Opinion
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
THURSDAY, JANUARY 21, 2010
WWW.KANSAN.COM
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--recognizable cigarette brands can be purchased from the Hawk Shop in the Kansas Union. Today, the Board of Regents will consider banning the sale of tobacco products on university campuses.
My anthropology professor looks like Charlie Chaplin and has the personality of a rock.
I have decided to ask her out. Problem: I only see her once a day, and when we pass in the hallways on our way to class.
--recognizable cigarette brands can be purchased from the Hawk Shop in the Kansas Union. Today, the Board of Regents will consider banning the sale of tobacco products on university campuses.
I am pretty sure that the guy on the computer next to me at Anschutz is high. Stop staring at the IT KU webpage and smiling at it. It's weird.
--recognizable cigarette brands can be purchased from the Hawk Shop in the Kansas Union. Today, the Board of Regents will consider banning the sale of tobacco products on university campuses.
What is love? Baby don't hurt me, don't hurt me. No more.
--recognizable cigarette brands can be purchased from the Hawk Shop in the Kansas Union. Today, the Board of Regents will consider banning the sale of tobacco products on university campuses.
Jesus didn't want us to be cannibals so he turned himself into crackers.
--recognizable cigarette brands can be purchased from the Hawk Shop in the Kansas Union. Today, the Board of Regents will consider banning the sale of tobacco products on university campuses.
I'm not fat, I'm fluffy.
One of my friends just realized he kneed a future Olympian in the crotch during wrestling practice once. My friends are awesome
--recognizable cigarette brands can be purchased from the Hawk Shop in the Kansas Union. Today, the Board of Regents will consider banning the sale of tobacco products on university campuses.
--recognizable cigarette brands can be purchased from the Hawk Shop in the Kansas Union. Today, the Board of Regents will consider banning the sale of tobacco products on university campuses.
I wish I had something pro-
found to say...but I don't.
To the boy who stole my heart six years ago: I still love you.
--recognizable cigarette brands can be purchased from the Hawk Shop in the Kansas Union. Today, the Board of Regents will consider banning the sale of tobacco products on university campuses.
Mmm...10 cent cookies from Dillons.
I really want to move my cat into my dorm room, but I think he'd whine when I'm in
--recognizable cigarette brands can be purchased from the Hawk Shop in the Kansas Union. Today, the Board of Regents will consider banning the sale of tobacco products on university campuses.
--recognizable cigarette brands can be purchased from the Hawk Shop in the Kansas Union. Today, the Board of Regents will consider banning the sale of tobacco products on university campuses.
Glitter is the herpes in arts and crafts
He's the one,but he plays air guitar 24/7.
--recognizable cigarette brands can be purchased from the Hawk Shop in the Kansas Union. Today, the Board of Regents will consider banning the sale of tobacco products on university campuses.
What is up with these bear like jackets I've been seeing lately. I'm pretty sure bears are becoming extinct. Stop wearing them.
--recognizable cigarette brands can be purchased from the Hawk Shop in the Kansas Union. Today, the Board of Regents will consider banning the sale of tobacco products on university campuses.
I hate my uterus right now.
--recognizable cigarette brands can be purchased from the Hawk Shop in the Kansas Union. Today, the Board of Regents will consider banning the sale of tobacco products on university campuses.
I think I finally found the one. :)
--recognizable cigarette brands can be purchased from the Hawk Shop in the Kansas Union. Today, the Board of Regents will consider banning the sale of tobacco products on university campuses.
Getting high alone on a Tuesday night. This is in no way depressing.
--recognizable cigarette brands can be purchased from the Hawk Shop in the Kansas Union. Today, the Board of Regents will consider banning the sale of tobacco products on university campuses.
I'm craving a rice cake right now. WTF is wrong with me? I'm gonna make a REAL cake.
KU Bookstore, you make me angry when I step foot inside
--recognizable cigarette brands can be purchased from the Hawk Shop in the Kansas Union. Today, the Board of Regents will consider banning the sale of tobacco products on university campuses.
--recognizable cigarette brands can be purchased from the Hawk Shop in the Kansas Union. Today, the Board of Regents will consider banning the sale of tobacco products on university campuses.
Why can't I have a threesome:
Oh yeah, because my boy-
friend's a nude
--recognizable cigarette brands can be purchased from the Hawk Shop in the Kansas Union. Today, the Board of Regents will consider banning the sale of tobacco products on university campuses.
