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University Daily Kansan, November 30, 1981
Opinion
Give up the race
As most of us head for our first class this morning, American and Soviet negotiators will be preparing to sit down at the bargaining table and discuss cutbacks in their nuclear arsenals in Europe.
It's the latest chapter in a long, long story, and most students probably give the talks little more notice than the front section of the morning paper (sports and comics are more palatable so early in the day) or their slowly growing soggy breakfast cereal.
But, in fact, the talks and what they symbolize have become more important than ever. In the midst of continuing unrest in the world's hotspots, and in the face of increased talk of assassination attempts and ballooning defense budgets, the cry for peace has grown more and more insistent.
Scarefully a week passes that doesn't contain news of peace demonstrations in European countries—Belgium, France, West Germany, Norway, Italy, Great Britain—where people know first-hand the horrors of war. Nor, however, does a week pass without one of the superpowers—the United States or the Soviet Union—announcing new defense plans or accusing the other of distorting defense figures into "pronaganda."
Now, however shaky the foundation of the arms talks may be, the world waits, hope against hope, that this time something will be settled.
At this point, the big powers should realize that the arms race is something that no one can really win. Will they have the courage and sensibility to stop in midtride, shake hands and call it off?
'Chosen ones' who lead us mix intelligence, insanity
One of America's more honest仕 is now called God, an unemployed author and a man who has had to live on the streets.
According to his word, a trinity from the star Sirius dropped by his apartment six years ago and instructed him to change his name from Terrell Clark Williams to God.
He was to play a key role in transforming the world, the visitors reportedly told him.
Especially unworrisome is the thought that God will not stir waves, much less floods. In the Midwest, he at most will be cited as a reason why the questionable going-on in California.
He will not, unlike the late Jim Jones or the late-will-not-come-soon-enough Khomeini, develop a following. He's already played his age—insanity.
The Gods that worry me are those who, before they are established, acknowledge their divinity in only whispered voices to the audience in a mirror.
I would feel more safe if every candidate
KEVIN
HELLIKER
for the presidency unsuspectingly yet regularly shaved before a two-way mirror, into which the entire nation poked its face via a camera on the hidden side.
My concern with the presidency is relevant, I think, because the most prevalent symptom of the God-complex is a desire to lead, which is both logical and frightening.
This invasion of privacy would be warranted by the occasional catching of a candidate who might later make such public declarations as, "Let there be limited nuclear
One modern leader who incites the fear of God is Moaniam Khadafy, leader of Libya. In a recent interview with Italian journalist Oriana Fallaci, Khadafy shouted for six minutes without catching his breath: "I am the gospel, I am the gospel, I am the gospel."
Khadiyat is, in Fallace's words, "a fool not a mental case with a streak of genius, but a creet, a poor thing whose intelligence does not surpass that of a chicken."
Unfortunately, fowl-mindedness does not characterize most self-called msemblies. And they do not draw their disciples with threats of death, as does Khadafy.
The average "chosen one," if such a one can be called average, is gifted with both insanity and genius. This does not imply a possessing of "the bad with the good."
The insanity and intelligence are subtly inseparable—desirably so, many would have us think.
A popular notion among thinkers and writers is that if a true sage comes to earth today, he would be locked up by society. They believe in the power of truth, truth on the far side of derangement.
A case in point is Ken Kesey, who in "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest" suggests that the people who run mental institutions, even those than the patients within them, are insane.
After writing the book, Kesey played messiah to a group in California called the Merry Pranksters, the adventures of whom he coined "Wilde's 'The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test.'"
Kesey had the idea that a little dab of LSD would do wonders for opening the doors of truth. Perriems was right, though he hasn't been given enough time to work on his spiked Kool-Aid days in the mid-'60s.
Although Kesey and his cult are generally incomparable to the Rev. Jim Jones and Company, one wonders whether some connection exists between the modern ministries and Kool-Aid, the poisoned potion of the monstrous massacre. Does Khomeini drink it?
Doris Lessing, perhaps herself a closet messiah, explored the idea of "chosen people" in her novel "Briefing for a Descent into Hell." She writes about superior beings who descend to Earth to save us from self-destruction.
Charles Watkins, the central character, remembers his mission only once he is behind bars at a mental institution. His conversations at the hospital about the nature of the universe make, to the reader although not to doctors, perfect sense.
Once here, they have no memory of their more enlightened pasts. They do not remember why they recognize one another. They step slowly to their purpose.
