Page 2/The Battalion/Thursday, July 7, 1983
opinion
Letters
Bicyclists break laws
Editor:
As a visitor to the Texas A&M campus
I am impressed. I am impressed by the
diligence and fervor with which the com
munity constabulary addresses itself to
the parking and moving violations
perpetrated by motor vehicular traffic. It
is with awe that I have witnessed the
hourly prowling of parking lots and the
countless stake-outs of stop signs all of
which convince me of the vast numbers
of security forces available and their de
dicated search for motorized villains and
illegal activities.
But what of the bicyclist? Surely Texas
A&M campus is not a declared haven
from the laws of the road for those with
bicycles. Just as the forces of Law and
Order maintain their vigilance over those
with four wheels, so do they ignore those
with two. Since arriving on the campus I
have been attacked on footpaths and
.sidewalks alike by speeding bicycles.
When I take to the streets in my auto
mobile, I find bicycles attacking me as
they travel one-way streets in the wrong
direction and two-way streets on the
wrong side of the road. I find them leap
ing out in front of my car from sidewalks,
across intersections or pedestrian cros
sings, without even slowing down. And I
believe I could count on the fingers of
one hand the number of bicyclists who
stop at stop signs, whether they are on the
road or the sidewalk and regardless of
the direction they are moving.
Now, as a pedestrian I don’t wish to be
maimed, and as a driver I don’t wish to
maim; sado-masochism was not one of
the reasons I came here. It would appear
to me that some clear regulations con
cerning bicycle traffic should be de
veloped (if not already) and enforced. It
is no less hazardous or illegal for bicycles
to ride footpaths, sidewalks, pedestrian
crossings, streets the wrong way or on the
wrong side, and ignore stop signs than it
is for motor vehicles. And just think of
the income that could be generated by
carrying out the spirit and letter of the
laws as they apply to bicycles.
Let the spirit of Aggieland be an
equality of peace and justice for all using
the roads and footpaths. Let law and
order prevail. Let’s prosecute and perse
cute the bicyclists ’til they obey the same
laws that apply to motor vehicles.
Yesterday I was privileged to see a
further development in the mahem of
two-wheel mania: a motorbike travelling
the wrong way up a one-way street on the
sidewalk. “When will it all end?” I ask
myself, rhetorically.
Alan Journet
Department of Entomology
White now minority
Editor:
I write this letter in response to the
black review of our dual education
system.
I am white and I do maintain a certain
degree of prejudice: I prefer the com
pany of white, blonde, blue-eyed females
above all others. I do not, however, be
lieve in discrimination of any kind — ra
cial, religious or sexual.
I find myself exceedingly annoyed
and disgusted by the endless cries of
minority organizations who quote statis
tics and ratios while demanding their
“equal rights” of representation and par
ticipation.
There exist scores of minority adv
ancement institutions, organizations,
clubs, television programs, grants, aid
programs and even a black Miss America
contest. But try to restrict the benefi
ciaries of any organization to whites only
and you’ll quickly receive a sound politic-
Editor:
Apparently there are a few Aggies
who can’t seem to read. Everywhere I
turn in the library I am confronted with
the sign, “Food, drinks and smoking pro
hibited.” Yet, there are a few Aggies who
seem to believe this sign doesn’t pertain
to them. I can’t begin to count the num
ber of times I have been distracted by the
crumpling of candy papers or the open
ing of a coke while I was studying in the
library. As a new transfer student, I am
appalled by this behavior. We’re not in
high school, so don’t act like high school
al, if not physical, lynching.
With all the programs which now exist
for the recruitment of minority students
and faculty, and all the federal pressure
being applied in their favor, it is we, the
white minority, who should feel discri
minated against.
I believe in equal opportunity and
equal pay for equal ability, whether the
recipient be black or white, male or
female. But, no extra effort or money
should be expended to recruit and em
ploy members of any specific racial
group simply because they belong to that
group.
If I could, at this moment, change my
racial origin and sexual gender (for busi
ness opportunity reasons only, mind
you), while retaining my identitiy and in
telligence, I would emerge both black
and female, take the world by storm, and
then laugh all the way to the bank!
Roy Robertson
ignored
students — it’s not funny anymore.
Food, drinks and smoking are prohi
bited in the library. It’s a rule — not an
option. When this rule is broken time and
time again by several students, their be
havior reflects upon the University. And,
I must say, it doesn’t paint a pretty pic
ture of the students’ respect for their
school. If you must eat, drink or smoke
while studying, go outside, go to the
MSC, or go wherever you must —just
don’t go to the library. Thank you for
your cooperation.
Robin Enloe ’85
Library signs
The Battalion
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Music charts expose middle
by Lloyd G. Carter
United Press International
FRESNO, Calif. — As a teen-ager in
the 1960s, it was my task to reassure my
frightened parents that the Beatles,
Animals, Kinks, Zombies, Rolling Stones
and even Herman Hermit’s were not in
vaders from outer space but merely my
musical heroes.
