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Friday. May 13.19*3
Thr Red and Black
Pages
(this eschew chewers, but habit persists
Mollv itrad/The Red and Black
Come on, girls, this can’t be a turn-off
K> GINA H AMMOCK
Rpd and Hlack l on'ribti tint; Hr iter
^ ou ve probably seen a
tobacco chewer somewhere
on campus, swaggering to
class behind a Coke cup he
fills with liquid brown
nicotine and sporting a
lopsided grin just like the
good ole boys in the com
mercials. If you're a girl,
vou probably turned your
head in disgust, adding a
grimace and groan for
impact
Doesn't feminine aversion
affect these guys?
"Girls think it's sick,”
says Steve Kothman. a
sophomore in political
science But girls aren't
everything."
Nevertheless, most who
chew curb their habit for the
sake of female com
panionship Some even curb
it for Mom
' When I used to play
baseball. I chewed tobacco,
and my inom would make
me spit it out," says Greg
Daniels, a junior in
economics "I still do it
every now and then. It's just
something to do w hen you re
out on the field "
I Mhers consider smokeless
tobacco the lesser of two
evils ”1 used to smoke
heavily, but I quit six months
ago." says Mike Chapman, a
treshman in dairy science
"Dipping kind of eases the
pain I guess it s a step
down I do it about six times
a day "
"I chew mostly at work."
says Rothman, a dishwasher
at Snelhng Hall with a daily
Skoal habit “I like the
nicotine and it's a good and
relaxing way to top off a
meal"
So far. these guys sound
like a TV commercial But
they don't concern them
selves. for the most part,
with the threat of potential
health hazards resulting
from the urge to take a chew
Nancy MacNair,
University health educator,
says that according to the
American Cancer Society,
smokeless tobacco is habit
forming, like cigarettes
"It has a yoyo effect on
your nervous system," she
says And users, she adds,
can develop leukoplakia —
leathery w hite patches in the
mouth as a result of direct
contact with tobacco
"Mouth cancer is found in
about 5 percent of the people
with leukoplakia," MacNair
says "And chewers have a
decreased sense of taste and
smell, making them use
more salt and sugar with
meals" Other problems
MacNair cited were
receding gums, tooth
discoloration and decay,
and of course, bad breath
"It gives you real nasty,
gross breath." says Ray
Butler, manager of
Georgetown News and
Tobacco That's the reason
girls don't like it — it gives
you barnyard breath "
And what's tile remedy for
barnyard breath?
"Once you brush your
teeth, you hold off for a
while," Rothman says
Yet despite odds of being
gruesome smelling and girl-
repelling. thr use of
smokeless tobacco continues
to rise The true appeal of
"just a pinch between the
cheek ana gum." at least for
some, is neither peer
pressure nor the macho
antics of bowlegged
television plug pushers
"Skoal gives me kind of a
buzz," confesses Seth
Hauser, a sophomore in arts
and sciences. And
Copenhagen, he says, “puts
me into hyperspace "
"I dip Copenhagen
because it gives a stronger
jolt, "Chapmansays.
It's no small wonder, then,
that these brands are
Butler's best sellers, with
Levi Garrett following
closely behind as the number
one chewing tobacco
"About 90 percent of our
chewers and dippers are
students some are in high
school It's just a fashionable
thing, I guess," he says
"They buy in cycles.
Everybody seems to get
tired ot Skoal, which has a
wintergreen tlavor and
they II start buying
Copenhagen."
Those cute little dip"
packets, called Skoal
Bandits, have been quite
populai recently, Butler
says, bul he Hunks dippers
are already turning back to
the messy old standard He
adds that smokeless tobacco
could indeed make the
novice user light headed,
since he isn't used to the
nicotine
"I chewed it plenty of
times and I never got a
buzz," says Jim Dukes, a
sophomore in arts and
sciences "I did get sick to
my stomach a couple of
times, though.”
Butler relates a story from
his undergraduate days in
which he offered a plug of
Red Man to an inex
perienced chewer "He took
about a quarter of the pack
They found him later in the
bathroom, and he was pretty
green Nobody had told him
not to swallow it."
One can assume the un
suspecting person was
subsequently cured of all
curiosity. There are those.
however, who never even
have the slightest desire to
experiment with that ever-
somacho trip to "hyper
space."
"I'd rather get bitten by a
rabid dog than put that
garbage in my mouth." says
Jeff Frazier, a junior in
journalism "But I do
smoke."
Ignoring opposition, ex
perienced chewers and
dippers have built something
honorable out of their habit.
"There’s a brotherhood
about it," Rothman says. "If
you run out, somebody will
always give you a dip The
cardinal rule of tobacco
etiquette? "Never take a
guy’s last dip."
‘Girls think it's sick. But girls
aren’t everything.’
—Greg Daniels
School prayer overruled
By DAVID RACE
%««urtetrd Rim Hrtter
ATLANTA — Two Alabama laws per
nutting prayer in public schools were
declared unconstitutional Thursday by a
lederal appeals court, which chided a lower
court judge for ignoring the Supreme Court's
ruling on the issue
One of the Alabama laws permitted
teachers to hold a period of silence ol up to
one minute lor meditation or voluntary
prayer during the first class period each day
The other allowed teachers to lead students
in a specific prayer written by the son of
then-Gov Fob James
In January. US District Judge W
Brevard Hand of Mobile dismissed a suit
filed against the Mobile County school
system by lshmael Jaffree, who contended
his three children in elementary schools had
been emotionally harmed because of their
refusal to join prayer activity
Jalfree later sought and received an order
from Supreme Court Justice Lewis Powell
staying Hand s ruling until his appeal could
be heard by the 11th Circuit
Alabama officials had argued that the laws
were constitutional because the First
Amendment was intended only’ to prohibit
the federal government from establishing a
national religion
But the U S llth Circuit Court of Appeals
said the Supreme Court had reviewed
similar arguments repeatedly in the past and
rejected them The appeals court said Hand
recognized the importance of the precedent
set by those earlier rulings but chose to
disregard them
"Judicial precedence serves as the
foundation of our federal judicial system,
the appeals court said "Adherence to it
results in stability and predictability If the
Supreme Court errs, no other court may
correct it.”
The appeals court said the Supreme Court
laid down three standards that a law must
satisfy in order to meet the requirements ol
the First Amendment doctrine of separation
of church and state it must have a secular
purpose, it must neither advance nor inhibit
religion and it must not foster an excessive
government entanglement with religion
"The record indicates that the teachers'
prayer activities were conducted in the
classrooms and did not appear to be
secularly motivated," the court said "We.
therefore, conclude that the Mobile County
school activities are in violation of the
establishment clause" contained in the First
Amendment, which liars Congress from
establishing a religion
The llth Circuit said both Alabama laws
"advance and encourage religious ac
tivities "
Dan Alexander, president of the Mobile
County school board, said the board would
appeal the case to the U S Supreme Court.
"We have said all along that we didn't hold
out a lot of hope of prevailing liefnrc the llth
Circuit." he said, adding that it would be "a
crime" to let the case stop in Atlanta
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