The warning behind this literature is that we might screw ourselves out of salvation by regarding lightly such self-called messiahs as the California God.
Who knows, but with what saviors we've seen in recent years, the world would seem to be so different.
Tragically, he is returned to "sanity" with electroshock.
Statistics belie claim of anti-gun lobby
By JOHN B. BARRETT
Guest Columnist
Gun control. Many see it as the ultimate weapon against violent crime. Others see it as ineffective and riddled by abuses that rival those described by Orwell in "1984."
The latter group is right. Even under the present U.S. gun laws (20,000 in all), abuses occur every day. Proposed future abuses include abandoning the exclusionary rule to allow unarmed and herdred people through metal detectors or warrantless, mass searches for weapons.
The abuses are very real and promise to get worse if stricter gun laws are enacted. On the other hand, the benefits of gun control are largely imagined.
Anti-gun advocates point to lower crime rates in gun nation with strict gun laws. However, they seem to be wrong.
Japan, for instance, does have a low violent crime rate and strict gun laws. However, Japanese-Americans have even lower homicide and violent crime rates than do native Japanese.
Great Britain is another example cited by antigun forces. Yet, the only in-depth study of Britain's firearms laws, done by Colin Greenwood, British police superintendent, found that "England's firearms laws have not reduced the use of handguns," or "abolishing or substantially reducing controls of any sort," as their enforcement had "diverted a vast amount of police time and effort."
Conversely, four nations, Switzerland, Israel, Finland and Denmark (in order of armament), are more heavily armed than the United States. All have lower violent crime rates than the United States and even Japan. In fact, Switzerland, which allows anyone except a criminal or a lunatic to legally own any firearm, has the lowest violent crime rate of any modern nation.
Nations with strict gun laws but higher homicide and violent crime rates than the United States include Mexico, South Africa (even Taiwan), politically motivated crimes) and Taiwan.
Comparisons within the United States are no more favorable for anti-gun advocates.
Six studies have compared areas of strict and lenient gun control in the United States. They found that states and cities with strict gun laws have as high or higher homicide and violent crime rates as the rest of the nation, whether the comparisons are made individually (with demographic factors neutralized), by demographically similar groups, or as a whole.
Frank Zimring, the leading academic proponent of gun control, found that most attacks will occur regardless of gun availability. He did find handgun lethality, at 7.5 percent, to be five times that of a knife. However, he classified gun can openers, forks, etc. as knives.
If an assailant is so blinded by rage as to choose a beer can operer over a long stabbing instrument, he will also operate the beer can operer and instruments and builders have identical lethality.
As weapon concealability is a factor in only 5 percent of handgun murders, rifles and shotguns, which are three and nine times as likely to substitute for handguns 95 percent of the time.
Anti-gun advocates have claimed there are as many as 200,000 accidental firearms injuries and 2,000 accidental handgun deaths annually. According to the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, in 1977 (the last year firearms injuries were a distinct class) there were 20,000 accidental injuries involving firearms. And according to the National Safety Council in 1979 (the last year available data) there were 1,800 accidental firearms. Applying statistics from a Metropolitan Life Insurance Study, fewer than 400 of these would have involved handguards.
Hirsch did not distinguish long guns from handguns, although his study is usually cited as applying to handguns. He claimed that if a person shot an intruder he knew, it was an accident rather
Another claim involving accidents originated in "Accidental Firearms Fatalities in a Metropolitan County," by C.S. Hirsch et al. He found a firearm in the home to be "six times as likely to accidentally kill a family member as to stop a crime. . . Only 23 burglar, robbers, or intruders who were not relatives or acquaintances were killed by guns."
than a defense. This is not valid, as most victims know their assailants.
Two 1978 polls, one commissioned by the National Rifle Association, the other by a national anti-gun organization, found that 9 percent of the incidents in which firearms are used for protection result in injury or death. Applying this and the latter to police officers who if 23 intruders who were strangers were killed, firearms stopped 1,750 serious crimes by strangers.
It is probable that stricter gun laws will increase crime by forcing police to waste time administering them and depriving citizens of a means of protection.
The only true study of the cost of gun, registration in the United States was conducted in 1968. Using the study's findings, set up and initial gun registration, with only a simple record check, would cost $7 billion. This is in 1968 dollars and includes enforcement costs. Prohibition would cost still more. Incidentally, the federal law enforcement budget is $5 billion.
