistered virtue, unexercised and unbreathed, that never sallies out and sees her adversary, but slinks out of the race where that immortal garland is to be run for, not without dust and heat (John Milton, Areopagitica).

We may be relatively safe on the actual asphalt road, but the virtual 18-wheeler of academic disaster is bearing down on all of us now. Please safe yourselves—stand up, be heard, and stop the coming wreck.

No quarter, but get off the dime.

Jameela"

The silence of the faculty is one reason the students remain so quiet. If EVERYONE is speaking out they have no choice but to listen.

Date: Mar 7, 2005

RE: Letters to the editor: do it now in your own h

Date: Mar 7, 2005

RE: Letters to the editor: do it now in your own home

Date: Mar 7, 2005

FROM FACULTY SENATE Listserv:

Amy Young, Ray Folse and Myron Henry may all have letters in the Hattiesburg American this week.

Date: Mar 7, 2005

I had a call early this morning from the Hattiesburg American confirming what I sent.

Amy Young

Date: Mar 7, 2005

RE: Letters to the editor: do it now in your own h

Date: Mar 7, 2005

RE: RE: Letters to the editor: do it now in your own home

Date: Mar 7, 2005

quote:
Originally posted by: Amy Young
"I had a call early this morning from the Hattiesburg American confirming what I sent.
Amy Young"

I too had such a call early this morning from the Hattiesburg American. They said, "Just wanted to confirm that you wrote the letter before we print it. Thanks for writing."

Thanks to "Emancipation Now," "Free the Coast also," and "Shout it from the rooftops" for making it so easy to send the letters, especially for USM refugees now living out-of-state.

Michael Kimber
former professor in the former College of The Arts
still with "y'all" in spirit! NO QUARTER!

Date: Mar 7, 2005

Thanks, Michael.

Date: Mar 8, 2005

A word from Dr. Seuss:

"This," cried the Mayor, "is your town's darkest hour!

The time for all Whos who have blood that is red

To come to the aid of their country!" he said.

"We've GOT to make noises in greater amounts!

So, open your mouth, lad! For every voice counts!"

Thus he spoke as he climbed. When they got to the top,

The lad cleared his throat and he shouted out, "YOPP!"

And that Yopp . . .

That one small, extra Yopp put it over!

Finally, at last! From that speck on that clover

Their voices were heard! They rang out clear and clean.

And the elephant smiled. "Do you see what I mean? . . .

They've proved they ARE persons, no matter how small.

And their whole world was saved by the Smallest of All!"

(Horton Hears a Who, 1954, unpaginated [but near the end])

Jameela