The gamecock. (Columbia, S.C.) 1908-2006, September 18, 2000, Page 6, Image 6
* &l ^ ' Quote, Unquote
The great players are the ones that you walk back to
( the locker room after practice and say, “did you see
k what he did today?’”
I J
w
' Coach Lou Holtz on running back Derek Watson’s performance this season
Page 6 'Che (59111 CCOCk Monday, September 18, 2000
Whe (damecock
Serving thJ Carolina Community since 1Q08
Editorial Board
Brock Vergakis • Editor in Chief
Kevin Langston • Viewpoints Editor
Nathan White • Asst. Viewpoints Editor
Patrick Rathbun • Editorial Contributor
Brad Walters • Editorial Contributor
SG narrowly rejects
discriminatory bill
Student Government on Wednesday narrowly rejected a reso
lution that would have given parking priorities in Bull Street
and Blossom Street garages to on-campus students who live
near them.
Had student senate passed the resolution, it would have set a
disturbing precedent of granting on-campus students special privi
leges while discriminating against those who live off campus.
If anything, students who live off campus deserve parking pri
orities in garages, because they’re the ones who have to drive to
get to class.
besides, at night, there are plenty ot garage spaces to go
around, particularly in Bull Street garage. The real issue has been,
and will continue to be, the safety of the garages themselves at
night.
Passing the resolution would have given students a false sense
of security in walking alone. Students who park in garages should
still travel in groups, no matter how close they’re parked to their
residence halls.
It’s scary to think that, had one vote swung the other way, the
resolution would have been passed and on its way to President
John Palms’ desk for approval. Thankfully, a majority of voting
senators remembered they were not elected to represent the
wishes of on-campus students - they were elected to represent
the wishes of their respective colleges.
We’re glad they voted the way they did. The current lottery
system - while not flawless - is the best way to ensure fairness in
doling out garage spaces. -
Price for goalpost piece
ridiculously inflated
e are three games into the football season, and already
we have more to celebrate than we’ve had in the past
two years. We’ve seen two streaks end and and two sets
of goalposts come down.
Some of our fellow students are not only sei7;ng the moment,
but they’re also trying to make a profit from it. A 13-inch piece of
goalpost taken down during the Georgia victory is selling on
www.cBay.com, a popular Internet auction site, for more than
$150.
We don’t doubt other pieces are going for similar prices around
campus. Why? These mementos are not going to be worth any
thing in the future. It might be of some personal value, but
weren’t there pompoms at the game? They were free and serve as
a similar reminder of the game. While we endorse team spirit and
the preservation of such a memorable victory, we don’t under
stand the high price they’re asking for these goalpost pieces. There
will be no monetary value applied to these pieces, so why pay so
much for them?
It was a clever move by the students to sell these pieces while
they’re still in demand, but they are obviously taking advantage of
these students. We should probably expect this from a university
that boasts one of the finest business colleges.
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
newsoaoer's Darent organization. The Gamecock is supported in part by student activities fees.
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should be 250-300 words. Guest columns should be an
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The Gamecock
Brock Vergakis Amy Goulding
Editor in Chief Sean Rayford
Brandon Larrabee Photo Editors
University Editor John Bailey
John Huiett Asst City/State Editor
City/State Editor Charles prashaw
Kevin Langston Amanda Silva
Viewpoints Editor Asst. University Editors
Jared Kelowitz Nathan White
Daytime Sports Editor Asst Viewpoints Editor
*yl* , MacKenzie Craven
Night Sports Editor „ .... _
Meredith Davis
Jason Harmon Asst. Spotlight Editor
Brad Walters
Martha Wright Miranda LaLonde
Copy Editors Ann Marie Miani
Design Editors
Student Media
Erik Collins Robyn Gombar
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Ellen Parsons Brantley Roper
Director of N.co e Russe
Student Med.a Adverting Staff
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# sw-^,=i£'r*L't,eV
(a'Us—
I Jr -v«u&v(rier
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/“■ ■ ■
translation:
Colon, care, is
HIGH ON TttE GOVERNORS
LIST OF HEALTH
PRIORITIES.
1 IPPING ETHICS
Tipping for the passive-aggressive
For too
long, 1
have stum
bled, in my own
passive-aggressive
"'ay, through the
social custom of
tipping.
I imagine that
many, like me,
have attempted to
master the ritual
of tipping with
out a suitable
guide or compass
to the act.
