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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (Oct. 14, 1997)
fJjQjuesday • October 14, 1997 O The Battalion PINION irror, mirror on the wall IB year-old’s suicide comes as glaring reminder of dangers of focusing on external appearances Chris Huffines columnist ime awai ora iox and]- the ens; 1:12 main haron with tht 7:41 " ” Sept. leadaslM - ^" 27, a tire 17:2; ou,1 g g id i the scoA England ikeringi wallowed a or Sonia atal over- thegoaliose of iringintiauikillers. fted the 'elly Yeo- hegamt^ans would 1 lromsf: 10 | ma jiy lave added r ier name to mor t ) ^ ^ st suicide vic- na l ims if not for the reason she )t Tec: iac * done so. Yeomans was lit- hoolrecf a dy teased to the point where he calmly and rationally con- allto^emplated, and then took her )lay. iwii life. ) nowois|Brhe 13-year-old was slightly 2 champ(verweight. She could have inoraii>eeii described as, at most, egeSta;chubby. Because of this, howev- :anwm^ r> } iac i ^gj- own little mob of ormentors, 15 the night of her . leath, who threw salt in her ieofbaB C ^’ dumped her clothes in he garbage and pelted her louse with stones and then ard as Wter and eggs, the ingredients rhesofi-F a cake - year’spirS^-S callous and insensitive as feomans’ tormentors were, the Big 12 juestions remains: How can a itativecilice, normal girl be so sensitive winner hat teasing could drive her to in St. L iuicidg? fcveryone who has been in tes unior high school (and if intota mark the and the: le men.:? Southut mship i ick have 21 Aggie: concluci: 'ekroad: hey travel i take on: ri ion Col ron’re here, hopefully you have) knows that teasing hap pens, and that it can drive peo ple into depression and can damage self-esteem. With the maturity that coming to college brings, students realize that those immature little weasels who teased them earlier in life were simply trying to improve their own self-worth by drag ging everyone else down around them. But why is this such a prob lem in society? Why have people become so sensitive about how they look that it overrides every other re deeming feature they have? Society’s obsession with physical appearance has be come dangerous. In years past, it was just an interesting paradox. Women, who had fought so passionately for and won so many rights and freedoms, were willingly, almost reli giously, submitting to the slav ery of physical appearance. But now, people are dying, by their own hands. What can people do about this? What can one student at Texas A&M do? Simply and clearly, students can break the stereotype. They can do what they have always done and refuse to concentrate on appearance to the exclusion of everything else. One person is a rebel. Forty thousand peo ple make a movement. The ma jority of a society is ‘normal.’ Society defines normal as underweight and attractive. So ciety has forced women into a role where physical beauty is a god to be worshiped, not the secondary condition that it should be, because most people seem to believe that is the way it should be. The power to change these destructive stereotypes rests with the next generation. Our generation has the power to redefine normal into an ideal that does not lead to depression and suicide. Chris Huffines is a sophomore speech communications major. Indents overlook various advantages in attaining a healthy exercise regimen Kendall Kelly columnist graduJtts 190-3133 3-4330 fell, it’s October in the Rec Cen ter. This is the ime of year when the last of the undedicated rickle out and the true Itness fanatics finally ave room to breathe. There are three roups that students ■ Compaq fall into when it comes - °n«<* jgo neglecting exercise. 5°™"^ The first and most * popular group is the “I’m too busy” crowd, fact, mm students who fall into this category can usu- illy be found in the MSC, Koldus or sprint- __ ng back and forth between the two. Other Jfriembers of the “I’m Too Busy” crowd are ,U|3 tot just the very involved, but the very stu- iious. They too claim that they are too busy o take care of their bodies. Their daily exer ase usually consists of a few brief jogs be- 1 SC l ween tkie computer lab and the library. As ^ "'ast as this crowd goes, one would think :hey would be sufficiently trained for the fenneco Marathon very soon. The second group of exercise neglecters ire the many, the proud and the clueless. If Am fall into this category, you avoid exercise iltogether simply because you are unedu cated about it. Women of this group might >ay things such as, “If I work out, I will be big ind bulky like a guy,” while men say things uch as, “The machines are only for girls.” Clueless exercisers are often those who lisplay the matching sports bra and biker horts, which probably cost the same amount is the Stairmaster they are trying to figure out iow to use. These are the same people who [hink they should work out on bikes at level 00 until they virtually undergo cardiac arrest. ents o m □broom easing as >707 George I* Marioi 1 The third group of exercise