| Summary: | What was the low point of your spring break? OPINIONS AWARD WINNING - MINNESOTA NEWSPAPER ASSOCIATION - BEST EDITORIAL PAGE Volume XCVI, Issue 20 - Friday, March 11, 2005 4 Kristen Rise ‘05 “Having to pay to go to the bathroom in Europe.” Q Kirstin Fernholz ‘06 “Running out of coffee creamer, and I’m still out.” poll photo Tyler Olson ‘05 “Losing my dinner on the Pacific Ocean beach. wait, maybe that was the high point.” 03 11 By Jennifer Mills Laundry day. A bittersweet day, yet the sweetness of clean laundry stays with you, for the next week or so. After I have completed the laundry process I always feel as if I have won the laund-ottery. Like millionaires wipe their sweaty armpits with 50 dollar bills, I wear several pairs of socks in one day. Sometimes two at a time, for extra padding and warmth. This wasteful practice is something I could never even dream of doing on a day like Friday when I am usually reduced to wearing a bathing suit for panties. No, laundry day is the only day when such extravagancies are allowed. It’s like Mardi Gras, but undies style. I’ll never forget the first time I really did laundry at college. I did four loads. Four loads. I bet Napoleon didn’t even do four loads after the battle of Bloody Stained Shirt. I remember going to class that day wearing a bathing suit, a woolen Italian designer skirt as ugly as sin and a baseball jersey. Let’s just say I felt like Paris Hilton on the cat walk. There is a certain glory and magic connected to clean laun-dry. One moment, a sock is so putrid and horrible that the devil himself wouldn’t wipe his rear with it, but one hour, 26 minutes and $1.75 later, the sock is clean enough to wipe the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, only to have the guards escort you out saying, “Sorry ma’am, we don’t allow items of such extraordinary cleanliness in here.” The magic of laundry day is often, however, clouded with the unfortunate reality of the time and money one must spend to transform their clothing from sinner to saint. It’s all fun and games until you swipe your ID card realizing you only have seven cents left on it, which isn’t enough to do a load for a flea. Then you realize you have to make the freezing cold north-ern Minnesota trek to the Normandy, the closest place to put money on your card. However, you have no clothes, because it’s laundry day, and will soon be reduced to making the arctic climb naked. Then you realize you have no money in the first place to deposit into your laundry account and curse the day you felt it necessary to have an underwear splurge, wearing five or six pairs of underwear daily, just because you had the resources. At the moment I am staring at my underwear drawer. It just barely shuts as laundry day was yesterday and the drawer is now a cornucopia of undergarment delight. I am fighting with all of my will power against putting on a clean pair of socks. I have, after all, been wearing this pair for about three hours now and they are feeling a bit moist. But then I close my eyes and think of how I will feel in a few days when my rations are running low and I will be wish-ing for that one extra pair. The five dollar bill you find hid-den in your jacket pocket comes to mind. Perhaps we should all start hiding socks and undies in our jacket pockets so we can be delighted in a few weeks time when we find them dwelling there. Then maybe we can post-pone the delight of doing laundry for a few more days. The glory that is laundry day LETTERS TO THE EDITOR By Laura Wylie ‘08 At a simple level, there are two ways by which to view morals in our society today: as a moral relativist, or as a moral absolutist. Obviously there are additional options, but for the purpose of this argument, those two will be used. A relativist, at a base level, believes that individuals have the right to make and follow their own moral guidelines, provided they do not infringe on the constitutional-ly given rights of others. Thus it is self-refuting to call people who believe homosexuality is wrong “dumb,” while at the same time main-taining that “freedom of choice is a universal one.” Relativists are forced by definition to tolerate beliefs differ-ent than their own. Moral absolutists, then, believe that there are certain absolute truths that apply universally, despite what individuals believe. As our society moves increasingly toward a relativist perspective, many dangers become apparent. It becomes difficult to differentiate between social tolerance and social approval. According to Francis Beckwith and Gregory Koukl in their book “Relativism: Feet Firmly Planted in Mid-Air,” there appears to be no difference between a relativist and a person who has no morals. Some examples they provide: A man and his widowed sister sleep together every so often for their enjoyment. A nurse leaves a newborn baby to die on a counter because although it is still breathing, it is not yet the 20 weeks