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0 4, THE GAMECOCK ♦ Monday, February 10, 2003 miTTW VTfTIO ONLINE POLL 1-^ ■ l\ I I * ■ I % I Will you be doing anything 1 i \l \l I ■ I % I l special for Valentine’s Day? JWWI \ ¥ yt I L I www.dailygamecock.com. M f * —H— ^-1 —■— rV / Results published on Fridays. _ IN OUR OPINION E-mail system merges skills Behind Columbia’s new e-mail filtering system are two USC-supported computer companies. Two Toads and Digital Systems Support play a significant role in the system introduced by Mayor Bob Coble at a news conference Friday. Both companies are supported by the USC Technology Incubator program, which helps students trying to start their own companies. implementing the Incubator program was a large investment — it gives students sta^t-up capital, free legal advice and rent-free office space to launch their companies.^ The new e-mail filtering system is proof that the investment has paid off; it is a prime example of how the program nas gone Deyona an academic exercise and made a tangible impact on the community. The project’s success also is evidence of strengthened ties between the city of Columbia and the university. With its computer-science and engineering programs, USC could be a valuable source of technologically skilled workers for the city. The city is making a smart move by taking advantage of the resources right in its own downtown. The filtering system itself, dubbed “Clean Cyber City,” shows innovation on Columbia’s part; it’s the first city to implement such a program. The e-mail filtering system, found at www.columbia.se, eliminates pornography, profanity and most junk mail by putting such letters in a separate folder for easy disposal. It’s free for any citizen who wants it. _)_j._n_a. i_l. • _j_ vuiumuxa o jy olcau, at xu oi iwuiv, xo tauux cu xxxui c smartly than the junk-mail filters that are now standard issue in Web-based e-mail services such as Hotmail and Yahoo. It targets more than just porn, it takes context into account, and it can be used with existing e-mail accounts. “Clean Cyber-City” is just a good idea. The system provides a service that will likely appeal to many Columbia residents, and it could help cement the newly improved USC-Columbia relations by combining the skills of both. -:-.— The success of the newly unveiled e-mail filtering system also is evidence of strengthened ties between Columbia and the university. GAMECOCK CORRECTIONS If you see an error in today’s paper, we want to know. E-mail us at gamecockviewpoints@hotmail.com. ABOUT THE GAMECOCK Editor in Chief Jill Martin Managing Editor Charles Tomlinson News Editor Adam Beam Asst. News Editor Wendy Jeffcoat Viewpoints Editor Erin O'Neal The Mix Editor Corey Garriott Asst. The Mix Editor Meg Moore Sports Editor Matt Rothenberg Asst. Sports Editor Brad Senkiw Photo Editor Johnny Haynes Asst. Photo Editor Morgan Ford Head Page Designers Sarah McLaulin, Katie Smith, David Stagg Page Designers Justin Bajan, Samantha Hall, Staci Jordan, Julia Knetzer, Shawn Rourk Slot Copy Editors Crystal Boyles, Tricia Ridgway, Emma Ritch Copy Editors Alyson Goff, Mary Waters, Jessica Foster Online Editor Bessam Khadraoui i* Community Affairs Kiran Shah CONTACT INFORMATION Offices on third floor of the Russell House. Editor in Chief: gamecockeditor@hotmail.com News: gamecockudesk@hotmail.com Viewpoints: gamecockviewpoints@hotmail.com The Mix: gamecockmixeditor@hotmail.com Sports: gamecocksports@hotmail.com Public Affairs: gckpublicaffairs@hotmail.com Online: www.dailygamecock.com Newsroom: 777-7726 Editor’s Office: 777-3914 STUDENT MEDIA Faculty Adviser Erik Collins Director of Student Media Ellen Parsons Creative Director Susan King Business Manager Carolyn Griffin Advertising Manager Sarah Scarborough Classified Manager Sherry F. Holmes Production Manager Patrick Bergen Creative Services Derek Goode, Earl Jones, Sean O'Meara. Anastasia Oppert Advertising Staff John Blackshire, Adam Bourgoin, Bianca Knowles, Denise Levereaux, Jacqueline Rice, Stacey Todd The Gamecock is the editorially independent student newspaper of the University of South Carolina. It is published Monday, Wednesday and Friday during the fall and * spring semesters and nine times during the summer, with the exception of university holidays and exam periods. Opinions expressed in The Gamecock are those of the editors or author and not those of the University of South Carolina. The Board of Student Publications and Communications is the publisher of The Gamecock. The Department of Student Media is the newspaper's parent organization. The Gamecock is supported in part by student-activity fees. One free copy per reader. Additional copies may be purchased for $1 each from the Department of Student Media. TO PLACE AN AD i ne uamwwn 1400 Greene St. Columbia. S.C. 29208 Advertising: 777-3888 Classified: 777-1184 Fax: 777-6482 nifty POINTER. s' WHere’D eeT p THOSe v CUFF LINKS?... Fanatics take things too far SHAWN ROURK GAMECOCKVIEWPOINTS@HOTMAIL.COM Anti-abortion protesters shouldn’t be on campus. I was under the impression that in college, we as students were supposed to be able to study the ways of the world and form our own opinions about life as we take one more step