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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (Oct. 29, 1986)
The Battalion Editorial Board Cathie Anderson, Editor Kirsten Dietz, Managing Editor Loren Steffy, Opinion Page Editor Frank Smith, City Editor Sue Krenek, News Editor Ken Sury, Sports Editor Too little, too late? Following the lead of Great Britain, the Reagan administration recalled the U.S. ambassador to Syria in protest of that country’s sup port of terrorism. The recall is the kind of international cooperation needed to combat terrorism effectively, but it’s a move we should have initiated months ago, not executed on the coattails of an ally. Syria’s involvement in terrorism has been painfully evident for years. A 1981 assassination attempt on the pope, the bombing of the U.S. Embassy in Beirut in 1983, the bombing of the La Belle discothe que in West Berlin April 5, and an April 17 attempt to blow up an El A1 jetliner by planting a bomb on a pregnant woman all have been linked to Syria in some way. The Reagan administration bombed Libya in response to the La Belle incident — even before all the intelligence reports were in — but allowed Syria to go unscathed. The administration’s reluctance to get tough with Syria is under standable — the Mideast country presents a diplomatic dilemma for the United States. While Syria is one of the driving forces behind anti-American terrorism, it is also one of the few stable channels for negotiating the release of the American hostages in Beirut. Withdrawing our ambassador is the next best thing to cutting off diplomatic relations, which can’t be done without damaging the hos tages’ release. The coordinated withdrawal of diplomatic emissaries by Great Britain, Canada and the United States will send Syria a long- overdue message. But the administration’s actions may be perceived as too little, too late. Syria, instead of getting a message that the United States will support a country that fans the flames of terrorism, will see the U.S. action as mimicking Great Britain’s. The action is an encouraging show of international coordination in dealing with terrorism. But the United States shouldn’t have taken so long in retaliating against Syria for the La Belle bombing. True, Syria is a sometime-friend in the Mideast, but with friends like these. . . . Myths about yesteryear twist facts about teen-age births Ask the average American if there is an epidemic of births to teen-ag ers in this country and the answer probably will be yes. Ask if things are getting worse, and the answer again will be yes. Ask if things were once better and Richard Cohen the answer still will be yes, and if you ask w r hen that was, you will be told “in the past.” Kids then had values. Learning to survive without an I.D. card So, to paraphrase the introduction to the old “Lone Ranger” show, return with me to those not-so-thrilling days of yesteryear, say 1957. That was smack in the middle of the Eisenhower era, when every good boy delivered papers and no good girl delivered babies. There was prayer in the schools, patriotism in the community and fins on cars. Those were the days. Darrell called me on the phone. Our group had somehow been chosen as the to ken seniors for 50- yard line, second deck seats at the Rice game. These would be the best seats this year, if not for my entire four years here. Mark Ude But it was not meant to be that easy. Thursday night my I.D. vanished, which really put me in a bind. I hadn’t picked up my 1985-86 Aggieland or looked at my meaningless midterm grades, and I still needed to cash some checks at the Memorial Student Center main desk before the weekend. Of course, it could have been worse. I could have been on meal plan, which means I would have starved over the weekend since I had spent a good por tion of my checking account and owed a good bit more to my credit cards. Luckily, being Mr. Resourceful, I had hoarded my I.D.s from years past. I cashed my checks and picked up my Ag gieland and midterms. Everything was hunky-dory until a sudden realization hit — how was I to get into Kyle Field Saturday? I had heard the horror stories. The place was guarded more closely than the Berlin Wall. Lord forbid that you should be caught passing an I.D. through the fence or trying to get by with a buddy’s. The powers-that-be would lock you away in a room and throw away the room. But I had to get in — I had choice seats. After 12-yard-line seats for the Baylor game, and the bit of bloody luck having Baylor fans in the seats immedi ately in front of and behind me, the mi nor inconvenience of an expired I.D. was not going to prevent my enjoying a good game. And most importantly, there was THE MOB. That alone was reason enough