Opinion
Kansan
Published daily since 1912
Published daily since 1972
Ann Premer, Editor Jamie Holman, Business manager
Gerry Doyle, Managing editor Sara Cropper, Retail sales manager
Angie Kuhn, Managing editor Dan Simon, Sales and marketing adviser
Tom Eblen, General manager, news adviser Justin Knupp, Technology coordinator
Friday, May 7, 1999
The Chicago Tribune
Editorials
Restructuring higher education to benefit University, Washburn
Last week, Kansas legislators began a historic transition of higher education into a coordinated whole.
Both the House and Senate approved legislation that would restructure the nine-member Board of Regents to account for Washburn University and the state's community colleges and vocational technical schools. These legislative bodies did the correct thing in passing the bill.
Higher education reform will benefit the University of Kansas both directly and indirectly. Patience and support are needed during the transition period that will begin on July 1.
A direct benefit includes the promise of increased funding for faculty salaries in 2001.
Transferring credits from a community college should become a seamless process
Faculty salaries will increase, and more students will be able to afford education.
with the new system. When classes are compatible among all colleges, course duplication can be avoided.
Perhaps the most significant aspect of higher education reform is the move toward economic equality. For many, a community college is the only affordable means of higher education. Those persons deserve an adequate and equal education.
The bill's funding is a point of controversy. Community colleges and Washburn are financed locally through property taxes. After the transition, statewide
funding will be phased in.
Critics of reform are quick to point out that the bill's funding component will leave the University competing with more institutions for money. Such fears are unfounded. The new legislation is designed to improve all higher education.
State Sen. Barbara Lawrence, R-Wichita, chairwoman of the House-Senate conference committee on higher education, said getting the process implemented now was important.
The next few years of transition that will begin this summer are critical to the long-term success of the restructured system. The passage of new legislation can be the turning point for Kansas if colleges and legislators need to continue to work together to build a world-class system of higher education.
The editorial board
Movie ratings overdue for revision
History teaches us that systems are doomed to fail if they do not evolve to meet new standards. When it comes to the movie ratings authorized by the Motion Picture Association of America, time clearly is not on its side.
In short, the R rating isn't completing the job intended for it. To alert parents in advance about levels of violence and sexual content, the Motion Picture Association faces two options: Either revise the 31-year-old rating system, or increase the application of the NC-17 rating.
The R rating is used indiscriminately. The association applies the rating to movies as diverse as the bloody Saving Private Ryan to the fluffy Shakespeare in Love. The former picture contains wall-to-wall gore, while the latter's offenses amount to a few scattered shots
Increasing use of the NC-17 tag would help problems associated with the R rating.
of bare female breasts. To suggest that they belong in the same restrictive category is absurd.
Grouping violent films together with films containing mild sexual content may have made sense in the late 1960s, but it does a disservice in today's anything-goes culture.
The simple solution: Apply the NC-17 more often to those pictures that push the limits of graphic content.
ers, maintain a firm anti-NC-17 policy Few theaters are willing to carry pictures with the rating. Newspapers are reluctant to advertise NC-17 pictures. Major video outlets such as Blockbuster will not carry them in their stock.
The reason? Like the X rating, NC-17 gives people false worries about pornographic exploitation films. The difference is that the old X rating was never trademarked by the Motion Picture Association, allowing pornographers to pirate it. The NC-17 rating, however, is an officially sanctioned rating, like the PG and G ratings.
Any adjustments in the system will face resistance. Many Hollywood studios, such as Disney and Warner Broth-
The association needs to make a clear, unmistakable distinction between movies with adult themes and "adult" movies. Increased use of the NC-17 rating would help the job along nicely.
