Opinion
Kansan
Published daily since 1912
Spencer Duncan, Editor Lindsey Henry, Managing editor Andrea Albright, Managing editor Tom Eblen, General manager, news adviser
4A
Sarah Scherwinki, Business manager
Brian Pagen, Retail sales manager
Dan Simon, Sales and marketing adviser
Justin Knupp, Technology coordinator
Friday, November 7. 1997
W. David Keith / KANSAN
Examining
California court should be saluted for equal treatment to Boy Scouts
The United States is based on an unprecedented idea of individual freedom. Under the auspices of the Constitution, people can worship whatever deity they choose, vote for whomever they choose and go wherever they choose. This philosophy was challenged when a California Boy Scout Council denied Eagle Scout badges for two youth with atheistic views.
If recognizing a "duty to God" (as the Boy Scout oath does) is a part
The California Supreme Court ruled that the boys should receive their badges. This was the proper decision. In a society where individualism is so valued, two people who fulfill every requirement for an honor should not be rejected on religious grounds.
of being an Eagle Scout, then perhaps there is grounds for denying brothers Michael and William Randall their Eagle badges. However, in light of the Boy Scouts' commitment to service and learning, it hardly seems right to exclude these two because they won't pay lip service to a God they don't believe in.
This same Boy Scout council sought in 1991 to deny the two boys admittance to a Cub Scout pack in Anaheim. The courts prevented the organization from penalizing the Randalls then, too. The Orange County Council of the Boy Scouts should have abandoned their drive to persecute Michael and William after the first court decision.
decision on whether the Boy Scouts can exclude atheists in general is still pending. But if allmen's schools must accept women, the military must accept homosexuals and minorities must not be denied education, it hardly seems reasonable to deny two young men an honor because of their religious beliefs.
While a legal decision has yet to be made in cases other than the Randalls', the court ruling that the two boys must be awarded their Eagle badges is a step in the right direction. In keeping with America's founding principals, the divisiveness being fostered by punishing a person based on their religious beliefs cannot be allowed to persist.
Gerry Doyle for the editorial board
Wescoe snack bar choices are limited
The Wescoe Terrace snack bar is a central location for students to grab a quick bite to eat. However, between the hot dog stand and the nacho bar, the variety of healthy food choices is limited.
Don Harvey, manager of Wescoe Terrace, recently expanded the salad bar to accommodate the student demand for a nutritious meal. This combined with the low-fat snack cart does offer students more choices, but hardly compensates for a well-balanced, hot meal.
Wesco Terrace serves students now as a grab-and-go snack shop.
All of the food sold at the snack bar is ready-to-eat and the only cooking preparation needed is a microwave.
But Wescoe Terrace has become more than just a snack bar. Placed in an area of heavy traffic, many students use the snack bar for breakfast and lunch. The snack bar should accommodate students by providing them with a well-balanced, hot meal.
However, only microwave ovens are allowed in Wescoe Terrace. Providing nutritious food that is
microwaveable is a challenge. If a grill and oven were placed in the snack bar, Wescoe Terrace would be equipped to serve meals much like the Kansas Union does.
Profits at Wesoc Terrace are at the industry average, according to Harvey. However, the snack bar is in a prime location for most students to eat lunch. By expanding the snack bar into a food court that could accommodate the necessary equipment for hot meals, Wescoe Terrace would become more popular.
Kansan staff
Tamara Miller for the editorial board
Bradley Brooks ... Editorial
Jason Strait ... Editorial
Jodie Chester ... News
Jen Smith ... News
Adam Darby ... News
Charity Jeffries ... Online
Kristie Blasi ... Sports
Tommy Gallagher ... Associate Sports
Dave Morantz ... Campus
Eric Weslander ... Campus
Ashleigh Roberts ... Features
Steve Puppe ... Photo
Bryan Volk ... Design, graphics
Mitch Lucas ... Illustrations
Mark McMaster ... Wire
Ann Marchand ... Special sections
Lachelle Rhoades ... News clerk
News editors
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Advertising managers
Matt Fisher . . . Assistant retail
Michael Soifer . . . Campus
Colleen Eager . . . Regional
Anthony Migliazzo . . National
Jeff Auslander . . . Marketing
Chris Haghrian . . . Internet
Brian LeFevre . . Production
Jen Wallace . . . Production
Dustin Skidgel . . Promotions
Tyler Cook . . . Creative
Annette Hoover . Public relations
Rachel O'Neill . Classified
Jaime Mann . Assistant classified
Marc Harrell . Senior account executive
Scott Swedund . Senior account executive
Aroadon your mind: Today's quote
"How come it to pass, then, that we appear such cowards in reasoning, and are so afraid to stand the test of ridicule?"
How to submit letters and guest columns
—Anthony Ashley Cooper, Earl of Shaftsbury, 1671-1713
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.
Guest columners 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 Bradley Brooks (brooks@kansan.com) or Jason Strait (jstrait@kansan.com) at 864-4810. If you have general questions or comments, e-mail the page staff (opinion@kansan.com) or call 864-4810.
Raving
Train to Mars necessary to keep society rolling
A few days ago NASA scientists said that they had probably heard the last from the Mars rover Sojourner. The robot lasted about three times longer than
expected and brought back the most exciting photos of an alien landscape since man walked on the moon. The mission was a great success for NASA's new better, faster, cheaper strategy to ensure continued funding. Geologists learned a lot about Mars and the Earth. But the most important thing about the mission was the way it sparked the imagination.
Joe
Suber
onlinen@kansan.com
At risk of being taken for
At risk of being taken for hyperbole, I must say that there is nothing more important for the continued survival of our civilization than finding that rover. Putting people on Mars is more important than feeding the hungry, more realistic than arms control, and a lot more interesting than whatever is on Oprah. I say this because our civilization is confronting a new problem that most people only understand obliquely; we have run out of frontiers.
