1
I
The Battalion
OPINION
WwtaMday, July 26,1989
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WHO GETS THE PARKING TICKET?
Legislative session
ends in failure
HISSING
TEMPOR ART
PARKING
PERMIT
AS
0
-rue BA'H’
/ FIREMCN
ON6 INCM
OYER
Catholic stance on birth
^ I
control needs reversing
"Population, when unchecked, in
creases in a geometrical ratio. Subsis
tence increases only in an arithmetical
ratio. A slight acquaintance with num
bers will show the immensity of the first
power in comparison of the second."
Thomas Malthus realized this
relationship in 1798 and left it for the
world to pondet and worry over in his
timeless An Essay on the Principle of
Population.
It is unfortunate that the Roman
Catholic Church either has not come to
the realization that the spectre of over
population is a severe threat to man
kind, or has chosen to ignore this prob
lem.
This Saturday will mark the 21st an
niversary of Pope Paul V'l’s banning of
all forms of birth control. •
Though the Roman (jitholk Church
has certainly made its share of mistakes
over the centuries, the recent position it
has taken on sex may be its most drastic
screw-up.
The Pope’s decision was cehtered on
his belief that "every matrimonial act
must remain open to the transmission of
life." He also indicated that the rhythm
method should not even be employed as
a regular practice. The papal ruling
aborted the efforts of the Pope’s own
appointed committee that had. in 1966,
recommended that the already existing
ban on contraception be halted.
Well, Pope Paul is dead, but Catholi
cism is flourishing. How could it not?
W’hen the papal ruling was handed
down, half a billion Roman Catholics in
habited the world. Because the follow
ers of this faith tend to adhere to its pol
icies. the church is growing boundlessly.
It reminds me of Monty Python’s “The
Meaning of Life” — a film that at one
point depicts the plight of a third world
Catholic family that grows so large the
father has to sell his kids to medical sci
ence.
Though the movie was humorous,
the situation it satinzed is not at all
funny. 1 recall that in mv youth I was
fascinated with knowing what the big
gest (along with fastest, strongest and
baddest) things in the world were. To
kyo was the biggest city in the world.
That meant it was even bigger than
Houston, which was almost inconceiva
ble to a kid mv age.
Later. I was even more shocked when
I found out Mexico City had instanta
neously shot by Tokyo to become the
most populous city. I do not know
whether to blame the Pope or Cortez for
that one. but either way, Mexico is a
largely Catholic country and birth con
trol is seldom practiced.
Mexico City is symbolic of many of
the Catholic third-world countries.
These countries often face the overpop
ulation and subsequent starvation seen
in Mexico City and described by Mal
thus. In these seemingly godforsaken
places, survival of the fittest is merely
survival of the fullest. The only people
who are full are the supporters of the
birth-control ban, and I prefer not to
mention their contents.
limes have changed over the 21
years since Pope Paul VI made his deci
sion. A sad note is that Catholic contra
ception policies haven't changed.
Since 1969. the threat of sexuallv
transmitted diseases has manifested it
self. in America and abroad, as a most
formidable opponent The federal gov
ernment even advised the use of con
doms via the Surgeon General's quite
widely distributed AIDS pamphlet.
1 see only two possible solutions to
these ills. The first is the reversal of the
Roman Catholic birth-control statue.
Bevond the fact that the reversal is now
almost a necessity, it is quite logical If
birth is held in such high regard bv the
church, how do thev treat infertile peo
ple?
*1 cannot agtre with sex as being
purely a means to an end. This is espe
cially true considering that the end,
childbirth, often |>er|>etuates the prob
lem ot starvation as Malthus suggested.
The only other solution would have
to be the disregarding of the anti-con
traception rules by members of the Ro
man Catholic Church. This is quite diffi
cult to achieve, but something must be
done.
Starvation is not a Christian policy.
Matt McBumett is a junior electrical
engineering major and a columnist for
The Battalion.
