The gamecock. (Columbia, S.C.) 1908-2006, August 27, 1999, Page 6, Image 6
Quote, Unquote
‘We basically pull up the slack for the rest of the
radio stations around here.'
Jason Paddock, station manager, WUSC-FM
Ffodav, August 27,1999
Whc 0amcoch
Serving the Carolina Community since 1Q08
Editorial Board
Sara Ladenheim • Editor in Chief
Kenley Young • Managing Editor'
Emily Streyer • Viewpoints Editor
Corey Ford • Assistant Viewpoints Editor
Brad Walters • Editorial Contributor
-1
Dorm rules should
apply to all students
In Capstone, one of the most requested dorms on campus, stu
dents in previous years lived in a coed environment, bonding
over such trials as window locks (despite uncontrollable heat
ing and air-conditioning units), no sprinkler system and the many
fire drills throughout the year.
This semester, the bonding has been replaced by wide resent
ment towards its lower-floor residents. Honors College students
are now grouped together there for their sophomore years, much
in the same way many are housed in Maxcy College their fresh
man years. Many upperclassmen not listed on the Honors College
scrolls were given a one-way trip to LaBorde, among other places,
once this measure took effect.
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nient lower levels of Capstone, but they were also granted the
privilege of having the window locks removed, adding fresh air to
their learning environment. Non-honors students must first per
form community service (picking up the trash around Capstone, as
trash thrown from open windows is the reason administrators give
for keeping them locked) before having their locks removed. Hon
ors College students receive this privilege but for the asking; the
implication apparently is that non-honors students cannot control
the impulse to jettison cups and other debris from their windows.
Specialty housing is wonderful if the circumstances surrounding
it are fair. NADA, Preston and the Horseshoe are prime examples
of successful specialty housing assignments. Capstone’s situation
this fall sends a dangerous message to non-honors students that
their status as equal members of the student body is in jeopardy.
The university can provide housing incentives to attract stu
dents to the Honors College without doing wrong by the rest of
the student body. We realize that, to some extent, it is important
to offer Honors College students prime housing all four years, and
that students who don’t get their housing preferences are bound to
nurture resentments, but to make separate rules for groups of stu
dents living in the same dorm is antagonistic. It crosses a line.
For fairness’ sake, take the locks off all the windows in Cap
stone.
USC's e-bookstore
great for students
USC’s Visual Information Processing Web page has a new ad
dition to the academics menu: USC has established a link to
ecampus.com, a virtual college bookstore Web site.
When users click on the ecampus.com link, they’re taken im
mediately to a page that lists the classes for which they’ve regis
tered and provides a list of required books and their prices, which
are, in many instances, noticeably cheaper than area bookstores.
Good job, USC! Finally, students have an easy-to-fmd alterna
tive to standing in long lines. It’s a win-win situation for everyone
- University Bookstore gets a percentage of the online sales at
ecampus.com, and students save money.
Of course, that doesn’t mean that the system isn’t trouble-free
or that you should look only on ecampus.com for books. Just like
any other bookstore, ecampus.com might not have a used book
available that one of the “bricks-and-mortar” bookstores does car
ry. It’s still important to shop around, but the university deserves
our gratitude for giving students an extra place to go for books.
About Us
The Gamecock is the student newspaper of The University of South Carolina and 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 activities fees.
Address
The Gamecock
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Submission Policy
Letters to the editor or guest columns are wel
come from all members of the Carolina community.
Letters should be 250-300 words. Guest columns
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Both must include name, phone number, profes
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be provided by the submitter.
Call 777-7726 for more information.
k i
The Gamecock
Sara Ladenheim
Editor in Chief
Kenley Young
Managing Editor
Emily Streyer
Viewpoints Editor
Kevin Langston
Brock Vergakis
News Editors
Clayton Kale
Associate News Editor
Kristin Freestate
Copy Desk Chief
Rachel Helwig
EtCetera Editor
Todd Money
Sports Editor
Sean Rayford
Photo Editor
Rob Lindsey
Encore Editor
John Hueitt
City Desk Chief
Student Media
Ellen Parsons
Director of
Student Media
Lee Phipps
Advertising Manager
Susan King
Creative Services
Director
Betsy Martin
Julie Burnett
Chris Black
Will Gillaspy
Online Editor
Corey Ford
Asst. Viewpoints
Editor
Ann Marie Miani
Asst. Etc. Editor
Jared Kelowitz
Asst. Sports Editor
Casey Williams
Asst.On-Line Editor
Greg Farley
Asst. Photo Editor
Brad Walters
Graphics Copy Editor.