suggested to begin prenatal care, but only 19. Someone calls her on the decision, and she suffocates the baby to further its demise. Are those examples of situations that society should leave to choice? The Constitution protects life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Some choices people make violate these rights. Abortion and homosexuality are two issues that society is now strug-gling with, due to this fact of person-al choice. Abortion is controversial mainly in the idea of whether or not a fetus is a human being. Some peo-ple believe that the fetus is a living being, which would thus be guaran-teed protection of life by the consti-tution, and others do not. It makes sense, then, that the people who believe that abortion is murder of a human life, would fight for the life of the baby. Consequently, they should not be referred to as “crazy ignorant lunatics.” Personally, I would rather have people from both sides fighting for what they believe in than many people in the middle keeping their beliefs to themselves. I will not get into the debate of homosexuality, because my current goal is not to argue for one side or the other. Instead, I would like to dis-tinguish between the ideas of social tolerance and social approval. The fact that only seven out of 30 people in that class raised their hands in what can be inferred as being approval of homosexuality, does not mean that every 23 students at this college are “dumb.” Rather, it most likely means that the majority of the 23 students are tolerant. Approval is not some-thing that can be legally forced on other people. Tolerance, on the other hand, can be socially expected of every person, in terms of outwardly respecting the opinions and lifestyles of others. ‘Keep your opinions to yourself ’ letter is in fact self-refuting By Jeanne Dotson Business Office The president’s proposed budg-et for fiscal year 2006 proposes no funds for the Perkins Loan pro-gram and to stop the lending of existing funds. This would make college less affordable to millions of students who depend on the nation’s first student loan program to help them finance their educa-tion. Without Perkins Loans, students would be forced to borrow from high-cost alternative sources, such as credit cards or private education loans. Since these loans require good credit or a co-signer with good credit, many low and even middle-income students are turned down. Concordia College can award up to $4,000.00 per year in Perkins Loan. However, our standard award is around $2,500.00. Please try to visualize what you will do in order to pay this amount out of pocket once the Perkins Loan is gone forever. The only way we can attempt to save this program is by a concen-trated “grassroots” effort. I am asking each one of you to fax a let-ter to your congressman or woman, either state or federal or both. Please ask your parents to do the same. I have sample letters that I can provide that just require you to “fill in the blanks” if you wish. This is so important to all present and future students attending col-leges and universities in the United States. Please do your part to encourage our Congress to keep financial aid available for you and your fellow students. stand on stage awaiting their fate looking like the top ten com-petitors in a beauty pageant just made for even more fake and forced smiles from the losers. The winners also didn’t get the satisfaction of walking past all of those “Very Important People” all seated in the front row. If nothing else, it made the nominees, resembling a group of cattle being shown at a county fair to come face to face with the reality that their award just wasn’t important enough. While that was bad, nothing was worse than the poor win-ners who had to have their award given to them in the middle or back of the theater. Not even being allowed up on stage must have just added salt to the wound. There was the Academy saying, “Sorry, your award is lacking so much impor-tance that we aren’t even going to let you touch the stage. Go ahead and accept your award back here.” While many of these changes were put in place to get the show over with before the witching hour commenced, it seemed to only take away from the classic tradition and nos-talgia of the show. But then again, it is the Academy, and let’s face it—any group organization even mentioning Spiderman 2 for an award has got to be crazy. MEGORDEN FROM 3 Having nominees stand on stage is petty them to “get away with it.” No, you’re right, he had no idea what he was doing. How could he? He was a mere juvenile! Never mind that Simmons was 17 at the time. Never mind that he had on several different occasions expressed a desire to commit a burglary and murder someone. Never mind that he had present-ed a detailed plan on how to successfully carry the operation out. I agree. This premeditation demonstrates absolutely no capacity to reason through right and wrong choices. You’re