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Curfew Youth off-the-streets legislation poses problems for teens, parents Legislation has been proposed in Richland County that would require all persons under the age of 18 to be off the streets and in their homes by midnight. The proposal has been modified to target only those under 17 and make the curfew 2 a.m., but the meaning and the implications are the same: the government now wants to have more control over people's lives. The proposal was made in an effort to find a way to curb teen crime because a large percentage of crimes in the county are com mitted by persons under 18. The problem is that the law, should it become one, will serve little purpose. , First of all, it assumes that parents will not mind having teen discipline partially taken out of their hands and placed in the hands of the law. Secondly, it forces teens that do want to be out late (for any reason, good or bad) to use out-of-the-way paths and meeting . areas ? places that, because of their location, make them naturally dangerous to anyone. The police could, then, be driving teens into dangerous situations ? giving real criminals perfect targets. Thirdly, if a teen is going to break the law ? by raping, robbing or killing ? is another law saying they cannot be out at night going to stop them? Not likely. People who break laws are going to break laws, and it really doesn't matter what laws they are. All that matters is if the law is in the way of what the person wants to do. Now, if the proposal does become a law, what's next? Will the legislators propose a curfew for those between 18 and 35 years of age, since most fatalities caused by drunk drivers involve people in that age category? Or maybe legislation could be passed requiring all people to be in before midnight or 2 a.m. That way, the \ police can arrest anyone they see out after that hour. As Richland ' County Sheriff Alan Sloan said, "No one in their right mind should be out at 2 a.m. anyway." I SUMMITS ;r ^ , a"170 Si CMS r*ir-Ditrxxt4*The Gamecock News: 777-7726 Advertising: 777-4249 Jeff Wilson Sharon Willamson Editor in Chief Managing Editor /Copy Desk Chief Lynn Gibson Elizabeth Lynch News Editor Carolina Life Editor DougAube Renee Meyer Sports Editor Photography Editor Kelly c. Thomas Viewpoints Editor Elizabeth Fox Sherri Tillman Assistant News Editor Assistant News Editor David Bowden Kathy Heberger Assistant Carolina tifo Psiitr>r Assistant Carolina I if/> Brant Long Julie Bouchillon Assistant Sports Editor Assistant Photography Editor Sara Verne Octavia Wright Assistant Copy Desk Chief Assistant to the Editors Kristin Francis Erik Collins Graduate Assistant Faculty Adviser Ed Bonza Laura S. Day Director of Student Media Production Manager Ray Burgos Renee Gibson Assistant Production Manager . Advertising Manager Kyle berry Carolyn Griffin Assistant Advertising Manager Business Manager Letters Policy: The Gamecock will try to print all letters received. Letters should be, at maximum, 250 to 300 words long. The writer must include full name, professional title if a USC employee or South Carolina resident, or year and major if a student. An address and phone number are required with all letters sent. The Gamecock reserves the right to edit letters for style, possibie libel or in case of space limitations. The newspaper will not withhold names under any circumstance. Western wor The Berlin Wall cracked. Then it fell dowr \nd the Wall apparently took Communism witl it. There was much rejoicing in the Westeri world. Why? No, not because the Cold War il self was over, but because the world was no\ fie Western world's oyster. Just look if you will at the nearest wall ma; md see just how big the Soviet Union is am just how undeveloped it is. Oooooh. Then look at the rest of the world that re nains undeveloped. Ooooooooooooh. Impressive, isn't it? Take this, throw in a little crisis in th Middle East that gets all of the developed na tions of the world pulling together for the goo jf the entire world and what do you have? Those of you who answered Imperialism ar absolutely correct. Not long ago it was easy for a powerful na Lion to go into an undeveloped place and tak aver for whatever reason, as long as no one im portant's toes were stepped on, and all unde the guise of it being for the good of whoever was you happened to be taking over at the time It would be nice to think the days of doin this by military force are over, but those are a awful lot of troops down in Saudi Arabia now. Actually, what I'm really talking about i LETTERS TO TH Poor housing ^ not far away Ja" ! cal term: To the editor: rains, bri If one wants to investigate truly sonry ai