Another special session has ended in
failure and there’s an all-stations blame-
alert on. All the usual suspects in work
ers comp are being blamed by all the ob
vious people The governor blames the
trial lawyers, the Senate blames big busi
ness. Housies blame labor, the smart
people are blaming the insurance com
panies and everybody's mad at the sys
tem. Ain't democracy grand?
For a handle on who’s being unrea
sonable around here, you may want to
take note of the post-session comments
of House Speaker Gib Lewis, staunch
fnend of business and the man who
heads the chamber that kept writing
workers comp bills that favor bidness
and insurance. "You can blame the busi
ness community — if that's what you
want to do. if you want to blame some
one — for plav mg an inactive role in the
whole process.’’ said Lewis.
Maybe hr means business should
have leaned harder, but I took it to
mean that business wasn't paving atten
tion and didn't know when it was being
offered a good deal. Sen. Ted Lyon
said. "If the business community had
been offered this bill two years ago. they
would have danced out of the Capitol
and held a party on the front lawn."
Two items for next time — this
should lie the last time we have to listen
to Richard Smith and the House nego
tiators piously claim they care deeply
about worker safety and are supporting
all measures to help mi that area. Bull,
thev are. 1 point out for the jillionth
time that the main reason this state has
such high workers comp costs is because
this state has such a high rate of workers
being hurt on the job. If you fix worker
safety, you fix the workers comp prob
lem. It is the cheapest, most effective,
most rational and most humane way to
fix it. But when it got down to actually
doing something about worker safety,
suddenly the House members didn't
want to go ’’overboard."
Rep. Rick Perry of Haskell, who was
on the conference committee, said cur
rent economic conditions in Texas do
not support spending millions on safety
and that the House doesn't want to "put
a burden on the business of this state."
Whv is it better to pav billions in work
ers comp than millions for worker
# safety? And what does he think business
m this state is toting around now? The
figures I used in this column three
months ago — although they were chal
lenged by a poorly-informed legislator
— have been reverified by the National
Safety Council and are correct.
Numero Two-o, every body needs to
take a much closer look at how insur
ance companies set the premiums for
comp insurance. There are some hickic*
in there that need to be fixed real bad.
The sensible thing to do would be to
call the members back into session im
mediately since they ’re all focused, in
tense and full of information and ideas
on comp. Difficult legislation is son of
like making fudge — you have to let it
boil for a while before it will jell. Right
now the legislature is boiling, but if
Clements puts off a special until No
vember. they’ll all cool down again and
it will just take longer But it's been so
long since I've seen Bill Clements do
anything right. I have no hope he will.
And. here’s a pleasant summer as
signment — a good movie. Spike lee’s
“Do the Right Thing’’ shouldn’t be
missed (although it is not tor those who
wince at the f-word). lee, the extraordi-
. narilv talented young, black director,
has made a brilliant movie on a shoestr
ing about racism in America. It's also
funny and. of course, sad.
And. how about those abortion polls?
New abortion polls are rolling in ‘since
the Webster decision, with the usual
confusion stemming from how the ques
tions are asked. But some constants are
showing up that should fie useful to all
of us in the coming debates.
Polls consistently find tha,i only one in
10 Americans believes abortion is mur
der. The polls show people are all over
the spectrum on when and why, and
they think abortions should be per
formed but are happily united, over 70
percent, m their opinion that the gov
ernment should not make these deci
sions.
h«
And one finding that seems to me
most interesting is that one demogra
phic segment of the population consis
tently turns up as the most pro-choice.
Who? Women of child (tearing age.
Cynics will find this evidence of Dr.
Johnson's famous contention. "Depend
upon it. sir. when a man knows he is to
be hanged in a fortnight, it concentrates
his mind wonderfully." No surprise that
those not facing the prospect of being
hanged m a fortnight, as it were, seem
not have concentrated as much on the
subject.
An extension of that phetumienon
appears in a gender gap armiiig legis
lators. According to a poll done by the
Onter for the American Woman and
Politics at Rutgers University, women
legislators are more pro-choke than
their male colleagues. Only 26 percent
of the women lawmakers think abortion
should be banned under all or most cir
cumstances, while 38 percent of their
male colleagues do.
- The Battalion
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