Opinion The University Daily Kansan
United States First Amendment Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion,or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech,or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble,and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.
THURSDAY NOVEMBER 4 2010
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PAGE 5A
FREE
--friend.
To contribute to Free For All, visit Kansan.com or call (785) 864-0500.
To all the people participating in no-shave November: if you don't want to shave, go live in France instead of making up a month to try and make it acceptable in the U.S.
--friend.
For the next election, I propose a tuition increase for the sole purpose of providing thicker toilet paper on campus.
--friend.
Dear Student Housing, I think it's cold in here than it is outside. Plus, my hair turns to icicles when I get out of the shower. I would really appreciate if you saved us some money, and turned off our AC. That is all.
--friend.
What is the point of studying for a week and still failing! I give up school! YOU WIN!
--friend.
Two nights ago I saw Little Bo Peep hooking up with Buzz Lightyear outside the Hawk. I can't believe he would do that to Woody. What an awful
--experiences, a powerful sense of well-being, and a buzzing or a ringing noise.
I think the fact that Jordan Juenemann is from Western Kansas instantly makes him way hotter than Conner Teahan. It makes him seem more down to earth.
--experiences, a powerful sense of well-being, and a buzzing or a ringing noise.
--experiences, a powerful sense of well-being, and a buzzing or a ringing noise.
The more I deal with people the better I like horses ...
Oatmeal chocolate chip cookie...with nuts...and milk...
and later maybe some sex.
--experiences, a powerful sense of well-being, and a buzzing or a ringing noise.
My vices are in this order:
alcohol, falling for in girls, food,
drugs, raves, sand beaches.
I really am not liking all these privacy protections on Facebook. I can't creep and stalk the good ole' days.
--experiences, a powerful sense of well-being, and a buzzing or a ringing noise.
So it's 37 degrees out and there are still bugs flying in my window. When will these buttholes die?
--experiences, a powerful sense of well-being, and a buzzing or a ringing noise.
Captain's Log. No-shave November, Day 3 - Scruffy.
--experiences, a powerful sense of well-being, and a buzzing or a ringing noise.
If you're the only teabagger on campus, then you must also be the only one delusional enough to think that eliminating all taxes will lead to good things.
--experiences, a powerful sense of well-being, and a buzzing or a ringing noise.
I love romantic comedies, and I don't care who knows it.
- experiences, a powerful sense of well-being, and a buzzing or a ringing noise.
I need to stop hooking up with random guys. I'm going to run out of possible names for my future sons soon...
--experiences, a powerful sense of well-being, and a buzzing or a ringing noise.
It was the magic brownies.I just know it.
SKPETICISM
Near death experiences may not always be religious
In the late 1980s, Nikki Sixx, bassist for the band Motley Crue and popularizer of the unnecessary umlaut, overdosed on heroin and was declared dead in the back of an ambulance en route to a hospital.
After two minutes of being clinically dead—and to the good fortune of Crue fans everywhere—the musician was brought back to life by a couple of shots of adrenaline and quickly recovered.
Sixx claimed later that although his heart had stopped and he had quit breathing,he was fully aware of the chaotic scene on the way to the hospital,and had even risen out of his body and observed it from above.
His account might sound strange, but rock star junkies aren't the only ones coming back from the dead with stories of this nature
In 1982, George Gallup and author William Proctor conducted a survey in which 15 percent of Americans responded that after a close brush with death they had undergone a near-death experience (NDE for short).
The term near-death experience refers generally to a wide variety of sensations reported by those who have come close to dying, and often times have actually been clinically dead.
Raymond Moody, parapsychologist and author of Life After Life, pinpoints several of the most common sensations experienced during a NDE, including a tunnel of bright gold or white light, out of body
BY ANDREW HOLTZEN
Moody, along with a minority of other researchers, argues that NDEs are indicative of something supernatural and are proof that the soul continues on after physical death.
A biochemical cause of NDEs has become the most prevalent theory and asserts that the reports given by near-deathers are very similar to the sensations felt by people under the influence of hallucinogenic drugs.
The scientific evidence, however, doesn't bode well for claims that NDEs require explanations beyond anything physically observable.
For example, many plants in the family Solanaceae contain alkaloids that can induce feelings of weightlessness and the hallucination of flying.
Other drugs, like LSD and psilocybin, are known to cause visual and auditory hallucinations similar to those reported in neardeath experiences.
Dr. Karl Jansen of the Royal College of Psychiatrists posits that the link between NDEs and hallucinogens could be caused by physiological factors like low blood pressure, a lack of oxygen, and low blood sugar during NDEs that could trigger the release of chemicals that interact with the same brain receptors as some psychedelic drugs.
Furthermore, the euphoria and sense of contact with a higher being of NDEs can be reproduced
There have even been studies performed showing that electrical and magnetic stimulation can cause out-of-body-experiences like those of NDEs.
with the dissociative anesthetic ketamine.
Despite the amount of research concerning NDEs, many questions still remain about the exact cause, but the ability to reproduce the reported sensations through natural methods adds credence to a scientific explanation rather than a paranormal one.
With the assertion that neardeath experiences are evidence that support belief in an afterlife researchers like Moody have made the mistake of trying to bring science to an issue that cannot be proven and must remain in the realm of faith.
Since just like a good Mötley Crüe album, the hereafter is simply something that believers can't be sure exists and deniers can't be sure doesn't.
Holtzen is a junior from Fayetteville, Ark., in chemistry and Spanish.