With this in
mind, I have in
vented a guide to
tinniiej — with the
peripheral help of some friends (hereafter
called the Commune).
Fotgi ve the bul leted catalog - consid
er it a journalistic attempt at Walt Whit
man’s interminable lists.
Scenario One: Condescension. This is
it problem when you’re in college. You go
to a restaurant, and based on your mien
and perceived socioeconomic status, the
wait staff decides you don’t belong
there.
Henceforth, your drink refills are pri
oritized after the plentiful wine orders of
the bourgeois couple to your right.
As a lip, I suggest the lowest possible
amount - for me, that’s 5 percent. Con
descension is the gravest of all wait staff
sins, but Pm too passive-aggressive to leave
nothing.
Scenario Two: The Dinner Theater
Conundrum. A real-life tipping ordeal oc
curred with the Commune and me in Gife
and Then Some in Greenville, S.C. We had
enjoyed the show - laughing and crying in
appropriate places.
Yet, when the bill came, we had this
question: Do we tip our waiter for only
the food he served, or for the cover charge
as well?
Ultimately, we decided to exclude the
cover charge, seeing as he had not per
formed with the grace and subversive wit
of the Cafe and Then Some Players.
Scenario Three: A flirty waitperson
makes sport of your dining companion.
There is no good way to deal with this sit
uation. If you blame the waitperson, you’re
being passive-aggressive, refusing to ac
cept it was your significant other, who took
a vow to you, who has really blundered.
Your inclination is to repeatedly slam
the waitperson’s fade against the table as
he or she gives you your check. This is not
only illegal, but also immoral. Nor
would 1 suggest physical violence against
your significant other.
Again, I suggest the passive-aggressive
route - tip well, but remember this meal
for your next blow-out fight.
Scenario Four: Your waiter has a swasti
ka tattoo on his hand. Strange as it might
seem, this happened at an all-night diner
in Seneca, S.C., my hometown.
The Commune was in partial atten
dance that night - Joe and I were eating
together, looking for late-night Belgian
waffles. As soon as the waiter put our or
der on the table, we noticed there was a
swastika branded on the fleshy skin be
tween his thumb and index finger. Wfe made
eye contact - looking at one another silent
ly as he arranged our silverware with ex
pert flair.
He was a good waiter - therein was
the root of our problem. Had he been a
bad waiter with a swastika tattooed on his
hand, we would have no questions regarding
our course of action.
We also wondered if he were making
some attempt at that often-abused con
cept: irony. He was Latino - Nazi sym
pathies are evil enough when found in one
of Hitler’s chosen, and further self-de
feating when found in ;ui ethnic minority.
We didn’t know what to do.
Liter, my brother suggested we should
have left seven pennies in a swastika for
mation on the table, so he’d not only get
i bad tip but also know why he got it. At
llie time, we had no such clever ideas and
left our usual percentage: evidence of our
need for assertiveness training and not pos
sible neoNazi sympathies.
Jennie Lightweis
is a senior
English major. She
writes every
Monday. She can
be reached at
gamecockview
points@hotmail.
com.
L E T T E R s
Opening Greene
Street gates not risky
To the editor
Your section is the reason I pick up
The Gamecock every day it is published.
It’s not really a good reason, though;
to be more specific, I read Viewpoints be
cause 1 am virtually guaranteed to see a
piece that makes me angry.
Today, Sept. 15, was no exception.
Since it was deemed necessary to have a
second editorial on the Greene Street gates,
as if the first wasn’t useless enough, I de
cided to take special offense to this one. -
The danger of removing the gates dur
ing the day is much less than the editori
al states. Since whomever wrote it obvi
ously didn’t know, the proposition to open
the gates carried along with it a reduced
speed limit, perhaps as slow as 5 mph. As
anyone who has crossed the street at around
3:45 would know, since they open the gates
early now anyway, it’s not really feasible
logo any faster than that down Greene in
the middle to late afternoon.
Why not open it during the day? No
one will use it anyway. Ami as for where
to put carnivals, bands and the like, 1 seem
to recall a courtyard behind the Russell
House that would serve nicely and did.
in fact, serve on several occasions when
I was a freshman.
You people might want to do more re
search in the future, since it seems to me
that misinformation is a trend in the edi
torials iuitl some of the columns. Or don’t;
bad editorials are much more fun tc
read.
