4
Wednesday, July 15, 1992
OPINION
UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
FROM THE EDITORS
Protesters should quit prescription of morals
It never seems to end.
time after time it seems that somewhere, someone is trying to prove a point with the most radical means possible. Why is this? What does it actually accomplish?
No matter what the cause, no matter what the point of view, it becomes increasingly difficult to understand, relate to, and finally sympathize with a group of people who have taken a giant leap away from their good senses. At that point, the groups fail to communicate their message. They simply become a nuisance. And they become the butt of bad jokes. They trample over other people's civil and moral rights.
Unfortunately, the most recent and seemingly most frequent offenders are the two sides in the abortion issue. When people can no longer respect the two sides of one of the most important issues facing the nation, a serious problem exists.
For the past several years the issue of a woman's right to have an abortion has plagued the nation. With its supporters and opponents descending upon different cities each month like a biblical swarm of locusts, the issue is never far from mind. Unfortunately, it seems that in the past two years the tactics of both sides have become more and more ludicrous.
Last summer, Operation Rescue besieged Wichita. Their modern arsenal of weapons included: barricading clinics with walls of human bodies, crawling through police lines, overloading the city's court system, verbal intimidation, physical threats against doctors, threats of bombings and religious intimidation
Not long in coming were the pro-choice factions determined to preserve the right of abortion in Wichita. More dry wood heaped on the already blazing fire. Arrests followed arrests.
Recently, possibly because the Supreme Court finally ruled on a case dealing with restrictions on abortion, things have changed. With both sides claiming simultaneous victory and defeat, the protests took on an entirely different atmosphere.
People began chaining themselves to cars and crawling under parked buses with hopes of preventing the vehicles from moving. All in all, overly dramatic.
Most recently, anti-abortion proponents literally crawled into one of the largest and busiest streets in Wichita during rush-hour traffic. How stundid can people get!
All these actions harm more than the legitimate cause some people are attempting to present. They harm innocent people trying to live their lives. It is one thing to harm and inconvenience the people associated with the issue. It is entirely another thing to harm, frighten, annoy and inconvenience innocent people.
It itens the basis for many of these actions lies in fanaticism — both political and religious. This is the root of the problem.
When fanaticism takes over, reason is clouded and common sense disappears.
Fanatics are not to be respected for their actions. Crawling into busy streets, brandishing aborted fetuses, telling people they will go to hell because of differing religious beliefs earns nothing but contempt, regardless of affiliation to the abortion issue.
It all comes down to a question of morality. These people are condemning other people for differing moral beliefs. Each person is entitled to his or her individual beliefs without having some fanatical idiot trying to legislate moral values. Morals cannot be legislated. Personal beliefs cannot be legislated. Religious beliefs cannot be legislated. The sooner both sides realize this, the sooner both sides of the issue will begin to regain the huge amounts of respect they have lost.
Justin Knupp
Olympics give unknown athletes a shot at glory
Crissy Ahmann-Leighton left her home in Tucson, Ariz., for her final pre-Olympic training camp yesterday. In a few weeks, she and many other athletes will attend the greatest competition of their lives. These athletes have achieved something very special, and they are about to see the fruits of their many years of training.
With all the hype about the "Dream Team," the other sports can easily get lost in the crowd. Basketball is much more visible than other sports and people doubtlessly would be quicker to recognize Magic Johnson than Ahmann-Leighton. As a swimmer, Ahmann-Leighton did not see much publicity. That all changed when she swam the second fastest women's 100-meter butterfly of all time at the Olympic Team Selection Meet.
Ahmann-Leighton is about to see her life-long dream come true — to compete at the Olympic Games. That's not to say that Magic isn't also realizing his goals; it's just good to see athletes who have earned the chance to compete against the best athletes in the world.
We might ache for those who do not get the chance to go to Barcelona, though. With all the publicity of the duel between Dan and Dave, which was be decided in Barcelona, it is easy to feel bad for Dan. Although it's sad that he doesn't get to compete, it's sure that his heart and thoughts are with the team at the Games.
People do not often think about what the Olympic athletes have done to achieve greatness. When the Games do start, pay attention to those inside stories on athletes such as Alhman-Leighton. A small-town girl who has made good, she is sure to succeed.
When the Olympic flag is raised, remember that shining moment when the athletes are THE BEST in the world. While their countries will be proud, the glory is all theirs. Good Luck, Crissey.
-Aimee Brainard
KANSAN STAFF
JUSTIN KNUPP Editor
KIM CLAXTON Business manager
JENNIFER BACH Managing editor
TOM EBLEN
General manager, news adviser
BRIAN WOLF Director of Client Services
Editors
Campus         Gayle Otterberg
Ast. Campus     Doug Flashback
Copy Chief     Alex Blohmof
Contributing   David Mitchell
Photo          Derek Nolan
Graphics       Almee Brainard
JEANNE HINES Sales and marketing adviser
Business staff
Special Promotions .Melissa Tetasi
Production mgrs .Brad Broon
Retail Support mgrs .Ashley Langford
.Hillary Wilcox
Regional Support mgrs .Jane Henderson
Classified mgr .Kate Burgess
**Letters** should be typed, double-spaced and fewer than 200 words. They must include the writer's signature, name, address and telephone number.riters affiliated with the University of Kansas must include class and hometown, or faculty or staff position. **Guest columns** should be typed, double-spaced and fewer than 700 words. The writer will be
The Kansas reserves the right to reject or edit letters, guest columns and cartoons. They can be mailed or brought to the Kansas newsroom, 111 Stauffer Flint Hall.
Guest columns should be typed, double-spaced and fewer than 700 words. The writer will be photographed.