CARTOON
LETTER TO THE EDITOR
Argument against using pill wrong
NICHOLAS SAMBALUK
I don't have the time to address the obvious moral underpinnings of her argument, but I do want to address her claim that oral contraceptives "mask the symptoms" of endometriosis. The number one reason I'm on the pill is because of my endo. I have a mild case, but even mild cases can cause severe pain. Before I started my current prescription, I was taking Percocet for an entire week every month.
The pill doesn't just mask the menstrual pain, it actually works to prevent further progression of endo. By having a lighter (or no) period, fewer endometrial cells have the opportunity to implant
I am writing in response to the Letter to the Editor in Monday's paper.
I was appalled by Patricia Huber's argument that women shouldn't take oral contraceptives.
I'm curious as to what Huber thinks I should do to deal with my endo, if not take the pill. The only other option is invasive surgery, and that's only temporary - the endo will come back. The pill is the only way I can survive my menstrual cycle.
themselves outside of the uterus, and during the menstrual cycle, less bleeding means that there is a lower inflammatory response, which means less pain.
My prescription costs me over $70 a month. Luckily, I have a boyfriend who is willing to split the cost with me. Because the government won't subsidize oral contraceptives, other women with similar conditions might not be so lucky.
-Jesi Lipp is a junior from Lenexa.
LETTER TO THE EDITOR
Fight song should drop old attitudes
To all,
Great effort to update the Jayhawk Fight Song. But one question—since you're updating a 104 year old song, why would you maintain 104 year old attitudes? "Cyclone boys"?? The last time I checked, we played Cyclone women and men, along with the women's teams from the Big 12 and the nation! Referring to men as boys is just as bad for a number of reasons. It is possible to carry tradition too far. Please reconsider that wording!
- Mary Ann Rasnak is the director of the KU Academic Achievement and Access Center.
STUDENT ISSUES
Jail time not an acceptable consequence for pot smoking
All my life, my mom warned me against smoking pot—but not for the usual reasons. If you get caught, shed say, you could lose your student aid money for college and that would be disastrous.
I'm not arguing against the proven fact that marijuana, and of course use of other drugs, have negative long-term effects on health and other measures of personal well-being. Instead, we should take a hard look at the comparative consequences of the drug and the drug war.
Progressive Perspective
Now, she's no irresponsible hippie parent who would have otherwise condoned any sort of drug use, were it not for my education being at stake. Far from it. Instead, she understands that there is a big disconnect between the relatively small harm done by responsible use of recreational substances and the possible enormous consequences of state and federal law.
The focus on punishment, rather than harm reduction, education, and rehabilitation, causes lives to be ruined and families to be torn apart. Since 1998 the Souder amendment denies federal financial aid to any student convicted of a drug law violation. This leads to issues of access and structural discrimination.
The policies of the United States don't seem to be working very well—we have over half a million people behind bars for drug offenses alone, and according to drugpolicy.org, about 1.5 million people are arrested every year for drug law violations; 40 percent of these are marijuana-related.
We should take a look at Western Europe's drug policy. They focus primarily on harm reduction, which drugpolicy.org describes as "grounded in the conviction that people should not be punished for what they put into their bodies, but only for crimes committed against others. It acknowledges that no society will ever be free of
BY ALI FREE
fire@hansan.com
drugs. It holds that drug policies should seek to reduce the negative consequences (principally death, disease, crime and suffering) of both drug use and the policies themselves."
This is much more logical than our system, which is based in the narrow idea that any illicit substance use is inherently wrong and the focus should be on punishment. It also recognizes that the gateway drug hypothesis is true not necessarily because of the old D.A.R.E. myth that marijuana will lead you to seek out more intense experiences, but partially because underground dealers are more likely to have access to other harder, more addictive drugs. Make it sold commercially, and you have at least part of that problem solved.
Of course, what works in one country won't necessarily work in another. But our current drug policy's consequences — including high incarceration rates, limited opportunities for higher education, the possibility for discrimination against minorities — imply that we could use some kind of reform.
Think about it. In the current political and economic climate, drug policy reform isn't high on the agenda. But it will be again someday, and logical, informed, and nuanced views will be necessary to achieve harm reduction and decreased negative consequences of the policies themselves. A hard-line approach is rarely the answer, and it certainly isn't here.
Free is a sophomore from Blue Springs, Mo., in women's studies.
Chatterbox Responses to the news of the week on Kansan.com
"This article screams ignorance. Birth control has helped many women to lead the kind of lives they wish while waiting until they are mentally and financially stable to rear children. It has allowed women to take control of their lives and bodies, and it has helped many women with serious health issues along the way. It has allowed people who are fully aware that they do not wish to parent to refrain from bearing children who are not wanted. I am offended that a woman wrote this article. Patricia, maybe you should do some research on teenage pregnancy, the foster care system, and unfit parenting to name a few. That might change your tune."
— "NitMat7" in response to "Letter: Oral contraceptives harmful to women" on Nov. 1.
"Also, why isn't election day more of a priority on the homepage? LJWorld's homepage today is all election coverage. There is hardly anything at all on the Kansan's homepage regarding it being election day today, except for this."
— "Douglasco" in response to "Bond funding library renovations up for vote" on Nov. 1.
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Alex Garrison, editor
864-4810 or agarrison@kansan.com
The submission should include the author's name, grade and hometown. Find our full letter to the editor policy online at kansan.com/letters.
Nick Gerik, managing editor 864-4810 or ngerik@kansan.com
Erin Brown, managing editor
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David Cawthon, kansan.com managing editor
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CONTACT US
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THE EDITORIAL BOARD
Members of the Kansan Editorial Board are Alex Garrison, Nick Geik, Erin Brown, David Cawthon, Jonathan Shorman and Shauna Blackman.