Dressed in bell bottoms, paisley shirt,
granny glasses and unfurled moptop —
my parents felt certain I would run away
with a band of gypsies — I reveled in the
emotional shocks registered by Mickjag-
ger’s menacing glare or Jimi Hendrix’s
irreverent Star Spangled Banner.
But as the years passed and the roses
of the Flower Power Generation wilted
slightly, my expert grasp on the minutiae
and trivia of rockdom (Paul McCartney’s
favorite drink? Rum and Coke) slipped
slightly. I began to hear more tunes on
the radio without being able to instantly
name the band, recording studio and
latest drug influences.
The grudging recognition that I am
inching perilously close to what others
(never me) might call middle age came
when I saw the latest list of Top 20 hits
and realized I may be hopelessly out of it.
At the top of the charts is a group
called the Police. Can you imagine how
uncool that name would have been in the
‘60s?
At the No. 5 spot is a group called
Kajagoogoo. Don’t ask me what that
means. It sounds like somebody starting
to sneeze.
Cruising in at the No. 17 spot is a
group called Debarge, who presumably
spent some time on De River.
A group called Madness has a No. 10
hit called “Our House.” I am trying to
track down the rumor they are referring
to Anthony Perkin’s abode in Psycho II.
While Mick Jagger’s paean to erotic
frustration, “(I Can’t Get No) Satisfac
tion,” kept plenty of parents nervous two
decades ago, the parents of my genera
tion get to worry about such innocuous
album titles as “Pyromania” (by Def Lep
pard, which presumably is a hard-of-
hearing, illiterate jungle cat), “Cuts Like
a Knife,” “Killer on the Rampage” and
“Eliminator” (which could be about a
murderer or a balm for a digestive tract
upset.)
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want to know.
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selling video cassettes and hoitiwo or three
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see that Centipede is at the top
home video charts. However, h:
a record-video-etc. store the oil
and saw a new video gameoutthi
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and it should be cutting a swathtoi
of the video game charts soon.
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Solar home means no utility costg
by Children’s Express
United Press International
NEW YORK — If the sun didn’t shine
for four weeks, Amory and L. Hunter
Lovins’ house would only lose less than a
degree of temperature a day. And it
could never go below 55 degrees.
Mr. and Mrs. Lovins are building a
completely solar house and research cen
ter called the Rocky Mountain Institute
near Aspen, Colo. They also write books
and give speeches about what they call
our vulnerable energy system and ways
we can replace it with solar energy, wind-
power, and flowing water, as they are
doing in their house in Colorado.
The Lovins are not going to get any
heating bills. Their house is “super-
insulated”.
“Just the sunlight coming in through
the windows can heat the whole build
ing,” Mr. Lovins told us. “We don’t have a
furnace. We don’t have electric heat. We
don’t need them. We have a special kind
of window that holds the heat in about
five times as well as ordinary windows. It
looks like an ordinary window but it’s
much more heat-tighf.”
But if renewable energy is cheaper
than non-renewable energy, why isn’t it
used more often?
“In the past few years it actually is
being used much more,” Mr. Lovins re
plied. “It’s turning out that it’s much fas
ter to build a lot of small simple things
that anybody can do than to build a few
big complicated machines that cost bil
lions of dollars and take 10 years to
build.”
Mr. Lovins stated, “By thousands of
people stuffing up the thousands of little
is going to get a lot of publicity]
Lovins says it’s going to make peopl
that they can have a beautiful hou
just solar energy, paying no electridl
all — “a house so beautiful that j-
body who sees it would like to 1
house like that.”
(For more information about C
Express, send a stamped, self-addn
envelope to Children’s Expresi |
Charles St., New York, New
10014.)
7071
The Lovins can also grow fish
and vegetables and food. They
have a farm in there and that’s
where they’re going to get their
food from.
If the sun doesn’t shine for a long time,
Mrs. Lovins said, “Just our body heat and
the heat from appliances like the typewri
ter, stove or lights will keep us quite
warm. And on a totally cloudy day, there
is still a great deal of energy in the light
that comes in.”
cracks, by buying more efficient cars, by
plugging up the steam leaks, by putting
solar collectors on their roofs, by produc
ing electricity from dams on little rivers
— we’re getting more new energy than
from the big boys going out and, let’s say,
building a nuclear power plant.”
The Rocky Mountain Institute house
(Editor’s note: Children’s Express,‘
vately funded news service, is real
journalism reported entirely by S
13 years of age or under whose
recorded interviews, discussions,it
and commentary are edited by teem
and adults. This story is written
Horowitz, 12; Glenn Golz, 12;
Heimel, 12; Sarah Stern, 13. Assi
Editors are Rosanne Marmor, Mi
Ehran Elisha, 16.)
Ir
inchufi: .
This i
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Berry’s
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The Lovins can also grow fish and
vegetables and food. They have a farm in
there and that’s where they’re going to
get their food from. They also have a well
that brings them water.
Slouch By Jim Earle
“In a few years we’ll even be getting
our electricity from solar cells,” Mr.
Lovins said: “We can forget about utility
bills altogether. We also don’t need to
worry if there’s a power failure.”