Kansan staff
Jeremy Doherty for the editorial board
Ryan Koerner ... Editorial
Jeremy Doherty ... Associate editorial
Aaron Marvin ... Neus
Laura Roddy ... Neus
Melissa Ngo ... Neus
Aaron Knopf ... Online
Erin Thompson ... Sports
Marc Sheforgen ... Associate sports
Chris Fickett ... Campus
Sarah Hale ... Campus
T.R. Miller ... Features
Steph Brewer ... Associate features
Augustus Anthony Piazza ... Photo
Chris Dye ... Design, graphics
Carl Kaminski ... Wire
Carolyn Mollett ... Special sections
Laura Veazey ... News clerk
News editors
Matt Lopez . Special sections
Jennifer Patch . Campus
Micah Kafitz . Regional
Jon Schlitt . National
Tyler Cook . Marketing
Shannon Curran . PR/Intern manager
Christa Estep . Production
Steven Prince . Production
Chris Corley . Creative
Jason Hannah . Classified
Corinne Buffmire . Zone
莎安娜Blue . Zone
Brandi Byram . Zone
Brian Allers . Zone
Justin Allen . Zone
Advertising managers
Broaden your mind: Today's quote
"Laugh and the world laughs with you; snore and you sleep alone."
—Anthony Burgess
Letters: Should be double-spaced typed and fewer than 200 words. Letters must include the author's signature, name, address and telephone number plus class and home-town if a University student. Faculty or staff must identify their positions.
How to submit letters and guest columns
Guest columns? Should be double-
spaced typed with fewer than 700 words. The writer must be willing to be photographed for the column to run.
All letters and guest columns should be submitted to the Kansan newsroom, 111 Staufer-Flint Hall. The Kansan reserves the right to edit, cut to length or reject all submissions.
For any questions, call Ryan Koerner or Jeremy Doherty at 864-4924.
If you have general questions or comments, e-mail the page staff (opinion@kansan.com) or call 864-4924.
Summer of Sam: flicks and politics take stage
Perspective
The Summer of Sam will soon be upon us. Twice, in fact. This may always happen will
The more obvious appearance will be director Spike Lee's new thriller, Sum-
The film about 1970s serial killer David Berkowitz already has rustled feathers with its extreme levels of sexual and violent content. Lee has returned to the editing bays at Disney — which is financing the picture — in the hope of losing the film's NC-17 material and delivering a kinder, gentler slasher flick.
Jeremy Doherty
 opinion@kansan.com
The other Sam making
waves is none other than Kansas' own Sen. Sam Brownback. It seems that everyone's favorite defender of family values and American morality has returned to his preferred whipping boy: the entertainment industry.
On Tuesday, Brownback and the Senate Commerce Committee staged a public hearing with the purpose of examining what Brownback referred to as the "culture of violence." The hearing, entitled "Marketing Violence to Children," had been scheduled before the school shooting in Littleton, Colo., but the stakes had increased substantially, to say the least.
"Over the past several years, our society seems to have become increasingly flooded with violent images — movies that depict teens killing their classmates; music with lyrics that glorify suicide, torture and murder; TV that trivializes the consequences of violence; and video games that simulate real-life killing and give points for each death." Brownback said.
Video screens set up in the hearing room beamed images of youth violence from films such as the horror entry Scream and the drug fable The Basketball Diaries. Morality watchdogs such as former Education Secretary Bill Bennett made an appearance and decried that major conglomerates like Disney were making money off violent images. Brownback's fellow senators made noise about subpoenaing entertainment companies' marketing documents and passing legislation that would make it a punishable crime to admit underage children to R-rated films.
All well and good. But attendees of the hearing didn't hear from the most important sources: the entertainment moguls
who OK and distribute the offending CDs, movies and video games.
Out of fairness to Brownback, he did issue invitations to the presidents and CEOs of Time Warner, Universal, Sony, Viacom, Sega, Nintendo and Hasbro. All seven groups refused to make an appearance at the hearing.
But it's not as though they can be blamed for not wanting to sit in the same room as Brownback. He, after all, is the same senator who staged similar anti-entertainment hearings in 1997 that basically blamed gangsta rap and heavy music for the decline of Western civilization.
We all remember how Brownback summoned a grieving parent who blamed Marilyn Manson's song lyrics for the suicide of his teen-aged son. How Brownback summoned anti-rap activist C. Delores Tucker, who demands nothing less than the censorship of any artist who doesn't produced Grated music. How Brownback summoned supposed experts on violence who attempted to link anti-social behavior with the billion-dollar entertainment business. How Brownback only allowed testimony from one recording industry CEO to provide some semblance of balance.
