Image provided by: Texas A&M University
About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (March 31, 1999)
TheBi The Battalion O PINION Page 11A • Wednesday, March 31, 1999 Irhe kids on the bus... iA&M buses antiquated, need seat belts installed to protect passengers in case of accident mL ■campaign season is here, ■ and once again candidates BL^are building substantial parts of their platforms on the neverending calls for more park- in; on campus. ■ There seems to be no end to |the dizzying amount of unorigi- Inal and unrealistic parking ■'jplfenks put forth each spring by ^Halous hopefuls. Caleb MCDANIEL ithon Readings [httoi Meanwhile, however, the continued deteriora tion of Bus Operations remains largely unnoticed land unaddressed by student leaders and adminis tration officials alike. ■ This misplaced emphasis on parking not only leaves Bus Ops in financial straits as funds are for ever siphoned away to meet parking demands. More immediately and much more importantly, it sacrifices the safety of bus riders for the conve nience of those who drive to school. The antiquated Aggie buses, after all, have poor- ay. was create: padded seats, no seat belts and no stop signs to ylor a sophom Prefect riders from oncoming traffic as they exit the bus. While students have fanciful dreams about more parking garages or an underground tunnel to protect pedestrians crossing Wellborn (where there is already an overhead walkway), buses continue to carry passengers without standard safety fea- tires like seat belts. ■ And they are not even being discussed. “We re ally haven’t considered seat belts at all,” Gary Jack- son, Director of Bus Operations, said. Safety belts would be largely “cost-prohibitive.” I Granted, the debate over whether public school buses even need seat belts has raged for some years in school districts, and most transportation researchers have persuasively argued that seat belts would actually increase the danger to young chil dren who ride the bus to elementary and secondary school. I In head-on collisions, which are the most com mon type of accidents involving school buses, stud ies have shown that small-bodied children who wear seat belts are likely to double over and hit their head and neck on the seat in front of them. *■ Therefore, rather than buying belts, most school districts across the country have added other safety measures to their buses. They have installed seats 'with higher, heavily padded backs and spaced them so that passenger movement will be mini mized in the event of a crash. ■ These efforts to “compartmentalize” each seat have been largely successful, and in some states it is actually more dangerous statistically for a child ihm Ko$ Alt y ot UIU.IH has been iroyed.” ’0 Albani, idus by fi iring acro< whelming irld’s poon s of habit d. Many* :you ind Europe <ets get youBI price. ; ifl jst destin® to ride to school in their parents’ car than to ride the big yellow bus. Meanwhile, back in Aggieland, buses have not even caught up with these developments. Perhaps “com partmentalizing” works for smaller children, but the danger of college students jack-knifing when they wear seat belts is less apparent. Even if that danger were real, Aggie school buses have none of the traditional features to compen sate for the lack of seat belts. Most of the buses still have seats with metal backing, which makes sliding forward in a head-on crash more threatening than in school buses with highly padded seats. The seat backs are also shorter than the newest school bus seats and the seats are farther apart, making the possibility that passen gers will flip over the seats in front of them during an accident a very real danger. More obviously, “compartmen- tal” approaches to bus safety do not even solve all potential dangers. Should the bus be hit on the side or roll over, passengers have no re straints to protect them from flying around the cabin. Worse, since there are not enough buses in the Aggie bus fleet, an unsafe amount of passen gers must stand up. Rather than seeing this as cause for concern, Jackson said the amount of standing passengers is the main reason seat belts would never work. Standing passengers and belt-less seats, he said, are not a problem. “We are considered a transit sys tem,” Jackson said, arguing the Ag gie buses operate more like a city transportation service than a school bus fleet. While this may be true, it ought to be a reason for concern, not complacency. Bus Operations runs like a municipal transit system but uses antiquated, unsafe school buses. Either the buses should be modified to meet new safety recommendations, or the buses should be re placed with larger vehicles more befitting of a mass “transit system.” Outdated