depressed living conditions, one play on need not journey to some Third covered World land or even to some area lighting of Columbia like "Little Soweto." grounds One need only travel to Carolina (particul uaraens Apartments, wholly Carolina owned and operated by the Univer- a transit sity of South Carolina. The univer- and pen sity has pursued a thoughtful cam- to have paign of neglect and discrimination your ap; against the inhabitants of Carolina ing in a Gardens based, I think, on the fact are so sj that many of the residents of these als can apartments are foreign students. aplomb. If you have never been to Car- frequeni olina Gardens, they are easy to particula spot. They are the two-story, brick, when it low-rent housing beside the new all but c athletic practice building. When One 1 this building started belching toxic ? or th fumes into the air last Saturday only arc and Bates House and Cliff Apart- out tho ments were evacuated, we were scatterec told to stay indoors and keep our Ins id windows closed. We live across conditio the street from this thing ? not have ha blocks away. Why wasn't the same the sum concern for our safety and that of mainten our children shown as the concern make a for other people? weeks ( Let me describe to you the joys suits. O of Carolina Gardens Apartments. her bat! Outside, we have no living grass. for mo There is no attempt made to keep months the grounds looking livable. Once we have a month, whether the grass needs it vices. T or not, they come and they cut it had it so low that the lawn is either new ao scalped or die grass burned so it to walk won't grow again for at least pare the another month. And heaven forbid The that you have the wash out on the dens ar lines on those rare occasions when nored a they do come to cut the grass, or it this uni gets covered with dust. The leaves way a are virtually never raked up. Yet dents. I after all of this, the university paid due in somebody to edge the sidewalks many o for a week ? as if there was any are fore The Gre&i Escape ?Pari i Id after market: i. -i cause h 1 bu?sin( f ^ \ who v Dennis Shealy t* mone; v neces! ken ii p to ma d Wil economic take overs. Without the threat of the munis evil Empire, big companies can go just about the W s- anywhere and on whatever conditions they be, w want. body American companies have already made the thing move into the Soviet Union, especially into the Sur e areas of high technology and natural resources, things i- Siberia has too much untapped potential to just They d let any old body make use of it. body mis is 01 course trie nature 01 capitalism, meuia e What American and other countries' companies No are after are monopolies on both markets and once i- resources with a country so eager to catch up are ar e with its Western neighbors that it will probably Be i- agree to almost any terms. and b ;r Not very fair, but that's business folks. There it America is not the only one who is into ex- world ploiting their neighbor. Japan has reaped huge threeg profits from China using them for the low labor ploite n side of production with the promise of help in watch increasing their technology and potential for to na s growth. This of course has not come about be- plane E EDITOR egetation encroaching on versity believes that they will valks. make a fuss over their living ina Gardens was appa- ditions. The sub-standard natui lilt on a landfill. In practi- the grounds, lighting and ma s, this means that when it nance must be made clear to oken bits of glass and ma- university population at la re exposed. Our children Your fellow students are livin the sides of hills literally conditions that many of you w with broken glass. The not put up with, is so inadequate that the are black as pitch at night Richard Schellham larly between buildings). history graduate stui Gardens at night becomes point for drunks, derelicts y jj , /erts. It is not uncommon JL/Cri0r WTllC] r\/*AnlA urinotincT nntQtHft irtment windows or look- ITIlSiri I 01*1X100 t night. The police patrols )oradic that these individu- To the editor: violate our privacy with in a recent editorial (letter In addition, our cars are Heather Buggy, it was stated tly vandalized or stolen, scientific and medical groups irly at Christmas vacation consistently pro-choice. I w seems that police patrols like to present to you what the ease. entific community has said final point about security cerning the beginning of hu ie lack thereof. We are the life. Landrum Shettles, the :a on this university with- scientist to consistently achie\ se emergency call boxes vitro fertilization of human < I throughout the campus. says in his book Rites of Life, e Carolina Gardens the Scientific Evidence for Life B< ns are not much better. We Birth that "the zygote is hi) d our rents increased over life." World famous genet imer to pay for "increased Theodosius Dobzhansky has s ance costs." Yet when we that "a human being begins hi maintenance call it takes istence when a spermatozoan )r even months to get re- tilizes an egg cell." It's ever ne woman had to live with serted in the International Cot tiroom window partly ajar Medical Ethics that "a doctor nths last winter. It takes always bear in mind the in tn Pet naintintr done. Yet ?on,~?? r?f nreeervina humeri ~ r O IU11VV VI ptvuv. . 