Drum and drummer

I found Philip Preville's opinion of the Tam Tam somewhat shocking, given the Mirror's position as an alternative weekly ["The trouble with Tam Tam," June 10].

Mr. Preville says there is no dress code for the Tam Tam, yet calls anyone silly-looking and "Seuss-like clowns" if they break his unwritten dress code. I never knew he was such a fashion critic. How come he's not covering the runways in Paris?

Hello Mr. Preville, this is earth calling. It's called democracy, it's called having fun and it's called the weekend. Let people have individual expression and quit being such a spoil sport.

Perhaps everyone could pick up after themselves, as far as littering goes. Lots of everyday Montrealers attend the Tam Tam and the mountain on Sundays. The same people who drive gas-guzzling SUVs and throw garbage all around movie theatres and Montreal Canadiens games. We could all live more eco-friendly in one way or another, and picking up after ourselves would be a step in the right direction.

The Tam Tam is one of those fine spices that flavours Montreal to set it apart from other cities, the same way a great chef makes the difference between a good soup and a superb one. Maybe Mr. Preville should move to Toronto or Ottawa, where everyone conforms. By the way, I live in Ottawa, but even I know the Tam Tam is closer to 20 years old. It's called research.

--John Stevens

Ottawa

What's the "plus side" to noise pollution? The Tam Tams are loud every weekend, all weekend long and weeknights, too. They turn Jeanne-Mance park into an industrial zone with their pneumatic pounding.

And it's the Tam Tam site where bonfires start the annual Saint-Jean-Baptiste riot. Last year, our children were really distressed to be awoken by that late-night madness.

We've heard there are plans to pave part of Jeanne-Mance park to provide a parking lot for a 12-storey "superhospital" that will wipe out the volleyball courts and surrounding greenspace.

Bass drummers or bureaucrats, it seems everyone just wants to trash the park.

--Eric and Winnifred Chapman

Army has sharpened up

I am shocked and appalled by the blatant criticism of the bold, new reforms brought to us in the National Defence ["A few lazy men," June 10]. Harassment sensitivity training such as the Sexual Harassment and Racial Prejudice (SHARP) sensitivity protocol has heralded improved conditions in the lives of all military personnel in the Canadian Armed Forces.

Traditionally, army mentality quietly encouraged physical and mental abuse, often dished out by psychotic instructors who vented their frustrations on harried recruits. The days of trainees ritually beating their fellows who could not maintain standards, and of female members who had to fear sexual harassment with no recourse, are finally numbered. I am disgusted by the likes of Corporal Andreas Beauchamp who clings "proudly" to his "old-school" antiquated army traditions.

On my GMT course in early 1998, I was taught--just like recruits of years past--to follow orders without hesitation. But the mentality in the era of SHARP has given us the power to question orders, which as a soldier, I would deem to be illegal. I question Corporal Beauchamp's ideals and morality if he suggests that I should not question (hypothetical) orders for me to fire on unarmed civilians, at the risk of reducing my "efficiency."

Furthermore, asking questions at the proper time denotes a sign of intelligence, which is what the National Defence seeks with its higher educational standards of acceptance. This new intelligentsia militaria will avoid our past embarrassments which have tarnished our proud history. The physical requirements of the GMT are still nonetheless quite gruelling and I feel personally insulted by being described as being part of "a few lazy men."

This man's army has not become "a kinder, gentler army," it has become wiser and more sensitive to the human condition. If Corporal Beauchamp's privates look at him as if he were from the Stone Age, perhaps it is because he is.

--Trooper Dominique Beaudoin