4A the university daily kansan
opinion
thursday, december 11, 2003
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perspective
I just want to thank the good samaritan that gave me a ride home last night in the 20 degree weather and the freezing ice.
Warning to all KU students: Blizzard plus alcohol plus skate board with no wheels and large hill equals concussion.
Please cancel school.
To all of those people who helped push my car up the hill in the snow on Tuesday night, thank you. I know you didn't know me and I really appreciate your help. As for the organic chemistry people who did not cancel the test I am really not that happy with you.
letter to the editor
Hazing story inaccurate denied house representation
I am writing to express extreme disappointment in the way Abby Mills' story on hazing was handled, particularly in regards to the way she covered the incident regarding Andrew Ward and Phi Kappa Theta ("Hazing still found on campus despite changing greek mentality." Kansan, Dec. 4). I am a member of Phi Kappa Theta and a former president. As a result, I know first-hand what the fraternity has done since this incident, both in re-evaluating our new member program and in trying to shed our image as a chapter that hazes.
However, nowhere in the article does it mention the work that Phi Kappa Theta has done to ensure nothing like that happens again, because Mills didn't speak to anyone in the fraternity. The people responsible for the terrible things done to Mr. Ward are long gone. In fact, other than Mr. Ward, no one even associated with Phi Kappa Theta during that time is still at KU. I mention this because I feel it is unfair that the current members, who do not haze, are now going to have to deal with the implications of the story, not those former members who actually were responsible. As I said before, Phi Kappa Theta has worked hard to make sure that we don't conduct ourselves in that way. More difficult, however, is dispelling the notion that we do. No prospective new member wants to join a fraternity that will haze him, and rightly so. This article has set Phi Kappa Theta back five years. Don't get me wrong, I'm not complaining. Members of Phi Kappa Theta committed these actions, and we have to take responsibility for them. But had Mills contacted us, she would have learned and reported that the current members of this fraternity do not condone that type of behavior and have long since shunned it.
Byrontkine
Linwood
senior business major
WYATT HARPER
Wvatt Harper for The University Daily Kansas
editorial board
Academic freedom prevailed
The controversy regarding Dennis Dailey's class "Human Sexuality in Every Day Life" may be over — finally.
Last week, Senate Executive Committee unanimously passed a resolution affirming the University of Kansas' commitment to academic freedom. The resolution was actually made in response to Sen. Susan Wagle's (D-Wichita) request that state universities establish a policy regarding the teaching of sexuality, sexually explicit materials, pedophilia and sexual harassment.
The irony, of course, is that the resolution at the University of Kansas basically stated that instructors should be responsible but had the right to control the way they presented subject matter. Really, the resolution shouldn't surprise Wagle. This resolution is just another example of the University supporting Dailey's methods and upholding academic freedom. Last spring, Provost David Shulenberger conducted an investigation of Dailey's class. The report, released in May, was very clear: Wagle misrepresented Dailey. None of Dailey's materials fits the description of child pornography or pedophilia, as Wagle alleged.
Moreover, Shulenberger characterized Dailey's student evaluations from the last five years as "remarkable." In the past five years, only three students rated Dailey "poor" in regards to his respect for the class, while 1,368 students rated his respect as "excellent."
Opinion at the University has always favored Dailey. But if students do, for whatever reason, feel uncomfortable with Dailey's class, they should just not take it. Dailey isn't going to alter his format, nor should he have to.
Though she couldn't be reached for comment, one can only hope that Wagle has gotten the message: leave our sex class alone.
Senior suggests hints for underclassmen
Stephanie Lovett for the editorial board.
GUEST COMMENTARY
Now that I'm about to face the somewhat anti-climactic December graduation, I find myself growing misty-eyed over every ludicrous aspect of college. Every final paper, every test study session and every freezing walk down Jayhawk Boulevard now takes on the sheen of a precious moment. And, since I'm the ripe age of 22, I see the freshmen in a different light. How enthusiastic many of them are, still in awe of their ability to get drunk. I remember when I was so bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. I just want to pat them on the heads, squeeze their red cheeks and say, "Oh, you'll settle down, you'll learn." Learn what? Well, I'm not talking about calculus or organic chemistry. You'll learn about how to deal with other people and, hopefully, you'll learn more about yourself. In the mean time, here are few tips I learned after exactly 4.5 years toiling in academia.
