Historical Newspapers of South Carolina

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'■IV ■■• ■■'■' ■ .•» * !■•••■ . SOUND OFF ONLINE POLL Create message boards at Should God be taken out of www.dailygamecock.com or die Pledge of Allegiance send letters to the editor to www.daUygamecock.com. gamecockopinions@hotmail.com Results Published on Fridays. IN OUR OPINION Help SG make choice Students have an opportunity to make a permanent impact on the setup of USC’s community. Here’s hoping they don’t waste it. Student Government needs your input if it is to make any sort of knowledgeable, conscious decision about which system to change the Clemson lottery system to, or whether to change it at all. You have a choice: a system based on a first come, first-serve basis; a system based on seniority; or a system based on the number of games each student attends over during If you don t take season. And, of course, the the time to voice option exists to leave the your preference, lotterysystemasls. y0U^h!"e™ If you don’t take the time to founds for . , .„ complaining volce your prcfcrencc’you wlU When the system have no grounds for is changed to complaining When the system something you is changed to something you disagree with, disagree with. This decision will ride on what students voice as their preference. This is your opportunity to have a voice in your school. Don’t make this another wasted chance — another example of initiative losing out to apathy. Take a few minutes to stop by SG’s offices on the second floor of the Russell House and tell President Katie Dreiling what system you want to receive your blessed ticket. Confront your student representatives; that’s what they’re for. Write a letter to The Gamecock. Do something. Anything. Just don’t throw this opportunity aside. College Quote Board THE HARVARD SALIENT HARVARD UNIVERSITY “Long before the United Nations failed to support action against Iraq last year, it had a history as a dictators’ club: Ever treasuring state sovereignty over human rights and liberty. Now, by refusing to ratify the American-led mul tilateral action against the Iraqi dictatorship, the United Nations has made itself a cause celebre of the left. “ DAILY BRUIN UNIVERSITY OF CAUFORNIA-LOS ANGELES “On a national level, the sit uation is not being adequately addressed: There is no serious debate about whether mari juana usage is less of a public nuisance than alcohol con sumption or whether it is less of a public health problem than smoking tobacco.” GAMECOCK CORRECTIONS SG athletics commissioner Alex Kronsteiner’s name was misspelled in a story Friday about the Greene Street gamecock. The Gamecock regrets the error. If you see an error in today’s paper, we want to know. E-mail us at gamecockopinions@hotmail.com. ABOUT THE GAMECOCK Editor in Chief Charles Tomlinson Managing Editor Adam Beam News Editor Michael LaForgia Asst. News Editor Alexis Stratton Viewpoints Editor Gabrielle Sinclair The Mix Editor Meg Moore Sports Editor Brad Senkiw Asst. Sports Editor Wes Wolfe Photo Editor Morgan Ford Head Page Designers Shawn Rourk, David Stagg Page Designers Justin Bajan, Samantha Hall, Staci Jordan, Philip Whitehead Slot Copy Editors Amy Genoble, Tricia Ridgway, Mary Waters Copy Editors Steven Van Haren, Jessica Foster Online Editor James Tolbert Public Affairs Kimberly Dressier CONTACT INFORMATION Offices on third floor of the Russell House. Editor in Chief: gamecockeditor@hotmail.com News: gamecockudesk@hotmail.com Viewpoints: gamecockopinions@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 Director Scott Lindenberg Faculty Adviser Erik Collins Creative Director Susan King Business Manager Carolyn Griffin Advertising Manager Sarah Scarborough Classified Manager Sherry F. Holmes Production Manager Amber Justice Creative Services Whitney Bridges, Robbie Burkett, Sean O’Meara Advertising Staff John Blackshire, Adam Bourgoin, Ben Sinclair, Jesica Johnson, Ryan Gorman, Laytoya Hinpc: 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 by 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 The Gamecock 1400 Greene St. Columbia, S.C. 29208 Advertising: 777-3888 v Classified: 777 1184 I Fax: 777-6482 • HfciMw... ....LicHftr CARTOON COURTESY OF KRT CAMPUS Sometimes silence is golden RACHAL HATTON GAMECOCKOPINIONS@HOTMAIL.COM Perhaps not everyone is so oppressed after all. It has been brought to my at tention that I am a stidgy-stodgy, stick-in-the-mud, death-of-the party, no-fun, grudging feminist. I am the antithesis of comedy, and my humorlessness will be the death of me. The comment was, “No matter what we watch, you can always find somebody being oppressed. Relax.” We were watching a histori cal