Editorial Contributor
MacKenzie Craven
David Clonninger
Charlie Wallace
Phillip Burt
Senior Writers
Kathy VanNostrand
Creative Sen/ices
Sherry Holmes
Classified Manager
Carolyn Griffin
Business Manager
Erik Collins
Faculty Advisor
Jonathan Dunagin
Graduate Assistant
College Press Exchange
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National Issues
Solution to violence threefold
Wichools I I
opening .
in past weeks, I
have involuntari- 5
ly wondered 1
when and where
the first shooting
will occur. It’s a | \
morbid question, .
but after last year, Wki McCormick
we had best be is a week|y colum
preparecL Trouble nist, appearing
is, we as a society each Friday. She
failed to find an- can be reached via
swers to the ques- The Gamecock at
tions raised by the gckviews@sc.edu
Columbine ___...
tragedy and sub
sequent spate of
copycat crimes. Worse, we failed to reach
a comprehensive solution. Instead,
we’ve got Band-Aids like Dutch Fork’s
see-through backpacks and that silly Ten
Commandments bill.
I’ve been bewildered at the bewil
derment of others over school shootings.
We all stumbled around for a few weeks
asking how such things could happen. So
I wonder...
If we took kindling, doused it with
lighter fluid, struck a match and placed it
on the kindling, would we all wander around
with our heads in our hands wonderine how
the fire started?
Of course not. We know that when
those factors fall into place, a fire erupts.
We’ve got that concept, then: A conflu
ence of certain factors is likely to produce
a certain outcome. Sure, obstacles can
change the outcome; say, for instance, the
lighter fluid wasn’t easy to obtain, or the
kindling was damp. Of course, the situa
tion can still exist without a factor; for
instance, if the lighter fluid is unavail
able, the kindling might still bum. Or you
could substitute gasoline. Still, the idea is
sound, so we will repeat it. A confluence
of certain factors is likely to produce a cer
tain outcome.
So why are we surprised when kids
who are given little reason to value
themselves, and whose minds are shaped
by violent images, and who have easy ac
cess to guns, start shooting?
We don’t talk about the confluence
enough. We end up isolating factors and
discussing them as if they alone cause shoot
ings. It is a waste of time to argue over
which factor causes this sort of violence.
Not one of them causes it. They enable
it. Those are two very different concepts.
The presence of kindling does not cause
a fire. But the fire could not blaze without
some matter to bum. It simply provides a
necessary ingredient.
So we must analyze these ingredients
individually to determine how they can be
made less likely to become part of a dead
ly mix.
One factor we blame is the availabili
ty of guns. The gun lobby insists, quite
rightly, that the presence of guns does not
make people shoot them at others. And
Rosie O’Donnell and company realize,
quite rightly, that shootings are much
less likely to occur with gun control mea
sures in place.
Guns are analogous to the lighter flu
id here. People who want to kill can do so
without guns. They can always look up
bomb recipes on the Web. But the crux
is this: Restricting access to guns makes
killing more difficult. Lack of availability
presents an important obstacle, which might
-just might - prevent a tragedy. There
fore, some meaningful form of gun con
trol is Step Number One in our solution to
school violence.
Next, we have to examine how kids’
minds are molded. Let me explain how this
to remove hair, the information she has
gathered watching me will become useful
to her and she will really shave. In the
meantime, she tries to practice when she
gets a chance.
It is thus with violent media images.
Kids spend hours daily watching shootouts
in TV shows and movies, and “practicing”
shooting with video games. So when that
rare kid comes along who actually wants
to kill people, he has a paradigm for go
ing about doing so. His first instinct is to
find a gun and shoot it.