Leah Shaffer opinion@kansan.com
1. Don't be afraid to be a stinky, slimy college student
Now is the time in life to eat ramen noodles for weeks on end, take a shower while drinking a beer (as my
roommate does in the summer), stumble through the streets to Burrito King at three in the morning and to generally act like a young fool. Think of these years as your free pass to be a little reckless and crazy. Too many college students disappear their first year to the gleaning, west side of town. You have the rest of your lives to live in boring duplexes near endless strip malls. Live in the student ghetto; live with slimy roommates; eat packaged food to the point of getting scurvy. You get the idea. Sometimes, I like to daydream about what powerful people were like as college students. Did Dick Cheney survive on Mac and Cheese and drink from
beer bongs? I bet John Ashcroft was the type of roommate who didn't do his dishes.
2. Get involved
Speaking of Attorney General John Ashcroft, now is also the time in life to get involved in politics. If you feel passionate about a cause, visit the Center for Campus Life and look for an organization that fits your interests. If you find that no club fits your cause, start one up. If you don't have the time to do that, then at least stay informed. As students at the University of Kansas, you have access to five free daily papers, including The University Daily Kansan. It's unlikely that you will ever again have access to that much free news material Take advantage of it.
3. Get out of your comfort zone
Do you hate art museums? Then take art history. Are you terrible at math? Then dive into calculus for a semester. The point is that some of the classes I most dreaded turned out to be the most fun and the most engaging. The point of going to a University is not just to coast through on what you think is an easy major with easy classes. Don't wuss out
and take your Western Civilization classes at Johnson County Community College. Classes like that may take a lot of work, but they also exposes you to subjects you may never run across again. Who knows, you may end up actually liking Nietzsche's philosophy.
4. There are no clear cut answers
If you really are paying attention, you're not going to just learn facts and figures in college.
If you are really learning, you should learn something about human nature
People are hypocritical, moody, inconsistent, boring, neurotic, lovable and above all unpredictable. But life is not about filling in the blanks of a Scantron sheet. The best professor and the best friends will pose more questions than answers. Hopefully, those questions will never stop. Hopefully by the end of your own college career you"ll realize that learning doesn't really end after they hand you that diploma. It really just begins.
Leah Shaffer is a senior in journalism and environmental studies. She is managing editor.
perspective
Let personal idealism burn through bleak days, keep hope strong and good deeds bountiful
Soon it will be the darkest day of the year.
COMMENTARY
In 10 days, on Dec. 21, it will officially be winter in the Northern Hemisphere. In Lawrence, we can expect to see only about nine hours of sunlight. Spring is still months away.
It's dark right now in America, too.
American soldiers continue to die in Iraq at a rate of about two per day. Nearly 500 have been killed there so far.
Rachel Robson opinion@kansan.com
Nearly 500 have been killed there so far. A historic budget surplus left by the Clinton administration was converted into an even more historic deficit one that we twenty-somethings could be paying off into old age. The projected federal budget deficit for just this fiscal year is now estimated at $400 billion.
Three million jobs have been lost in the American economy in the past three years. The slight economic recovery we are now experiencing has not been enough to replace them.
The Al Qaeda terrorist organization that attacked us on Sept. 11,2001, has
still not been apprehended on destroyed. Our military is spread desperately thin.
Patriotism has been redefined as obedience, and dissenters smeared as traitors. We are more politically polarized than we have been in decades, chilling even relationships among family members who disagree.
It's easy to be a pessimist in times like these. It's easy to hibernate in a cocoon of cynicism and selfishness, waiting for the world's problems to work themselves out. It's easy to use one's own lack of power as an excuse
Most of us will never again be as free or as energetic as we are as college students. With rare exceptions, we will never again be able to indulge an interest in political or social issues the way we can now.
It's easy, and it's wrong.
And that is why, while we still can, we are morally obligated to make the world a better place.
for ignorance and apathy.
You can do this. You can volunteer at one of Lawrence's many charities. You can adopt one of the children on the Salvation Army Angel Tree in the Kansas Union. You can sign up for Alternative Spring Breaks. You can learn more about issues that concern you, and then inform others. You can help with the political campaign of a candidate you believe in. You can, in a small but significant way, change the world.
It is dark and cold in our country right now. It is, I fear, going to get a lot darker.
Don't burn out. Don't allow the darkness and the chill that has enveloped our nation to become a permanent fixture. Don't allow your idealism to be diluted with the misguided notion that you are only a college student, unable to affect any change in the world.
But a few days after the darkest day of the year is Christmas. "The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has never overcome it," declares the Christian Gospel of John. A few days after the year's darkest day is Hanukkah, a Jewish celebration of lights that didn't burn out.
We must act, knowing that our light will not be extinguished, and that spring will come.
Snow is blowing, and the nights are long. But we can't be afraid of the dark.
Robson is a Baldwin City doctoral candidate in pathology.
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