Historical Newspapers of South Carolina

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_VIEWPOINTS . TH#feAMECOCK EDITORIAL BOARD Editor STEVEN VAN HAREN News Editor JACKIE ALEXANDER Assistant News Editor JOSHUA RABON The Mix Editor ALEXIS ARNONE I Design Director chas McCarthy ; Sports Editor STEPHEN FASTENAU Viewpoints Editor BRINDY McNAIR Assistant Viewpoints Editor AARON BRAZIER 9 IN OUR OPINION A ‘Saudio t' summer would last for-e-ver Surqmer’s creeping up like mercury in a thermometer, and if you ever wasted your dog days in high school by lounging around in an easy chair, the three or four summers that punctuate your college years are the perfect time to play catch-up. Live it up. These precious three-month vacations are the last most of us will ever get. 0 An Indian summer is wholly un-American without baseball, and the firm crack of hickory under the bright lights of Sarge Frye can make even the biggest non-baseball fan stare like an awe-struck Smalls in /-l 11 « t rn • inc oauuiot. i ;* ..n ti,«aa squad is one of the best Live it Up. These in the country, and with precious three- a mid-May series against . Tennessee coming up, month vacations those staying in Columbia are the last most of “,weat these us will ever get. Even if you study the finer points of the fastball change-up, students’ minds tend to go to mush without the steady stream of academic stimulation A during the school year. Go to Barnes & Noble and 9 snatch up a few handfuls of discounted books from their summer reading section. Mix the classics with the new stuff and help keep your mind sharp on the beach. Grab a map at the bookstore and get the heck out of Cola for a while. If you’re strapped for gas money, go to the cutting-edge Georgia Aquarium and watch the belugas. With a couple weeks and a large bank account to spare, students can and should drive across the country. You can’t know America without feeling how a mountain turns into a field with the push ana pull of your accelerator. Obviously, you have to work and pay the bills, but scheduling a few days here and there to go a little nuts will help you remember that work is not life, but • rather something that makes life more livable. Don’t waste your summer playing “Halo” like a schmuck. Go live like a college kid and leave lazy summers to middle-schoolers. IT’S YOUR RIGHT Voice your opinion on message boards at www.dailygamecock.com or send letters to the editor at gamecockopinions@gwm.sc.edu CORRECTIONS If you see an error in today’s paper, we want to know about it. E-mail us at gamecockopinions@gwm.sc.edu # ABOUT THE GAMECOCK Editor STEVEN VAN HAREN Design Director chas McCarthy Copy Desk Chief AARON KIOD News Editor JACKIE ALEXANDER Assistant News Editor JOSHUA RABON Viewpoints Editor brindy mcnair Assistant Viewpoints Editor AARON BRAZIER The Mix Editor ALEXIS ARNONE Assistant Mix Editor KRISTEN TRUESOALE Sports Editor ^ STEPHEN FASTENAU Assistant Sports Editor ALEX RILEY Photo Editor nick esares Assistant Photo Editor KATY BLALOCK Public Relations Director ROSE GREENE Page Designers MIKE CONWAY, MEGAN SINCLAIR Stttff'Writers A.J. BEMBRY, TOM BENNING, JESS DAVIS, tim McManus, marjorie RIDDLE, GINA VASSELLI Copy Editors CAROLINE DESANCTIS, BETHANY NICHOLS, ELIZABETH PARHAM, JAMISON TINSLEY, KRYSTAL WEBBER, LIZ WHITE ti CONTACT INFORMATION Offices located on the third floor of the Russell House Editor’s office hours are from 2-3 p.m. on Tuesdays and Thursdays Editor: gamecockeditor@gwm.sc.edu News: gamecocknews@gwm.sc.edu Viewpoints: gamecockopinions@gwm. sc. edu The Mix: gamecockfratures@gwm.sc.edu Sports: gamecocksports@gwm.sc.edu Public Affairs: gamecockPR@yahoo.com Online: www.dailygamecock.com Newsroom: 777-7726 ; Sports: 777-7182 Editor’s Office: 777-3914 Fax: 777-6482 STUDENT MEDIA Director scon UNDENBERG Faculty Adviser ERIK COLLINS Business Manager CAROLYN GRIFFIN Advertising Manager SARAH SCARBOROUGH Classifieds Manager SHERRY F. HOLMES Production Manager c. neil scon Advertising APRYL ALEXANDER, KATIE CUPPIA, BREANNA EVANS, MARY RACHEL FREEMAN, DEIDRE merrick, mckenzie WELSH Creative Services MIKE CONWAY, JOSEPH DANNELLY, LAURA JOYCE GOUGH, MARGARET LAW, MEGHAN WHITMAN i. THE GAMECOCK is the editorially independent student neivspaper 