on the road toward adulthood. So why the devil do we have idiots like “Brother Bob” and our newest anti-abortion brethren coming to this campus to try to persuade us away from our opin ions? There must be a law against this or something. As I walked to class the other day, these insistent jerks accost ed me. Being the apathetic per son I am, I just kept walking through their barrage of dead ba bies and, when accosted, re sponded only by politely giving one of them the finger as he tried to pass out more propaganda. Granted, I am all for free speech. I’d be the first one in line for a giant freedom-of-speech par ty on campus, and we could have as much freedom of speech as we pleased. I have learned from a few gov ernment teachers, however, that those freedoms, which we love so much, are not absolute—they’re subject to the next person in line. We have freedom of speech up to the point at which we offend somebody else. And, frankly, be ing forced to look at gruesome photos of dead babies on the way to class is quite offensive. Whether you agree with abor tion and whatever else they are trying to preach to students, post ing those kinds of posters is a bit much in their quest for world domination. When this first hap pened this past semester with Brother Bob, I thought that if the students of this campus ignored him and his comrades, they would go away. But that only works if the students actually ig nore them. I sat in awe as some students went up and actually talked with these “righteous” fascists. Can’t people in this pathetic ex istence we call society think for themselves? Is it really neces sary for people to come to this campus and wave signs in our faces to try to scare us into be lieving them? At this point in most stu dents’ lives, they have had enough time away from home to make their own decisions about things and accept the results of their choices. We don’t need rab ble-rousers coming to campus and interrupting everyone’s day while they are trying to live in reality. These idiots need to grow up and get a job: one that does not involve going to campuses and bothering students while they are trying to better their lives and not end up like these people. Students can make their own decisions; I’m not discounting the intelligence of the universi ty or the students. I would like to think that the students here are actually informed and intelligent — although every time I go to a basketball game, my faith in their intelligence dwindles. Therefore, Brother Bob and his comrades need to take then little signs, put them back in their beat-up van and go park it back down by the river. Rourk is a first-year print journalism student. IN YOUR OPINION Freedom of speech protects taunting I didn’t understand why USC felt it had to apologize for Carolina fans’ “rude” behavior. I thought the First Amendment allowed me freedom of speech. Was I misinformed, Mr. McGee? I was not threatening anyone; I was just speaking my opinion. The students paid for the new arena and for the tickets. I think we should be able to cheer the way we want. I have been to a lot of games here at USC and remember when ragging on a particular player showed how good that player really was. So I started to think, why is this an issue now? The past 10 years, it was fine, but now, all of a sudden, the fans are just “horrible.” I will tell you why: The directors of USC think students will drive away all the high-paying customers who attend the game. This was not a problem at the old arena. Now it’s all about money. Are you telling me that USC is the only place that rags on the opposing team’s players? Go to UNC; the things we say are mild compared to a school like UNC. They boo their own head coach, for God’s sake. Everyone knows that USC’s rival is Clemson, which we will play on Wednesday. I will be there in full force — but for how long will be the question. I absolutely hate Clemson; and just like the old days, I will be yelling my head off, even if it’s for only five minutes before I am kicked out. But I am a true fan who cares about basketball and not about filling seats with people who don’t care at all. NIRMESH SHAH GRADUATE STUDENT I Ignoring Iraq would show weakness It has become impossible for me to read The Gamecock late ly without subjecting myself to the opinions of misguided op ponents of military action against Iraq. It is a fact that Saddam Hussein has shown belligerent tendencies toward his own peo ple — the Kurds — and toward other nations, such as Kuwait. When a leader such as Saddam sets his country on a course that endangers the people of the world, it’s up to the global com munity to make certain that the world is safe. And, as the most powerful nation in the world, it is our responsibility, both to ourselves and to those who are unable to defend themselves, to fight the just fight when the rest of the world refuses. It comes to this: The burden of proof of the disarmament of Iraq does not fall to the United Nations, but to Iraq, because Iraq has shown itself to be a danger in the past. The U.N. resolution passed last year re quires Iraq to furnish proof that it has disarmed itself. This has not happened; indeed, not only has Iraq been uncooperative with regards to the weapons