| Summary: | OHMONPAGE 8 D THE CONCORDIAN • November 7, 1986 Editorial Schools need to educate, not segregate Remember growing up? The pro-blems trying to decide what to do. Not the little things, but the really big things. The right and wrong things. If someone would have said, "The best approach is to try to combine family and peer influences as you shape your personality and establish your identity./' at least that would be a starting point Apparently someone does not agree with this advice. On October 24, 1986, in Greenville, Tenn., Federal District Judge Brevard Hand ruled that parents could withhold their children from reading classes if the reading material's view-point opposed the parents' religious viewpoint The books in question are accus-ed of portraying a religious belief, secular humanism. Thus, this case centers upon the separation of church and state. When the constitution was pass-ed, the separation of church and state was instituted to prevent the state, or government, from specify-ing which religions might be taught in the public schools, to avoid a "state" religion. It reasoned that everyone should be able to choose their religion. Lately, the struggle between church and state has intensified. One would be hard pressed to open a book and not find some allusion to a particular religion. Religions are appearing constantly. What was not though of as a religion a hundred years ago may well be a religion a hundred years from now. The point is that we cannot shelter ourselves from other religious beliefs. But should we want to? The parents' point of view can be appreciated. Parents want to have some control over what their children are learning at school. Yet, parents should have control of their children's values from birth to the time their children go to school. When the children go to school they encounter peer groups and teachers who represent other influences or ideas. At this point the children should digest the information they receive in their new setting and discuss the alternatives with their parents. Parents should realize their children must one day make deci-sions for themselves. Not only is it wrong to deny this right, but to delay this right could be detrimental to the child's decision making abilities. It is wrong to take away the respon-sibility of decision making. This is not only a right, but an obliga-tion. for all people of all ages. Children have rights. They have the right to be aware of situations outside the home. They have the right to receive information not monitored. They have the right to draw on resources outside their overprotective environment Yet, where do we draw the line? In Kentucky the line has been drawn. Both sides have decided that adolescents cannot make their own decisions. The courts are allowing the parents to withold information from their children. This informa-tion concerns religion. Why must we go from one ex-treme to another? We cannot any more deny the fact that religion is a part of our history than we can deny that the sun rises in the east. We don't need to take religion out of the school. Rather we need to be aware that there are other religions besides the one we choose. We need to be aware that the world is round, not flat, and colorful, not black and white. We need to give equal time to all religions. We need to put religion back into the school. CONCORDIAN The Editorial Board is responsible for the selection and writing of all editorials David Krueger, Editor Bryan Marshall, Associate Editor Dan Batten, Features Editor Dave Garbe, Advertising Manager Kristin Troff, Staff Reporter Lameduckishness to remain unseen Stromvoll solves women's struggle You all ought to be happy to hear that my faith has been restored. Yes. I was having my doubts, but four weeks ago this Sunday, many of these doubts were dispelled. During the last couple of months — what with the Daniloff mess, the override of Reagan's South African sanctions veto, and the gloomy outlook for a Republican senate after November — I was beginning to wonder whether our President Ron was finally feeling the effects of his lame-duckishness. His leadership ability seemed to be disappearing faster than the student loans here at Con-cordia. Then, that glorious Sunday arrived. . Jeff Johnson Let me tell you, 1 seldom ap-preciate being interrupted during a Vike's victory, but this was different This was the news of Reagan's so-called failure at the Iceland "sum-mit." I'll admit, I was a bit disap-pointed at first that nothing had been agreed upon. After hearing the whole story, though, I knew that Mr. Reagan had done well. Don't get me wrong. I'm not a big fan of nuclear weapons. Quite frank-ly, they scare the hell out of me. There is something, however, that scares me even more. This is the idea of our President shirking na-tional security responsiblity and making a bad agreement just so he can come out smiling. If I remember correctly, President Reagan wasn't smiling when he left Iceland. He was obviously disappointed that a fair and sound agreement wasn't possi-ble, the President didn't back down and sign a foolish treaty just for the sake of popularity. He knew that too much was at stake. As he put it himself, "We prefer no agreement than to bring home a bad agreement to the United States." This takes more guts than what most people can claim to have. President Reagan didn't back down to predictable Gorbachevian stubbornness as some suggest he should have. The media seems bent on making this appear to be the only way art agreement could have been reached. Little is mentioned, though, of the Soviet unwillingness to compromise on the Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI), also known as "Star Wars". I'll tell you now that I profess to be no expert on SDI. I'd venture to say that no one at this school, con-trary to what many may lead you to believe, does know much about the feasiblity of SDI. One can read arti-cle after article, book after book, and only come up with scores of very qualified contradictions. The only way we will ever know of SDI's real potential is through the research and testing. A ban on much of this research and all of the testing was a prerequisite for any offensive reduction to which the Soviet Union would agree. ' After a lot of deliberation and what seem to be rather sincere of-fensive reduction proposals from both sides, President Reagan of-fered to go one step further than the Soviets. He offered to curtail deploy-ment of SDI for at least ten years and, after this time, share our research with the USSR and the rest