Page 2/The Battalion/Tuesday, February 18, 1986
Opinion
Democratic ideals slaughtered
in the name of good taste
The classroom
and the rock mu
sic industry are
the latest suspects
in a never-ending
crime. The charge
— corrupting the
youth. It is a com
plaint that has
been levied
against everyone
from Socrates to
Frank Zappa. The scene is familiar: The
backbone of the nation is being warped
by some seemingly innocent medium
which children come into contact with
regularly. Unfortunately, what is
warped in the long run is the backbone
of democracy.
Luckily, there’s always someone to
save our children from subliminal de
struction. The classroom is patrolled by
Accuracy in Academia, an outgrowth of
Reed Irvine’s Accuracy in Media. The
word “accuracy” is, of course, relative.
AIA is out to protect students from
professors who teach their personal be
liefs in the classroom — especially if
those beliefs are liberally biased.
The rock music business is monitored
primarily by the Parent’s Music Re
source Center. The PMRC is a group of
senators’ wives who listen to heavy metal
music and determine if certain songs
will cause a kid to nail the babysitter’s
forehead to the underside of a mahog
any desk.
It’s important to realize that these
groups aren’t made up of fanatics.
They’re merely people who think the
moral fiber of this country has been
torn to shreds by professors who have
the gall not to think like Ronald Reagan,
and by musicians who do have the gall
to sing about sex, violence, peace, love
and other unmentionable subjects.
The PMRC has made some important
advances. Several record companies
have agreed to print song lyrics on the
outside of album covers, which means
parents can stop listening to senators’
wives and start deciding for themselves
what songs are turning their children’s
brains to guacamole.
The tell-all lyrics will give parents —
and children — a better idea of what a
song is about. Of course, rock songs still
will be open to misinterpretation, out-
of-context quotations and general dis
section. But even great works such as
Mark Twain’s Huckleberry Finn are
picked apart by people who would
rather see how many times the word
“nigger” appears than pay attention to
the book’s anti-racism message.
What is disturbing about these
groups is not their what’s-right-for-me-
is-right-for-everyone attitude, but that
they employ this thinking in the name
of democracy. Obviously they are doing
what they think is best for impressiona
ble children. Someone has to keep Satan
from invading their brains and turning
them into Charles Manson groupies..
But at the same time these groups are
protecting our children’s minds, they
also are warping them. We are showing
them a contradiction in the concept of
free speech.
It’s fine with AIA if professors lecture
on free expression, but if they exercise
it, their names are recorded by the ever-
vigilant AIA reporters. They’ll be added
to the national list of known, card-carry
ing liberals operating on America’s col
lege campuses.
Freedom of speech doesn’t mean just
a freedom of the norm, it means a free
dom of extremes — some of which are
not pleasing. If we are to hear Martin
Luther King Jr., we must tolerate the
Ku Klux Klan. If we are to read the Bi
ble, we must tolerate Penthouse. If we
are to listen to John Lennon, we must
tolerate Ozzy Osbourne.
Groups like the AIA and the PMRC
are attempting to control specific “un
desirable” situations, but the result is an
attack on a basic principle of democracy.
Socrates was forced to drink hemlock
for his “crimes.” Let’s hope our First
Amendment isn’t similarly poisoned.
Loren Steffy is a junior journalism ma
jor and the Opinion Page editor for
The Battalion.
<g)l906 HOUSTON H*T
United Feature Syndicate
Where there is smoke ...
I he tobacco
companies are
fighting back
against the steady
drumbeat of anti
cigarette propa
ganda.
According to
the Wall Street
Journal, Philip
Morris has
launched a vigor
ous campaign to
prevent discrimi
nation against smokers. The tobacco
company says anti-smoking zealots are
harassing smokers and violating their
civil rights.
A Philip Morris spokesman also
maintains that when it comes to report
ing the smoking story, the media are
grossly unfair to the tobacco interests
and support the “fringe element in the
country today bent on modifying Amer
icans’ behavior to conform to their own
interpretation of Utopia.”
