Historical Newspapers of South Carolina

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Our last summertime issue comes out! Then we'll, well, start on the first fall issue. Wednesday, July 29,1998 Be? Setting tbe Carolitia C EDITORL Rosalind Harve Kiki McCormick Marcus Amake USC athletic; careful with Let's face it. We IMBBTTT worship our athletes , F n , The athletic here. Gamecock ? football and basketball stars, among others, serve as our H local celebrities and , . wtrsuuuta our ambassadors. They represent University of sacrifice South Carolina for countless sports fans who may know nothing of our academic programs, and who otherwise may not even have heard of our school. It would be hard to determine to what degree the reputation of any university depends on the performance of its sports teams. But it is a good guess that when the Gamecocks do well, the name of our university garners positive connota tions in the minds of countless fans. It makes sense, then, that we should have a stake in the high performance of our athletes. Put simply, we want .them to do well so that we'll look good. We are faced with a dilemma, then, when we are presented with a substance that will help our athletes improve performance with possible detrimental effects to their health. Such a situation is at hand with creatine. Creatine is a substance sold in health fond stores that maYinmps the effects of workouts by helping build muscle and making recovery time shorter. Technically, it is a "natural" substance, because it is found in our bodies; however, creatine's status as a "natural" substance doesn't mean it is necessarily safe. tfe HDe(5a Serving I be Carolina Con The Gamecock is the student newspaper of The Universit Friday during the fall and spring semesters and eight times dui exam periods. Opinions expressed in The Gamecock are those o Carolina The Board of Student Publications and Communications Media is the newspaper's parent organization. The Gamecock Rosalind Harvey Editor in Chief Amy McCorm Kikl McCormick Viewpoints Editor Rebecca Whit Jennifer Stanley flews Editor Rob Undsey Marcus Amaker Features Editors Jennder Stanley Bryan Johnston Sports Editor Student Media Ellen Parsons ;s Director of Carolyn Griffii Student Media .. _ Jim ureen Lee Phippa Advertising Manager ?f|k jSherry F. Holmes Classified Ad Manager ' V, * J MlCCOClt (immunity since 1908 VL BOARD :y, Editor in Chief Viewpoints Editor 5 needs to be creatine use TVTr^HHBl There are readepartment s?n\1 be ?us r , about the use of create use with too . r. tine. It may cause care- dehydration; in fact, it may have conrestrict use tributed to the deaths ,.,tof three wrestlers. ouldntbe p , , n - , . J.11C 1UUU CU1U 1/lUg forsc oo. Administration has even issued a warning concerning the substance. Some sports teams have taken concerns over creatine's safety to heart, and have discouraged use among their players. Others widely encourage use of creatine. USC has taken few steps to ensure players' safety. Head trainer Rod Walters told The State that each player must be approved for creatine use by a physician, but this is not enough. The long term effects are not yet known; current creatine users are, to some extent, guinea pigs. We have no way of knowing what will happen to those athletes "loading" creatine. We should feel a little guilty that we are allowing our athletes to act as guinea pigs. It is as though we are sacrificing them for our own possible gain. The athletic department does not, in effect, take responsibility for the possible negative repercussions that will result from creatine use. The department is requiring students to sign a waiver excusing them from responsibility. We have a responsibility to protect our student athletes; hopefully, USC will adopt more prudent guidelines before someone gets hurt. mccock H99 i munity since 1908 y of South Carolina and is published Monday, Wednesday and ing the summer with the exception of university holidays and f the editors or author and not those of The University of South ; is the publisher of The Gamecock. The Department of Student All numbers area code 803 tck Photo Editor The Gamecock te Online Editor Editor 777-3914 Viewpoints 777-7726 Copy Editors news j 777.7726 ? Etc. 7773913 Sports 777-7182 On-line 777-2833 ' Business Manager Student Media Creative Director Advertising 777-1184 AH Classifieds 777-1184 Faculty Advisor Fgx 777^4g2 Office 777-3888 [EWPOI] The Gamecock We need Steven Yates Columnist "We are all slaves to our histories. If there is to be a bright future, we must learn to break those chains." - Delenn, Minbari Ambassador, Babylon 5. African Americans lament what they perceive as subtle (or not-sosubtle) forms of prejudice: "white flight," snubs from potential employers, rejected loan applications, etc. Whites sometimes complain bitterlv about affirmative action nrefer ences. Blacks respond that these aren't "preferences" at all but attempts to create a level playing field. They add that society cannot reverse the residual effects of more than 300 years of oppression and systematic discrimination with 30 or so years of affirmative action. Today's younger whites answer with this: "But we weren't there, 300 years ago. No one alive today owned slaves. I haven't personally discriminated against any black people." Blacks retort: "You still have advantages you don't even notice, simply because you are in the dominant group." Every so often, though, an act of racial violence occurs which is so startlingly heinous that it brings us all up short. Or ought to. The Gamecock will try to print all letters received. Letters should I livered by the author to The Gamecock newsroom in Russell House toon or space limitations. Names will not be withheld for any circumstance. To McCormickus "Not-a-cluelius" Erectus: Upon reading your recent absurdity, I was left with an uneasy feeling NTS c \ to reali I refer, of course, to the event a few weeks ago in Jasper, Texas, a town most of us never heard of before three white men were arrested for having dragged a black man to a gruesome death involving his decapitation. The three were connected to a white supremacist group. No white people in Jasper came to the defense of these men. The KKK showed up. What these whiterobed lunatics thought they were accomplishing is another good ques tion. Fortunately, just about everybody ignored them, as well as the militant black group which appeared. What would have been appropriate, however, would have been for both mainstream conservatives and Christian Coalition types to have denounced the violence. In particular, those of us who have previously criticized affirmative action programs in one context or another have a moral obligation here. Our obligation, whatever our politics, is to repudiate violence and racial hatred when they appear, not to score political points, but because opposing racism is the right thing to do. There is a sense in which we are slaves of our histories. Our attempts to escape these histories by political means haven't exactly been smashing successes. Hopefully we haven't 1333. M letters must include the author's telephone number. The & in my head (and stomach). It led me to one conclusion: "We mock what we can't understand." "I know he will show the same spirit fighting through this as he displayed on the football field." Dolphins coacb Jimmy Johnson on Wheeler's accident. Page 3 m - [ T Jp ^ allege press EXCHANGE I ly talk grown so cynical that we no longer are'willing to entertain the possibility that racism is a moral problem, not merely a political one. The Christian Coalition is wrong. We haven't lost our moral center, we never had one! We are still tiying to discover it. Breaking the chains of history was always fated to be hard. It's probably the hardest thing we have ever attempted. But that doesn't flhsnlvp lis nil nf 11s wViitp black,etc., of the responsibility to try and to keep trying. So can we stop tormenting one another and start talking? It ought to be clear that those struggling economically in this "booming economy" are more similar than we are different. We should be allies, not enemies. Fact is, I don't think we have a choice. With our rapidly changing demographics, if we don't create racial peace, we don't have a future. Not really. I don't think a soaring stock market is going to give us the answers, either. We either learn to i tallr QnH croi olnnrr ^ovnlnninrr i^noo VUAU UUU gVV ?AlUU^y UV>TVIU|/Ulg 1UV/UO and morals we need, or our society is I going to self-destruct. Oh, about the quote at the beginning of this column. It may seem strange that a character in a science fiction TV series has more to say than any of our real leaders, black or white. But then again, we five in strange times. amecock reserves the nght to edit aIt letter for style, possible libel Saying all NASCAR fans are rednecks is absurd! NASCAR is not only the FASTEST growing spectator LETTER page four