4A - THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
OPINION
FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 8,2002
TALKTOUS
Jay Krall editor 864-4854 or jkrall@kansan.com
Brooke Hesler and Kyle Ramsey managing editors 864-4854 or bhester@kansan.com and kramsey@kansan.com
Laurel Burchfield readers' representative 864-4810 or lbuchfield@kansan.com
Maggie Koerth and Amy Potter opinion editors 864-4924 or opinion@kansan.com
Amber Agee business manager 864-4358 or advertising@kansan.com
Eric Ketting retail sales manager 864-4358 or advertising@kansan.com
Malcolm Gibson general manager and news adviser
KANSAN EDITORIAL BOARD
Matt Fisher sales and marketing adviser 864.7666 or mfisher@kansan.com
'Romeo and Juliet' law shows Legislators' bias
As this column is read, 20-year-old Matthew Limon sits in his jail cell. He's been confined there since the Kansas District Court handed down its 206-month sentence.
His crime? When Matthew was 18 years old, he performed consensual oral sex on a boy three years younger than him. He will not be released from prison for his transgressions until his mid 30s and will be registered as child molester for life.
The cruel and unusual punishment meted out in this decision is just one of the many reasons the American Civil Liberties Union has filed an Amicus brief, that is a brief file by someone who is not a party to the case, with the Supreme Court on behalf of Matthew. The case is not about a 46-year-old sleeping with an 11-year-old, it's about consensual sex with someone just over the statutory limit. For the "crime" of being one year too old, Limon will spend the next 17 years in prison.
Of equal concern is the imbalanced sentence given to a particular group of people. "If a girl had done this, she'd be out of prison right now," said Chris Hampton, a representative of the ACLU.
In Kansas there are two separate laws dealing with consensual sex between a person age 14 or 15 and an adult. Matthew was charged under Kansas statute 21-3505, which carries with it a maximum sentence of 19 years.
In 1999, however, the state legislators passed statute 21-3522, better known as the "Romeo and Juliet" laws. The statute is
nearly identical to 21-3505 except it is applied only when the parties involved are "members of the opposite sex." The maximum penalty for the crime of sodomy under this law is 15 months.
"The Legislature carved out an exception to the law," said David Miller, Miami county attorney. "This statute is constitutional." Miller's office prosecuted Limon in the district courts.
The ACLU disagrees with Miller's assessment. It contends that the new law violates the 14th amendment's Equal Protection Clause.
The same punishment isn't given for the same crime solely on the basis of who the participants are. Homosexuals are given a prison sentence over 14 times longer because they're homosexuals.
When the legislators singled out "members of the opposite sex" and gave them lighter sentences, they knew exactly what they were doing.
The point was to ensure that any homosexuals caught in the act would stay in prison for a long time to come.
This law needs to change, but given the choice between amending the law to give everyone a lighter sentence and keeping so-called sexual deviants locked away, it's pretty clear what the Legislature would do.
After all, Kansas is a state that still has adult sodomy laws on the books.
Dan Osman for the editorial board.
Call 864-0500
Free for All
For more comments, go to www.kansan.com.
Free for All callers have 20 seconds to speak about any topic they wish. Kansan editors reserve the right to omit comments. Slanderous and obscene statements will not be printed. Phone numbers of all incoming calls are recorded.
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To the girl in my German class, you don't know what you're saying,and you're really boring the rest of the class including the professor. So if you would do all a favor and just maybe shut up, that would really help our learning process.
vacation? I need to know, my world is turned upside down.
I'm flipping through the channels, and The Price is Right is on, and there's a different voice. There's no Rod Roddy. Could somebody please tell me what happened to Rod Roddy? Is Rod Ok? Did he die? Did he get married or something? Is he on
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What's up with the woman bus driver who wears sunglasses in the fog and the rain? That's scary and definitely not cool.
ing" claimed music sharing is equivalent to stealing from the music industry. Statistics were shown to prove a few points, but I think these figures were used in a narrow sense.
About the fish with the fungus. Just go down to Pet World, and there are special anti-fungus pills that you drop in the water. And good luck.
ing" claimed music sharing is equivalent to stealing from the music industry. Statistics were shown to prove a few points, but I think these figures were used in a narrow sense.
I just wanted to tell everyone that my roommate has a condom on his dresser, yet there is no way in hell that anybody would ever have sex with him.
There's a ghost that lives in Hash. We call it the masturbating ghost because it does weird things to lotion and it throws lotion across the room.
ing" claimed music sharing is equivalent to stealing from the music industry. Statistics were shown to prove a few points, but I think these figures were used in a narrow sense.
For all of you who didn't go to see Rent tonight, you missed out on something amazing.
So I get a $20 ticket from KU parking for being an inch and a half over the line. Maybe they should come up to the McCollum lot when 15 people were parked here illegally and give them tickets.
ing" claimed music sharing is equivalent to stealing from the music industry. Statistics were shown to prove a few points, but I think these figures were used in a narrow sense.
ing" claimed music sharing is equivalent to stealing from the music industry. Statistics were shown to prove a few points, but I think these figures were used in a narrow sense.
STAYSKAL'S VIEW
'KANSAN' REPORT CARD
Pass:
Rent. This one's a partial pass. It's great that Rent came to the Lied Center and it's a really good show. But frankly, we could have lived without the jazzhands-happy leading men.
Fresh and hearty meals. It's about time students got an option for on-campus eating that isn't fried and full of grease. Maybe these menu changes will help future classes keep off that dreaded freshman 15.
