4
University Daily Kansan
Opinion
Friday, March 21, 1986
A proposal to shorten the final examination period from eight days to six and increase the number of finals scheduled each day weaselied its way into a University Senate Executive Committee recently.
Leave finals alone
The committee, revealing good sense and good perception, mildly rebuffed the proposal and sent it back for review.
He's correct. The proposal virtually is ridiculous. Why would anyone want to cram finals into six days when students can barely handle them in eight?
"I think it's possibly the worst idea I've heard yet." Sidney Shapiro, SenEx chairman.
The proposal suggested that a reduction of the final exam period would allow more time for teaching and would bring an early end to the semester. But the proposal for a six-day exam period would fester the possibility that some students
would have to take four exams on one day.
In past semesters, some students have been confronted with having three final exams scheduled on one day. They realize now that with three exams crammed into one day, it was difficult to perform to their potential on any one of them.
Many students know and agree that the final exam period, although a stark reality, is a stressful time for them. Many pull all-nighters and pump themselves with caffeine to make use of the little time that they have to review the materials they spent all semester trying to learn.
A final exam period of six days simply would cause more stress. The few days saved at the end of the semester by a shorter exam period could prove worthless if students are not able to do as well on their exams as they might have been able in a longer exam period.
The right first step
The resolution, which went into effect last week, prohibits owning most vicious dogs that attack or attempt to attack people in unincorporated areas of the county.
The Douglas County Commission has joined the city of Eudora in passing legislation prohibiting vicious dogs such as pit bullterriers. These are the first steps in the right direction.
Cities in the county will have to approve their own ordinances.
The rest of the cities in Douglas County need to follow suit.
Dogs used by law enforcement agencies or dogs used to protect property or people on that property are exceptions to the ordinance.
County commissioners
began considering legislation against vicious dogs after a three-year-old Eudora boy was mauled by a pit bull in December.
Eudora adopted its own ordinance banning pit bulls last month.
The county commission has made a wise move that was long overdue. Unfortunately, it usually takes an incident such as the mauling of a helpless person to spur lawmakers into action.
The resolution also requires owners of vicious dogs to maintain insurance for claims resulting from the action of the dog.
Lawrence and the rest of the cities in the county need to pass their own laws prohibiting the dogs now, before another attack makes it a necessity.
Back on the march
The Great Peace March, which ground to a halt in the Mojave Desert on Friday, is on the road again, but although financial problems have been temporarily overcome, the organization and focus of the march is still questionable.
None of these methods is associated with the marches of the past that drew their strength from grassroots support. The methods smack of a carefully conceived media
The march was conceived of and organized by PRO-Peace director David Mixner, the mastermind behind Gary Hart's 1984 presidential campaign. The Progressive magazine reported in its latest issue that Mixner called the shots from the start, alienating established peace groups with his questionable methods.
For example, marchers were invited to participate, asked to complete detailed questionnaires to be used in the compilation of valuable mailing lists, and were to be subject to strict regulations established by the organizers.
campaign that makes a mockery of the high goals of the peace movement.
Only two weeks and 120 miles into the trek across the United States, the financial structure of PRO-Peace collapsed. And out of the shambles, a grassroots organization has formed, suggesting a break with Mixner's methods. Plans are vague at this point, and organizers are concerned mostly with the logistics of finding water haulers and refrigerated trucks.
But when they establish their foothold, the new organizers should strive to establish a tighter focus. The administration is embarking on a new stage in the arms race. This is no time for media hype and vague calls for global nuclear disarmament.
Citizens need to find ways to force the administration to call a halt. That is a goal that will take determined, focused effort, not aimless wandering across the countryside from one protest site to another.
News staff
Michael Totty ... Editor
Laurette McMillen ... Managing editor
Chris Barber ... Editorial editor
Cindy McCurry ... Carpenter editor
David Giles ... Sports editor
Brice Waddill ... Photo editor
Susanne Shaw ... General manager, news adviser
**Business staff**
Brett McCabe ... Business manager
Davidixon ... Retail sales manager
Jim Williamson ... Campus manager
ori Eckart ... Classified manager
Caroline Irwinne ... Production manager
Pallen Lee ... National manager
John Oberzan ... Sales and marketing adviser
Letters should be type, double-spaced and fewer than 200 words and should include the writer's name, address and telephone number. If the writer is affiliated with the University, include class and hometown, or faculty or staff position. Great student should be bored, double-sacred and fewer than 700 words. Then
Guest shots should be typed, double-spaced and fewer than 700 words. The viewer will be photographed.
