Opinion
Page 4 University Daily Kansan, December 5, 1980
Ladies in waiting
It has been a few years since the majority of the American population referred to homosexuality as a grievous sin, excluding Amita Bryant, of course.
But it will be several more years before even most of those who call themselves liberals will be ready to accept and promote the idea that homosexuals may marry, rear children and enjoy the rest of the conveniences of wedded bliss, such as joint tax returns, inheritance and insurance benefits.
It will be a few years before nervous heterosexuals' skin stops crawling long enough for them to quit asking what will happen to the American family—mommy, daddy and two kidlies—if people of the same sex are allowed to marry.
Two Lawrence women, who are bucking the system by trying to obtain a marriage license, face what could be an even more
formidable obstacle than uncommitted public opinion.
After all, this IS Kansas, the state that specifically outlawed same-sex marriages less than a year ago.
Good luck, ladies. You're going to need plenty of it. But you will need patience even more. Although it's high time for Kansas legislators, attorneys general and other very moral midwesterners to accept that some boys don't love girls and that some girls don't love boys, they don't see it that wav.
Thank goodness, we have come a long way from the days of Mickey Rooney and Judy Garland and their pre-pubescent romantic trials and tribulations. But it hasn't been far enough for even the liberals to be willing to admit or to move toward admitting that homosexuals are people with preferences, too.
Someday, perhaps.
Lone conservative voice has bittersweet semester
The semester is over. The votes are in. and some campus wag has lifted his head up from the sand long enough to name me "campus neo-Nazi of the year."
Well. you win a few and you lose a few.
There were some pleasant reactions. The references in letters to the editor, for instance,
comparing me to other, more famous, conservative columnists were particularly enjoyable. There were two comparisons to James Kulpatrick, one comparison to William F. Buckley and my favorite, one reference to my "serebral clone" George F. Will
But there has been more than praise generated by my work. And although constructive criticism is welcome in any endeavor, the form that much of the campus criticism has taken is alarming.
At such comparisons I can only blush and mutter thanks. Who wouldn't enjoy being compared to people who are among the most respected and knowledgeable in their field?
Voltaire may have been willing to defend to the death another person's right to express a contrary opinion, but on this campus, that sentiments like Voltaire, rarely makes an appearance.
Narrow-minded people have always been a part of society, in all political factions. But what is disturbing around this campus is the form that the criticism, for the most part, has taken.
Logical disagreement has given way to the use of buzz-words, such as "fasciist" or "nee-Nazi," by college students who should know better. The very atmosphere of ignorance and fear these letter writers allegedly attack is being generated by their own words.
Name calling, in vogue during the recent elections, is all right if it is original and its purpose is true satire. Getting people to laugh at those one disagrees with a is much more effective weapon than bowing to the trendy crowd and joining in the mouthings of ignorance.
And it iS trend, at least around campus, for the desperate few who cannot accept the workings of the real world to label things fascist or neo-Nazi if they do not mesh perfectly with their narrow view of the world should be. The work in these studies is only previously attained by wet rocks and clay.
But I have faith in most of the people on this
campus. They are not about to let their thinking become permanently warped by either the elitist intolerance of a Jerry Fallow or the mouthings of the allegedly liberal campus idiots.
Conservatism has been around long before Falwell and his Moral Majority, and it will be here long after they are gone. They, like some of the conservatives, have a warped idea of what conservatism is all about.
The labeling of a conservative philosophy, which is based on the premise that liberty is preserved by an ABUSENCE of government in our own country, is also less childish, ludicrous. To say the most, it is least.
Nazi philosophy is about as conservative as Edward Kennedy's philosophy is communist. Yet some people still do not wish to make the distinction.
But, as I said, I have faith that this is not to be the rule. If it does become the dominant form of criticism, what is to be of that great alternative of demonstration? My editor's ucers to the contrary, it was a unique, exciting experience to write a tongue-in-cheek column about women's wear that was viltified to a point where I was the object of two demonstrations and a 30-wimmin storming of the Kansan newsroom.
I learned what it was like to know that my words were being read. I learned what the influence of the columnist could be. I learned how to avoid the office of the Women's Coalition.
There are a lot of things that remain undone, however. A lot of questions remain unanswered on this campus, and it's hard to tell whether anyone will have the time or inclination to look into them. Free speech, the University's role in South Africa, the power of the chancellor's office and faithful pursuit of academic ideals are important issues.
