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Monday, April 20, 1987 / University Daily Kansan
Promoting safe sex
Maybe in a perfect world, parents would be able to sit down with their children and explain and discuss sex. Parents would try to make their children aware of the possible consequences of sex and of birth control. Most importantly, they would understand that, ultimately, the decisions on sexuality rest with the child.
Because we don't live in a perfect world, the best that can be done is to inform and protect minors in matters of sex. An opinion handed down last week by Kansas Attorney General Bob Stephen said it would be unconstitutional to require minors to have parental consent before receiving contraceptives. But the opinion also said that a county or the state could impose a law requiring the notification of parents of minors seeking birth control devices.
Like it or not, children are having sex at increasingly earlier ages. It is unrealistic to think teen-age pregnancy can be curbed by stopping children from having sex. The most logical answer to the problem is to educate children and to make contraceptives available.
Parents cannot prevent their children from having sex, but they could scare them away from practicing safe sex. Although children should be encouraged to talk to their parents before engaging in sex, many would rather take their chances without a contraceptive than with anger, and possibly abusive, parents.
Allowing minors to get birth control devices without, or even despite their parents' permission is the best way to realistically promote safe sex and protect minors.
If you got 'em, you'll no longer be able to smoke 'em — at least not in retail stores, restaurants and public buildings, except in specially designated areas.
A breath of fresh air
Gov. Mike Hayden made this possible by signing the smoking bill into law last week. Hayden said he did so because the state had an obligation to protect the health of its citizens.
For years, people who have made a choice not to smoke have had to put up with the smoke of others. In restaurants and other public places, this can be a distraction and irritation.
The current state law prohibits smoking in elevators, libraries, museums, theaters, many governmental meeting rooms and waiting rooms of
This law should not bring about protests from smokers because their rights are not being threatened. However, the rights of others are being protected.
doctors' offices. The new law will add to that list.
The law gives owners and operators of public places a lot of latitude in designating smoking areas. It does not specify where or how large the areas may be. It only says that owners should use existing barriers and ventilation systems wherever possible.
This will not wipe out smoking, and it is not intended to. It will, however, make nonsmokers lives more bearable, and that can't help but make life a little more pleasant for everyone.
Cleaning up 'Dirty Harry'
"Go ahead. Make my day." That phrase, which Clint Eastwood uttered just before pumping lead into a dangerous thug in the movie, "Sudden Impact," might no longer be just memorable lines from a famous movie. They might become a way of life for many people in the United States.
A growing number of states are beginning to enact "make my day" laws. The laws give homeowners the right to kill intruders or anyone someone may think is threatening their lives or property.
The results of the survey are not surprising. The high crime rate in the country and the probability of becoming a victim are astounding. People are
Some of these states have blindly enacted the law, but others are studying it carefully. One study by the Media General-Associate Press showed that 68 percent of Americans thought that people did have the right to shoot intruders, whether the intruders were armed or not.
But states allowing homeowners to become vigilantis is not the answer. That would promote only more violence.
frightened, and they should be. And they want to take precautions.
Trying to provide citizens with some sense of security, especially in their own homes, is a noble gesture of state legislatures, but it is illogical. What about abuse of the system? Already some states have documented cases of people who have shot others and claimed they were a "danger" to them when they weren't Or what about children in these homes that accidentally wander into a desk drawer or closet, find mommy and daddy's "security system," start playing with it and end up shooting themselves?
Enacting tougher laws, and giving out stricter sentences may be one solution but turning the country into a bunch of "Dirty Harrys" definitely is not.
News staff
News staff
Frank Hansel          Editor
Jennifer Benjamin     Managing editor
Juli Warren         News editor
Brian Kabertle      Editorial editor
Sandra Engelland    Campus editor
Marks Siebert       Sports editor
Diane Dutmeier     Photo editor
Bill Skeet          Graphics editor
Tom Eblen        General manager, news adviser
Business staff
Lisa Weens           Business manager
Bonnie Hardy        Advisor
Denise Stephens     Retail sales manager
Kelly Scherer       Campus sales manager
Duncan Calhoun     Marketing manager
Lori Coppel        Classified manager
Phillip Liemanski  Production manager
David Nixon        National sales manager
Jeanne Hines       Sales and marketing adviser
Opinions
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Advocates of nuclear power never have liked to talk about the liability and social costs of storing low-level radioactive waste. In the '70s and early '80s when the future of nuclear power was being discussed, there was only muted emphasis on what
Pull out of compact before its too late
Christian Colbert Columnist
the money it owes for membership, and then pursue alternatives, such as forming another more equitable compact with other states or going it alone. If legislators don't put money in their hands, the state risks being sued by the other states in the compact.
was going to be done with the waste. Ronald Reagan exemplified the lack of concern when he said, "Paper, not nuclear waste, is our major problem."