documentary about movie cameras. A woman walked be side a young baby who was wearing stilted shoes. I said that it was obscene to make a child wear those shoes. My feelings were hurt by the comment and I felt like fighting about it. What can I say, I love asking for trouble. My idea of fun is stirring things up and making people mad in the hopes of mak mg them think. But truly, some times I go too far. This speaks multitudes about my personal ity, and my pleasure in riling people makes me more like the Rev. A1 Sharpton than Margaret Sanger. In my defense, I could really say that I’m combating everyone else’s apathy. I try to care too much, be too radical, and make a fool of myself because I try to make a difference by caring enough for everybody. It’s op pressive then, that I’m ridiculed for stating what’s obviously tyrannical. And then I just had to let it go. Wasn’t that what the whole thing was about, anyway? So I started thinking about it — be cause, apparently, I also think too much — and was pretty offended. Did people actually expect me to be completely blind to these things? I felt that I was being asked to stop noticing when people are un fairly treated and when they are in situations imposed on them by society. I felt I was being asked to give up something I’m good at — identifying aspects of the pa triarchy and posing solutions for individual response. Boy was I wrong. I had to think about it more to grasp this concept: relaxation. I can’t change the people on television by my whining about their prob lems, and likewise ,1 can’t change the people on television who I dis like because of their privilege and stupidity. I need to take the proverbial chill pill. Being able to recognize dis parities in my life and my com munity is enough for now, and taking action over that is more than I can handle, so getting an gry at the television, historical movies, and the president is a long way off. I should stop wasting my time worrying about the jerks of the world and start close to home to make changes. And just because I’m right, I shouldn’t force it on other people. That places me in the same mind set as those situ ated on the right side of the fence. I’ll leave them to their own mistakes. After all, if it weren’t for dis senting opinions, I’d be bored to tears. It’s just that I’m so good at being a loudmouth and am really quite awful at verbal restraint. What I have realized from all of this, though, is that people will only listen to a loudmouth for so long before they tune out. Saving breath can be a saving grace in making yourself heard. Hatton is a third-year women’s studies student. Syllabuses is correct word CHARLES TOMLINSON GAMECOCKEDITOR@HOTMAIL.COM No, seriously. We don’t make this stuff up. Thursday night, an angel ap peared to me in my dreams. He was glowing and held a book in his right hand. “I am Pluriel, messenger of The Associated Press,” he said unto me. As I stared in awe, the angel prophesied, “The Student Senate will pass a resolution asking for teachers to post their syllabuses online.” “Ah-hah! What a dumb an gel!” I said. “It’s ‘syllabi,’ Mr. AP Angel. Don’t you know grammar?” “Silence, thriddle fool,” the angel said. “You think you know, but you know not. See page 242 of The Associated Press Stylebook.” He tossed his book to me, and it magically opened to page 242. “Wow,” I said. “It clearly says, ‘syllabus, syllabuses.’” “Yes,” the angel said. “You must write a front-page headline about this story, and it will in volve the plural form of ‘syl labus.’ You will use ‘syllabuses.’ You and your followers — er, staff — will be criticized, ridiculed and even persecuted by those who do not understand. “But you must use ‘syllabus es’ because the AP deems it so. Use it and be consistent, but do not change quotes from teach ers or student senators. Use it, and the AP will ensure your days in journalism are long and fruitful.” And only hours after Friday’s issue of The Gamecock hit the newsstands, people were stop ping me and other staff members to tell us that we got the front page headline wrong. The headline, “SG seeks on line class syllabuses,” might look wrong at first glance. But just a glance in the AP Stylebook — or even the dictionary — proves otherwise. I, for one, have used “syllabi” as the plural of “syllabus” most my life. The Webster’s New World College Dictionary, Fourth Edition—the official dictionary of the AP — lists both “syllabus es” and “syllabi” as plural forms of “syllabus.” But “syllabuses” is listed first. And, even more importantly, the AP Stylebook, the arbiter of style for most newspapers, says “syllabuses” is THE plural form papers should use. Newspapers use the stylebook so they can