If his brain has not seen this done hun
dreds of times, using a gun might still oc
cur to him, but it will be a much more alien
notion and seem like less of a possible re
ality. Then he might settle his differences
in a less deadly way, such as a fistfight.
So Step Two is twofold: Violent im
ages must be removed and replaced with
more wholesome conflict-resolution sce
narios. The burden lies partly with the en
tertainment industry, which should self
regulate to make its products more
responsible. And the burden lies with par
ents, who out of laziness allow children to
be raised by the tube. And schools should
teach conflict resolution and require stu
dents to hold themselves to a high standard
of conduct. No child should be forced to
go to a school where he is daily taunted,
even if he doesn’t show violent tenden
Step Three involves a factor that hasn’t
really been widely discussed, but which is
perhaps the most important. The fact is
that adolescents today have little to do to
make themselves feel useful. They are told
by society that the job of a teen-ager is to
be cool and have fun. When they aren’t
fulfilled, or when this silly dream doesn’t
come true for them, they get upset and
wonder why they are left out. This leads
them to seek solace in the wrong things.
Teens need a way to use their talents
for the better good. Work that teaches and
requires skills, or work that benefits oth
ers, gives them feelings of usefulness and
competence that increase their self-es
teems, leaving them stronger people who
can better deal with the stresses of grow
ing up.
And it eats up their TV-watching time.
There are probably other, smaller fac
tors, but I’m betting that if we as a society
sufficiently addressed those listed here,
we’d have a more well-adjusted, less vio
lent teen population.
‘A confluence of cer
tain factors is likely to
produce a certain out
come.’
works, using my daughter as an example,
because it is analogous and because I like
to talk about her whenever I find an ex
cuse.
My 2-year-old daughter cut herself try
ing to shave yesterday. She soaped up her
little legs and proceeded to scrape until it
hurt.
She did not think her legs unsightly;
she probably doesn’t even realize that hair
removal is involved. She just went through
the motions because she has seen Mom
my do it. She can’t imagine that there is a
reason for it. It is just an act that has im
printed itself on her little brain as “some
thing people do,” simply because she has
seen it done.
Later, when she has actual motivation
Letters
Ventura formerly in the
navy, not in the army
To the Editor
America used to be a place where you
could freely criticize people if you had a
fair reason to. Unfortunately, it has be
come a haven for morons like Mark Pi
nts to criticize people without even giv
ing them the common courtesy to leant
who they are [“Ventura a politician after
all,” Aug. 25]. Anybody with half of a po
litical pulse should know that Jesse Ven
tura was a Navy SEAL - not Army Spe
cial Forces. I hope he fine-tunes his literary
focus to collecting the facts instead of pre
senting material that was obviously hap
hazardly composed and poorly thought
out. If he doesn’t, in the future, it may be
he whose “credibility will surely suffer.”
Rob Beatty
Medical Student
To the Editor
Jesse Ventura did not serve in the U.S.
Army with the Special Forces. He
served in the Navy with the SEALs. I know
this factual error doesn’t change the argu
ment, but it does cause me to wonder if
Mark Piras really did his homework and
knows the subject matter.
Mark Jeffris
International Studies Graduate Student
GOP can’t complain
about media this time
To the Editor
I recently read Corey Ford’s article in The
Giuiiecock [“Time to end media scrutiny,”
Aug. 25], and let me start off by saying I
agree totally with the fact that candidates’
personal lives don’t belong in the media.
They never have, and they never should
be!
However, Mr. Ford doesn’t have the
right to criticize President William Jef
ferson Clinton for doing the same petty
maneuvers that the Republican Party pulled
off with the “I didn’t inhale” incident in
an attempt to kill his popularity with the
public. Mr. Ford’s party spent the better
part of $73 million ($73.4)! For what, may
I ask? To investigate a MAN’S private sex
life. Then Mr. Ford’s party has the gall
to use the most vile, dirty and malicious
stunt: to have a declaration of impeach
ment issued to the White House because
of a “sexual” affair. Then, against the will
of the people, the Republican House im
peached William Jefferson Clinton know
ing that the public, whom these idiots are
serving, doesn’t want an impeachment
hearing and that the U.S. Senate will not
pass the vote.