neglecters are people who are doing well have even pur chased a pair of athletic shoes within the last five years. Most of you who fall into this category are in the “I just don’t give a flip” arena. You’ve been to the Rec Center maybe once and it was most likely during your freshman orientation tour. Exercise is not an aspect of your life and frankly, you cannot understand why something as ridiculous as running is considered a hobby. If you have been faking a healthy lifestyle and know it, what can you do about it? The first thing you can do is nothing. Keep up what you are doing and you too could be the victim of the No. 1 killer in America, cardiovascular disease. For those of you who have identified yourself as a member of any of the aforementioned groups, how ever, there are three things you can do to counteract negligence to start paying atten tion to the body. #1: Enroll in a kinesiology class for a grade. If you are unmotivated, then this gives you no choice — either show up or fail. #2: Treat your exercise regimen as a class. If you do not want be enrolled in a class, then make the time you set aside for exercise as im portant as a class. This means that no matter where you are during your designated work out time, excuse yourself and head to the Rec Center. This may sound a bit harsh, but peo ple do the same thing when they have a class or a meeting — it’s called commitment. #3: Work out with a friend. Having a workout partner is one of the best ways to motivate oneself about making exercise a daily part of life. You can burn off calories while catching up with a friend. Long-term benefits are more fulfilling than a Power Bar. Exercising and practicing an active lifestyle increases chances by 50 percent to maintain low blood pressure, ac cording to the American Heart Association. I spoke with one elderly gentleman who shared with me the long-term benefits he discovered through making exercise a daily part of his life. Bart Braden, a 64-year-old war veteran and a part-time student at Texas A&M, took up running over 30 years ago and currently enrolls in two aerobic running classes each semester. Since then, he has lost nearly 50 pounds and boasts that the the only thing in his medicine cabinet is a bottle of aspirin, expi ration date 1963, and a box of tissues that has turned yellow from lack of use. But Bart wasn’t really interested in telling me about his bronze medal he won at the Senior Olympics last month or that he was a charter member in the Texas A&M Roadrunners Club. Why does he take exercise so seriously? “It keeps me sane up here,” he said with a smile, knocking his head with his fist. While 1 listened in awe, Bart told me about a 77-year-old woman pole-vaulter who cleared four feet, nine inches in 91 degree heat, and that the only duties of the EMTs during the six days of events were treating al lergies. If there were more people such as Bart and his fellow participants, there would be less excuses, greater health nationwide and a significant decrease in the Medicare budget. It is oxymoronic (emphasis on the “mo ron” root) that as body-conscious and weight-obsessive as our country is, the leading cause of death is cardiovascular disease. What should be empty are nursing homes and hospital beds, not the Student Rec Center. Kendall Kelly is a junior Spanish major. Focus on beauty alienates women Michelle Voss columnist sage opeafl ~ father gives thanks "" for his son’s survival ■ On Sept. 13, my son Zack - G'fr Washburn, was severely injured int in an auto /pedestrian accident a & Cjn College Station. He was in intensive care at St. ... Joseph Regional Health Center ’ e 1 for several weeks before being transferred on Oct. 7 to Warm ll QllBrings Rehabilitation Center in San Antonio. n It if 4 wou ^ ^ ke to take The Bat- i DO talion for publishing articles re- 69 garding the blood drives and fund raising activities that were conducted for my son. Also, I would like to thank the students, faculty and staff of Texas A&M University for their help and concern during this difficult period. Wayne Washburn Fort Worth, TX Columnist abuses power with abortion In response to Joshua Hill’s Oct. 13 "A Swift satire of abortion" column: Hill’s satire on abortion does not give the issue of abortion the degree of seriousness and thought that it deserves. The involved laws surround ing this issue are based on such complex topics as the point at which life begins, the civil rights of both the mother and the child and the morals of we as people and as a country. These topics require people to both educate themselves on the technical subject matter involved and to do a lot of soul searching within their religions and value sys tems (as well as knowing the intrica cies that each proposed law entails). I for one, have taken this issue very seriously, and I find Hill’s absurdities within his column to be unintelligent and belittling of the subject. I would have liked to have known Hill’s reasons for being against abortion, and more specifically, the law in question. Instead, he