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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (Sept. 20, 1990)
The Battalion OPINION Thursday, September 20,1990 Opinion Page Editor Ellen Hobbs 8 All I want for Christmas is a drug-detecting test SherTest, a company based in Yonkers, New York, has begun the marketing of a product called DrugAlert which can detect traces of marijuana and cocaine. The product is designed to be used by parents who wish to test (or have the capability to test) their children’s bedrooms and personal effects for the residue of drugs. The kit consists of three aerosol cans and a parent’s guide to drug abuse. I suspect that the “parent’s guide” would prove to be both informational and entertaining — a must for the family library and alone worth the package price of $49.95. Sidney Kline, SherTest’s general manager, says the product should be used in families that are “already in turmoil.” And it seems logical that if Boyd Waltman Reader’s Opinion family strife is your goal, you could do no better than to run around the house with a couple of these aerosol cans. However, Klein clarifies the proper function of the product by saying that it should not be used as an end in itself, but as a tool to encourage frank talk about drug abuse. You see, DrugAlert is not a device of detection, but of communication. And of course family communication leads to family bonding. Hence, the inevitable conclusion: the family that sprays together stays together. Klein offers an interesting scenario to illustrate the introduction of DrugAlert to the typical troubled American home: “If your family is being torn up, you can get the product, hold a family meeting, open it up together ...” Although the scenario is heartwarming, it presents an obvious dilemma: Who does the gift-wrapping? Mom? Pop? Uncle Bob? Is it a stroke of luck or of marketing genius that DrugAlert is already on the shelves for the early Christmas shopper? Not only is it the one gift perfect for every member of the family, but DrugAlert is also the gift that keeps on giving. Every kit provides enough spray for 100 tests! Never before has it been possible to wrap up 100 chances for communication and put them all — in one neat package — under the tree. Although DrugAlert is the family communication tool par excellence, it is used in an imperfect world. That’s why SherTest has designed it for use in a multiplicity of poi atial bonding situations. As Klein, the communication guru, says, “If something tests positive for cocaine, and your child says it’s because he loaned it to a friend who uses cocaine, you say OK, and if you think you’re being conned, you test something else.” Of course, some hard core civil libertarians have clamored for children’s rights to privacy, taking the ethical high ground. Some television stations have even refused to run ads for the product. But Klein, ever the pragmatist, rebuffs the critics with a probing analogy: “Emotionally, sureit’san invasion of privacy, but so is a thermometer. By TROY HA DfThe Battali While mos iffected by a Apparently the you, fets have adults in the Klein family knowhou HSC groups take a thermometer the hard way The Drug Alert family is a familji the 90s. It does not pretend to exist the ethereal regions of the warmfu but reluctantly accepts that, in this world of human frailty, lovemustlx tough. Why wait till Christmas fora communicative family? Who knows, you act now Mr. Klein may eventb in a deluxe over-sized thermometer The Stiidi down the hal ;o the forme when MSC es The Browi of the MSC. Dennis Bu versity Cente about half th itudents havi lays. "They hav elocate to with every order — from his familyi smaller space yours. Boyd Waltman is a graduate stuk ? nims a g ree - English. Mail Call Several sti People ha rary offices,” Cepheid Var tical archaeo we are all in Letter full of Marxist doctrine EDITOR: We can proudly say that A&M has finally become a “world class” University. How do I know? We finally have graduate students writing crackpot letters spouting so much Marxist doctrine I needed a shovel to clear my way through it. I am referring, of course, to Paul Kennedy’s letter to the editor on Sept. 17, 1990 about the current Middle East crisis. His letter’s faults are both glaring and numerous. Kennedy refers throughout his letter to U.S. “imperia lism” and “aggression,” as if the United States had nothing better to do with our army than to throw a few hundred thou sand soldiers into the desert. The only imperialistic act in this affair is on the part of Iraq, who invaded and looted Kuwait. The U.S. response has been reaction only, not aggression. Kennedy also claims that “troop deployment is at the be hest of the oil companies who are seeking higher profits at the expense of the working class.” By controlling both Iraq’s and Kuwait’s oil fields, Saddam Hussein controls an estimated 20 percent of the world’s oil reserves. If the oil companies wanted high prices, they could enter an oligopolistic relationship with Hussein, thereby maintaining higher prices for a much longer time than from the result of military ac tions in the Gulf. Kennedy ends his letter with a bang, saying “It is no coin cidence that this operation has taken place just before the fall campaign,” so as to “give everyone seeking election to pre serve the status quo,” and give everyone a “chance to wrap themselves in the flag.” Gosh, Paul, did you think of this one all by yourself? I find it hard to believe that President Bush called up Hussein to say “Boy, Saddam, this campaign is really going down