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 0/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. Iran's N'JCigAg ve\jeu>eMe^r worrys u-s. ■ /it!? ok aV.. t \ / 17'? \ ( A Mlp-A&S" "THAT j A. Courtesy KRT Campus Sluts, shoes makes stupid\ shallow television HBO program reminds men of advantages, perks of masculinity If there is one thing I cannot stand, it is spoiled, moronic, ignorant sluts who fart around in an over-rated city dealing with “problems” that face them. Anybody who has seen “Sex and the City” and has an ounce of sense knows that it was designed to terminally annoy the intelligent on these grounds. From obnoxious redheads, to two obnoxious blondes and an attractive yet obnoxious brunette, the quality of American television drops severely whenever a re-run of these out-of-date, fashion obsessed tarts gets thrust into our faces. New York City is not that impressive. Dating problems happen all around the world. There is nothing new in “Sex and the City” beyond an incomprehensible amount of smugness crawling up their own arses. Even the character’s names make me want to vomit. “Mr. Big”? Are we as an audience meant -• to believe that the producers, writers and actors all agreed on mmon such a stupid BRAZIER name? “Buffy Fourth-year the Vampire philosophy Slayer” it is student not. The message of the show seems to. revolve around how much sex one can have with as many partners as possible. Whether you are a straight woman turned lesbian, or formerly married, just bonk anything and everything in sight. There would have been no show if the women weren’t so stupid as to bed whatever they got their creepily manicured hands on. Just date a guy for a set period of time — perhaps longer than 60 seconds — to find out what he is like. When they “wake up” and realize that the guy is not suitable, the intelligent have to smack their hands against their head. Of course he was mentally unstable, was the character not called “Mr. Mentally Unstable Head”? The actress playing the brunette is a good South Carolinian, too. Adopting the finer Southern actresses and indoctrinating them into a New York lifestyle is culturally insensitive and morally bankrupt. With the power of “fashion” (for the want of a better word) behind them, the four girls seem to sledgehammer their way through the best of Milan, Paris and London to destroy the souls of any independently minded person. Original thought is not necessary when tacky Dolce and Gabbana heels can resolve all your problems. “Sex and the City” merely represents the worst side of female life today. It would be OK if the lifestyle was impressive, but it is not. The main character Carrie is probably named after the movie of the same name, featuring humiliation to the point that she wreaks havoc on everyone around her. The starting sequence has her wearing the worst top and skir.t combination known to man. I am not a fan of chauvinism, but shows like “Sex and the City” make me feel happy to be a man, rather than some self-centered city-slicker with no emotional or intellectual depth. Maybe a man’s world is not such a bad thing after all. Show addresses contemporary sex problems Re-runs remind girls of universal, growing issues in modern life It all started when a group of girls suggested we watch “Sex and the City.” Aaron became the belligerent Brit that he is. For some reason, he takes the typical male view of the show — somehow it’s complete crap. Well, I think Aaron is complete crap. He could use a little help from the “Sex and the City” girls. And that’s the point of the show. Issues, like dysfunction, have become aids to the sexually inexperienced and clueless, not to mention staples in __: •_• i_ l/Ul LVIVftJlOll J V^IVV^O. They taught us how to talk about sex. They were brash and cold and made us modern women. We can talk about sex over breakfast, lunch and dinner now without a cringe. “Sex and the City” gave us a look into the sexual lives it was once too taboo to talk about. Sexually active, unmarried women across the world feel a little liberated because of those four characters. And anyone who went to hear Candace Bushnell, the writer of “Sex and the City” this fall, can vouch for that. LIZ It opened WHITE us up for Second-year shows like print “Desperate