And we wonder why those seven CEOs declined this week's invitation? They would have been staring down the barrels of some very angry shotguns if they had decided to show.
Brownback is concerned. When he talks about how horrified he is that students are shooting their classmates to solve problems, I believe him.
But when he and his Senate colleagues talk about further regulation of the entertainment industry, I feel like ramming my fist through a wall. Aren't we tired of this nonsense yet? This shameless finger-pointing — "Blame the media," "Blame guns" — serves nobody except the politicians who want to score brownie points with anyone stupid enough to believe them.
The sad thing is that this grandstanding shows no sign of fading. Sen, Orrin Hatch, R.Utah, announced at Tuesday's hearing that he may ask the Justice Department to investigate ways in which the entertainment industry markets violence to young consumers. If Hatch gets his way, we can expect to hear a lot more fluff from moral guardian Brownback this summer.
If that's the case, then I'll be spending that time with my good friend Spike Lee.
Doherty is an Olathe senior in journalism and the Kansan associate editorial editor.
Senator clarifies position on recreation center item
Well, it's certainly been an interesting week. A column in Tuesday's Kansan attacked me, and on Wednesday an editorial commended me for
J.D.
Jenkins
Guest columnist
In fact, I've been mentioned or quoted in the paper almost every day for three weeks. The unfortunate result of this has been to confuse many people as to what my position on certain issues really is. I want to clarify my views on the recreation center referendum and answer some of the unwarranted criticism that was directed at me earlier this week.
After the election, dozens of my constituents came up to me and said, "I didn't vote for this rec center and I don't know anyone who did." Because of the overwhelming opposition to the proposed center by the constituents with whom I talked, I wrote a petition that outlined some of the problems with the proposal and some specific examples of how students were misled as to what they were voting for. I hoped that by circulating this petition, I could gauge the opinion of the student body, and if as I thought, a majority of people were opposed to it. I would send the petitions to the Chancellor.
However, the column on Tuesday by Joe Walberg grossly misrepresented myself and my position. I was not offended by Walberg's disagreement with my political views, but rather with his insinuations that I am not fulfilling my responsibilities as a student senator and that my petition was a politically motivated effort.
Walberg, as a political science major, would surely agree that it is a senator's obligation to represent his or her constituents. The only reason I continued to oppose the referendum after it passed was, as I said above, because my constituents asked me to.
These students did not feel that their views were being properly addressed by the results of the referendum, and I kept up my campaign to represent their voices.
As to Walberg's second assertion — that I assume voters are dumb and don't value their opinions — this is completely untrue.
The other major issue for which I have been mentioned in the paper recently was a complaint I filed with the Attorney General, alleging that the elections commission was violating state law by holding closed hearings. I asked that my complaint against the recreation task force, alleging fraud, harassment, and other violations, be reinstated in an open hearing so that students could hear the decisions that were being made which affect them. In fact, all my actions on the recreation center issue from the beginning have aimed at making sure students are fairly informed on the issue and that their views are represented. I regret the inaccuracies and misinformation of Walberg's column, and in the future, I hope that he and any other students with questions or comments will e-mail me at cyberbob@ukans.edu.
Additionally, even the consultants paid by the task force admit that this facility will not meet the long-term needs of the University. I invite Mr. Walberg to talk to students, as I have done, and tell them these little-known facts. If this information had been included on signs, and on the referendum, would as many people have voted for it? I don't think so.
What I suggested is that the propaganda campaign by the recreation task force was so misleading that students could not have been reasonably expected to know what they were voting for, regardless of their intelligence. Walberg says the proposal was "detailed" and he read about the "incremental fees program" and "lots of other stuff." But how many people saw the size of the facility on the proposal or on signs? When I tell students that the new center will be about 88,500 square feet (smaller than Robinson and half the size of K-State's recreation center), many of them are surprised. After all, the task force's signs showed big pictures of K-State's rec center and suggested that the new facility would ensure that we no longer have the smallest rec center in the Big XII. Unfortunately, the new recreation center will still be the smallest in the Big XII, despite having one of the highest fees.
If Walberg had read the petition that he is against, he would see that nothing is farther from the truth.
jenkins is a Shawnee sophomore in history and a Nunemaker Senator.