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^ THE GAMECOCK ♦ Friday. April 18, 2003 5 SOUNDOFF TT'V|TTT'|/r>V“ VTmO ONLINE POLL Create message boards at I B—^ fl /B / B fl fl I Who should get www.dailygamecock.com or fl fl 1 i B/ B/ I fl fl fl l ^B priority housing at USC? send letters to the editor to I I i W W I \ W B III www.dailygamecock.com gamecockviewpoints@hotmail.com M —m 4 ¥ ¥ —I— ^ ' —■— ' '—S IN OUR OPINION i Don't build giant fetus % Visitors on State House grounds will soon greet a 6 foot tall statue of an unborn child — if a joint resolution makes it through the South Carolina Legislature. The bill even mandates that the memorial for unborn children be visible from the roadway. This statue would help no one. A tacky display wouldn’t just make everyone’s morning a little harder to bear; it could also deter tourists from visiting the Columbia metro area. Anti-abortion groups themselves have nothing to gain. Building any monument assumes that the battle is over, but for abortion groups, it won’t end until abortion is illegal. Rather than sympathy, a giant fetus would instead inspire jokes about their cause. Furthermore, the construction of this monument would open a can of worms. If the anti-abortion lobby builds the statue, others, too, will want to get in their 2 square feet Having granted one dubious monument already, the Legislature would have no reason to deny other groups. The State House isn’t a park dedicated to its preferred political groups — nor an exhibit of modern art. With state budget funds scarce, the blouse doesn’t need to build a giant fetus. A grotesque memorial to unborn children would help no one, including anti-abortion %r°uPS- If the battle continues, what is there to memorialize? Gamecock Quotables “I just want to tell Zach and Ben that I’m very excited about this year. I can’t think of anything better than working with two attractive males like yourselves.” KATIE DREILING NEW STUDENT GOVERNMENT PRESIDENT ON NEXT YEAR “It can be the biggest piece of junk, and somebody will still want to steal it.” 4 LT. HENRY GARBADE ^ USC POLICE DEPARTMENT OFFICER ON BICYCLE THEFT ON CAMPUS “It’s not the press that gives you freedom of speech; it’s the soldier.” SEN. JAKE KNOTTS, R-LEXINGTON AT A PRO-TROOPS RALLY ON DAVIS FIELD “Sometimes, you just got to put the blinders on and do your own thing.” ANDY BRADLEY use DIVER ON COMPETING “I remember screaming that it was so hot and that my hair was on fire.” JENNIFER LEHREN OHIO STATE UNIVERSITY STUDENT ON THE FIRE THAT KILLED FIVE PEOPLE AT OSH GAMECOCK CORRECTIONS A story in Monday's paper incorrectly reported that the School of Library and Information Science and the Public History Program are the first university units to use the two-way video courses for distance education. The College of Engineering and Information Technology has used the video courses for two years. If you see an error in today’s paper, we want to know. E-mail us at gamecockviewpoints@hotmail.com. ABOUT THE GAMECOCK 4 I Editor in Chief Jill Martin Managing Editor Charles Tomlinson News Editor Adam Beam Asst. News Editor Wendy Jeffcoat Viewpoints Editor Erin O’Neal The Mix Editor Corey Garriott Asst. The Mix Editor Meg Moore Sports Editor Matt Rothenberg Asst. Sports Editor Brad Senkiw Photo Editor Johnny Haynes Asst. Photo Editor Morgan Ford ^ I Head Page Designers Sarah McLaulin, Katie Smith, David Stagg Page Designers Justin Bajan, Samantha Hall, Staci Jordan. Julia Knetzer, Shawn Rourk Slot Copy Editors Crystal Boyles, Tricia Ridgway, Emma Ritch Copy Editors Jessica Foster, Alyson Goff, Mary Waters Online Editor B&ssam Khadraoui Community Affairs Kiran Shah CONTACT INFORMATION Offices on third floor of the Russell House. Editor in Chief: gamecockeditor@hotmail.com News: gamecockudesk@hotmail.com Viewpoints: gamecockviewpoints@hotmail.com The Mix: gamecockmixeditor@hotmail.com Sports: gamecocksports@hotmail.com Public Affairs: gckpublicaffairs@hotmail.com Online: www.dailygamecock.com Newsroom: 777-7726 Editor’s Office: 777-3914 STUDENT MEDIA Faculty Adviser Erik Collins Director of Student Media Ellen Parsons Creative Director Susan King Business Manager Carolyn Griffin Advertising Manager Sarah Scarborough Classified Manager Sherry F. Holmes Production Manager Patrick Bergen Creative Services Derek Goode, Earl Jones, Sean O’Meara, Anastasia Oppert Advertising Staff John Blackshire, Adam Bourgoin, Bianca Knowles, Denise Levereaux, Jacqueline Rice, Stacey Todd The Gamecock is the editorially independent student newspaper of the University of South Carolina. It 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 toy student-activity fees. One free copy per reader. Additional copies may be purchased for $1 each from the Department of Student Media. TO PLACE; AN AD Trie Gamecock 1400 Greene St. Columbia, S.C. 29208 Advertising: 777-3888 Classified: 777-1184 Fax: 777-6482 BEELER® Ki?rca>tPt& “■* CARTOON COURTESY OF KRT CAMPUS USC’s Horseshoe-ites revealed DAVID STAGG GAMECOCKVIEWPOINTS@HOTMAIL.COM Frisbees and homework and lobsters, oh my. It’s that time of year again, when students get in as little clothing as possible and flock to the same place with the hopes of young babes in a world of oppor tunity. No, I’m not talking about USC game day. I’m