probably right. When Simmons espoused his intent to murder someone, he could-n’t possibly have understood that this meant he would actually be taking a human life. I mean he was only 17! Give the guy a break! Now, I’m no psychologist, but does that argument strike anyone else as ridiculous? Don’t get me wrong. I don’t think we should be installing express lanes in our state and federal pens for juvenile executions. In fact, any one under 17 should have immunity from the death penalty. But a 17-year-old who wanted to kill someone and did so because he believed the law would protect him from death? No. No way. Ultimately, however, this is an issue that should be left to the consideration of each individual state legislature and not to nine people wearing cool black robes. MADDEN FROM 3 Some 17-year-olds should be held accountable Additionally, young teens are struggling with impulses that they have never encountered before. We’re not talking about teens that have grown up in homes like you and I have. These children have been beaten and abused and do not have the resources that an average teen has access to. Some of these children are exposed to and make these decisions under the influence of alcohol. A study of 14 juveniles sentenced to death found that 12 had been phys-ically or sexually abused, some at the hands of relatives. After failing to protect and treat these children, we impose on them the harshest, most ultimate punishment possible. Should we really rob these children of a chance at redemp-tion if they are 17 and make this decision at a 14 or 15-year-old level? No. Thank God we no longer stand for this. Finally, there is no public support for juvenile execu-tions, and if you do support them, you are in the minority. A Gallup poll released in May 2002 found only 26 percent of Americans support the death penalty for offenders under the age of 18. If you ask me, I’m glad these few rogue states that allowed this practice are not speaking on behalf of Americans to the rest of the world anymore. LEY FROM 3 Little public support for juvenile executions By Vanessa Wilhelm ‘07 Maybe I was too subtle in mak-ing the purpose of my article, which was a critique on the way the pro-life Dueling Columnists piece was composed, or perhaps it just comes down to this: some people just don’t get it. If I were attempt-ing to write a pro-choice article, I would make this intention known, this was not however, my primary drive; although I’m sure my posi-tion in the debate was quite evi-dent. Also, if it were my objective to specifically and tactlessly attack the piece or argument written by this “pro-lifer”, I would have done what my opponent did and cross out almost every line she wrote and make comments on it like “blah blah.” Then to top it off I would send this desecrated copy of her article to her with a note. In fact, a good example of a note like this was personally sent to me and it reads as follows “Vanessa- First of all. This is NOT a harassment or hate letter. Dialogue is good & I hope we start some. I’ll just put it out there: your argument really lacks.everything. I crossed off substance (no, not comments that I brushed off, they really say nothing). When it comes to attempting to down play OR defeat the pro-life argument, you didn’t add much at all. Bottom Line, if you want to know who wrote this, want to strengthen your argument (you are a poly sci major, afterall) Legally, ethically, etc., come to one collegians for life meeting, 7:30, Feb. 14th Old Main. No hate-just open minded dialogue.” It was unsigned, even scarier. Wow. Well all those who felt that was not a hate letter and complete-ly about calm open-minded dia-logue raise your hands. Anyone? I didn’t think so. To make matters worse, two days prior, I received an e-mail from the faculty advisor of Collegians for Life saying basically the same thing. I’ve never felt so pressured to “convert” in my life. Not by subtle or “cordial” means (“cordial” being a word the faculty advisor used to describe how we should act…funny, huh?) but con-version by harassment. I was once told that when deal-ing with aggression it is not neces-sarily best to simply retaliate but better yet, to expose it for what it is. I would like to follow this ideol-ogy and not be provoked by such childish means, but simply share with my fellow students my first experience of being persecuted for expressing my opinion. I didn’t think that such things actually happened to people who spoke their minds; I always figured it was something one saw in movies or read about in books. This, sadly, is not the case. It may be a surprise however, to know that this was not as big of a deter-rent as one might imagine. Actually, I was quite excited about it. It’s not everyday that one receives personalized hate letters that are reminiscent of religious terrorism. Perkins Loan under fire Pro-life org. harassment
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