Letters

Letters to the Editor must be signed, include a phone number, and be delivered to the CTR office (BC-117/
1463Bishop St.) in person, by fax (514-848-2814), by e-mail (barblak@alcor.concordia.ca) or mail by 9a.m. on the Friday prior to publication.

A Letterman list

Top 10 reasons for the administration's closing of Concordia's Ecotoxicology Program:

10. Dignitaries exhausted by hand shaking of Ecotoxicology
graduates at convocations.

9. Graduate science programs must be neither popular with female students nor fiscally
profitable.

8. Concordia is not in the business of providing knowledge, skills and tools that enable science students to enter the workplace.

7. A devilishly clever tactic
whereby the closing of a strong, dynamic program frightens weak programs at Concordia into strengthening their operations.

6. Puts correct meaning to the word, fresh, as in Fresh Ideas of the administration, i.e. "having little or no experience, raw (Webster)."

5. It's a power trip to defy the
written pleas of an elected
federal environmental minister to foster ecotoxicology.

4. It shows verve to mock Concordia's commitment to the Talloires Declaration.*

3. This closing doesn't hurt the friends of key administrators; in fact, it immensely pleases some.

2. Either God or China will save the environment.

1. McGill doesn't have an ecotox- icology program. How dare Concordia!

*The Rector signed this international agreement in 1995, committing Concordia to expand options in environmental education for its students and to integrate a sound environmental philosophy into all its operations.

Perry D. Anderson, PhD,
Founder and former director,
Ecotoxicology

Swastika
predates Nazis

In the article headlined "When meaning changes with time," on the work of Karen Doerr in German Studies (CTR, April 23), you quote her as being "...surprised to see swastikas in the articles published here; in Germany, it is illegal to show Nazi symbols." Surprised Dr. Doerr may be, but the swastika has an honourable history as a symbol with no Nazi connotations. It is known as the fylfot, the filler for the foot of the page. It is also the gammadion, being built from four capital Greek gammas. The word swastika is Sanskrit and means good fortune. It is a Hindi religious symbol, and many are seen in India (and in Japan) today. Whatever the undertones in Germany, they are not universal.

John McKay
Computer Science