school buses will simply not do. This is not the fault of Jackson or Bus Opera tions officials. It is the fault, once again, of a wide 1 spread student attitude that riding the bus to or around campus is an inferior mode of transporta tion. What is needed, students insist, is parking, parking, parking. MARK MCPHERSON/The Batialion Surely, though, what is most needed is the safe ty of fellow Aggies. It would be wrong to wait until a tragic accident occurs to act to improve our bus system. Instead, students and student leaders should rally around initiatives to help Bus Opera tions. Caleb McDaniel is a sophomore history major. EDITORIAL ;re! I Editorials appearing in The Battalion reflect the liews of the editorials board members. They do not Becessarily reflect the opinions of other Battalion eoc/i/ej^Estaff members, the Texas A&M student body, re lents, administration, faculty or staff. Columns, uest columns, cartoons and letters express the opin ions of the authors. you want to jO' jre no cumbers)"' rsjuirement ^ Editorials Board AARON MEIER Editor in Chief KASIE BYERS Managing Editor MANISHA PAREKH Opinion Editor BETH MILLER City Editor Conservation efforts by humans foolish, presumes ability to affect environment C iummetf SBP Endorsement Battalion endorses Will Hurd for student body president due to experience, leadership onservation efforts in America today are point less. While the mission statements of environmen tal groups contain such broad state ments as “preserving economic di versity for the children of tomorrow,” Luke SAUCIER I The Battalion has decided to endorse Will Hurd for the office of student body president. Hurd, who is currently MSG president, dis- ugg a getobackpJ a y s the communication, leader- ack ,tnd ianny"-' s r 1 P and diplomacy skills neces- slry to make a successful student rv Jpdy president. Hurd is well-respected by stu- , ———^cfents, faculty and administration, ICING * a ^ n g him a good representative u for the student body at Texas A&M. * i jHe is also a good communicator a SSIStclth quality that makes him an ideal am bassador for this University. B Furthermore, Hurd, through the v^st experience gained from his leadership roles at A&M, knows how to make things happen on Program pis campus. He knows how the 7 lampus is organized and who to talk to to get things done. £ ii K; M° st importantly, though, Hurd one 0[ taf Bpresents the kind of student body ,j , JBndidate who can actually im prove the University. Hurd has real re office B^hons for improving student life, ' not vague promises. His ideas in ch ide working towards a seamless pansition between his administra- -m. tion and current Student Body Pres ident Laurie Nickel’s Hurd plans to e of Profess’'start taking the reins of student gov- , n , 7 i, eminent immediately instead of al- _ic building -trier Students LOpS flying to it Progr lission? lowing issues to fall to the wayside as the semester ends. Much of Hurd’s platform centers around — and supports — Vision 2020, the blueprint for A&M’s role into the next century. He plans to rally students together in order to voice important concerns to the ad ministration, making the University more responsive to its most impor tant customers, the students. Hurd also plans on making changes to the way student gov ernment works in order to make it run more efficiently and effective ly. Some of these changes include utilizing University resources, such as Measurement and Re search Services, to poll students about their top concerns and pos sible solutions. Hurd plans on making sure Student Government reaches out for student input in stead of relying on students to come to them. The Battalion believes Will Hurd is the best choice for student body president. His commitment to im proving A&M through both long- and short-term goals will have a positive effect for the students and faculty alike. His experience, knowl edge and ability make him the strongest candidate for the job. people in volved in conservation have for gotten to ask themselves why they are doing what they do, and what benefit will be gained by so spending their time and money. Greenpeace argues that hu mans should conserve other species because they have a right to exist on Earth and are at least as important as humans. But who are we to say which species have a right to exist? If it had been up to people, the more cud dly of the dinosaurs would prob ably still be around, but that is not the way it turns out, and we are glad of it. Earth is a dynamic place, and a view that does not take into account the existence of natural cycles of extinction and ecological change is a nar row one at best. Certainly Darwin’s theory of evolution and its theme of sur vival