I wish the spokesman had said “some
of the media” because I believe that any
body in this country who wants to smoke
should be allowed to do so. I refuse to
be lumped with zealots or members of
the fringe element. While I am a born-
again ex-cigar smoker, I would never
take sides between those courageous
people who have given up smoking and
the weak, miserable wretches who still
are addicted to this filthy habit.
The newspaperman’s job is to be fair
and impartial on any political issue,
whether it is tobacco or Colonel Kha-
dafy.
So I will first deal with the arguments
in favor of smoking. Most people who
smoke are walking time bombs waiting
to go off, and the cigarette is the only
thing to keep them from self-destruct
ing. The country does not have enough
mental institutions to take care of all the
neurotic people who would have to be
committed if they weren’t permitted to
smoke.
Smokers are among our biggest tax
payers. Through cigarette taxes they
support schools, sewers and the hospi
tals they check into when they get sick
from smoking.
Smoking contributes to the nation’s
economy. Cigarette addicts will spend
their last dollar for a pack of smokes
rather than throw it away on bread or
milk.
One of the most telling health argu
ments in favor of smoking is that more
women are doing it now than ever be
fore. They wouldn’t if it weren’t safe,
because women smokers are not dumb.
The more anxious peole are about
lighting up, the more they are bullied by
nonsmok'ers who will not tolerate smok
ers in the same room. These nonsmok
ing zealots justify their rudeness by
claiming they become dizzy from the
fumes. This is a joke. It is a known med
ical fact that tobacco smoke cannot do
more physical harm to a nonsmoker
than a glass of warm water from the
East River.
The biggest fear of the tobacco com
panies is that if the nonsmoker is per
mitted to persecute the smoker today,
he will persecute diesel trucks tomorrow
and Consolidated Edison smokestacks
next week. So the pro-smoker is fighting
not just for his own rights, but the rights
of everything that smokes in America.
Now let’s be fair to the other side.
The nonsmokers are made up of wimps
who sit around all day waiting for a
smoker to pull out a cigarette. They are
intolerant, selFish people. When asked
why they object to someone enjoying a
few puffs from a Filter tip, all the non-
smoker can come up with is a weak, “I
have asthma,” which is no reason at all.
Besides the wimps, a large number of
nonsmokers are reformed puffers, who
gave up the weed and now want every
one else to do the same. These people
are unbearable because they not only
ask smokers to put out their cigarettes
but spend a half-hour telling them why
they are not good.
So there you have it, two opposing
sides, each with their own truth: one
composed of smoke worshippers, the
other always praying for fresh air.
We, as Americans, should have toler
ance for both — the side that believes in
long life, and the side that couldn’t care
less. No one has a monopoly on truth.
The only thing we can all agree on is the
tobacco companies are not in business
for our health.
Art Buchwald is a columnist for the
Los Angeles Times Syndicate.
Mail Call
:$
GE
Letters to the Editor should not exceed 300 words in length. The editorial staff resent!.:—^ ^
right to edit letters for style and length but will make every cttnr t to maintain i/ieamkiH 1 i 'i
intent. Each letter must lye signed and must include the address and telephone numbti
the writer.
Ise
tic in f
sing
no*
facin
Reagan’s plan doesn’t hold water
EDITOR:
I am writing in response to President Reagan’s plan to begin se
off federal assets to help balance the budget.
llings,
Ration
. Art
|he Te
ter, s
26,00
ire that
| a city
creat
1 can not believe that anyone would suggest liquidating assets as at*
lution to the deficit problem. It is proposed that such assets as the!
ville Power Administration, the Elk Hills Naval Petroleum Reserve;
satellites owned by the National Weather Service be sold to privateim
est at the earliest possible date and that the funds be* earmarked lor deft]
reduction. It seems to me that the idea of selling off capital assetsikl
have been accumulated over generations to relieve a deficit broir"
about by poor fiscal management is somewhat akin to pawning the fair,.
heirlooms to Finance a spending spree.
