Letters to the Editor

Where is your compassion?

To the Editor:

After the recent events occurring at the Castle, it gives me great dismay to see the overwhelming abundance of distasteful and insensitive remarks by our own community of Penn students. After spending this Sunday thinking about the events that transpired, praying for a miracle and hoping that modern medicine will do its job, I found myself, for the first time, reading the online forum posted on dailypennsylvanian.com in the brief article about Matt Paris ("Student critically injured in fall at fraternity house," dailypennsylvanian.com, 9/19/04). Although there were many caring and thoughtful comments written, there were far too many hurtful and upsetting remarks made by our fellow students.

To the people who chose to write unnecessarily upsetting comments online, who remark negatively when they read or heard what had happened, stop it. You're smart, you're young and you should feel compassion and sympathy when someone is in pain, especially if that someone is your classmate, your colleague. You should feel guilt and remorse for having such negative thoughts toward a person's life.

Caki Zamoiski

College '06 Genes are a gift

To the Editor:

Forgive me, but I think Jason Lott's column ("Recognizing genetic advantages in athletics," The Daily Pennsylvanian, 9/20/04) might be the most idiotic thing I've read recently. Some athletes have better genes; woe is me to be "best fit for the average ranges of typical physical exertion." Who hasn't sat around and wished he could run like Michael Johnson or catch a football like Randy Moss? What makes these people great is their gifted abilities, with the key word being "gifted." That's what it means! Your genes are a gift -- a starting-out point for who you will become. It's almost like saying Albert Einstein had an unfair advantage over the rest of us, so he shouldn't have been able to publish his theories of relativity until people within the "average range" of intelligence were able to either come up with it on their own or take intelligence-enhancing drugs.

We all are good and bad at some things, and it's dictated partially by our genes, partially by our own drive and partially by environment. Should we also make all athletes practice the same amount of hours, eat the same food and wear the same shoes to "level the playing field"? You will never achieve the ideal basis for comparison. Isn't the goal to be the best that you can be and use those that are better than you as guides?

Kimberly Malecka

GAS Return my sign

To the Editor:

A custom-made sidewalk sign that cost me several hundred dollars was stolen from my cafe at 4013 Walnut St. last week. Since it weighed around 100 pounds, whoever stole it went to a lot of trouble for what I can only assume was a prank.

I'm asking for its return, no questions asked. The sign means nothing to the person or persons who took it, but it means a great deal to me as a new business starting up. We're a little out of the way, being just off 40th Street, and that sign was my most important advertising vehicle to pedestrians and the passing cars on Walnut Street. Also, replacing it is a considerable financial burden for me right now, while I'm trying to grow my business.

The sign is painted bright red and stands about 4.5 feet tall by 2.5 feet wide, with slate boards on either side and a "Metropolitan Bakery" logo header on top. Please return it to me. You can leave it outside the front door any day before 6:30 a.m., when we arrive to set up the cafe, or call 215-222-1492 and let me know where I can find it. Again, no questions asked.

Jim Lilly

Metropolitan Bakery

Please note All comments are eligible for publication in The Daily Pennsylvanian.