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                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: FRIDAY, January 31, 1992                   TAG: 9201310451
SECTION: EDITORIAL                    PAGE: A-8   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Short

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ORWELL'S `ANIMAL FARM' PLAGIARIZED

IN "DOUBLE-PLUS fairness or guilt by proxy" (letter, Jan. 24), my colleague Joseph Germana pointed out that certain equal-opportunity/affirmative-action initiatives are aptly characterized by means of concepts and language drawn from George Orwell's "1984."

We have plagiarized Orwell's "Animal Farm" as well. There, having gained power, the pigs adopted the motto, "All animals are equal - but some animals are more equal than others."

At Virginia Tech there has been disseminated on at least four occasions "An Affirmative Commitment to Faculty Diversity" that states: " `Equal opportunity' means just that. Every person is given an equal chance for employment and enrollment. Each individual is judged on his or her individual merit . . . We welcome all and will judge those who come on their merits as individuals. opportunity, however, does not typically change existing conditions, and therefore, further action is necessary." (Emphasis added.)

No guidance is offered as to evidence on which that "typically" is based. Evidence is surely called for, since the assertion seems to contradict the past several centuries of American experience.

"Existing conditions" now are incomparably better than they used to be, for Catholics and Jews, for Chinese and Irish, for countless groups of initially disadvantaged and initially despised people who found fortune and even fame here, benefiting from the typically not-even-equal yet ample opportunities. HENRY H. BAUER BLACKSBURG

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