In this unreliable technological age of space shuttle disasters, Chernobylis and collapsing bridges, it may be wishful thinking to entertain the thought of a technologyally safe solution to the low-level radioactive waste problem short of ceasing the operation of nuclear reactors. Meanwhile, as we continue our profligate ways of not adequately researching solar, wind and geothermal energies, extremely dangerous radioactive waste is piling up and is in need of a home.
Many people think that home should be right here in the Land of Ahs. In fact, Kansas may have to
adopt the unwanted and extremely dangerous waste because five years ago, the state entered into a compact with Arkansas, Nebraska, Oklahoma and Louisiana to determine possible storage sites for low-level radioactive waste.
The compact commission hired a geotechnical consulting firm, Dames and Moore, to locate suitable sites for the waste produced by the compact states. Seventy-five percent of the disposal sites chosen in the Dames and Moore report are in Kansas, while 20 percent are in the waste of the states in the compact, mostly because of a Kerr-McGee operation which produces millions of cubic feet of low-level waste each year, has not been chosen at all.
Over in the state legislature, the controversy is whether to drop out of the compact. State Sen. Paul Feleciano JR., D-Wichita, who favors pulling out of the compact, said it was the single most important decision we could make for the next six generations.
I don't claim to know much about geology or the criteria Dames and Moore used to select the dumping sites, but it seems inequitable, even a bit suspicious, that Kansas has so many suitable sites for radioactive waste. On many occasions I've driven through Oklahoma, and in most parts it doesn't seem all that much different from Kansas.
It may be more expensive for Kansas to go it alone. Estimates have said that it would cost approximately $40 million if we stored our own waste. That $40 million probably will come out of taxpayers' pockets, because, although the storage costs would be charged to the producers of the radioactive waste, it would then be passed on to consumers in the form of higher utility rates. We think, however, you consider the risks involved in accepting much more low-level radioactive waste than Kansas produces, it seems wise to search for ways to store our own waste. Moreover, should we trust people from outside the state to store the waste here?
Feleciano's concern is confirmed by the fact that four of six low-level radioactive waste storage sites in the city are in use. They are in intoading ground water sources.
Unfortunately, efforts to pull Kansas out of the compact fail in the Senate. But the Senate did pass a bill that will ban underground storage of low-level radioactive waste without legislative approval. Of course that doesn't mean radioactive waste will never be buried underground, because methods of above ground storage haven't been with us very long, and the legislature could always change its mind.
At this point, Feleciano thinks Kansas should pull out of the compact before the compact commission meets on June 5 to decide on a developer for the waste storage.
He said, "The developer is going to wander around and find a site, and the compact and the state governments that make it up are going to say that all of this is out of their hands and we're going to have nothing to say about it."
If you've ever seen the state legislature in action you'd know what Feleciano is talking about. The longer legislators delay pulling out of the compact, the harder it will be to do so and the more likely we'll be stuck with the flawed process.
if legislators pull out now, Kansas can save face by paying the compact
By taking care of our own low-level waste and using experts from within the state, we can reduce uncertainty and do the job right. If we rely on people from outside Kansas to do the job, we run the high risk of ending up like one of the four sites currently contaminated. Then we can be known, not as the Land of Ahs, but as the land that glows.
Mailbox
City has rich history
I read with amazement your reporter's account of Mound City. The story zeroed in on the economic problems of that historic location without a syllable to its unique character, which is the original Potashotomie reservation old St. Mary's, and the Sacred Heart Shrine Church.
The church was built to commemorate the beautification of Rose Philippine Duchesne, R.S.C.J., who lived among the Potawatomi in 1841 at the age of 72 and whose cause for canonization is still under consideration in Rome.
This beautiful, French-style church has stained glass windows showing her life, which began in Grenoble, France, and ended in St. Charles, Mo., where she is entombed. The Commission on the Status of Women awarded her the first Outstanding Pioneer Award from the 18-angle window etched in glass, showing Mother Duchesne teaching the Potawatomi may be seen in the St. Lawrence Catholic Student Center.
The canonization of Mother Duchesne would bring economic benefits to Mound City. The city now has strong ties, not only with its own past, but with a present full of hope in the relationship with its beautiful Philippine Duchesne, now being recognized in Lawrence.
Beverly Boyd Professor of English
Prank not amusing
Last Wednesday, I didn't even get out of bed on the wrong side before my bad luck started. There was a fire in the living room, 45 a.m. My neighbor was at the door.
"Sorry for waking you, but did you know that there's a moped on your car?" she asked. I had no idea that there was a moped on my car.
