Page 2/The Battalion/Monday, January 21, 1985
OPINION
Students have right
to go to safe school
The Supreme Court, in a 6 to 3 ruling, last Tuesday said
teachers and other school officials don’t have to meet the police
standard of “probable cause” or obtain a warrant before search
ing students.
Opponents of the ruling say students’ Fourth Amendments
rights must be protected. Obviously the ruling discriminates
against the trouble makers, but what about the rights of the
well-behaved students and school administrators?
The ruling did not strip students of all their rights. Instead,
the Court said school officials can conduct “reasonable”
searches of students for drugs or other contraband. Without set
guidelines the “reasonable” standard will probably be abused,
but it is a step in the right direction. As cases come up,
guidelines and standards will be set.
One guideline which would probably work more effectively
and discourage abuse of this ruling would be to allow only a few
experienced administrators to conduct searches. These few ad
ministrators could show more consistency and fairness in decid
ing when searches are really needed.
Guidelines are needed to avoid situations like the recent
one where a teacher ordered a classroom full of chilren strip-
searched because money was found missing.
A school is a place for learning, not for violence or drugs.
The fact that we need such a ruling to protect the rights of
the majority of people in our schools is a sad statement about
our school system.
The attitude of students that it is normal to bring weapons
and contraband to school is absurd.
Last year in a Houston public high school a student shot his
teacher because the teacher “gave” him a F. Some schools Fight
a daily war to keep drugs and weapons out of their buildings. A
recent survey done by the National Association of Secondary
School Principals showed that 85 percent of school searches in
volve drugs and weapons.
The Supreme Court ruling should give schools a little more
ammunition, because if they lose the war, society will pay the
consequences with a generation that not only missed out on an
education, but accepts violence as the norm.
Learning needs to take its rightful place as top priority in
schools.
The Battalion Editorial Board
‘Offensive’ rafings
are state of mind
Loren
Steffy
America has be
come obsessed
with the word “of
fensive.” Groups
like the Citizens
for Decency are
campaigning
against pornogra
phy, calling it,
among other
things, offensive.
A few years ago,
violence on tele
vision was a pri-
mary concern. Recently, the PG-13 rat
ing was tacked on certain films to
protect younger movie goers from
scenes of sex and violence which might
corrupt their impressionable little
minds.
With all the fanaticism surrounding
the suppression of offensiveness, some
thing genuinely beneficial was bound to
be smothered beneath the blanket of
“social decency.”
CBS and NBC have rejected a com
mercial by the American Cancer Society
because it is too graphic. The advertise
ment depicts a human fetus puffing on
a cigarette. The fetus, actually a plastic
puppet, takes a long drag on his little
cancer stick just as a narrator asks
“Would you give a cigarette to your un
born child?” Obviously, the point of the
commercial is that pregnant women
who smoke endanger the life of their
unborn child as well as their own.
The Cancer Society is trying to reach
the expectant mothers of America and
get them to think, and hopefully, act re
sponsibly in caring for their children.
Perhaps the commercial is a little
graphic, but then so are birth defects,
which can result from smoking during
pregnancy. Perhaps the reason the ad
may seem so “offensive” is because it
hits close to home.
When Dirty Harry splatters the
brains and entrails of thugs against
LETTER:
white walls, the audience cheers. At the
end of “Sudden Impact,” when Harry
needs an even bigger gun to make even
larger portions of organic strawberry
marmalade, the spectators are ecstatic.
When Eddie Murphy pumps his antago
nist full of holes and the audience gets
to see five minutes of slow-motion blood
spurting, painful expressions and a cat-
sup-smeared tumble down the stairs,
the onlookers roar. And when the audi
ence has to see a simulated human fetus
suck on a cigarette, they scream “offen
sive, startling, inappropriate.”
Even the ad which depicts happy-go-
lucky teenagers hopping in a car and
turning into skeletons while a narrator
says “Drinking and driving can KILL a
friendship” didn’t create the uproar
that the Cancer Society’s commercial
has.
The fetus scenes in the movie “2001:
A Space Odyssey,” which has been aired
on television several times, never caused
so much as a whisper. Now a commer
cial which uses an almost identical fetus-
puppet is branded “far'too graphic for
presentation on CBS.”
The networks argue that the com
mercial could show up without warning
and thus might startle some people.
Good. The ad presents a startling mes
sage, it’s not supposed to make people -
happy and cheerful. NBC said the com
mercial “might be offensive to some
people.” Too bad. Birth defects and
women smoking during pregnancy can
not be ignored.
