Linda Chupkowski

News

Looking Back on Columnist Time

By Linda Chupkowski | April 30

Today is my last column in The Daily Tar Heel. At first, I wasn't so sure I should take on a responsibility equivalent to an extra three-page paper each week, but in the end, the experience was worth it. In my application for the position, I wrote I wanted to provide a progressive voice for the UNC community. I got to do that and so much more.Through my column, I was able to have many inspiring and educational conversations with friends. I also got some practice in e-mail management and still have an inbox full of responses to a column I wrote four weeks ago.

News

Accept a Continuum of Sexuality

By Linda Chupkowski | April 23

Over the last two semesters, I have noted the debate about homosexuality in The Daily Tar Heel. A number of letters argued about the morality of homosexuality, often with the main question: Is sexuality a choice or something a person is born with? I have the answer to this question. It's both. I know this because my own life history tells me so. The personal is political. I grew up as the good daughter. When I got to be a teenager, I started dating boys. I liked it and dated a fair amount of them. I followed the rules.

News

Sexist Language Is Wire in Cage

By Linda Chupkowski | April 16

"Imagine someone walking up to a group of guys and saying, 'Hey, girls, how're ya doing?' We doubt they'd be amused! So isn't it weird that women are supposed to accept -- even like -- being called 'one of the guys?'"We're also supposed to like 'freshman,' 'chairman' and 'mankind.'"Get over it, some people say. Those words are generic. They apply to everyone. But then how come so-called generics are always male?"What if generics ended in 'white'? Freshwhite, chairwhite and whitekind.

News

Just Reach Out and Touch Yourself

By Linda Chupkowski | April 2

Women need to start masturbating. I'm serious. Not enough women know how to get themselves off. Heck, not enough women know how to get off, period. How are they ever going to tell someone else what they want if they do not first figure it out for themselves? Masturbation was surely one of the greatest things that came into my life. About six months after I had ended a relationship with a guy I had dated for a long time, I was feeling really underconfident, slightly depressed and sexually empty.

News

Babies, Billboards and Blasphemy

By Linda Chupkowski | March 26

There is a group on campus today and Tuesday that calls itself the Genocide Awareness Project. Though it has huge billboards on the main quad with butchered, bloody fetuses that compare abortion to genocide, I still think abortion is fabulous!I'm familiar with the rhetoric: Abortion stops a beating heart. It's a child, not a choice. Those slogans are tiring.I don't care what they say -- I can't wait until I get pregnant and have absolutely no means of supporting the baby! The life of a child?

News

Celebrating Women Still Necessary

By Linda Chupkowski | March 19

Women's Week is next week, yet we've all heard the complaint so many times: "Carolina is like 60 percent women; why do we need a week for them?" We need to set aside a time and space to celebrate people who are not celebrated every day. We need to remember the historical and current ways women are made invisible, degraded, violated and tossed aside. We need to work against this system of problems and look for ways to celebrate all women.Many who do not understand events like Women's Week or Black History Month fail to see harmful inequalities that still persist today.

News

Duke Game Unites UNC Campus

By Linda Chupkowski | March 5

Wow, some game yesterday, huh? Though I am not the most die-hard Heels fan, I couldn't help catching the fever going around. Today, I'd like to share some of my thoughts on this epic game.What an amazing chance for all of Carolina to come together. There we all were, filling the Smith Center, the bars on Franklin Street and the residence hall rooms fortunately furnished with big-screen televisions.

News

Living 15 Minutes Less Powerful

By Linda Chupkowski | February 26

Last week's column was my most controversial yet. I had intense, hourlong arguments about it with people I don't know as well as with good friends. Also, three professors shared their compliments, and I got one thankful e-mail from a Native American woman.In all the conversations I had about it, I recognized a need for improvement. This week, I widen my angle.

News

Racism Can Be Difficult to Notice

By Linda Chupkowski | February 19

I am internally racist. Of course, I try not to be, but most of the time, I don't even know when I'm doing it. Growing up white in a white system, I was systematically taught to look down on those who were different from me. I do not blame my parents or my teachers or my peers for teaching me racism. This is absolutely not the case. Most of them did the best job they could in teaching me to love all different kinds of people. Unfortunately, the system was not set up so they would always succeed.Let's define our terms so there is no confusion here.