Saturday, April 25, 2026

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Opinion | 1000

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COMMENTARY

Summer recap

Welcome back, Spartans. As students move in, work and go to classes, East Lansing might look and feel the same as it did when most students left last spring. The buildings look the same.

COMMENTARY

Admit fault

The evidence is stacking up against the police involved in the April 2-3 disturbances. On Friday, MSU Vice President for Student Affairs and Services Lee June and eight of his colleagues gave firsthand accounts of the events they witnessed that night.

COMMENTARY

Student money is misused by MSU

Here we are nearing the start of a new semester at MSU. Recently there has been grumbling by the administration at MSU that tuition needs to be raised again because the state does not provide enough funds to run the university.

COMMENTARY

Affirmative action promotes racism

I'm writing in response to Ross Hammersley's letter on the Michigan Civil Rights Initiative while also responding to all other articles printed about race/gender affirmative action ("Initiative is a step back for equality" SN 8/15). I am in total agreement that the treatment of African Americans in this country throughout history has been unfair and disheartening.

COMMENTARY

Tragic ritual

Sometimes there's a fine line between fun and foolishness - other times, there's no question that an incident should have never happened.

COMMENTARY

Ticket policy will ruin school spirit

I believe that the new student ID football vouchers are a big mistake and will not only financially disturb our beloved school, but will damage the spirit and energy of the student section.

COMMENTARY

Initiative is a step back for equality

I must take issue with columnist John Knowles' characterization of affirmative action as "offensive," and the Michigan Civil Rights Initiative, or MCRI, as an "inevitable impending victory for justice" (SN 8/11). As we all know, for roughly 400 years, Europeans uprooted and enslaved Africans by bringing them to the colonies and eventually portions of the United States, forcing them into atrocious conditions and attempting to instill in them an attitude of racial inferiority.

COMMENTARY

Student view

The city of East Lansing is a divided city - half is students and the other half residents. Cliché as this might be, many problems result from this simple fact.

COMMENTARY

Live movie

Like white, there are different shades of black. In many movies, blacks are portrayed in prisons and ghettos, with boisterous attitudes, slick motives and other most commonly associated situations. "Barbershop," "Diary of a Mad Black Woman" and "Bad Boys," to name a few, all have a limited view of blacks. MSU Assistant Professor Jeff Wray, who is directing a film called "The Soul Searchers" this summer, is trying to move away from such hackneyed roles in the movie. "We rarely see black folks depicted in a way that's expansive about humanity," Wray said in Thursday's story in The State News.

COMMENTARY

Seat belt campaign waste of resources

This letter is in response to "Police launch 2-week safety-belt campaign" (SN 8/9). Michigan State police Trooper Tom Tucker said the area chosen is highly traveled. I wonder how many lives they save by enforcing in a 45 mph zone?

COMMENTARY

Test case

Many students at MSU have been at a party that's gotten broken up by the police, or at least have heard stories about one from a friend.

COMMENTARY

CAFTA will result in job loss like NAFTA

Call me a nerd, but the night the Central American Free Trade Agreement, or CAFTA went to the House, I sat up watching C-SPAN intently, waiting and waiting for the result I had been hoping for - for logic, for sensibility, for the best interest of Average Joe living and working in Every Town, USA.