The Kansan reserves the right to reject or edit letters and guest shots. They can be mailed or brought to the Kansan newroom, 111 Staffer-Flint Hall.
The University Dialy Kansas (USPS 650-640) is published at the University of Kansas, 118 Stairwater Filt. Haltland, Kan., 66045, daily during the regular school year, excluding Saturday, Sunday, holidays and finals periods, and on Wednesday during the summer session. Second-class postage paid at Lawrence, Kansas, and St. Louis, Missouri. County and $18 for six months and $35 a year outside the county. Student subscriptions are $3 and are paid through the student activity fee.
**POSTMASTER** Send address changes to the University Daily Kansan, 118
Staffer-Find Hall, Lawrence, Kan. 68045
University of Chicago cracks down on lewdness
Students fight to keep lascivious party
It's often said that today's college students lack the spark of rebellion and aren't concerned with anything except getting through school and finding a well-paying career.
That might be a burn rap. While it's true that students aren't making much noise about social injustice, environmental dangers or war, they sometimes show interest in issues beyond their job prospects.
For example, a vigorous protest campaign is being waged at the University of Chicago, one of this country's most prestigious institutes of learning.
During the last ball, one young man wore only a couple of well-placed Frisbees. Another male student opted for the height of simplicity in outer wear: a Styrofoam cup.
The Lascivious Costume Ball is held in the stately Ida Noyes Hall. Students wear attire that ranges from nothing at all to nighties or outfits of their own design.
Students are putting their names on petitions and rallying each other by telephone. At issue is whether the students will be permitted to hold their traditional Leiscivious Costume Ball.
This is considered the main social event at the university, which isn't known for its frat house antics.
The ball also featured male and
Many of the female students wore the kind of lingerie often advertised on the cover of most women's magazines.
Mike Royko
Chicago Tribune
female strip shows, skinny-dipping in a swimming pool, porno movies and other diversions.
It just shows that despite the awesome number of Nobel Prizes won by the university — exceeding the number of bowling trophies in most Chicago bars — the students have a playful streak.
It wasn't that the administration objected to young men wearing only Styrofoam cups, or the other lascivious displays.
But this year, the university administration stunned the students — at least those students who like partying naked — by forbidding the students to hold the ball.
But at the last ball, a considerable number of students wound up in a hospital emergency room, suffering from being loaded to the gills. Others had to have their eyeballs realigned, as a result of having smoked, sniffed or swallowed the wrong herbs and spices.
And there were the usual problems of students throwing up, or falling down, or otherwise being untidy, or needed to some damage to the building.
"In sum," a university spokesman
said, "it's unsafe, unpleasant and unhealthful. That's the gist of it."
Many of the students are upset. A young woman who is majoring in the study of ancient ruins or something, called me to angrily say, "I don't
During the last ball one young man wore only a couple of well-placed Frisbees. Another male student opted for the height of simplicity in outer wear: a Styrofoam cup.
think it is the university administration's role to try to repress my sexuality."
What was she planning on wearing?
"A few feathers." she said.
Neat. And the student government president said he and others weren't going to give in without a fight. They are circulating petitions, conducting a telephone campaign and otherwise trying to protest.
As an impartial observer, I have
mixed feelings about this dispute.
On the one hand, it's encouraging to see students involved in a serious issue. As the student government president pointed out, the ball is paid for out of student activity funds. So, he said, "I consider this decision to be a dangerous precedent."
Naturally, we must be on the alert for dangerous precedents.
On the other hand, today's students, like the Yuppies who have preceded them in recent years, are said to be strong for individual enterprise, getting out in the world and making it, getting that condo, buying that BMW.
So their reaction to the university ban would appear to be in conflict with their individualistic spirit.
I don't see why a young man needs the university's approval to dress only in a Styrofoam cup. Or a young lady in a couple of feathers.
It seems to me that if they really want to have a Lascivious Costume Ball, they could go find a suitable hall somewhere off campus, rent it and carry on as lasciviously as they choose.
After all, throughout recorded history young men have been getting drunk and falling down and making fools of themselves.
So if these students really want to be luscious, as is their right, they will learn.
And Styrofoam cups can be found in aisle three.
Mailbox
Students owed more
We feel their decision to allot only 100 of the 1,000 tickets made available to the University is atrocious. We realize that certain groups such as cheerleaders, band members, players' families and the Athletic Department deserve first rights at the tickets.
As faithful followers of the KU men's basketball program, we see the need to speak out to the Kansas University Athletic Commission.