for my determination. But on the chance that some good Ag would return my student I.D., I was hes itant about paying $8 for another one, especially since I didn’t have any money. So armed with last year’s student I.D., fee slip and ticket book in hand, I went forth to the gate. I assumed that the fee slip would prove that I am enrolled this semester — and that I had paid all my tuition and fees. And I assumed my I.D., which had a picture that matched my face and a Social Security number that matched my ticket book, would prove the tickets were mine. No prob lem. But also being Mr. Naive, I assumed that would do it. When they asked for my “current” I.D., I innocently at tempted to explain that I had lost my I.D. and it had not been found yet. I would have gotten more response from a brick wall. A supervisor, ob viously numbed to students’ pleas an d/or problems handed me a printed sheet of pink paper, informing me of the applicable rules and regulations while suggesting that for only $7.50 more I could purchase a guest pass. I couldn’t afford a new student I.D., so how was I to find enough spare change to buy a guest pass? I looked enviously at the numerous ticket scalpers trying to attract custom ers. Perhaps they would trade a student 50-yard liner for one with a guest pass. But I decided against it. I mean, how of ten does one get such seats, especially for an important game? Attempts to discover why the system was so uncooperative had limited suc cess. The Athletic Department passed the buck and told me that the Southwest Conference requires it for “reduced” (hah!) ticket rates and that the Student Senate ordained it and that one could get another I.D. in minutes, so there. To commit one line at the gate to those stu dents with similar problems would be too inconvenient and take too long for both parties. Come on, people! Inconvenient or not, one still would get inside to enjoy the game instead of harboring thoughts of scaling the fence. If time is a prob lem, the people who actually lost their I.D.s could show up early, while the one’s who forgot would at least have an option to wait in line rather than trudge all the way back home to find it. In spite of these obstacles, I got inside to see the game. And although I missed our first field goal, THE MOB perfor mance made up for it. Now, if I told everybody how this am azing miracle was achieved, then it would be like mentioning that the men’s senior ring is in two parts and that cop ies of The Advocate are available in the Sterling C. Evans Library. I would spoil it for everyone. Besides, I still need to get in for the TCU game. Sorry. The Census Bureau says that 1957 was the peak year for teen-age motherhood. Girls aged 15 to 19 had a birth rate of 96 per 1,000. Broken down by race, that amounted to 85 for white women and 173 for women categorized as “non-whites.” Every year since, the rate has dropped. By 1985, the most re cent year for which data are available, the average for all women aged 15 to 19 was 51 per 1,000 — 42.5 for whites and 95.7 for blacks. So then what accounts for the wide spread perception that teen-agers have gone from the Girl Scouts to Plato’s Re treat? Well, for one thing, the rate of births to single women is up. The figure for 1957 was 15.8 per 1,000; in 1984 it was 30.2. A fair assumption is that teen agers who once got married because they were pregnant now do not. Gone is the desperate dash to a marriage mill and nuptials witnessed by a shotgun. In stead, more teen-agers are having ba bies and remaining single, producing a host of social problems that, through welfare, become our expense. That helps account for our concern. But what about the widely held per ception that the teen-agers of today are sexually active and need a dose of 1950- era vaues? That’s a harder question. Clearly, the figures prove that a lot of today’s conerned parents have become retroactive teen-age virgins. Those 15- to 19-year-olds who set a record back in ’57 are, it says here, having sex. That hardly means, though, that today’s kids are not and there is every indication they are. The birth rate can Ik* held down by a variety of factors, including abortion, birth control, sex education or postponing marriage. If that’s the case, then more power to birth control, sex education and — de pending on your views — abortion. Nevertheless, the effectiveness of these programs often is denigrated by those who say they encourage promiscuity. It was precisely on those grounds that the New York City school board recently killed programs at nine high schools where contracpetive devices or prescrip tions for them were made available. “We cannot . . . support clinics in any school that provide abortion counseling and the distribution