Tobacco ban should pass
EDITORIAL BOARD
Mariboro, Camel,
Parliament, American
Spirit. All these
Although all students have the right to choose whether to smoke, the University should not be profiting from a product that is damaging to the students it is here to serve. The Regents should vote in favor of banning tobacco sales from university campuses.
Removing cigarettes from campus will not take away the right to choose whether to smoke. It will simply show that the University does not profit from a choice that is a health risk to students.
The money from the Hawk
Shop goes directly back into the Union, which is an affiliate of the University. Although it is separate, some of the Union's profits are used for student activities and go back to the University for programs such as new student orientation.
In a Kansas editorial from February 2009, David Mucci, director of KU Memorial Unions, said the profits from tobacco sales did not represent a substantial sum.
Weston White/KANSAN FILE PHOTO
Losing this small amount would not hurt the University financially which lends even greater support for the ban.
"We're not afraid to lose the money," said Mucci.
In an obvious paradox, not only can students buy cigarettes on campus, they can also receive assistance to quit smoking through a Student Health Services' program called Kan-U-Quit at Watkins
As a leader in education and progress, the University should not benefit from or support a product that is ultimately a heath risk for students. Having tobacco products behind the counter is condoning and enabling the habit. Though the choice to smoke remains in the hands of the student, the Regents will be making the right decision in removing Kansas universities from association with tobacco sales.
Health Center. The University has recognized the problem but is still selling the product causing it.
Caitlin Thornbrugh for The Kansan Editorial Board
Call the Board of Regents today to support the ban:
785-296-3421
EDITORIAL CARTOON
PRIVATE MILITARY CORPORATIONS: A NEW TERM...
He who [uses] mercenary troops can never be solidly or securely seated. The wise prince, therefore, has always avoided these arms.
...BUT AN OLD DILEMMA
NICHOLAS SAMBALUK
POLITICS
PAGE 7A
PMCs are counterproductive to peacekeeping
War breeds tragedy; this is inevitable. But, greater tragedy occurs when needless and preventable violence takes the lives of ordinary people living in a warzone. This truth is evident in the recent arrest of two former Blackwater employees working in Afghanistan.
The unfortunate Blackwater example highlights the problematic issue of the use of private military contractors.
Two Americans, Justin Cannon and Christopher Drotleff, formerly employed by Paravant LLC, a subsidiary of the company commonly referred to as Blackwater, were charged with the murder of two Afghan civilians in Kabul last year. The men allegedly opened fire on a vehicle involved in a traffic accident in front of their convoy. The men were armed, despite a U.S. military order forbidding the contractors from carrying weapons.
Although more widely publicized than others, the incident is just one of many involving contractors in Afghanistan and Iraq. In another case in 2007, five Blackwater employees opened fire in Baghdad's Nisour Square, killing 17 Iraqi civilians. Charges against these employees have been thrown out.
For those unfamiliar, Xe Services,
still referred to by its former name.
POLITICAL PLANET
What the use of these companies has done is to proliferate violence while creating a void of accountability, both to the contracting government and to the public. There exists a serious lack of government oversight with regard to the contracting and conduct of PMCs.
The widespread use of PMCs presents a unique dilemma in war: On the one hand, if they were to act in a responsible manner, they might have a role to play in peacekeeping around the globe. However, this never has been, and probably never will be, the case.
Blackwater is a private military corporation (PMC). PMCs are essentially mercenary armies and gun-ship hire. In Blackwater's case, this includes an air force and navy.
DEVIN LOWELL
This often results in gross misconduct, not just limited to murder of civilians. Just one of many past examples is last year's assault of a female contractor in Iraq by her coworkers.
PMCs allow the government to expand its use of force without the oversight or input of the public—the taxpayers funding these wars. The idea of armies loyal only to their salaries is a dangerous enough one. Couple that with secretive, often nobid contracts, and it becomes an exponentially greater threat to democracy and international order.
If, however, a system of international and domestic accountability and oversight could be established, and the PMCs prove a willingness to take legal responsibility for their actions, then they might present an opportunity rather than a hazard. In instances of humanitarian crises, it might prove easier for a PMC to act than any national military to intervene.