After lifting it off the hood of my car, I returned it to its sleeping owner, who was just as surprised as I was. The damage had been assessed at just under $400. And I'm fairly angry. I'd love to strangle the idiot
who's guilty. How would you feel if someone inflicted $400 worth of damage to your property? That's about two-thirds of my tuition.
I have nothing against fun. I have nothing against debaucherous fun. My only gripe is that someone had fun at my expense. And it will cost me dearly. At $5 an hour, it will take me about 80 hours to make enough to fix my car.
It is not just the destruction of property that gives some people great joy. Some of these people enjoy the pain of others. What leeches!
So, should I go out tonight, get as drunk as possible and flick mobets at cars in retaliation? Or should I forgive and forget? How about a bulletproof衬里衣 for the Kansan? Would that serves as my vengeance? Hardly.
One good thing has come out of all this. I will think twice before having too much fun at someone else's expense. If only those fellows had remembered the golden rule. But let's face it, animals don't have very good memories.
Robert Hindman London junior
Lacking intelligence
Paul Greenberg's lead-footed, dull-witted and inaccurate column on the recent Supreme Court ruling in an Affirmative Action case (April 15) restates one more time all the white male supremacist idiocy that makes an intelligent white male ashamed. I do not relish being classified in the same world with those who suppose that any minority holder of a scholarship or a supervisory job "got there" through "reverse discrimination."
In the past, women and minority groups had to demonstrate higher, not equal, qualifications. Let Mr. Greenberg search the editorial files of the Lawrence paper — he need not search very far back — for expressions this attitude, once a majority opinion. Now, we are reduced to a legalistic quibble over a two point differential on an in-house test, whose margin of error is unknown, but probably greater than two points.
Success or failure in living up to such opportunities after they have been granted is, as far as I have been able to observe, about the same among women and minorities as among white males. That statistic and only that statistic, in the end, demonstrates equality. We wouldn't have much evidence to support our constitutional belief in equality had it not been for the operation of Affirmative Action; it has afforded opportunity to succeed or fail to those traditionally denied the chance.
The point upheld by the Court is that when candidates have met the specified requirements for a scholarship job and are substantially equal, the candidate selected should be the one from an underutilized class (translation: the one who, by being unlike those normally encountered in this position, is most likely to bring to it fresh ideas, to serve as a model for the other members of that class, and to demonstrate to those who though their gender and race gave them the inside position that they too have something to prove if they desire preferment.)
Ellen Goodman wrote a masterful column in support of the Court's decision. I wish you'd hunt it up and get her permission to print it.
George Wedge Associate professor English and linguistics
Looking for purpose
This is a letter not only to the editor, but to anyone who can provide an answer. Just what is parking services for?
My experiences with that renegade group of Jeep enthusiasts has been limited to stickers, tickets and potholes. The title they use is a joke. After all, they don't provide any services.
For instance, when parking services was asked to put a yield sign at the Oliver Hail parking lot, they said that they didn't want to be responsible for it. Their suggestion was KUPD.
Also, when asked about replacing the faulty lights for the Lewis-Tempin-Hashinger parking lots, they said that they weren't responsible for them. This time, however, they passed the buck to housing.
Nevertheless, they continue to take our money, and for what? Perhaps a secure parking lot? (No, try KUPD). Perhaps a safe parking lot? (No, try housing). Perhaps more parking? (Well, try East Topeka). Perhaps a pothole free parking lot? (No, don't try at all).
If anyone out there cares about the image put forth by a run-down parking lot maybe they could pressure parking services to do something positive for the University. Or else at least change the name to Parking Control.
Mark L. Gillem
Walnut Creek, Calif., junior
Civil liberties for all?
Strange how quickly Victor Goodpasture pointed to his civil liberties in the dreadful "Stolen Stalwarts" affair.
Maybe now, having felt life's cruelties firsthand, he can pause to consider the rights of others, like blacks on campus. He might be more general, women and religious minorities.
Like another arrogant conservative, Oliver North, goodpasture only notices the Constitution when convenient. If it gets in the way of their blind dogma, as in the Iran-contrade affair, then checks and balances are for your Visa and Mastercard records, not the government.
I hope you and your fellow Reserve Officer Training Corps members see what happens when military men go to war. And then when they return, trv. Vic, not your corporate sponsors.
katz
By the way, people might find your paper slightly less offensive, Adolf, if you took the fascist-looking eagle off the masthead. Sure, it may not be explicitly a Nazi symbol, but a slick public relations dude like you ought to realize the potential for misinterpretation.
Jon DeVore
Lawrence junior
k. l. thorman
BLOOM COUNTY
by Berke Breathed