Pretty much all the dwellers on arable land have accepted capitalism, western thinking and big government. Francis Fukuyama calls this end of ideological frontiers the end of history. Environmentalists, lacking imagination, see a world of limited resources that demands an end to economic and population expansion. We have plumbed the depths of the oceans and flown over the highest mountains on a regular basis. Most recent technological innovation is all about making the same things lighter, smaller, cleaner and more efficient.
The so-called frontier of cyberspace isn't a frontier. It's an uncensored magazine married to a telephone. Cyberspace mostly provides a fantasy frontier to explore. I can say from personal experience that surfing the web is more of an addiction than a noble pursuit. If there are any frontiers in cyberspace, they are inside the minds of people, and they tend to evaporate when somebody
digging a ditch cuts a cable.
But if we choose to expand instead of turning inward, the rewards will be great. Just as the colonization of the New World touched off the renaissance in Europe, going to Mars would open the door to all sorts of new ideas and projects that would do more than make interplanetary travel economical. Just as with the Apollo program, the spin-offs of new space technology can be the sweetest plumb to those who remain at home. But once the raw materials and energy mined from space became significant, we would no longer be caught in the trap of the environmentalists who say we have to limit what we are because we have limited resources. Even Fukuyama's end of history might be premature, as the Martian colonists might decide at some point to become politically independent.
We only have the technology for sailboats now. We have been stuck with basically the same sailboats since the Apollo program. However, there are bright people who still dream of a better future that isn't necessarily easier or more equal. If these people do not succeed in creating the means for our civilization to peacefully expand, then our civilization as we know it will die. Mars is a great test for the rocket scientists and for the rest of us.
Suber is an Topeka senior in political science.
I haven't written anything in quite a while. My loyal fans (both of them), have been pestering me for quite a while, wondering when the "Kansan's" funniest columnist
A 10-year anniversary dream as a KU columnist
when the Raksa's run would be published again. I had to quietly remind them that Andy Obermueller is usually published on Wednesday.
But the wait for stuff from me is well worth it. I took a brief sabbatical to work on the very column you see before your eyes, my 10-year anniversary column.
I can't believe that it's been 10 years since I first started this humble home of my rants. Of course, as I'm sure a few of you
Nick Bartkoski opinion@kansan.com
remember, when I got started my column was very different from what it is today. I began this column in Fall 1987 as a cheap and effective way of recruiting a loyal army to help me in my quest for world domination. Here's an example of what it looked like then:
And some day soon I shall be overlord to you all. My glorious revolution shall bring in a new order, one where the strong rule by fear. I shall enslave all those who refuse to join my army of absolute evil.
I wrote stuff like that for nearly three semesters. I would have gone on longer, but I found out that people would read my column, look at my picture, and laugh until milk came shooting out of their nose, regardless of the length of time since their last milk consumption. They just assumed it was a humor column.
I might have changed it to a humor column at this point, but it was a different time in early 1989. The country was becoming a kinder, gentler nation lit by a thousand points of light. This was just after President Dana Carvey and
the first nine year old to ever hold the office of Vice-President had been elected, and the nation was becoming a more happy-go-lucky place. Realizing that my take-over of the globe wasn't going to fly with the students of the University of Kansas, I did the only thing a rational human being would do: I used my column space to write a serialized pornographic novel.
The story followed the exploits of the hero, Jack, through his misadventures at Stewardess School. My problem with this column was that I was writing Jack by using myself as the psychological template.
I figured, what woman could resist a man who could recite along to each and every "Star Trek" episode? But apparently people still thought the column was meant to be funny. Who am I to swim against popular opinion?
So by Fall 1989, two years after I became a columnist, I shifted to the format everyone knows and loves today: One dork against the world. While looking over my columns to prepare for this anniversary, I was astounded how much I had grown as a columnist. Look at some excerpts from early 1990:
"Chancellor Budig? Boy does he suck." And then from evening of 1905
And then from spring of 1995:
"Interim Chancellor Shankel? Boy does he suck." And finally something from my most recent columns:
"Chancellor Hemenway? Boy does he suck." I'm amazed at the level of growth I've had through the years, but it's important to remember that I've worked hard, and that not everything I've done has worked. For example, look at this joke that was cut from a recent column:
"Chancellor Hemenway? Boy does he blow. But it has been a great 10 years. I can only hope the next 10 years are as full of greatness.
Bartkoski is a Basehor junior in English and journalism.
Feedback
E-mail article fails to tell full story
The "Kansan" article, "KU e-mail not picture perfect," on Nov. 4 is an excellent example of how even a student who uses falcon or eagle for e-mail may not know the capabilities of the system she is using.
Unfortunately, while those who use KU e-mail to exchange graphic images laugh, others will assume that the article's premise, that KU systems process only text messages, is true.
E-mail accounts on falcon and eagle can be used to exchange messages that contain any type of content, including graphs, charts and illustrations. Most students who send and receive multimedia messages through falcon and eagle use Eudora, an e-mail program that runs on PC and Macintosh computers, although many use Web-based programs such as Netscape Communicator. The Unix systems serve as "post offices" that store messages until users are ready to read them.
Academic Computing Services buys advertisements in the Kansan each week to inform students of free classes during the coming week. These classes include sessions on e-mail, and cover topics such as sending and receiving images. If the author of that article had attended the Oct. 15 Eudora class, perhaps the headline would have been, "KU e-mail users get the picture."
Wes Hubert
Wes Hubert Assistant Director, Academic Computing Services University of Kansas Information Technology Services