Historical Newspapers of South Carolina

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Viewpoints Staff members take on The View Last week, our esteemed Viewpoints editor went off on a tangent that some how connected every issue he had qualms with and related them to Larry King. This week, we decided to follow his enlightened lead. Miranda LaLonde and Ann Marie Miani are both journal ism juniors. They can be reached at Gamecock viewpoints® hotmail.com *Both take a sip of decaffeinated, low-fat Frappucino.* Miranda “Mir” LaLonde: Parking. Ann Marie “Mimi” Miani: Don’t even start. Starr Jones (from here on, known as SJ to avoid legal action): 1 don’t know that the University can legally take away all the parking. Barbara “Babs” Walters: Well, Starr, the University legally owns the University, so stringently, I think they can. Cocky “Cocky”: *Looks at Babs, then stares at camera. Waves.* Mir: Seriously, where are we sup posed to park? Babs: 1 found a parking spot without a problem. Mimi: Your police escort could have had something to do with that. SJ: Legally, that’s bordering slander ous, young lady. Cocky: *yawns, looks at watch* Mir What about average students? Mimi: You could ride your bike. SJ: What about the students who don’t have bikes? Don’t they have legal rights? Mimi: Yeah, the right to walk. Cocky: *chuckles, sends Mimi two thumbs up.* Mir Well, what about the morphing of our parking lots into green space? Babs: It looks resplendent. SJ: Huh? Mimi: Didn’t you people read my column?! Babs: No. I’m Barbara Walters. Mimi: Let me reiterate: Screw green space! SJ: Didn’t your mama teach you some respect? Cocky: Nooks at Mimi and gulps* Mimi: Don’t you drag Mama Miani into this. Babs: Ecologically, green space tran scends any of the negative effects of cars, therefore Minn: (cutting off Babs) I want a place to park my car, you stupid - Mir (cutting off Mimi) NEW sub ject! Mimi: OK, let’s talk about housing. Babs: When I was at a higher educa tional institution, 1 never had to inhabit a campus dorm room. Min It’s not fun. Mimi: Waking up in the middle of the night for fire drills and paying nearly $2,000 for some on-campus housing is just ridiculous. I could put a down payment on a house for what East Quad costs per year. Cocky. *Nods head in agreement* Min *singing* Movin ’ on up... SJ: *singing as only a lawyer could* Movin' on up.... Mimi: *doing the George Jefferson walk and singing* to the East Quad! Babs: *stands and uses Evian bottle for mike* to that DEE-lux apart ment... i^ucKy. ' snaK.es tail learners ana starts grinding with Babs.* Min Do you know what a Palmetto bug is? *Babs and Cocky sit down. Babs and SJ shake their heads* Mimi: Whit until the sun goes down and walk into any of the crappy buildings on campus. Mir: They’ll be the gargantuan roaches flying at you. SJ: Anyone else hungry? Mimi: No, we have one of the worst cafeterias in the country. SJ: Let’s order out... something with French bread... mmm mmm. Min We’re on college budgets. Babs: Well, then order cake. Min *cockseyebrow at Babs* SJ: *Reaches for chicken wing from KFC bucket* Cocky; *Shakes finger at SJ * Mimi; Cocky’s a vegetarian. SJ: *smacks lips and takes huge bite from a chicken wing.* Mmmmm....* Cocky jumps out of chair and over coffee table.* Mir Well, with two members of our forum escorted out by security, I suggest we wrap this up. What have we accomplished here today? Babs: We have learned that today’s collegiate society at USC is dimin ishing with its reputation and drive. Such a sad occurrence. Mimi: Hey, Babs, could you please speak English? Babs: We have also learned that there is a depreciation in the com prehension of language among eng lish and journalism students. Mr *stands up and smacks Babs* You know what, Babs, I’m not going to cry like you want me to: I’m sick of you. Let’s just call it a night ... SHOW OVER! ♦Music plays, Babs leaves set, weep ing. Cocky and SJ still fight with police in the background.* When in doubt, blame society Y - ^hese days I nothing A. is any body’s fault. If somebody runs into an office building and shoots 27 peo ple, it’s not their fault. Yet Matt Gordon is a guest colum nist to view points. He can be reached at gamecockview points@hotmail. com somehow, in this culture of mis placed blame, it was John Rocker’s fault. It’s obvious he is mentally dis turbed, can’t control his anger, is uneducated, minority hating, and he probably watches too much NASCAR, too. At least that’s what most of the country thinks. It’s not his fault. If nothing is any body’s fault, then Rocker’s ill-fated comments in Sports Illustrated were clearly not made of his own volition. Let’s explore the reasons why John Rocker is just a pawn of society. First of all, his hate of New York is clearly a psychological sickness. Moreover, it’s a psychological sick ness brought on by those oppressive, Brave-hating New York baseball fans. In my book, the city of New York should pay reparations to Mr Rocker and his family for the wrong that was done to them. Secondly, his apparent personal rage that manifested itself in the SI * article is not his fault. Rather, it is a product of the Yankees beating my beloved Atlanta Braves like rented mules in the ‘99 World Series. In light of the emotional trauma this event caused Mr. Rocker, I believe we should re-evaluate the system that caused this emotional break down. After all, isn’t competition just a ploy foisted on us by the capi talist paternalist system to make us believe that some of us are better than others? Why can’t we all just get along? Why submit ourselves to that dirty Republican idea of compe tition? Surely Mr. Rocker would have been much happier if we had n’t kept score in the Series. All his suppressed rage would have turned into love and warm fuzzies. He might have run up and kissed George Steinbrenner. You never know. finally, 1 m sure his apparent dis like of foreigners is also not his fault. In fact, it’s the result of not enough education about foreign people. If he got to know them, he’d learn to love them. Or maybe his parents taught him to hate foreign people. Sure, that’s it; his parents taught him to hate people not like him. It’s gotta be their fault. After all, they go to church, and we all know church doesn’t teach people to be tolerant - only MTV does. Whew. I’m glad I got all that lib eral gobbledy-gook out of me. In case, you couldn’t tell, this column had two purposes. Number one, it was a feeble attempt at humor. Number two, it was an attempt to place John Rocker’s unfortunate public comments within the current liberal rubric of “blame it on some body else.” Whs it Clinton’s fault he performed illicit sexual acts with Monica Lewinsky? Heck, no - she’s just so dam cute. Point is, was it John Rocker’s fault he said the things he said? Yes, absolutely. And at least he was'man enough to face his team, the Braves organization, the city of Atlanta, and the world and apologize for what he did. He didn’t banter with lawyers for hours as to what “is” meant, he didn’t play dumb that he had no idea there was anything wrong with what he said, he came out and apologized. Still, we’re ready to string him up while we let congenital liars run the COUNTRY in Washington. He’s a ballplayer who made stupid mistakes and apologized for them. Give him the ball and send his 98-MPH fast ball to the mound. Now, if you catch him with an improperly placed cigar and an intern while he’s on the phone with a Congressman, that’s a different story... Mr. Gordon is an Atlanta Braves fan who cried like a baby when the Braves lost to the Yankees in the 1999 World Series. Not really. He just blamed the loss on the fact that the Yankees had too many foreign ers on their team. How’d they all get in this country anyway? Would You Accept $20 to Save Kids'Lives? 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