So please, Mr. Ford, don’t you dare say
Bill Clinton doesn’t have the right to bring
up Bush’s past, because that’s kind of hyp
ocritical for a Republican to say after all
they dug up on the president. In conclu
sion, I'd just like to say that the castration
of President Clinton’s admittance to in
haling should be nowhere near the light
ness that should be taken with Gov. Bush’s
refusal to answer questions of his drug use
right out.
David J. Breslin
Computer Engineering Freshman
Society Issues
Most don't
need SUVs
to pick up
loaf of bread
If Abercrombie
& Fitch were
selling
neutered puppy
heads as ear
muffs, half of you
would be wearing
them today.
The need to
drive a tank into _ . _. ,
. r , Paul Blake
work five days a
week seems to be >s a biweekly
a trend in the up- columnist. He can
per-class suburbs be reached via
of America. Very The Gamecock at
few people car- gckviews@sc.edu
pool, and the
High Occupancy Vehicle lanes remain
empty (or full of violators with man
nequins). No one seems to be thinking
about the future. Every time I make a trip
in my Geo, I am reminded of “advanced”
societies’ lack of concern for others and
for the environment. Motor vehicles are
responsible for an estimated 20 percent to
25 percent of the world’s carbon dioxide
emissions from fossil fuel use, and they’re
therefore principal contributors to global
warming. So the bigger and less fuel-effi
cient your car is, the more you contribute
to global warming and pollute our breath
ing air, not to mention that you’re being
an annoyance on the road.
While the environment worsens, car
companies from Lexus to Nissan contin
ue to produce “bigger and better” vehi
cles that use more and more gasoline.
Just recently, Ford released the largest
SUV ever, weighing almost four tons and
stretching 19 feet in length. While it’s
sure to raise the quality of life in Saudi
Arabia, it is certainly ticking me off here.
At 10 to 15 miles to the gallon, some say
it’s so powerful that it can pass anything
but a gas station.
Between 1988 and 1990, the fuel ef
ficiency of new U.S. cars declined by 4
percent; Asian models (from Japan and
Korea) declined by 6 percent over the
same period. Furthermore, the new-car
fleet (domestics and imports) showed a 6
percent weight gain and a 10 percent in
crease in horsepower. According to the
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency,
“... if this backslide continues, problems
with nationwide fuel consumption will
increase, and global warming trends will
worsen at a pace faster than is generally
being assumed by analysts.”
lhese huge vehicles are hazardous on
the road and should require commercial
driver’s licenses. They block all visibility
for normal-size vehicles and blind you at
night when they come up behind you
with the beams of a 747. Some people say
they purchase these vehicles to “feel
safe,” yet SUVs are three times more
likely to flip over and go out of control
than other vehicles.
The anti-lock braking systems in
these vehicles are also a safety concern.
The number of accidents blamed by con
sumers on the alleged brake defects is
more than 3,550. However, more than
15,000 consumers have complained - a
record for the National Highway Traffic
Safety Administration.
According to Consumer Reports
magazine, more people have been killed
in crashes between a car and a light truck
(such as an SUV) than in crashes between
two cars. So while you may feel safer, the
rest of us in normal-size vehicles are join
ing you in being less safe, just so you can
feel cool when you hop a curb. Notice
how manufacturers’ advertisements em
phasize power, speed and luxury, and
rarely mention fuel efficiency or safety.
SUV ads often include the truck out in
the wilderness, sometimes on a mountain
overlooking streams and forests. Ironical
ly, these are the same streams and forests
being destroyed by the SUV that never
leaves the pavement. The roads have
been paved since Eisenhower, so it is not
necessary for larger-than-life 4x4s and
SUVs to get people from 12th Street to
18th Street for a loaf of cinnamon raisin
bread
I can’t wait until there’s agas crisis in
this country, because I’ll be laughing my
tailpipe off, from the bank to the gas sta
tion, waving to you in my Geo Prizm. I
probably shouldn’t be so harsh - you
' could easily take my life at that moment.
Emissions and polluting the environ
ment probably don’t matter to you any- .
way; you can always just pay $1.50 for 12
ounces of purified bottled water. Keep it
up <uid look for boxed air for $3.50, on
sale soon.