of the world in an effort to make ex-isting nuclear weaponry obsolete. Many Americans agree that even this may have been going a bit too far. Mr. Gorbachev, however, surpris-ed no one be saying the American concessions weren't nearly enough. Knowing full well that Soviet scien-tists have been working on a missile defense of their own since as early as the 1960's, he demanded a ban on all testing and non-laboratory research as well as deployment for that same ten years. Few can disagree that this would virtually destroy any chance of gaining dependable knowledge in SDI in the near future. Unless the system is tested, we will never know how feasi-ble it is. Understandably, Mr. Reagan stopped smiling. He must have, at this time, wondered why the Soviets are con-stantly insistent that the U.S. never know if a defense against nuclear oblivion is possible. He must have asked himself why such a defense page 9 column 3 Hi, it is me again. You know, the one who poses all those strange ideas every second week. I know it is a little late to ask you, but did you have a good and relaxing break? I hope you did so you are all well rested and ready for the second block of school. One of the classes that I am tak-ing this semester is "Women's History" taught by Beverly Stadum. If you are looking for a history class to take, this class is absolutely wor-thwhile. It is well-spent time and money (this should get me an A in the class, don't you think?). John Sbremvdl So, why am I talking about my history class? Well, I am not going to write about the history of women, but more on a question/idea that has developed during these first weeks of school: Why is it that women, after well over a century (about 150 years) of struggling for equality have not been able to achieve being equal to men yet? Why do we (both men and women) persist on keeping this inequality between the sexes? I know I can not answer this ques-tion within the the boundaries of this column but I would like to bring up a couple of what I find to be us-ed as excuses for keeping the dif-ferences. The first one that comes to my mind is the one of biological difference. Now, I am not going to argue that there is no biological dif-ference, that would be really hard to do. Just put a man and a woman next to each other and we can see the difference. But should this dif-ference put women on a lower rank than men? Should this exclude women from taking certain occupa-tions or vice versa? If given the same opportunity should we not be able to do the same things? Another "excuse" I have heard to keep the difference between the sexes is the one with biblical basis. According to the Bible, Adam was born before Eve. Eve was not only created second, but she was created from one of Adam's ribs. Does this give the men a higher standard among the human race? Are the women second rate because Adam (man) was born before Eve (women). If you believe so, were we not all Men are animals Is there equality between the sexes? Many women want to be equal to men, but they are usually talking about in the job market. I think there are other things to think about Renee First of all, how long does it take you to get ready to go to class? I think most guys take less than 15 minutes. All they do is blast their stereos, some take showers, brush their teeth, throw on clothes, comb their hair, eat cold pizza, drink a beer, and go. v r v Young women, on the other hand, get up at least one to one and one-half hours before a class. They take a shower, wash their faces, brush their teeth, curl their hair, choose their outfits and ac-cessories, get dressed! apply their makeup, and watch shows like Tor day and Donahue. - Females are much more civilized. Guys gulp down about 10 plates of food at each meal, and I mean huge mouthfuls at a time. The ladies, on the other hand, take small bites and actually chew them so as not to choke to death. Guys' stomachs are bottomless pits that cannot be filled. They are glut-tons. The women are more like gourmets, because they take the time to savor the flavor of the food. College men are willing to live like animals, while college women take care of their living quarters. The men throw beer cans around, their rooms. They convince themselves that their trash is decorative. They don't have their mommies to clean up after them. The college women take the time to make their rooms nice and neat. They keep them clean, and use classier room decorations than empty beer cans and Playboy magazines. V All in all, women really iren't equal to men, and I don't think they would want to be. Of course, there are exceptions to what I said. There might be a few guys who are neat and girls who are slobs, and I hope some of you aren't offend-ed. We all have to be patient and in a few centuries, maybe men will catch up with women. Edhor's note: The writer is a col-umnist for The Chimes at Capital University. : created in His (God's) image? Well then, should we not all be equal simply because we are all human? Should we not have the same rights? I have only mentioned two main reasons (excuses) to why this in-equality exists. There are quite a few more. So what? I have not told you anything new. Well, I know that this is old news to most of you, but what are you doing about it? Why do we persist on keeping this inequality? Why do women have to fight for rights already existing for men? Should we not try to erase the ex-isting differences? So, what can we do to start eras-ing some of the boundaries? I think one of the main reasons why we have this inequality is that men are afraid to give up the advantage we have over women. There is nothing strange about that Giving up something that is your advantage and that someone else does not have, is really hard to do. Maybe, if we stop looking upon women gain-ing equality as a threat, we might be J able to work together instead of against each other (?). Could we not achieve more together than split? So, why do we not simply start treating each other as equals? To me it is simply a matter of living together as human beings. That should not be too difficult, should it? Well, I guess I just solved one of the main struggles in this century. AH we do now is start doing it (treat each other as humans with the same rights disregarding gender). I am trying as hard as I can and I find it to be quite challenging sometimes but it is fun to discover that there is hardly any difference at all. I wish you all good luck and nice talking to you again. Have a peaceful weekend — shalom.
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