Increased student voter registration. Thanks to efforts by the Student Legislative Awareness Board and other groups, student voter registration increased by 70 percent this year. This is one trend we hope lasts a long time.
Fail:
Romeo and Juliet Law. Supplying special privileges for straight couples flies in the face of equal protection under the law. Kansas' legislators are entitled to their beliefs, but they should not be allowed to ruin other people's lives because of them.
Blocking routes home. We've said it before and we'll say it again; there is no reason to keep students from their homes and study spaces because of a basketball game. Leave one street open.
Nevada nixes nugs. Here's our less on for today, kids: it's Ok to get involved in gambling, prostitution, liquor and Celine Dion, but you had better stay away from that demon weed.
Maggie Kcerth/Kansan
PERSPECTIVES
Music industry hurts itself MP3 downloads not to blame
GUESTCOMMENTARY
Audrey Snyder's Oct. 28 column "Downloading music is moral equivalent of shoplifting" claimed music sharing is equivalent to stealing from the music industry. Statistics were shown to prove a few points, but I think these figures were used in a narrow sense.
Everyone could look at the hard facts and figures and percentages surrounding the loss of profit by the music industry, supposedly due to the loss of CD sales. But I'd like to point out that correlation does not necessarily mean causation.
Steve Everly
opinion@kansan.com
Just look at how much the average CD costs. CDs sometimes cost upwards of $18 to $20 each, just for a disc of about
Just because CD sales have decreased since the rise of Napster several years ago, it does not mean that it is only attributed to musicsharing.
Let's assume there has been a decrease in profit for some recording labels. Can these labels blame just music piracy for their problems?
In fact, according to the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), the music industry as a whole has actually increased its profit by an average of $1 billion each year since 1996, the year of Napster's explosion of popularity. It wasn't until 2001 that the CD sales stopped increasing at their high rate and suddenly only increased by approximately 1 percent rather than nearly 2 percent in each preceding year.
12 songs.
Does this sound like a fair price to pay just to listen to something? Perhaps people have turned to the free music-sharing services to prevent having to pay a lot of money just to hear a few specific songs.
Another point of interest is the issue of new bands and their struggle to "make a buck."
A no-name band has to rely on the radio and word of mouth to get their name out to the public. With only these two forms of communication the process of "making a name for yourself" will take an extremely long time. But, what the music-sharing industry provides is a medium of free distribution of music to
If CD sales were lowered then one cannot dispute the much larger difficulty of making money in the music industry. However, that point seems to be the only aspect of the anti-music-sharing argument. What is commonly overlooked is the benefit these file-swapping networks bring.
millions of listeners.
Musicians do not have to pay any fees or worry about advertising, all they have to do is upload their song onto the network and their name is out.
Granted, they will still have to go out and inform others of their music, but placing a song on the Internet for free listening provides an easy and cheap means of getting music to a possible fan base.
The point to be taken in all of this is those who call music and file sharing "stealing" are being both cynical with the issue at hand and ignorant of its benefits.
When a band gets started and they want to make money, they are going to have to make sacrifices and investments to get their name out.
Although music sharing may harm them a bit if they ever become popular, but if nothing else it extends their fan base, free of charge.
When the music industry complains about declining CD sales maybe rather than pointing the finger at someone else, they should look in their bulging wallets and wonder whether there is any way they can alleviate this problem where it is most deeply rooted: the recording industry itself.
Everly is a Eudora sophomore in United States history.
Students should have the right to decide area of study
Because of budget cuts, only students in the school of education can take special education classes. This hamps non-education students from expanding their knowledge in the study of special education.
I realize, as a journalism student, that special education classes would be of better use to education majors. Although this is true, one must consider non-education students who planned to pursue a minor or concentration in areas of special education.
Last spring, approximately 225 students, enrolled in sign language classes, were regretfully informed of a new University policy. The School of Education informed all non-education students they
were unable to enroll in any special education classes. Now, the School of Education only offers special education as a minor to students with an elementary education major.
The right of each non-education student to advance in the sign language curriculum was revoked. Additionally, the new policy was implemented during the middle of the semester. This decision should have been made prior to enrollment, because it placed non-education students in a dilemma.
GUEST COMMENTARY
Four sign language classes previously fulfilled the foreign language requirement for journalism students. Only having one class completed, and being restricted from taking the following three, put several students back to the beginning, at step one after the policy was enforced.
Christy Hass
opinion@kansan.com
Because of the policy, sign language classes are no longer considered as credits for requirements, but rather electives. Students enrolled in the classes considered dropping them for little or no refund.
The lack of funding is the main reason
behind this problem. Sally Roberts, assistant professor of special education, said, "due to the lack of funding for non-education students, the school has emphasized a focus on those pursuing professional careers in special education."
This policy is unfair, and although there is a lack of funding, the state budget cuts shouldn't directly affect the classes we can or cannot take. It is a necessity that all KU students receive a fair education, and the choice to decide which area of study or classes they would like to pursue.
Unfortunately, this is only the beginning. Come Jan 1, there could be another set of budget cuts, and the chances of our choices being limited again is very high. Now one must be careful they can actually
enroll in the classes of their choice
The amount of money allotted to each school by the University should be distributed appropriately, but should never conflict with students' abilities to choose their education. The University needs to focus on enhancing the variety of studies that are available to all students.
So, next time you are looking at the timetable, trying to decide which class suits your personality, make sure you are able to participate in that area of study. Whether it is yoga, human sexuality, or even sign language, all KU students should have the right to choose the class of their choice.
Hass is an Omaha, Neb., junior in journalism.