While I can understand why the present administration would bee®
cerned by a federal debt that has more than doubled under its steraj
ship, I think that liquidating federal possessions to make thedeficitl
better on paper offers a short-sighted approach to the problem. Itrt;
resents its desire to make the deficit numbers look better without beii
willing to make the hard decisions that are demanded.
■We w
jplding
res,"
ie kids
Texa
llielby
lions at
In the First place gelling these assets would not alleviate the harmtJ
economic effects that running a deficit causes. The money that is now It jrs Syn
ing taken out of the capital market to finance the deficit would simpiu
borrowed by private interests to finance the purchase of these assets fro;
the government. There w r ould be no more money available to financed
vestment in capital improvements that would create jobs and econotr.
growth. We would have made little headway towards insuring longten:
economic growth and some of our national assets would be gonefoiB
good.
While there are no easy solutions to the deficit problem 1 amquHl
confident that the solution lies somewhere in a mix of cutting federj
spending and increasing revenues through a tax increase. While ihisir.
not be the easiest course to follow', I am convinced that it is the properoxl
and the one that reflects true leadership.
I hope we will have the national character to resist this attempt aifc-1
litical expediency and make the hard decisions to insure America’s future I
William L. Hancock Jr.
Illogical rationale
EDITOR:
I could not help noting your article on Thursday concerning
SCONA keynote speaker on the Middle East, William Stewart. The Bit
talion reported that Stewart said the “ . . . Israelis insisted that the Pali
tinian ref ugees had no right to a national state of their own.”
It is impotant to remember that the* area of Palestine, which tod?
comprises Jordan, Lebanon and Israel, was divided in the 1940s. The Pi
estines were offered a homeland in this area, and they refused it!
In addition The Ball reported “Stewart said, in the Middle East,tf
rorism is seen not as cruel, but as a useful political device.” How tragic in
that there are people who utilize cold-blooded murder as a justificaf-
for political acts. Such illogical rationale shows how much Jews and Cte
tians alike must live by the ideal expressed in the Ten Commandments
“Thou shall not kill.”
Barry Laves
Not the Christians fault
■
EDITOR:
Why does Karl Pallmeyer do this to himself? Is he some sort ofasadi l
or something? Does he enjoy making unprovoked attacks on ChristiaJ
and Christianity?
I’m referring, of course, to his nice little column about Valentint
Day. From what Karl says about the “good old days” it seems to mepeopl
acted just about as silly and stupid then as they do now (perhaps more it
since the men were running around in skirts and the women were well'
ing bedsheets).
But that was the old tradition, and we all know that in ordertok
atruly world-class holiday (is that anything like world-class wrestling?)lit
dition must be changed. And so it was. Those tyrannical Christians^
were obviously in control of the government since they had cleverly^
their leader and a bunch of his most influential men killed to rallysif
port for their cause) changed the name to Valentine’s Day despiteik
cries of the majority of the people to keep the holiday as it was.
Oh sure, the masses tried to maintain the old tradition of dancint
drinking and degenerating — but severe punishment levied by theGirii
tian’s eventually forced both the name and the activities of the degeneran
but noble holiday Lupercalia to change.
Sure Valentine’s day is silly, stupid and sickening. I feel like barfc
every time I read one of those borderline (sometimes not-so horde#
obscene or mushy mumbo-jumbo cards. But.does Karl have tog
ing Christians for it? Christians didn’t commercialize Valentine's Da 1
though commercialization seems to be Karl’s main objection.
It’s almost like he thinks there’s only one kind of religion — lean#
call ever reading him attack any others. Perhaps it’s a personal thingdei
within Karl’s own soul. I know I always was angered when someone
wronged repeatedly granted me forgiveness if I only asked sincerely,i f
stead of wronging me in return as I expected. But then, that was the» ;
me.
I 5
\
Duane Davis
The Battalion
USPS 045 360
Member of
Texas Press Association
Southwest Journalism Conference
The Battalion Editorial Board
Editor Michelle Po ,,
Managing Editor Kay Mil?'
Opinion Page Editor... LorenStrf’
City Editor .JerryOsH 1
News Editor Cathie Andtn
Sports Editor TravisTi#
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