A large portion of the remainder of the tickets will go to Williams Fund contributors and KU alumni. We can't rationalize why such a large percentage of tickets is set aside for the alumni and contributors. The student fans who yell and cheer the team create the home-court advantage.
We, the students who come to games early and stay until the final seconds tick off the clock show that we wholeheartedly support the team. If and when we the Jayhawks make it to Dallas, we hope the KUAC gives the student body more than a passing glance when they decide who gets what percentage of the available tickets.
Yes, without the alumni money that goes into the scholarship fund, KU might not be where they presently are. But without the students' undying support for the team, the same would be true. We just ask that everyone be given a fair opportunity to join in the Jayhawks' pursuit of a national championship.
The KUAC should realize that the students who are denied tickets today are the alumni and Williams Fund contributors of tomorrow.
Paul Robleder
Overland Park sophomore
Mark Elson
Grandview, Mo., senior
Paul Robledor
Dissident reveals U.S. weaknesses
For most of our lives we've been told that our Western culture has been threatened by the ruthless expansion of communism.
The Reagan administration is seeking military aid for freedom fighters in many parts of the globe. It is believed that this aid — plus a strong defense — will prevent other countries, including our own, from becoming victims of the "evil empire."
However, outside influences are not the only threat to our way of life. We talk of a threat from outside our borders, but what about the threat from within?
Soviet dissident Aleksandr I. Solzhennisys has warned that our own culture could very well be the cause of our decline.
On June 18, 1978, Solzhenitsyn, who is very much anti-communist, delivered a commencement address at Harvard University titled, "A World Split Apart." This address is still being read and studied today.
How we listen to the message he gave that June day could decide the fate of Western democracy.
He notes that the West tends to measure nations on the progress they make toward a Western pluralistic democracy.
He says, "The real picture of our planet's development bears little resemblance to all this . . . It is a soothing theory which overlooks the fact that these worlds (Western countries and the Soviet bloc) are not at all evolving toward each other and that neither one can be transformed into the other without violence."
With that introduction, he dives in to the heart of his address by stating boldly, "A decline in courage may be the most striking feature that an outside observer notices in the West today."
While most of his audience is taken aback by this, he continues, "Must one point out that from ancient times
Victor Goodpasture Staff columnist
a decline in courage has been con-
sidered the symptom of the end?*
He points out that since we raise our children by preparing them for happiness, possession of material goods, money, leisure and an almost unlimited freedom in choice of pleasures then, "Why should one risk one's precious life in the defense of the common good? . . . Even biology tells us that a high degree of habitual well-being is not advantageous to a living organism."
Pause for a minute. Reread that last paragraph. Doesn't it accurately describe most of us and our style of living?
Solzhentisyn says that our culture is based on a system of laws that are, in fact, destructive to our civilization.
Then he attacks the press,
"Hastiness and superficiality — these are the psychic diseases of the twentieth century and more than anywhere else this is manifested in the press . . . The press merely picks out sensational formulas."
He says, "Society has turned out to have scarce defense against the abyss of human decadence . . . such as motion pictures full of pornography, crime and horror.
"Life organized legalistically has thus shown its inability to defend itself against the corrosion of evil." The example he uses is when the government tries to stop terrorism, which is accused of civil violations.
out his attack on socialism is even more biting. He describes Igor Shafarevich's book titled "Socialism" as a "penetrating
analysis demonstrating that socialism of any type and shade leads to the total destruction of the human spirit and to a leveling of mankind into death."
Such a book should be required reading for every liberal Republican and Democrat.
However, his most brilliant observation is that our social system is really very unhealthy and unstable. He says, "The center of your democracy and your culture is left without electric power for a few hours only, and all of a sudden crowds of American citizens start looting and creating havoc."
Then he warns, "The forces of Evil have begun their decisive offensive. You can feel their pressure, yet your screens and publications are full of prescribed smiles and raised glasses. What is all the joy about?"
Y
Now that Solzenitsyn has upset everyone with his gloom and doom prophecy, he does offer a solution, "Only moral criteria can help the West against communism's well-planned world strategy."
His solution to prevent war with the Soviet Union is found to be unacceptable to many in the West. He says, "To defend oneself, one must also be ready to die; there is little such readiness in a society raised in a cult of material well-being."
How true? Even when we've got all-volunteer armed forces, some in government are reluctant to give all that is necessary to defend the West.
The question we all must ask is: Do we heed Soizhenitsyn's warning? Are we truthful enough to admit our weaknesses and do we have the courage to correct them?
If not, it is this ignorance that is the opening stage of the self-destruction of our society.
Solzhentysin is lucky — he already speaks Russian.
O