Ironically, our society advocates en
tertainment depicting exploding heads,
people ripping their own faces off and
humans being blown to Chicken Mc-
Nuggets in slow motion, but we find a
public service announcement aimed at
preserving the quality of life offensive.
Loren Steffy is a sophomore journa
lism major and weekly columnist for
The Battalion.
Gays shouldn’t be
accepted as normal
EDITOR:
My letter concerns Mr. Loren Stef-
fy’s article regarding the recent activities
of the Ku Klux Klan. Mr. Steffy asks,
“After gays become accepted by society,
who will be next on the Klan’s list?” I do
not agree with the Klan’s methods or
philosophy. However, Mr. Steffy seems
to think that our society will accept ho
mosexuals and their abnormal lifestyle
in the very near future.
I would hate to see the day Americans
view homosexuality as an ordinary con-
donable lifestyle. Yes Mr. Steffy, it is
true that “all men are created equal,”
but that doesn’t mean that they can’t be
come warped as time goes on.
Eddie Klein
Class of ’88
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Staying on as rainmaker
By ART BUCHWALD
Columnist for The Los Angeles Times Syndicate
I still have friends who owe me a few fa-
Well, everyone seems to be back in
town, not only the winners, but the los
ers in last November’s election. The vic
tors have taken their seats in the House
and Senate, and the losers have taken
theirs in one of Washington’s 100,000
prestigious law firms.
Ex-Congressman Turtleback is one of
the losers, if you call making $350,000 a
year with Tort &: Tort a losing proposi
tion.
“I thought you’d go back to Wistful
County after you lost your seat,” I said.
“You ever been in Wistful County?”
Turtleback asked me.
“Can’t say that I have,” I admitted.
“All I know about it is what you said on
the floor of the House — that it was
America’s biblical Garden of Eden.”
“I’m not on the floor anymore, and
Wistful County is the pits. I’m not just
saying that because I lost the election af
ter serving the people there for 20
years. It was the pits when I first came to
Congress, and it’s the pits now.”
“Did you ever practice law before you
got elected to public office?”
“No, and I don’t intend to practice it
now. I’m going to be the rainmaker at
Tort & Tort.”
“What’s a rainmaker?”
“The fellow that makes it rain new
business on the firm because of the peo
ple he knows. I may be out of office but
“Then you’re going to be an influ
ence peddler.”
“Never. My job is to provide advice
and consent to the private sector which
can’t operate under the oppressive laws
passed by a vindictive anti-business Con
gress,” he said. “Clients will come to me,
not because of the influence I still wield,
but because of my expertise in getting
around the overbearing rules and regu
lations I demanded when I served the
people.”
“I can see where Tort 8c Tort would
want you to be a partner in their firm,” I
said. “Will you also provide lobbying
services?”
“You can’t be a rainmaker in Wash
ington if you are not willing to stand up
for the things your clients believe in.
The reason ex-congressmen and ex-sen
ators are in demand by Washington law
firms is that we have access to our for
mer colleagues on the floor, not to men
tion the use of the congressional dining
rooms and the gym. It’s amazing how
much law you can practice when you’re
doing Jane Fonda exercises with the
chairman of a House or Senate commit
potential source of funds for thee
lure political campaigns.”
“What about the administra
How do they look on you?”
“Kindly. If you were a former Re:
lican congressman, they want tom
up to you for losing your election,
if you were a former Democratic
gressman, they are so delightedthai
are no longer in opposition thattli
go overboard to show they don’t
grudges.”
“You can’t say Washington do
take care of its own.”
“Had I known then what 1 know
I would have lost an election 10't
ago,” he said.
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The phone rang and TurtleL
picked it up. “Willy, how are you?
are things at Wistful Tools? .
don’t say? The Navy refuses to psM
for the Snail Darter tool kit?.,.H.v|
claim you overcharged them by
lion? No problem, Willy, we’ll not* I
get your money, but we’ll getanapH|
f rom the Pentagon.” Turtleback hit: I
fort 8c fort timer on his desk and ti if
said, “Tell me a story.”
tee.
“And they don’t treat you any differ
ently because you are no longer a mem
ber of Congress?”
“They treat you better, because now
that you’re with a big law firm you are a
After 20 minutes he hungup*
winked at me. Then he broke into sot |
“I’m singing in the rain, singingint
rain. What a glorious feeling dadt.t
da da.”
CBS EVENING GOOD NEWS
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