referring to what is commonly known as the “Flocking of the Horseshoe,” where, in one of the oldest and most famous ceremonies, a new guard exchanges places with the old guard in front of Buckingham Palace while tourists take pic tures and make themselves look like jackasses. TOURIST: Hey! Dude with the huge black hat thing! HEEEEYY! Can you even heeaaar me?? DUDE IN BLACK HAT THING: (Silence.) TOURIST: I knew it! I can do anything to you and you won’t move! Ha ha! Watch as I hump your leg! (Tourist begins to hump leg.) DUDE: (Kicks tourist in the face.) In the Flocking of the Horseshoe events, students heretofore referred to as “Horseshoe-ites” go to enjoy a generally beautiful every-other day because the weather in South Carolina changes its mind more than a bachelor the night before his wedding. So to help you out, I’ve compiled a list of all the types of people you will see on the Horseshoe. Take this con venient field guide with you, and be careful not to feed the ani mals. 1) The Sunbathers: These are usually the most prominent type. They are unmistakable as they lie half-naked, boys or girls, ei ther reading a book or sleeping. You can even distinguish these Horseshoe-ites when they are not on the Horseshoe. Just look around you; see that girl who looks like a lobster? She have white circles around her eyes with lines going back to her ears? She’s one of them. 2) The Ultimate Frisbeers: Also easy to distinguish. The Frisbeers are the self-proclaimed kings of the Horseshoe. They take up more room than anyone else, run around making ridicu lous combinations of movements with a Frisbee and their hands to make you think, “There’s no way that Frisbee will make it 2 cen timeters,” and will run you over if you get in their way. 3) The Homeworkers: Easy to confuse with sunbathers. They sit with a lack of clothing in the sun, but do homework instead of read or sleep. Definition: Homework is the work that teachers assign to do out of class, but students all know you don’t REALLY have to do it. 4) The Observers: These peo ple don’t really have a purpose on the Horseshoe. They kind of come to see people, kind of want to see what all the commotion is about, and usually end up getting hit in the face with a Frisbee. So in general, those are the four types of people you should watch for when visiting the Horseshoe. Keep all hands in side the vehicle; it can be a rough ride sometimes. And if you need help with any of these, just look for me. I’ll be the one who looks like a lobster. Stagg is a second-year media-arts student. IN YOUR OPINION Student’s opinion reflects media spin After having a few hours to let the letter fronrBrian Cox sink in (“War protesters have been proven wrong,” April 4), I can’t help but ask: Where has any semblance of intelligence gone? Where did the original reason for this war go? Long before MSNBC and Fox News told me this was a war to liberate Iraq, they were telling me it was a pre-emptive strike against Saddam’s regime’s pro duction of weapons of mass de struction. Where are these weapons now? Certainly, Saddam would have used them by now, since he’s so close to de feat. Perhaps they ran out? Of course, there are thou sands in the streets of Iraq wel coming U.S. soldiers. They are now enjoying their new free doms to loot and pillage Baghdad. But consider the math: Baghdad is (or was) a city of roughly 5 million people. A show of support from thou sands, even 10 thousand, would be, at best, 0.2 percent of the population. USC shows more solidarity at a Gamecock foot ball game. Granted, USC has a better record against visiting teams. The lack of activity you per ceive is not an acceptance of the war’s outcome. It is a stunned silence as we witness the installment of yet another corrupt Iraqi government, sponsored by American inter ests, as the rest of the nation must stand idly by or be de famed as un-American. Finally, I must inform you that your sense of irony is irre vocably lost. How could you possibly write^protecting your pathetic self from foreign con quest” and still be talking about the United States? From whom are we in fear of being conquered? Iraq? Sorry, Iraq’s national back is broken from 12 years of harsh economic sanc tions and impending civil war. And considering how quickly we rolled over it, I doubt it could have been a threat. Perhaps you mean Afghanistan? But that makes no sense; after bombing them into rubble, we’ve rebuilt them into a willing stronghold of democracy. Now they are one of our strongest allies, right? Perhaps we could take that model to Iraq as well. How about you, Cox, climb out of the state media spin ma chine and policy of acquies-' cence you’re in and learn to deal with the freedoms this na tion is founded on. Oh, and wash your hands. The oil on them is unbecoming. MICHAEL JACOBS FOURTH-YEAR COMPUTER-SCIENCE STUDENT Student shouldn’t assume so much As a co-founder of Carolina Food Not Bombs, I must say that the recent attack on our or ganization in The Gamecock by Bryan Cox is completely un warranted. Clearly, this man has little knowledge of what our organi zation stands for. Food Not Bombs is a nationwide move ment that started in either Boston or San Francisco (it’s highly debatable). Its main mis sion as an organization is to pro vide free food