But has anyone ever attempted to find out why you can never find a table in the Wescoe Dell when you need one? Why do people who normally would walk or ride bicycles now drive "energy-saving" mopeds on campus? Why does it take seven Facilities Operations people to get ice off of six feet of sidewalk? Why don't the concessions people at football games save a few skulls and go to either paper or lighter plastic cups?
Perhaps, from God knows where, someone will come along who has the time to ask these questions. Maybe, if the stars are right, the Kansan will be blessed with another columnist who can give the campus a different, if not always perceptive, point of view.
Until then, I suppose the campus will have to get its paltry diet of conservatism from my "cerebral clone," or the "multisyllabic" William F. Buckley. But that's not all bad. With a little effort and a little openness, they might even learn to like it.
And maybe they will remember that they heard it here first.
Alternative energy needs publicity
It is a squat, brick building where I intermed this summer, in an easily overlooked town. It is one small beginning of many in the alternative energy movement, a part of a field with growing pains that is too small for its ideas, too big for its buildings. It is Alternative Sciences of Energy (ASE) magazine, 10 volume, to provide realization of a down-sized American dream.
In 10 years, the magazine has grown from a newsletter mimeographed in a basement to a full-fledged publication with a readership of 25,000 in 55 countries. It is confidentially capitalist, relying on subscriptions and enthusiasm for its success.
Its dreams are private. Practicality is pounded on the magazine's typewriters. ASE publishes largely technical articles on alternative energy systems and appeals to a readership of mostly engineers and architects. It also promotes alternative energy legitimizes a movement that has only recently gone from waving banners to businesses.
As Abby Marier, associate ASE editor said, "Ten years ago when small groups of us were talking about alternative energy, people told us we should get serious about something feasible. Today we're consultants, architects and business people in alternative energy.
"We're making money from alternative energy."
heated buildings spiraled from 52 in 1974, to more than 50,000 in 1979. The budget for the government-sponsored Solar Energy Research Institute has increased by 20 times since its opening in 1977, from $5 million to $100 million.
Yet if there are successes, there are reminders of work ahead. In the ASE office, one floor in a brick building, plaster falls all too frequently from the aging ceiling, contractors are in short supply and documents are crowded into a too-small space.
It is the alternative energy movement in microcosm, at once overworked, understaffed, overcommitted and a movement with momentum. It is a movement emboldened by success. Since the early fifties, for instance, photovoltaic costs were sharply reduced from $2,000 per peak watt to $8-15 per watt. Meanwhile the number of solar
Grown from speculation to sophistication within the last decade, alternative energy measures its history by what happened the day before.
But progress is not a pat measure of an alternative energy future. Improvements are only as good as the policies that promote them. All too often, government and private
SUSAN
SCHOENMAKER
industry are at cross purposes in pursuit of the same goal. The research and development efforts of small alternative energy companies are often duplicated by governmental programs. In a further display of intelligent economic thinking, we suggest that alternative energy publicity vital to the success of both its programs and small company marketing.
The result is high-priced programs and an uninformed public.
In a recent study by the Arthur Little Corporation, 50 percent of Americans weren't even aware of government tax credits on alternative energy devices. Forty percent of the first $10,000 spent on the purchase of a solar, wind, photovoltaic or hydropower device can be credited against the purchaser's income tax bill.
What appears as an apathetic public is really the result of a government that doesn't
publish the alternative energy programs it practices.
Whether alternative energy is even on the governmental agenda is in doubt after Ronald Reagan's election. In his campaign, Reagan suggested the elimination of the Department of Energy the major source of alternative fuel and the removal of the windfall profits tax.
The windfall profits tax is supporting, among other projects, the Solar Energy and Conservation bank. In 1811 the bank is scheduled to offer low-interest loans to customer purchases of energy-funded homes, solar collectors, and the financing of retrofitting.
Progress in alternative energy is just as easily replaced by federal procrastination. Without government cooperation, and forced to compete against federally-subsubsidized conventional energy, alternative energy is an empty argument.
The same government that provides tax write-offs to oil field exploration, that funded the Alaska pipeline and insured nuclear power by $55 million, owes alternative energy equality. When the free market is a farce, no alternatives to governmental assistance.