Wally Altman
Junior, Math Major
Maurice Bessinger
still a racist
To the editor
Maurice Bessinger is no less a racisi
today than he was in the 1950s and 60'
when he refused to serve black people ir
his restaurants. One afternoon back then
my younger sister and I had been shopping
downtown in Columbia and were waiting
to catch a bus home. The Ku Klux Klan
in full regalia, came marching up Mail
Street. It was so frightening and intimi
dating that we quickly went around the
comer and took a taxicab.
Klan support of Bessinger’s white su
premacy had a powerful impact on me and
greatly increased my awareness of racism.
I didn’t see any people of color that day,
but my own reaction to such a show of
white-hooded menace was so strong that
I can only begin to imagine what it must
have been like for the black community.
My husband and I do not buy Piggy
Park barbecue, and we share our concerns
with numerous friends and out-of-town
guests. We worked to remove the Con
federate flag from our State Capitol. Since
Bessinger is now flying this flag at his restau
rants and selling literature to justify slav
ery, we arc now taking our concern to an
other level. We are calling on managers
and customer relations people of grocery
stores where we shop and risking they re
move Bessinger’s products from their
shelves. Join us and ask your grocer to stop
selling racism in a bottle.
Rebecca Burgess Rogers
Chairperson, Carolina Peace Resource
Center
---——1
Get published in ®7?f (SttJTlCCOClu
Bring your letters, sample columns and editorial cartoons
to Room 333 in the Russell House, or write us at:
gamecockvieivpoints@hotmail.com
USC Football ^
Improving
the USC
football
experience
As I’ve
been re
flecting on
how we’re 3-0 in
football and our
school is awesome
and all that jazz, I
started thinking
about things that
could make USC
football games even
better.
First, that
whole cheer thing
going down in the
student section has
got to go. There
were several factors last game that led
me to this conclusion. The first mid most
terrifying was the unexpected (mid un
necessary) return of the creature they (■
call Ace. I brought my three-year-old
niece to .the game for the first time, mid
when Ace started gyrating on that dumb
stage, she started crying. That made me
mad because 1 remember crying the first
time I saw him when I was a freshman.
Ace, go away!
Second, that cheerleading wanker
who thinks he’s The Rock has got to go.
Hey, buddy, you’re a tool. Can you smell
what I’m cookin’? Just do your cart
wheels and fling those 60-pound beau
ties in the air. No love for you, either.
Third on the hit list is the hot babe
who has replaced Ace. She doesn’t have
to go - quite the opposite - but her (f
microphone privileges are done. Here’s
why: Late in the fourth, she was cheer
ing for a score while we were punting,
but I am going to give her the benefit of
the doubt mid put 100 percent blame on
the microphone. I’ll call it “The Mi
crophone of Incoherence.” Whoever
speaks into it immediately becomes
dumb. So the microphone and its cor
rupting influence on our female fan sup
port coordinator has got to go.
She stays. In place of cheering there
will be lots and lots of jumping. And
speaking of jumping, the wooden stage
will be replaced with a trampoline. I got
three words for you: The Man Show. 0
Yes sir, it’ll be USC’s version of The
Man Show’s sophisticated and articu
miv
Tliere are otlier tilings I would change
as well. I would have the police grab by
the hair people who plop on the stairs
or walkway ;irca to watch the game and
then haul them to the end zone, shoot
them and toss their aircasses in the lietkres
for fertilizer. You people suck. When I
have to piss, I don’t want to fight my
way to the restrooms for 40 minutes.
The troughs are bad enough -1 need all **
my strength when I get there. I don’t
have eneigy to waste on you tools.
Another thing I would get rid of is
the whole “ticket system.” I don’t much
like tickets, and I suffer from turn
; stileaphobia. If you want to watch the
! ‘Cocks play, you shouldn’t have to have
a ticket. No more tickets. They got to
go. Profits, schmofits. If the Athletics
Department wants to make some mon
! ey, set up a collegiate sports betting ring.
I know plenty of folks who’ll get in on
that. I’ll set you up with some of my
people in the Caymans.
If these changes arc made, I guaran-w
tec the games will be a lot more enjoy
able for all of us after that, especially for
my thrcc-yca--old niece. She loves t-ram
po lines.
Nathan White
is a senior politi
cal science and
history major. He
writes a column
every Monday. He
can be reached
at gamecockview
pointsOhotmail.
com.