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Kansan
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Tuesday, December 1, 1998
EVERYBODY COMES AWAY WITH SOMETHING LASTING...
Editorials
World AIDS Day can be observed by students through memorials, testing
Today is a special day, but not the type that makes people want to celebrate. No one likes to think about World AIDS Day, but we all should.
The lone fact that we need a day to remind us of the threat of AIDS is sad enough. Despite being the No. 6 killer of 15-to 24 year-olds, many people still think that it can't happen to them. Four pieces of the NAMES Project, otherwise known as the AIDS quilt, are on display on campus today—two in the Kansas Union Art Gallery, two in the Spencer Art Museum.
Another memorial will be heard throughout Lawrence at 2 p.m. today, when the 18 Bells Project, sponsored
AIDS is the sixth leading cause of death for people between 15 and 24 years of age.
by the Douglas County AIDS Project, takes place. Area churches will join the Campanile in ringing their bells 18 times, symbolizing the 18 years that Douglas County has fought the battle against AIDS.
It is a battle that America has been losing, with teens and college-age students suffering the most casualties. In the last year, 50 percent of new AIDS cases reported were in
people between the ages of 15 and 24. One out of every four cases in the last year occurred in those under the age of 22.
And those are just the cases that are known. Because HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, has no symptoms, those who are at risk must have themselves tested to find out if they are infected.
Today, Planned Parenthood of Douglas County is sponsoring free HIV testing from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. at their clinic, 1420 Kasold Dr. Suite C. Those who would like to be tested need only make an appointment by calling 832-0281.
Ronnie Wachter for the editorial board
Variety show isn't only for greeks
The 50th anniversary of Rock Chalk Revue, a variety show put on every year to benefit United Way of Douglas County, will be an all-greek show. In fact, it has been three years since any non-greek campus living organization performed at Rock Chalk. Many people view this situation as evidence of a pro-greek bias, which they say affects the entire Revue.
This blanket condemnation is unfair to the people who work hard to get into the show. The Revue's rules state that all campus living organizations, from fraternities and sororities to residence halls and scholarship halls, are eligible to try out as long as they meet the show's internal deadlines.
Non-greek groups have participated and won awards in the community service aspect of the competition. There are two such
The Rock Chalk Revue has been unfairly dubbed a greek event.
groups competing this year, but, as usual, none performing in the show.
This year's theme was announced in mid-September, after which organizations were given time to write a skit, record music and put together a notebook. Notebooks were due Nov. 6, and the final selection of performers was announced on Nov. 23. This year's Revue will be on Mar. 11, 12 and 13.
Some people also contend that judges are biased toward greeks. This just is not true. All selections are made blind. That is, each group is identified only by a number.
have any current affiliation with the University and must have graduated more than four years before serving as a judge.
The only complaint about the Revue that has any merit concerns the cost of trying out. Most of the non-greek organizations that don't try out for Rock Chalk cite lack of funds as a major reason. Stricter spending limits than the ones imposed last year would do much to address this complaint.
However, this does not change the fact that those who want to participate in Rock Chalk must make the commitment to do so. Only five troupes make into each year's show, and this year only 10 troupes tried out. Last year that number was 14. Those people who want to perform but suspect a pro-greek bias in the Revue should submit a notebook first.
Also, judges are not allowed to
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I am still a little unclear about the electronic implications of the new millennium.
Perspective
Mike Perryman
Guest Columnist
Y2K bugs epitomize computer dependency
Evidently so are many of the individuals
responsible for administering year 2000 computer tests, including some defense agency officials who falsely claimed that all nuke-related national defense computer systems were in compliance with Y2K operating standards.
I personally wouldn't call this group of people ignorant, but I know that I would never trust a multimillion-dollar "mission critical" computer system that allegedly would shield the entire nation from the 'tn self-aggrity itself.
a nation from the tyranny of evil men to self-certify itself.
Putting aside the mixup, I'll cut the Defense Special Weapons Agency a little slack. I understand that there must be a lot of pressure, and it takes time to test all of that nuclear-death-deterrent equipment. However, if by some seemingly impossible chance the agency computers miscalculate or fail to calculate at midnight, Jan 1, 2000, and my house and neighborhood in Kansas City are compromised by some stray Iraqi missile that escaped United Nations weapons inspection, eluded United States reconnaissance satellites and slid through an invisible breech in the nation's defense shield. I'll have to make a phone call.
Every computer that might, in some way, disrupt our perpetual existence probably is being checked by capable individuals even as we speak, right? For the most part, I believe this. But I can see a few important systems — which previously had some clue — ceasing all computation and saying to one another:
"Duhhh what do we do now."
Hypothetical: Some thorough and highly cautious bank computer programmer simply forgets to bring his glasses to work — they're sitting at home on top of a copy of "How To Rid Your Coffee Maker of the Millennium Bug" — so he has to squint when updating the bank accounting system's internal clock. Because of his inadvertent folly, on Saturday morning, Jan. 1, 2000, the bank's system will read 1900 and will think to itself.
I can see them failing to operate, or worse, failing to remember important events, such as the time I deposited $500 into my bank account! Oh boy. That's a frightening thought. If this were possible, which in some abstract, almost inconceivable way, I'm sure it is — then it wouldn't take much to throw the entire country into a frenzy and possibly into economic chaos.