of the fittest pertains to hu manity and its activities as well. If a species becomes extinct to day, regardless of the cause, it was still phased out by the process of evolution just as sure ly as were the trilobites. Humans never have and never will toler ate the existence of anything per ceived as a threat to humans. There is no question that smallpox, measles, tuberculosis and AIDS will be utterly wiped out if humans get the chance. There would be no question of their “natural beauty” or “right to live,” yet they are life just as surely as humans are. If a dis tinction is drawn between the lives of bacteria and viruses and the life of an owl because one is more complex than the other, then only the most complex life forms are worth anything and humans are by far the most com plex life form on Earth. By this logic, all other life is secondary to the needs of humans, which is obviously not the philosophy en vironmental groups adhere to. Perhaps they strive to pre serve only life that is not a threat to humans. This is a good guide line for now, but eventually, hu mans will be so numerous that any species that does not directly benefit humans as food will be come competition for food and space and will doubtlessly be de stroyed. So humanity will ultimately only conserve those life forms which are of benefit to humani ty. Thus cows, chickens, pigs, wheat, corn and oats will proba bly never become extinct. But are not all life forms useful to us? So it can be argued — to para phrase John Donne’s For Whom The Bell Tolls, every time the earth loses a species to extinc tion everyone is somehow im poverished. The world is fearfully and wonderfully made, and the com plexity of its operation is so far beyond human comprehension that we are only now beginning to understand how it works. Our reckless use of this wonderful creation is dangerous, regardless of whether or not its wrong. Just as dangerous however are our fumbling attempts to fix what we have damaged. Like it or not there is no ecosystem on Earth unaffected by humans, so even isolating fragile environments has become a moot point. Earth has been around for quite a long time and has seen many violent events humans would call eco logical disasters but has sprung back from each such event even more wonderful and diverse than before. The world has proven its ability to take care of itself. Are humans so arrogant as to as sume that they have had some lasting impact on the planet, let alone that they can possibly fix the damage they may have done? Our role in any conservation at tempts must be a humble one, not relying on what humans think they understand and mak ing rash decisions to “fix” what they think they have ruined. In stead, humans should focus on learning more about the wonder ful creation that is Earth and en gage in a much more passive role that focuses not on other species but on humanity itself. Luke Saugier is a sophomore petroleum engineering major. MAIL CALL Reader provides verses about gays In response to Aaron Meier's Mar. 29 opinion column. I am writing in regards to Aaron Meier who wrote the article concerning the Church’s action against homosexuality. In his arti cle, he stated that in his four years in college, he has yet to have anyone be able to quote the exact chapter and verse in the Bible where homosexuality is deemed an abomination. Well, get your pen and paper ready Meier, because here it is; 1 Corinthians 6: 9-10 states, "Do you not know that the wicked will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor male prostitutes nor homosexual offenders nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunk ards nor slanderers nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God.’’ It is pretty simple, huh? It is in the Bible after all. Also in the article, Meier asks the question, “ Why is it so diffi cult for religion to accept the ho mosexual community?” Well, I will tell you why, and again, I will use scripture to do so. 1 Corinthians 5: 11 says, “But now 1 am writing you that you must not associate with anyone who calls himself a brother but is sexually immoral or greedy, an idolater or slanderer, a drunkard or a swindler. With such a man do not even eat.” So, when two men or women come to a Church to be wed in holy matrimo ny, it cannot be done. God will not recognize it, and He will not toler ate it. That is why the Church cannot accept homosexuality. Now I ask you, why is it so hard to see that homosexuality is wrong? It is straight from the Scripture. It is the word of God, and God’s word cannot be compromised. Clint Harris Class of '00 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 77843-1111 Campus Mail: till Fax: (409) 845-2647 E-mail: batt@tamvml.tamu.edu