Criminals will be able to obtain guns regardless of controls. The illegal flow of handguns from Mexico alone is so great as to have prompted congressional hearings in 1978.
Armed citizens are a deterrent to crime. When Albuquerque, N.M., and Tucson, Ariz., police went on strike, all classes of serious crime dropped dramatically. Police credited this to citizens taking arms. When San Francisco, Baltimore and New York City police went on strike, citizens could not take arms. Serious crime rose dramatically.
Contarry to popular belief, when armed citizens face a criminal, they are usually successful. For example, armed women are able to successfully resist rape 85 to 90 percent of the time, and they are less likely to be killed. And women are also the women who successfully resist rape use a gun.
Space limitations have prevented discussion of the constitutional issues, and I have only touched on the other issues. I would gladly discuss gun control and provide information to anyone who is
(John B. Barrett is a first-year law student from Clearwater.)
Letters to the Editor
Sorority discrimination story stressed only the past
As an active campus organization, we are concerned with the objectivity of the recent series of stories dealing with discrimination in KU's Greek system (Nov. 18-20 Kansans).
To the Editor:
We feel it is the responsibility of the campus newspaper to research all facts and seek out the viewpoints of all involved parties before reporting on issues of such a sensitive nature. We do not believe the Kansan readers were provided with all the relevant facts concerning this issue.
An editor's note accompanying the first article said the series would deal with "the sensitive issue of minority involvement in the Greek system at the University of Kansas." However, the series focuses on only one minority. Because no black women have chosen to participate in Panhellenic rush in the past two years, one cannot determine if there has been any recent discrimination in this area. However, members of several other minorities have chosen to participate in rush and were pledged. This was overlooked in the Kansan stories.
Instead, the article about sorority discrimination centered on incidents that happened several years ago. Specifically, we are referring to the incident used as the lead in the article, in which a person felt unwelcome in our home one afternoon more than three years ago.
We question the newsworthiness of the lead for several reasons.
First of all, no current members of Alpha Gamma Delta were members in 1978, when the incident reportedly occurred. Also, the incident had nothing to do with the sorority's policies or views regarding a minority participating in rush. Finally, the report implies that parents of members, not members themselves, were questioning a woman's presence in the residence where a fatal victim to defending the attitudes of parents of members no longer living in the house.
The articles also fail to stress the recent advancements by sororites to increase relations with black women. As a campus organization, we adhere to University and Panhellenic non-discriminatory standards of dress in our black sororite exchange dinner with one of the black sororites to further improve relations.
Rather than focus on these positive advancements and encourage further interaction, Miss Schallau chose to push relations back several years with her biased reporting. We are very concerned with the implications of these articles. We are proud of our diversity of members and our policy, which is to give each rushee equal consideration on an individual basis. It is not who a girl knows that will gain her membership. Many of our members had no
acquaintances in the house before they began rush. We think rush is a learning experience and a challenge.
If Schallau had bothered to contact our president or any current member of Alpha Gamma Delta to find out our views and policies, this letter would not have been necessary.
Denise Heffley
For the women of Alpha Gamma Delta
Overland Park senior
Only one choice
To the Editor:
The implication by Kansan staff writer Connie Schallau that I wanted to pledge a white sorority was erroneous (Nov. 18 Kansan). I never went out of my house because, because white sororites have nothing to offer me.
The reporter said that a woman in the Alpha Gamma Delta house and I were friends. We were friends in that I gave her rides to home games because we were Spirit Squad members.
The editor's note said that people who asked that their names not be used would be honored. This is not true, because when I asked that my name be left out of the story, I was told that it was too late, even though the story wasn't even close to being printed.
In closing, Delta Sigma Theta, a black sorority, was not a second choice. It was the best choice among them.
Wendi Coleman
Lawrence senior
To the Editor:
'Mr. Establishment'
Kathy Hoggard Kansas City, Mo., resident and KU graduate
Over the years his image did not change: tweed coat, earmuffs, "Mr. Establishment." Neither did his message change: justice, fairness, the rights of students. Those of us who wear our politics on our sleeves, who aren't as sutle and so much more smart, now be twice as diligent to fill the void he has left.
Those of us who believe in justice must mourn the passing of our own Don Alderson.
When I came to KU in 1969, the campus was bubbling with the issues of race and Vietnam. Don Alderson was not a man of our generation, but few at the University stood up for the rights of radical organizations as effectively as he did. He insisted that protesting groups be accorded the same rights that the University had always given the mainstream campus organization
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