Hurricane Katrina, in the devastation it has wrought on thousands of Americans - many of them the poorest and most vulnerable - has forced this nation to examine issues from which it has turned away, including and especially those of racism and class.
Race in particular has come to the attention of the Daily Lobo because of an editorial cartoon in Friday's paper that sparked concerns among the African-American community at UNM and in Albuquerque. The cartoon depicted a mostly African-American second line parade - a New Orleans funereal tradition - marching through the flooded French Quarter.
Callers to the newspaper expressed anger at the drawing for the culturally and historically insensitive depiction of the marchers and expressed worry that the cartoon might be downplaying the tragedy in the Crescent City and be upsetting to those with family on the Gulf Coast.
This newspaper - especially its opinion editor, responsible for selecting the cartoon, and the editor in chief - did not intend it to be insensitive or offensive to the African-American community or those with loved ones in New Orleans and we apologize to them. We hope everyone affected expresses their voices on these pages.
Through the response, our eyes have been opened to issues long ignored yet vitally important to our campus and our nation.
Representatives of the African-American campus community expressed concern Tuesday that the Daily Lobo is not representative of or sensitive to their community.
The Daily Lobo strives to be a newspaper that is both culturally diverse and representative of all students on this campus. We would like to take this opportunity to encourage anyone on campus to become involved with the newspaper, whether through writing letters, contributing stories or story ideas, or joining the staff.
We want our staff to reflect the community it serves and to be in conversation with the viewpoints and concerns of all of UNM's diverse groups. We will do our part to reach out to all communities on campus and be more aware of issues concerning each of them.
In addition, we want to open the newspaper, and especially this page, as a forum for analyzing and discussing the topics this tragedy has dredged from depths of our national consciousness.
These questions of race and class have been brought into stark relief by Katrina's destruction, and will linger long after. We will do our best to delve into them, and encourage everyone on campus and locally to join us.
Chris Narkun
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Opinion editor
Rivkela Brodsky
Editor in chief