to the homeless without having a prerequisite for the meal, i.e. a church ser vice. The food comes from dona tions from area restaurants and grocers from what would other wise have been thrown away. Food Not Bombs as an orga nization has the goal of raising awareness of the homeless situ ation here in the United States by protesting the billions upon billions of dollars spent each year on our war-based foreign policy and economy that could be better spent helping the less fortunate. This amount of mon ey could be spent to help our so ciety thrive, but instead it is wasted on bombs, tanks and planes while millions of our o wn citizens die every single day from living on the streets. The food served by Food Not Bombs represents a relatively small portion of all that is dis posed of on a daily basis — mil lions of tons — that is perfectly fine and reusable, but simply wasted. Food Not Bombs is a commu nity service. We are trying to clean up the state of our nation’s population. What are you doing to help us along, Cox? Condescend all you want; the war in Iraq was not a failure for our movement, but instead a fail ure for the United States’ foreign relations and foreign-policy mak ers. Those citizens you mention welcome the aid we are giving them, yes, and also the fall of Saddam Hussein, but they do not want us there by a large margin. Rest assured that the war is not over and that we intend to stop naked aggression and direct vio lation of the U.S. Constitution and international law that we claim to be defending. MATT SMITH FIRST-YEAR HISTORY STUDENT Submission Policy Letters to the editor should be less than 300 words and include name, phone number, professional title or year and major, if a student. E-mail letters to gamecockviewpoints@hotmail.com. Letters will be edited. Anonymous letters will not be published. Submissions are limited to one per person per semester. Call the newsroom at 777-7726 for more information. Statue would be going too far ALYSON BIRD GAMECOCKVIEWPOINTS@HOTMAIL.COM State House isn’t the place for a 6-foot fetus. I was eating lunch when I read about the proposed bill calling for a 6-foot statue of an unborn child atop a 2-foot base to be placed in a “prominent location” on the State House grounds. Just visualizing a fetus monument taller than I am turned my stomach. Displaying the Confederate flag was too controversial, but now we might display an elevated, giant, underdeveloped, dead baby? That might sound graphic, but that’s exactly what it will be. u ay memDers oi me property Tax Subcommittee are present on Tuesday, the House will vote the monument’s construction. I hope our legislators leave their hearts out of this one and use their heads. Who will want to walk or drive by the State House if they have to pass such a nightmarish specta cle? Who will want to show their children where our state’s laws are made if they have to expose them to the concept of abortion before they’re old enough to un derstand human reproduction? If this bill is passed, our State House grounds will be a real mul- ' timillion-dollar freak show: a monster outside, a few crazy folks inside, and all our money going to keep it running. The anti-abortion movement is respectable — an example of free speech upholding the American ideal of the natural right to life. And I’m confident this bill will never pass, but is merely an at tempt to encourage anti-abortion sentiments. What a failure. You don’t have to accept abor tion to accept that it’s not just a 20th-century problem, and it’s not just going to end if we make it ille gal. It’ll justleave desperate wom en dead after seeking abortions by whatever means are left. I am a staunch opponent of par tial-birth abortions: A fetus that has been developing for months is as much a person as you and I. And I favor proposed legislation forcing minors seeking abortions to inform their parents. So many grown women live in regret that impulsive young girls should not be allowed to accept carrying that baggage alone. But my anti-abortion senti ments only extend so far. If we erect this monument, it will haunt those women who have already had abortions. Granted, memorials to the dead enrich us as humans, but only when we willingly seek them. If they are shoved in our face, what is sup posed to make us think will just annoy us and desensitize us to the underlying message. If spiritual motives of men in suits lay the foundation for the bill, someone should tell them that the real “good Christian” approach is helping those who have already had abortions recover physically, mentally and emotionally — and helping those considering seeking abortions by calmly presenting the alternatives in literature on adop tion services, pregnancy camps and support groups. Sure, a picture is worth a thou sand words, but this monument would only conjure up words un printable from me. We should leave this graphic madness to the anti-abortion nuts who park their van on Greene Street and yell at us all. At least we can give them nasty looks, and at least they aren’t mak ing our laws inside that van. Spending money on a 6-foot - tall dead baby in the heart of our city won’t help anything, except to perhaps affirm stereotypes against our state. __ Bird is a first-year print journalism student.