Until this becomes the case, the use of PMCs should be severely restricted or entirely banned. The growing insurgency in Afghanistan is only fueled when Americans commit murder or otherwise cause unnecessary civilian deaths, and any new counterinsurgency strategy there should be wary of that.
Lowell is a Concordia senior in journalism and political science.
HEALTH
Good bye to 'va-jay-jay'
Charlotte: "just keep talking about his big cock."
Samantha: "Correction
- his big, beautiful cock.
Carrie: "We're using the C-word now?"
This excerpt from the popular TV show "Sex and the City" is an example of how the show was changed the way we talk about sex. The deposition of explicit sexual language and pictures was called revolutionary and provocative.
But was it really?
We've come a long way when it comes to talking about sex. Obviously, sex has taken place since man existed; it's inherent in our nature as procreating human beings.
There were kinky people in old Rome and there are kinky people today. There were people who complained about it thousands of years ago and there are people who complain about it today. These things haven't changed.
What has changed is the consciousness that we have a freedom to talk about anything we want not be persecuted unless someone is hurt. But who should decide what is hurtful when it comes to sex?
Sex, in a purely physical sense, is considered a good thing. It creates life, satisfaction and orgasms. When deprived, bodies show a need for sex through cravings or dreams. Yet, somehow, sex has become a scapegoat for people who claim to have a monopoly on morally correct behavior
While no one can prevent what is done in the privacy of bedrooms, many people try to prevent us from seeing it. For example, anything that is considered "lascivious" or "too graphic" cannot be shown on TV.
Is this really the best policy? Who doesn't remember the momentary exposure of Janet Jackson's breast during the 2004 Super
LET'S TALK ABOUT SEX
CAROLINE BLEDOWSKI
cbledowski@kansan.com
According to sex therapist Marty Klein, there is no indication that the rates of sexual violence and child abuse have increased after the "wardrobe malfunction" at the Super Bowl. Yet many people connect sex or the human body to something that is harmful.
Bowl halftime show? Maybe we would have forgotten it if it wasn't decried as such a scandal.
According to some, even the words used to describe sex and the body can turn innocent people into violent sexual monsters, willing to do anything for sexual satisfaction. However, the only outcome of a ban on sex talk is a lack of information.
This shouldn't be allowed to happen at a university. After all, by the age of 19 (yes, dear college freshmen), 69% of men and 77% of women in the U.S. already had sex, according to the National Center for Health Statistics. If you can do it, why can't you talk about it?
Let's show Oprah that we have vaginas and penises and that we are not afraid of saying so.
Even Oprah, the icon and ideal for many women, is not able to speak correctly about human body parts. Her version of the vagina is called the "va-jay-jay." We can do better.
Cheers to the vagina. I hope I never hear "va-jay-jay" again.
Bledowski is a Cracow, Poland, graduate student in journalism.
LAUREN BORNSTEIN
WHAT'S UP WITH THAT? What's up with the fog?
You know how drivers seem to get worse in bad weather? Well, what's up with people who walk in the middle of a street where there is no crosswalk in the fog? Real smart, people.
So you think, "No problem, I'll illegally walk into visibility limited traffic. There's no way a car would ever hit a pedestrian they can see."
But, wait, what does fog do again? Oh, yeah. It obscures vision.
Word to the wise. If you're seeing bright lights 100 feet away, but not the shape of the car, get the hell out of the road. Even if you're covered in reflectors and lights (which I doubt you are), the driver can't see you until it's too late.
So, move bitch. Get out the way
CHANCE
CARMICHAEL
There can only be one explanation for this fog: a mystery.
That's right, somewhere on the outskirts of Lawrence, Old Man Jenkins has jerry-rigged a cardboard cutout of a monster onto his glass truck (it's invisible!) and is terrorizing his next door neighbors.
So, don't be surprised if the Mystery Machine rolls up out of the fog (don't worry, it's moving); that's just cheap animation). Just make the gang feel at home by letting them solve the mystery. The fog will be gone in no time.
And if you can, try to find out what Shaggy and Scooby are smoking. Now that is a real mystery.
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THE EDITORIAL BOARD
Members of the Kmanian Editorial Board are Stephen Montenayor, Briane Pnissentiel, Jennifer Torlaine, Lauren Cunningham, Vicky Lui, Emily McCoy and Kate Lareeab.