be consistent on mat ters such as these, which have more than one option. Sometimes, the stylebook also corrects misconceptions about words and phrases. For example, according to the stylebook, a speaker stands on a podium, not behind or at one. Sounds silly, sounds like the newspaper got it wrong, I know. The stylebook is a finnicky thing, but it keeps journalists consistent and on their toes about grammar. For example, “running the gauntlet” is an absolutely wrong usage of “gauntlet” — a gaunt let is a glove. “Running the gamut” would be correct, however, because a gamut is a “scale of notes or any complete range or extent,” ac cording to the stylebook. The stylebook comes first when determining how some thing should be written. Next comes the dictionary. Sometimes its recommenda tions sound funny, but some times that’s because our society is accustomed to hearing, say ing and reading them the wrong ways. The Gamecock and newspa pers everywhere study and fol low the teachings of the AP stylebook. Some make minor amend ments to the rules — we call the capital building in Columbia the State House, not the Statehouse, for example. But all journalists are held accountable by a higher power that put these commandments in place for us to follow, and for our own good. Tomlinson is The Gamecock editor-in-chiefand a fourth-year print journalism student. gamecockopinions@hotmail.com Stop being a drone in society JOHN RABON GAMECOCKOPINIONS@HOTMAIL.COM Meet a new hero for the disaffected masses. Thoreau’s Civil Disobedience has a new champion. This past week, the misadven tures of a Londoner calling him self Angle-Grinder Man (real name unknown) were brought to my attention. Apparently park ! ing in the United Kingdom’s capi tal has become so limited that peo ple very often take to parking il legally around the city—imagine that. The city has responded by placing boots on cars as a regular punishment for drivers. Often, the fine to get these boots taken off is about 95 pounds, or $150. in response, one man nas risen above the law of the land and started on a mission to remind the politicians who they work for. This auto-vigilante strives to teach the politicians a lesson by undermining the punishment, putting his circular saw and flair for spandex in service to the com mon man. The hero’s intention thus being to flagrantly act against the law in order to demonstrate the unhappiness of Londoners at the lack of parking and what they feel to be an unfair punishment for illegal parking. Now this is what I’m talking about! I mean, how many times do we sit around and grumble about laws we don’t like, that make our lives miserable, but we don’t do anything about it? We just sit in our rooms, waving a fist at the TV, mumbling about how the bloody country is going down the tubes. Why isn’t it the case that more people stand up and say something? i inuiK me prouiem is laziness. Sitting on the couch mumbling is a lot easier to do that actually get ting up and taking the time and effort to speak out. When you complain you don’t have to lift a finger. Society then just comes to accept whatever crap is being dealt to them and never make an effort to change that thing they find offensive. If you’re like me, it generally takes something pretty intense to get you hot and bothered enough to do something. I’ll generally let things just eat at me and eat at me until I’m so fed up I can’t take it anymore. That’s when I explode and give the person(s) a piece of my mind (and probably my boot too if I’m really ticked). Obviously this self-billed “wheel-clamp superhero/vigi- I lante” is the same way. He saw a problem, but never really consid ered doing anything until it af fected him. According to his Web site, www.anglegrinderman.co.uk, that’s when he went out and rent ed a circular saw, cut the boot off of his car, and started a life in service to undermining what he saw as an ineffective, ludicrous solution to London’s auto traffic. It’s stuff like this that makes me believe that one person can make a difference. In the few months since Angle-Grinder Man’s been running around, he’s already got a Web site, media ex posure, and legions of fans. Needless to say, when you’ve got fans, that makes you popular, and when you’re popular, people lis ten to what you have to say. Now imagine if a lot more peo ple were willing to do stuff like this, except maybe without the tights. Then perhaps we’d all have to deal with a lot less crap that government or college poli tics hands us on a daily basis, or any organization for that matter. All you’ve got to do is get up, get out there, and make sure your voice is heard. Think about it. Rabon is a second-year English student.