TO THE EDITOR:
The selection of quotes you chose to publish for your “Quote File” on Monday is deplorable in light of some of the articles and editorials you’ve recently published.
Just last week there was an article (“Hockey team’s cube sparks discussion about ‘rape culture,’” Nov. 23) about how the Feminist Students United responded to a Club Hockey ad featuring a busty woman and the tagline “come watch us score.”
That article headlined how the ad had sparked discussions of “rape culture” on campus and incited a reaction against the continued objectification of women.
The reaction was so strong that the hockey team eventually painted over its own ad and sent a letter apologizing in this newspaper.
However, by taking quotes from your “average UNC student” equating a girlfriend’s value with her willingness to perform frequent oral sex, it seems the DTH is guilty of the very same thing which prompted the hockey team’s penitent letter.
I understand college newspapers take a generous view toward exercising their First Amendment rights, but are quotes like “I’d rather you touch my penis than my iPod” really the most insightful or funny quips you can publish?
The real problem, though, is not that these are the best quotes the DTH staff can dredge up, or that you cheapen your reputation as a newspaper, but that you continue to normalize and propagate the “rape culture” and objectification of women that was rightly condemned last week.
By making these attitudes seem like the norm among the student body, you only regress the discussion.