childishly chal lenged others in a battle of satires while making no genuine points. Hill is obviously against abor tion, but his “shock-appeal” tac tic of challenging it was both dis gusting, and it eludes the complexities of abortion that we all must consider. Columnists harbor a powerful position, since they have the power to be catalysts of impor tant thoughts, including religion and politics. I believe that Hill, and all columnists, should handle this responsibility in a dignified and mature manner. Chris Fox Class of’98 The Battalion encourages letters to the ed itor. Letters must be 300 words or less and in clude the author’s name, class, and phone number. The opinion editor reserves the right to edit letters for length, style, and accuracy. Letters may be submitted in person at 013 Reed Mc Donald with a valid student ID. Letters may also be mailed to: The Battalion - Mail Call 013 Reed McDonald Texas A&M University College Station, TX 77843-13.11 Campus Mail: 1111 Fax: (409) 84^2647 E-mail: Batt@tamvml.tamu.edu For more details on letter policy, please call 845-3313 and direct your question to the opinion editor. C ookies are evil. Chocolate is Lucifer. Cheesecake is venial sin. Calories are death. Like Alice in Warped Wonderland, the mass me dia distorts reality, trapping women in a never- ending psychological nightmare. Through society’s looking glass, the modern woman perceives her self as overweight, unattractive and incapable of achievement without physical beauty. Just last week, a 13-year-old British girl took a fatal overdose of pills, no doubt to kill the pain of her existence. After enduring taunts of “fat ty” from fellow classmates for three years, Kelly Yeomans com mitted suicide because she could not handle the abuse any longer. A gang of teens gathered outside of Yeomans’ home and threw a block of margarine through her window, shouting abuse about lard and fat. Women today have an obses sion with superficial appear ance. This modern epidemic is a direct result of powerful images and words that alienate women from themselves. Contemporary culture is vin dictive toward nature’s role for the female body. Starving them selves, lypo-sucking out their fat and stair-stepping to nowhere, women deprive their bodies of fetus-feeding fat to conform to societal standards. As a result, menstruation cycles go out of wack, calcium deficiency runs down the woman’s body and hor mones go crazy. Society no longer respects womanhood. Actually, society no longer respects motherhood. Na ture gave women more fatty tis sue than men for the simple rea son that women carry babies — shocking, we know. If an anthropologist, a thou sand years from now, unearths an issue of Cosmo or Vogue, he or she might wonder why adver tising campaigns feature con centration camp survivors. As twinkie crumbs fall onto the pages of haute fashion maga zines across the world, women today wish someone could just give Kate Moss an M&M. Models are simply pre-pubes- cent girls in a state of arrested de velopment. The only role these bony, underfed girls can play is drooling, heroine-addicted euro trash. Looking like their panties are too tight, the twigs of fashion pull six-figure salaries and en dure the hardships of lounging around with pouty faces. Women in ads look like vul nerable victims, frail kittens with their appetites scared away. There is no celebration of the fe male form. Rather, the fashion waifs look like trans-gender, unisex, 13-year-old boys — in a word, ugly. In stark contrast to the freak ish poster-girls of today, visions of women in past eras were posi tive. Once considered ideal, the voluptuous Marilyn Monroe graced movie screens with her smoldering sensuality, winking and blowing kisses. Botticelli painted fertile women, glorifying the goddess like qualities of the female form. Depicting women as nurturers, Mary Cassatt painted plump and rosy women with a glowing warmth. Now, we no longer re gard women with soft and curva ceous figures as ideal. Today, happiness is not the goal, but thinness. Perhaps the social message is that thinness equals happiness. Fear of social rejection compels women to stock their shelves with piles of styrofoam rice cakes, gallons of slim-fast and prepackaged goulash. Herds of calorie-phobic women base their social worth upon their weight, believing somehow that 20 extra pounds lessens their value. Leagues of diet-queens such as Oprah and Jenny Craig lead the daily crusade against fat. Hurray, they can wiggle across a room without splitting their size- eight cocktail dress. And sure, they lead healthy lifestyles, ab stain from fudge, run eight miles at dawn and drink two gallons of water every hour. Clap, clap, clap ... their kidneys are clean. But we can not neglect the inside, what lingers beneath the skin. Women need to develop an appetite for freedom. Rebel against mainstream images that deny nature and stifle women. Rather than feed off of social pro paganda, build a self-image that is uniquely your own. Michelle Voss is a sophomore English major.