1IMI1IUU j to pay extra for these ser- from the time of conception he athletes in the old Roost death." Further still, The Da bad before they got their tion of Geneva holds physicia comodations, but it's hard the following: "I will maintaii by their dorms and com- utmost respect for human life ;m to how we live. the time of conception; even t residents ol Carolina Gar- threat, I will not use my ki e being systematically ig- ledge contrary to the laws ol nd discriminated against by manity." Even more recentl iversity in much the same 1981, hearings on senate bill slum lord treats his resi- 159, of the 97th Congress (c t seems likely that this is the Human Life Bill), were lafge part to the fact that ducted by senator John East, f the students living there senate report concluded "PI ;ign students, and the uni- cians, biologists and other s monopolies Japan has kept all of the high technology iss within their sphere of influence and vants to give up cheap labor, i real point to be made here is that big y makes the world go round, which isn't sarily bad as long as some fairness is taito account on the part of those planning ke the big money. th the fall of the Berlin Wall and Com;m and then the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait, 'estem World sees the way things used to hen they called all of the shots and noreally had much of a chance to say anyabout it. e the big countries have still been running > but they couldn't do it with authority, had to do it through polite politics. Nowanted to look like a bad guy in the i-influenced world of today, w, though, there's the chance to prove and for all who the big boys on the block id who is up for exploitation, cynical folks, and keep an eye on political usiness figures in our country and abroad. ;'s nothing like making money, but the [ is not going to become a better place if fourths of its population are being exd and companies are not operating under a iful eyd that keeps them from laying waste itural resourse and polluting the whole - 1 1 I not tists agree that conception marks con- the beginning of a human being ? re of a being who is alive and a member inte- of the human species. There is i the overwhelming agreement on this rge. point in countless medical, biologiig in cal and scientific writings." ould Some say the fetus is part of the mother's body. This seems ridiculous knowing that the fetus often imer has a different blood type and half dent ^me *s a different sex than the mother. Professor A. W. Riley, research professor in fetal physiology in Auckland, New Zealand, [has stated that, "It is the fetus who stops the mother's periods and makes her womb habitats by developing a placenta and a protective ) by capsule of fluid for himself ... and that finally it is the fetus, not the were mother who decides when labor ould should be initiated." ; sci- So how may this HUMAN orcon ganism, which while in the womb iman has it's own blood, sexual identity first and it's own NERVOUS SYSTEM re in be allowed to be aborted. Some of jggs, those in the pro-choice camp bei: ?4. .L. : 4 DC A T T V I he iicvc uiai LI1C I ClUS IS IIUI rvE.n-i-.Aj * efore human yet; that is, that it is not huiman man in a meaningful way. I pose icist these questions to those individutated als. At what point did your life bes ex- come really human? When was fer- your existence justified? If not (at) 1 as- conception, when? le of Others site viability as a marker, must but the time at which a fetus is potpor tentially able to live outside the life mother's womb has dropped from until 32 weeks in 1960 to 19 weeks in :lara- 1989, due to scientific achievens to ment. Certainly, the humanness of n the the fetus does not depend on otir from ability to successfully care for it. inder FACT: Biologically speaking, at now- conception there is life. That life's f hu- cells are distinctly human. Therey, in fore, the embryo is human life reNo. gardless of what subjective values ailed arc placed on it by beings other con- than itself. Abortion is the process The ?f terminating that life, hysi- Tim Mallace cien- jazz/media music junior