"Hmm, what is this strange number? I have never seen this before. I do not know what I should do about this. I am feeling a little woozie. Maybe I should slow down just a little bit and take a rest. Maybe I should stop for a
while. Oh no. I do not remember anything. Too bad, sorry folks, need sleep."
A little extreme, I know, but these days too many people and too many things, such as national defense systems and cars, are dependent on computers.
I spoke with my uncle — a computer systems engineer — the other day about whether my car, which contains an internal computer, would quit on Jan. 1, 2000. In a way, I was hopeful that he would give me an affirmative answer — This is because I figure my car computer is good for only one thing: creating that loud, annoying, metronomic dinging sound when I open the door or forget to fasten my seatbelt.
It never fails, and when the car starts dinging, I want to take a hammer and a screwdriver and disable the computer myself. Although my uncle could not give me a definitive answer about whether my car would quit, he did give me a little insight on the whole year 2000 issue.
The way I understand it is that certain mechanical devices, such as some cars, microwaves, coffee makers and television sets, among many other things, contain embedded computer chips. Not all, but many of these chips have the last two digits of the year programmed somewhere within. Embedded computer chips are designed differently, and many will not have any problem functioning when the year 2000 roles along.
So when I asked my uncle how the year could affect the calculations inside a computer — after all, why would cars, micwaves or TVs break down into tears just because they don't know what year it is— he told me that after '99 flipped over to '00, some embedded computer chips would read the year 1900 and see it as an error because the year 1900 never was programmed into the chip. After seeing this error, the computer would shut down or the machine would cease to function, or function properly anyway because the chip would not be able to make sense of the error. Every time you'd try to restart the computer or operate the microwave or TV, the chip would find that error, not understand and then shut down again— theoretically.
As far as my Mazda MX6 goes, the internal computer has another function — other than creating that incessant dinging sound. The computer regulates the gas to air ratio in fuel-injected cars. Thus, if my car has an embedded computer chip that is incapable of overlooking the year error, I probably will find myself en route to a New Year's Eve party — late again
— sitting at a stoplight at about 12:01 a.m. Jan. 1, 2005, pressing the gas pedal and getting no response. At that point, I think I'll get out of the car with my hammer and screwdriver, open the hood, and with a few strategically calculated strikes, make sure the internal computer is permanently dysfunctional.
Perrymen is a Prairie Village senior in journalism.
Frankly, it all is a lot of posturing and garbage, if you ask me.
Joe Camel not deserving of anti-tobacco criticism
I have been watching and listening to all the arguments recently regarding Joe Camel and all the moralizing one way or another in regards to cigarettes and tobacco companies'
advertising campaigns. President Clinton and some members of Congress want you to think of them as saving children from the evils of lung cancer, while the cigarette lobby presents itself as the last bastion of freedom.
Meredith
Toenies
opinion @ kansan.com
Last year, I smoked what I hope was the last cigarette of my life.
I wanted to quit for a long time, and while I have no intentions of going back, smoking was a big part of my adult life and a chunk of my childhood.
When I was ready to quit, I talked to a physician at
Watkins Memorial Health Center and got support from my family and friends.
I suppose it could be compared to having your vision surgically corrected. You don't regret being able to see better, but some mornings you forget you don't have to find your glasses. When you're thinking, you sort of miss the habit of taking them off and rubbing for smudges with your shirttail.
I smoked my first cigarette in 1982, when I was 13. I started because I wanted to have something in common with the girls, mostly older, that I found myself thrown together with. And because I thought they were cool, it would help me be cool.
Joe Camel had absolutely nothing to do with it, mostly because that ad campaign was still a few years in the future. It was, simply, a wish to be like the older kids I admired. I didn't want to be like the Marlboro Man or the women in the "You've come a long way, baby" ads. I'm pretty sure that most kids older than 10 have no wish to emulate a cartoon camel, however cool the ad company may try to make it look.
Even if you smoke, you can have an effect. A friend of mine has kids who, at the time I met them, ranged in age from 7 to 12. At the time, most of the adults in their lives smoked — including their parents.
I think that the best way to keep kids from smoking is to talk to them: your kid brothers or sisters, nieces, nephews, any kid in your life.
Prohibition turned little old ladies into boot-leggers when something they had done all their lives suddenly became illegal. The last thing anyone wants to see is pensioners raising tobacco plants under a grow light in their basement and getting busted on the 10 p.m. news.
We should learn from the lessons of Prohibition and the War on Drugs. Making something harder to obtain doesn't stop it; it just drives it underground.
I remember one friend and I telling all three kids that, while we ourselves smoked, we regretted the decision and wished we could take it back, and we talked to them about why it was a bad idea.
Prohibition also fed organized crime as the illegal drug trade does now, so I doubt that anyone wants to give them something else to from which to make money.
Those "kids" now range in age from 17 to 22, and not one of them smokes. Even their mom finally quit. They had Joe Camel all around them, but honesty from the people they looked up to worked better than threats or legislation.
The price of cigarettes is so high in Canada that smuggling of the cheaper American brands is a problem. Yet, of the 50 or more Canadians I've met in the last two or three years, more than half smoke. While this group may or may not be representative of Canadians as a whole in this respect, many of them are quite young (under 21) and the high cost of cigarettes hasn't seemed to deter them at all.
The next time you're tempted to blame your problems on TV or advertising, stop and think about how these things came about. You may owe that camel an apology after all.
1
Toenjis is a Kansas City, Kan., senior in history and psychology.