in spections, but also Secretary of State Colin Powell has provided the world with evidence that Iraq is hiding something. Even if the U.N. refuses to act, we cannot afford to do the same. If we fail in our resolve now, we prove beyond any doubt that anyone with weapons of mass destruction and the will to use them can threaten the rest of the world with impunity. WALLY ALTMAN GRADUATE STUDENT I Rothenberg forgets his own argument I find it amusing that Matt Rothenberg wrote an entire col umn on the words and actions of a few Carolina fans (“Carolina stu dents don’t get the point,” Friday) and ended it with such a hypocrit ical statement. That statement, if you missed it, was for everyone to “just go out there and make your selves heard through your positive cheers.” Well, Rothenberg, you quickly forgot your argument and the very negative statements con tained within. I think you call “some, but of course not all, Carolina students” ignorant. What kind of positive cheer is that? Profane language is not the mark of an ignorant person. Look at George Carlin, for example: Would you call him ignorant? Maybe you are calling our fellow students names because you think they misunderstand the sport of basketball, do not understand los ing and are bragging or too proud. I think those were not the rea sons for the “verbal assault” that occurred last Saturday. Did you ever stop to think that those same fans were at previous games when people were on their feet cheering positively and loudly for our beloved Gamecocks only to see them lose? But, if the game would have been exciting and the team, God forbid, had won, I doubt reporters would have been writing about fans. CHAD CRUMBAKER FOURTH-YEAR INTERNATIONAL STUDIES STUDENT Submission Policy Letters to the editor should be less than 300 words and include name, phone number, professional title or year and major, if a student. E-mail letters to gamecockviewpoints@hotmail.com. Letters will be edited. Anonymous betters will not be published. Call the newsroom at 777-7726 for more information. Brain surgery is back in style TYLERJONES GAMECOCKVIEWPOINTS@HOTMAIL.COM Watching TV kills your senses like a lobotomy. I am utterly sick and wretched ly ill from this monotonous ooze that is coming out of the televi sion and wedging its filth into my frontal cortex. Yes, friends, I feel like I have been lobotomized by those wicked imbeciles in the tele vised media. Historically, the lobotomy has been a practice reserved for quacks, drunken railroad work ers, and highly educated yahoos with grandiose visions of medical discovery. In fact, a bizarre physi cian named Walter Freeman per fected the “ice-pick lobotomy,” in which the good doctor inserted an ice pick into the patient’s eye socket and up into the brain, then proceeded to dislodge several pieces of brain matter by striking the ice pick with a hammer. Although this practice seems to be a ghastly form of medicine, swarms of soldiers who had snapped in World War II were herded into Freeman’s assembly line-style lobotomy clinics. In 1949, Dr. Antonio Egas Moniz was awarded the Nobel Prize for medicine because of his discover ies in prefrontal leukotomy, a more scientific method of per forming the lobotomy. Oops — excuse me if I have a tendency to drift; the entire front half of my brain is seeping out of my ears, and I have come to grips with the nasty truth that Jon Stewart is the only anchorperson I can watch these days. Between the war, exploding space shuttles and that alien named Michael Jackson, the television has be- | come littered with enough apoca lyptic tidings to put Freeman back in business. But who is to say that Freeman, or perhaps one of his disciples, isn’t ice picking away at the American public? How do you explain the fools filled with pseudo-hubris who march out on “American Idol,” only to shriek and shrill like a paralyzed pea cock? Actually, it is a fact that the lobotomy is most commonly used in the political arena, especially for those hard-luck losers who can’t bear the brunt of reality out of office. My sources tell me that A1 Gore and Jim Hodges both booked a weekend together at a resort in Switzerland where beautiful blondes in bikinis per form a more savage version of the ice-pick lobotomy. In fact, I’ve heard several stories of how Kichard Nixon once ice pick lobotomized the entire Democratic Party in the early ’70s. It makes sense; since then, no Democrat has taken the White House except two Southern yokels who were probably over looked because of the drool and dazed look on their faces. There I go again, almost to the end of the column and nothing to show for it but a quick history lesson and a polluted stream of consciousness. Ah, but such are the breaks in the hard-luck worlds of journalism and exper imental medicine. But fear not, there is hope on the horizon. My hero and spiritual savior returns to the spotlight on Feb. 22 in Memphis, Tenn., and keeping with the theme of lobotomy, I will be on the front lines to re port all the mayhem and de bauchery at the Mike Tyson fight. Just in case you’re wondering, I hear Greene’s has ice picks on sale: two for $3.99. Jones is a graduate student in She College of Mass Communications and Information Studies.