Alternative energy once begun is not easily ended. But without significant federal aid, it may be preserved at the expense of its decentralized philosophy. Already oil companies own 50 percent of the photovoltaic market, which is a potential centralized energy source. To exploit an expanding exploring or exploitable on a large scale through the development of wind energy farms. An oil company recently was the first in its field to buv out a wind company.
Letters to the Editor
Alternative energy in America today is still an unfinished aspiration for those who gave to its beginnings. Whether it will truly lead as a decentralized energy source depends on the technology that will be used, begun, are willing to continue until aspirations and acceptance finally meet.
Once again, we, the Muslim community of Lawrence, find the name of Christ used by those who preslyze their religion of racial, national and religious bigotry.
To the editor:
Muslims denouncing Christian bigotry, narrowness
We denounce the Crusade's base attempts to set up a psychological environment for racism by is distribution of the infamous and racist "virulent" "Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion."
We denounce its official organ, "The Cross and the Flag."
We denounce its role in fostering a climate that has resulted in a spate of racially motivated violence throughout the United States, for example. Wilmington, N.C., and Buffalo, N.Y.
In light of this, and because we have so long borne the brunt of well-calculated attacks by similar bigots, we now take the opportunity to categorically denounce the Christian Nationalist
We denounce its attempt to co-opt the Muslims' legitimate struggle against perceived inequities and injustices in the policies of the government of Israel.
For those ignorant enough to question why Muslims would denounce the religious defamation of Jews, we have an Islamic tradition that says, "Whoever from among you
se anindecency, he must modify it by his hand.
if he cannot, he must do so by his tongue; if he
 cannot, he must do so by his heart (through
 disnoropal. etc.) ..."
Karim Abbas Muslim Student Association
To those who are frustrated by opposition to or questioning of certain attitudes you might hold, we say do not become so frustrated that you call for so-called alliances against the Muslims. We see such calls as incentive for society's bigots to be vicious viperous heads. They care not when they bite.
To the editor:
I have lost track of how many letters Kevin Helliker has had printed in the UDK, but I really enjoyed reading the one in the Nov. 14 issue! At first I asked myself, "is this a joke?" But then I realized that the letter was to be taken seriously. It rambled from first in Hood, to two men lost in a wormstow, and finally to a bur under a saddle. Drowsiness nearly overtook me while reading, until I came to his criticism of the judicial system for outlawing prostitution, gambling, drug abuse and suicide. He claims these are "victimless crimes."
Helliker off base
For those of you fortunate enough to have fallen off into a peaceful sleep before getting that far, Helliker made the assumption that, "given the freedom to do so, man will price himself right out of business." He continued with, "This assumption, which substitutes fear for facts, is the same assumption that led our judicial system such as each act as preemptive of drug use, and acts most commonly known as victimless crimes." Then for us, those he is trying so hard to enlighten, he adds, "A victimless crime is a contradiction in terms, a joke and a slap in the face of justice."
First, I must make clear a point that Heliker has confused, that being the fact that the judicial system has NOTHING to do with the legislation of laws in this nation. The judicial system is empowered to enforce, not create, the laws of our nation and state. If you want to "blame" someone for the illegality of your "victimless" crimes then you should blame yourself, because the laws governing them were and still are being legislated by the representatives YOU elect.
Seeing that Hellikler had confused two separate and distinct branches of government, I wasn't sure how to react. "I'm not timeless" crime. According to the eternal Webster's, a victim is "a living creature who is
Mark Gillett
Leavenworth sophomore
If Kevin Helliker is so set on changing the laws of this nation, then he should stop spending his time confusing the public with erroneous data. Instead he should tell his representatives, both at state and federal levels that he would like something done. In an earlier letter, Helliker stated, "Your mind is your salvation." Helliker, you are utterly lost.
killed, injured, or subjected to suffering." To be sure that each of Hellerk's "victimless" crimes in fact has a victim, let's apply this definition. The first two crimes, prostitution and gambling, have for years been the subject for debate. If anyone really hurt? I have my opinion, but it is primarily up to the reader to determine for himself if it is moral to have sex for money and put "earned" money up to chance. For the next crime it is important to note that drug use is not illegal in this or any country. Drug abuse is. It is illegal in other countries, in thousands of deaths and millions of dollars of property loss each year. Surely, among all this pain and suffering, we can find one victim. Suicide, or "the act of intentionally killing oneself," must also fit our definition. The victim causes the death (no doubt of that). But the fact remains, there is a victim.
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