Daron J.Bennett / KANSAN
omega fountain becomes a swimming pool for several children. The children, who live in the Oread neighborhood, spent the afternoon yesterday playing off the fountain.
Chi Omega pool?
This past weekend, I went to see the movie, "A League of Their Own." It was very good. At least, I think it was.
Chattering teen-agers, crying babies and tall kids don't belong at movies
My family arrived at the theater a few minutes late, and we were forced to separate to find seats. I sat behind a row of empty seats being reserved by a small child sprawled across as many as her arms and legs could reach. "Ah, short children in front of me, terrified! It was预谋ly premature. But it was not to be. The child who was to sit directly in front of me arrived. She was at least as tall as I am, and with the huge bow she was wearing on top of her head, she cleared six feet...sitting down. She sat stock straight through the entire movie, never once slouching. This military posture was sure to make her mother proud but was a real pain in the neck to those of us sitting behind Her. Alateral pain, as we had to strain our necks to either the right or the left in order to see the screen.
To my right sat three teenage girls who spoke some foreign language,
Kate Kelley
Staff
Columnist
Spanish I think. I wouldn't have minded that they spoke Spanish, but they spoke it very loudly and throughout the entire movie. I'm not sure, but I think the girl directly to my right, girl A, was interpreting the movie dialogue, line by line, to her friends, girls B and C C kept saying, "Huh?" So, of course girl A would have to repeat it all again. Then girl C would laugh uproariously — after the rest of the audience had quieted down.
I realize I should have smiled politely and quietly asked girl A if she could please whisper, but I didn't want to
embarrass possible visitors to our country. And basically, I a wimp when it comes to confronting people. Besides, the young man in front of girl C kept turning around giving them annoyed, evil looks of death which were only met by staccato laughter, so I figured my asking wouldn't work either.
Therefore, I sat through the movie leaning to the left of Bow Head with my finger in my right ear. I would have felt bad for the people behind me, but they had lost my sympathy on their third trip across the row to the aisle. Every time this occurred, I got popped in the head by some unidentified, but obviously large body part, knocking my finger from my ear and shoving我 forward into the giant bow.
This was all pleasant enough, but then the baby started crying. I don't know who this baby belonged to or where they were sitting. It might as well have been right behind me for the
volume on that child. It even drowned
the teenagers beside me.
Now, I understand how hard it is to find baby sitter, and I honestly don't mind babies in a movie theater, as long as they are quiet. But, parents, at the first peep of your infant, get thee to the lobby! No one paid $6.50 to sit in a small, dark, crowded room and listen to someone else's baby howl. In one memorable scene in the movie, an obnoxious young child gets his due in a very delightful malicious manner. The entire audience cheered and applauded. If I had been the parent of the crying baby, I would have taken that as a very serious message!
As I said, the movie was very good. Although Tom Hanks always had this huge bow on his chest. And was Madonna speaking Spanish? I guess you're just going to have to go to the
Kate Kelley is a Ft. Leavenworth junior majoring in English
Computer suggests word replacements that could spell trouble for newspaper
Every day our society gets a little bit lazier.
We do not cook. We microwave. We do not do math. That is what calculators are for. And unfortunately, many people do not read the news, they watch it.
Technology continues to advance at a rapid pace, making life easier in every aspect.
Computers have transformed the newspaper business. Gone are the days of laying out pages on dummy sheets. Computerized pagination is much faster.
Gone are the days of counting headlines to make sure they fit. The computer will show space limitations.
To make a short story long, computers have made things much too simple for us.
Gone are the days of teletypes, which would spit out printouts of the day's news. Today's news appears electronically on the screen.
David Mitchell Contributing editor
The Kansan's computer system of choice has many interesting tools,
including a spell check. Who needs a dictionary? The computer does it all.
Sometimes this tool can be helpful.
It has undoubtedly saved reporters and columnists from looking like Dan Quayle. It can spell potato.
Unfortunately, this system has the vocabulary of a junior high dropout. During spell check, the computer highlights words it does not know — about one in 10. It then lists suggested replacements. For example, the suggested replacements for Jayhawks — that's right, the Kansan's system does not know Jayhawks — include
Jocks and Jacks. But then again, it does not even know Kansan.
Aside from being ignorant of many common words, the system's dictionary is unfamiliar with most proper names. Thus, most sources, subjects and cities are highlighted by the computer as unknowns. Of course, the copy editor can simply select skip, and the computer will leave these choice words unscathed.
On the computer screen, the skip command is right next to the replace command. This is disaster waiting to happen. And last week, it did.
In a sports column, Kansas City Royal Mark Gubicza was rechristened Mark Gabs. Though this is the most recent instance of spell-check pseudonyms, it will probably not be the last. During cross country season, runner Cathy Palacios was redubbed Cathy Policies.
The possibilities are frightening.
The possibilities are tightening.
For example, if Kansan copy editors took the system's advice, the interim executive vice chancellor
would not be De Shanker but Def Chinchilla. I swear, I'm not making this up. Del Chinchilla. It does have a nice ring to it, doesn't it?
The governor of Kansas would be identified as Joan Phoney. The system apparently knows what I have suspected all along.
In sports copy, the Kansas football team's game against Missouri would be moved from Faurot Field to Fart Field.
To suggest we should not utilize the technological advances available would be ridiculous. However, we should not let ourselves become so dependent on advancements that we take a step backward.
And my favorite favorite. The star sophomores of the women's basketball team would not be Angela Aycock and Alana Slatter, but Angela Waikiki and Allegheny Splatter.
David Mitchell is a DeSoto senior majoring in Journalism
Loco Locals
WE WILL BE BACK TO EXCITING, SECOND ROUND GOLF ACTION,
AFTER THIS COMMERCIAL BREAK.
1992 04 17
by Tom Michaud