of contraceptives that may encourage sexual activity and promiscuity among teen-agers,” said Dr. Irene ber. [inpeluzzen, a school-board r. In effect. New York had passed> amounts to the Teen-age MotkrJi ervation Act. Unlike many govern programs, this one will work.Seu ac live teen-agers will not becomei thev will become pregnant. Ne*! like a lot of jurisdictions, niadr choice. It hopes, maybe, that rets sexuality itself will goawav-a<i mvthical recollection of the obscure government statistics > otherwise. The point, of course, is thattec sexuality is not something that e wished away. In the 1950s, it u died in one way — prematurei riages, shotgun or otherwise-am! ten, premature divorcesas' Married or not, teen-age girls*® only having sex, they weregmujl as well. Now, different econontkffi cial circumstances have produced!' ferent problem — single mi and its awful consequences.Tilt slant, though, is the cause of theft lem — teen-age sexuality. As did our parents before would prefer if teen-agers refi f rom sex. It’s hard enoughforadit handle, tougher for kids. Toootit produces confusion, anxiety and,i tably, pregnancy. But the waytoi) with the problem is not just top values, hut also to teach sexedm and make birth control easilyaiai 1 he Gensus Bureaus statistics that when we had the fornieiatill the hitter we also had somethin?S| awf ul lot of teen-age mothers. Copyright 1986, Washington PoslWnB- 1 ! EDI As Party Dem GOF that supp true. Fc Repi do sc so-ca mem I a misle lettei Mike Presi ! Edir< knov So i EDI! T1 joppe ; Soutl fund Ur ito be equal assist is ext thou; inclu disgu by ch W1 ityou c the Si the L oblig; mora trade They don’t taste bad but For lunch to day, I drank some mannitol, ate some propylene oxides and then Anthony S. Casper Guest Columnist would just be a gooey mess. Pork sau sage, without the processing, grinding and texturing, would he just a mess of pig guts and bones. freshened my breath with some guar and sorbitol before going to class. And tonight, after my meal of sorbates, so dium chlorides and nitrates, I plan to go to the Dixie Ghicken to imbibe some sul fites. Look at the front of a can of beans or a box of cereal. Notice all the nutritious goodies in there? Now look at the back — where the ingredients are listed. No tice anything in the list that sounds ap petizing enough to eat? Sound interesting? Well, what I actu ally had for lunch was a soda, an apple and a stick of chewing gum and will have some bread, cured meat and veg gies for dinner. The Chicken, by the way, will be serving me gallons of beer (I hope). These are just some of the ingre dients colliding in my intestinal tract. Those lovely little additives are al lowed to be there in various concentra- Haven’t you ever wondered why the green beans your mom served you dur ing those wonderful holiday dinners could last forever in a metal can on the shelf — without being refrigerated or frozen? How about those succulent steaks we all know and love? Why are they so tender and juicy? Do you really want to know? Every single bit of food we eat has some sort of chemical or additive in it that can, if you eat enough of it, have a detrimental effect on your day, week, month or possibly your whole life. tions and are regulated by the Food and Drug Administration. Most of the checks made on our food are conducted by the manufacturers themselves, only occasionally does the over-burdened FDA ever get to perform comprehen sive checks of their own. act wasn’t even considered nffil until Upton Sinclair’s book “Tit gle” caused such an uproar ovfl people were actually eating dial i/ resentatives in Washington final 1 heed. But even with these laws® (Tood Manufacturing Practices I® by responsible manufacturers, t' control the amount of rodentw 1 sect fragments, worms and otto allowed in food, were still necesf- didn’t come into effect untiltl^ 1972 Filth Guidelines werepassttl These regulations, while wf pletely comprehensive, arespec® • Peanut butter can have in : than two rodent hairs and? 1 fragments in S'/a ounces. • Chocolate can have non#' 150 insect fragments inei • F'ruit juices can have non#' 10 fly eggs per 8/2 ounces But take heart - unless you have ar saf e for just about anyone to® only ones who should watcW elderly, infants under four# and those on restricted diets. By the way, the insec Mark Ude is a senior geography major and a columnist for The Battalion. For example, processed cheese, with out added emulsifiers and thickeners, Our food laws, as important as they are, didn’t come into existence until the Food and Drug Act of 1906 and the Meat Inspection Act of 1906. The meat have any effect on you - f' chologically. Anthony S. Casper is a seniC /ism major and photo editor ■■ Battalion.