the drain. Could you invade Kuwait, so we can put troops in the Gulf, and I won’t have to answer any more questions about this S&L thing anymore?” I’m sorry, Paul, but even “The Twilight Zone” doesn’t get that bizarre. Time and space do not permit a complete discussion of all of the logical faults of Kennedy’s letter. But I am reminded of one thing. After the fall of Marxism throughout the world, the main difference between the United States and Eastern Europe is that we still have people who quote Lenin. Britt Bullard, ’90 Put wasted inserts in garbage cans EDITOR: As a regular reader of the Batt, it has come to my atten tion that there is a problem with the distribution of advertis ing inserts in the paper. When it comes to these inserts, Ag gies who normally are quite conscientious about keeping the campus clean seem to have a problem. I have noticed that there is at least one garbage can next to most Battalion boxes. How much of an extra effort is it to simply place the ad in the garbage can? Let’s keep our campus looking good. Julie R. Chamberlin, ’91 End distraction: Get your heads out of the sand Anyone v can call BA ion’s phone prove com the new spa} BATT IP! 3315. Ideas can feature idea files of inter It’s all about distraction. It’s about turning on the radio when you are supposed to be studying. It’s about skipping your two o’clock class to go try on clothes at Foley’s. It’s about finding someone to work for you on Sat urday so you can go to the game. It’s about going to college. Terri D. Tomlinson Reader’s Opinion Not that college is a distraction, it’s not; but it breeds distraction. It breeds this he,ad-in-the-sand attitude which puts a higher value on beer than it does on the environment, on sorority parties rather than current events. This kind of distraction promotes nothing but ignorance. Ignorance at a world class University frightens me. I myself am distracted all of the time. I am more concerned for an attorney doing “God’s” work telling me that mu sic promotes rape and sin than I am about my Constitutional Rights. I am more angered by a semi-illiter ate man with a foul mouth who claims to be a musician than I am about who gov erns my body. I am more moved by a mother’s story on the dehumanization of the Greek system than I am by my brothers, sisters and friends being sent off to war. I am made more nervous over whether or not I understand logic than I am about the gun my friend carries in her purse. I am brought to tears by Hallmark Card commercials, and yet I turn my head when I walk on campus and see women digging through the trash. (And speaking of trash, I have never seen College Station so filthy with litter — it looks like the day after a t.u. game.) A professor once referred to college as this strange state of limbo which somehow borders on adulthood. Tax laws force our parents to hold onto us by the scruffs of our necks while at the same time they are trying to kick our butts out of the nest. We are adults. We can vote, go to war, drink, reproduce, work, drive, spit, chew, feed ourselves, die, change our own clothes, and practice proper hy giene. College should provide an atmo sphere in which the raising of conscious ness is practiced, not ignored. We, as college students, as young adults striving for knowledge and in sight into the human psyche, need to fo cus on those things affecting our world just as much as we focus on a popqini beer bust, or a blemish. The collegiate bubble is not only I trading, it is unrealistic. Those tlii I which we ignore exist right here-n I stealing, starvation, AIDS, drugs, [ lence, waste. Students are just as I fected as the next guy, maybe more | I If a full scale war develops in the 111 die East we will be fighting it, not I parents. We will have to dealwitli[| lution, crime and political unrest. ? ? ? On were Afl & If a full scale war develop* in the Middle East we will • be fighting it, not our 7 parents. We will have to ' deal with pollution, crim ? and political unrest The. future belongs to our • generation and if we igntty it now how will we be abkf to change it for our ? children? i The future belongs to our genera*? and if we ignore it now how will w I able to change it for our children? ; I for one will not be distracted ? longer, not by my government I friends, my parents or my professoi ; cannot live in a bubble, I am real! take the responsibility of an adult U p :; . that I won’t cry at Hallmark contfe cials anymore, but I will also cry fo * 1 * homeless and the children, andttiil tims. E Terri D. Tomlinson is a senior major. to? I « ? The Battalion (USPS 045 360) Member of Texas Press Association Southwest Journalism Conference The Battalion Editorial Board Cindy McMiilian, Editor Timm Doolen, Managing Editor Ellen Hobbs, Opinion Page Editor Holly Becka, City Editor Kathy Cox, Kristin North, News Editors Nadja Sabawala, Sports Editor Eric Roalson, Art Director Lisa Ann Robertson, Lifestyles Editor Editorial Policy The Battalion is a non-profit, self-sup porting newspaper operated as a commu nity service to Texas A&M and Bryan- College Station. Opinions expressed in The Battalion are those of the editorial board or the au thor, and do not necessarily represent the opinions of Texas A&M administrators, faculty or the Board of Regents. The Battalion is published Monday through Friday during Texas A&M regu lar semesters, except for holiday and ex amination periods. Newsroom: 845-3313. Mail subscriptions are $20 per semes ter, $40 per school year and $50 per full year: 845-2611. 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