journalism Housewives” student and “FootballerS Wives,” for the British. Even if I don’t support that show, and it prepared us for a sexual revolution. Without them, I wouldn’t be able to write sex columns every week for our newspaper. It’s like the Cosmopolitan of television. Fashion, sex and girlfriends all in one 30-minute show. > If Aaron had actually watched the show, he would realize that everyone could relate to something in it. There’s a guy who takes showers after sex, a guy who only sleeps with models and a guy who swings both ways. If Aaron can’t relate to any of those he should rent the DVDs and find someone he understands; I promise he’ll find one. But the show tackles the biggest problem facing women today. Career or relationship? Most women feel the pinch of the .biological clock ticking away as they struggle to compete with men in a dog-eat-dog world and fall in love with Prince Charming — or at least someone who won’t treat you like trash — at the same time. Maybe Aaron doesn’t understand it because he can’t relate to the overall problem. Do we fight like Charlotte to become housewives, or do we rely on ourselves' to become more like Samantha? Yeah, none of the characters really had the right answer or one universal “truth” we could all conform our lives around, but they did, somehow, make us a little more comfortable with the impending fate of modern womanhood. Even if we don’t find Mr. Big in Paris, we could still be fashion goddesses with a corner office overlooking Fifth Avenue. Birth control and sex positions, embarrassing moments and broken hearts, one-night stands and Mr. Right. And they did it all with humor, wit and some killer footwear. Whoever said honesty works needed to try oodles of lies Making up personality provides ample amount of entertainment, fun What’s the difference between a dull response and a cheeky reply? It’s the same deviation between interesting and lame. For some, like my father and the justice system, it’s TEClfl the difference m between right Second-year and wrong. public For others, it’s relations an everyday student conversation tool known as a lie. Blame it on the moral decay of my generation 6r boredom in our own lives, but lying is fun and perfectly natural. It’s a fib, not a bomb. Now in the thick of exams, I’m not suggesting anyone go out and forge a paper or cheat on a test. That’s unoriginal and proof of stupidity. Lying is so common, \ yet so taboo. People hate liars, even more than they hate witches. Republicans* Democrats, liberals and conservatives all shudder at the prospect of their reputation being tarnished by a half-truth. We get blasted with lies everyday. Marketers,' mothers, men. Even the most simple statements: “free trade,” “homeland security,” “your vote counts” and “safe sex.” All lies! And people loved to be on the other side of lies. I bet nobody has told you lately that you are at very best, average looking. My parents are regularly assured they have raised me well. I crashed a wedding this Saturday. It was a very Kevin Bacon, six-degrees type deal; an old friend called me out of the blue to be his date. So I puffed up my hair and painted my pout. Working the party, from one drunk frat boy to another, I was a ’ different person at every introduction — a farm girl from Montana, a Polish immigrant, single, rich, poor. I stopped at nothing. It turned out to be the most fun I’ve had in a while. Perhaps, however, the lies we tell ourselves are often the most important of all. Self-deception is the most potent ingredient to greatness. I tell myself that I will go very far, no matter the odds. But in the harsh light of truth, I find that I am just an over-grown baby that calls home when her checking is too low and cries over dead things, like newborn, torn-from-their nest squirrels. And while integrity and honesty beckon the young and idealistic, I resist. I will continue to weave my web. But what slows the inertia of continual deceit? Lying, like nicotine and crack, is incredibly addictive. What are the costs of fibbing your way through life? I’ve wracked my brain searching for an answer and have found nothing. Life is hard. Virtue is important, but not as important as doing what you want and saying what you may. Just ask Bill Clinton.