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4 • The Red and Black • Tuesday, May 8, 1990
OPINIONS
The Red & Black
Eitabliahsd 1893—Incorporated 1980
An indtpindtnl itudtnt nu ipaptr not affUiatod with tfte University of Georgia
Charlene Smlth/Editor-in-Chief
Amy Bellew/Managing Editor
Hogal Nassery/Opinions Editor
■ EDITORIALS
No choice in Guam
Censorship is alive and well in the United States
. and its territories. An ACLU lawyer, Janet Benshoof,
was arrested in Guam on March 16 for “soliciting”
women to have an abortion. It is now illegal to perform
or help to perform an abortion in Guam, so Benshoof
advised women to travel to the neighboring island of
Hawaii, where abortions are legal. Benshoof violated
the law deliberately in an act of civil disobedience.
This policy is reminiscent of the days of
Torquemada in Spain, and it began with the Federal
Department of Health and Human Services’ decision
that federal or state funded family planning clinics are
prohibited from giving information on abortions to
clients. It is obvious that these agencies are forging
their own policies in violation of the Supreme Court’s
1973 decision on Roe v. Wade.
Abortion is legal in the U.S. and yet, this is less
than obvious in states like North Dakota, South
Dakota, Missouri and Wyoming, where no public
hospitals provide abortion services. This is a tragic
situation for many women who cannot afford private
clinic costs.
Here in Athens, there are no physicians or clinics
that perform abortions. As a consequence, women are
forced to go to Atlanta or other major cities in order to
practice their reproductive rights. In reaction,
University students should boycott Clarke county
gynecologists, until they, in turn, learn to respect a
woman’s freedom to control her own body.
By violating Guam’s archaic law, Janet Benshoof
has made a strong statement for all of us. Hopefully,
her challenge of the law will put an end to this insanity,
once and for all.
In the meantime, Georgians can champion this
cause by voting NO to gubernatorial candidates Roy
Barnes (D) and Bob Wood (R) who are both anti
abortion, and thus ariti-egalitarian.
The Athens Pro-choice Action League is mobilized
and actively trying to convince our leaders and
legislators that pro-choice is the only choice. We must
realize that the abortion issue is going to affect our
generation for years to come, and ground lost now is not
easily regained.
For the health of it
Student apathy is considered more of a nuisance
than a real problem on campus, but now students’
health is on the line and no one can afford to pretend
the measles won’t strike them.
The spread of measles on campus has gone beyond
classification as a threat or a scare. With 26 confirmed
cases reported in the last two weeks, the disease is
approaching epidemic levels.
In a town where countless people cram local health
clubs and jog the streets to achieve a desirable
physique, it’s ironic that people need the threat of not
being able to register in order to take a few minutes to
get a measles vaccination. Physical fitness needs the
basis of good health, which includes freedom from a
disease that confines its victim to bed for up to a week
and a half. That little stick in the arm could save weeks
of missed classes or even withdrawal for the quarter.
If you don’t worry about your own health and
academic progress, and the thought of spending a
couple of sunny weeks spring quarter holed up in your
dorm room or apartment doesn’t faze you, then at least
have the decency to get a shot for the sake of those you
breathe near.
Don’t depend on the hope that everyone else has
been smart enough to go out and get their shots
because at this point, most students haven’t.
Get the shot, before you get the rash.
STAFF
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QUOTABLE
•Ninety-five percent of the people who are not Immune and are
exposed to the measles virus will contract It.
- Jacquelyn Kinder, University Health Services Director.
Maligned SA accomplished past goals
Congratulations are in order for last year’s
successful Student Association and the recently
received award declaring them the best in the
University System of Georgia.The up-coming
year looks even more promising. In only its
third year of existence, the representative body
accomplished much, especially considering the
lack of interest on the part of students. It is for
this reason that I am shocked to hear com
plaints from people that do not vote, do not par
ticipate in SA events, and have never been to
the weekly meetings.
To say that last year’s SA was ineffective re
flects total ignorance of the organization. How
ever, I have heard worse when others blame the
SA for not landing a spring concert. If anyone is
to blame for UGA not having a big band on
campus, it is the University itself, and other
University groups like the Georgia Athletic As
sociation and the University Union. To place all
the blame on the SA is wrong and unfair.
We have an effective student government. If
you do not realize this, allow me to recount
some of the acomplishments of last year.
From the SA sponsored mayoral debate of
last fall, to racial unity programs like the inter
national food fesival, the work began. Activities
were monitored and action taken in matters be
fore the Athens City Council through the SA
liason to that council.
The SA worked with the Physical Plant in
order to ensure an adequate number of left-
handed desks in as many classrooms as pos
sible. Steps toward publishing course evalua
tions were pursued by senators, while efforts to
extend bus routes on the Family Housing and
Milledge bus lines were also of concern.
Blacks must
The present chaotic state of black America
exists oecause many blacks have forgotten
where they came from. Many blacks not only
forget their collective heritage, but they forget
their individual roots as well.
To remember where you came from is to re
member your childhood struggles, to remember
your innocent dreams and to remember those
individuals who influenced your life.
Most importantly, to remember where you
came from is to never deny those who are less
fortunate them you are. By doing so, you are
also denying reality. The reality of many blacks
in America is quite grim and very void of the joy
felt by the “talented tenth.”
While we sit in the comfort of our exclusive
homes, in the company of our sometimes
shallow friends and in the hallowed halls of
American universities, we must remember that
America was not meant to be a society of sepa
rate spheres. America was meant to be a con
centric whole.
Not only are the college-educated a part of
society, the uneducated are also. What affects
the uneducated inner-city ghetto dweller, ulti
mately affects the educated guilded ghetto
dweller as well. When the media portrays our
youth as the filth of the nation and the inner-
city ghetto as an eye sore to the integrity of
America, everyone’s affected. Out of one’s per
ception of the inner-city ghetto emerges the
greater truth that black Americans are quite
forgetful.
The situation in which many blacks find
themselves reflects on our virtues, on our faith
in one another and on our intelligence. To the
While rapes and other violent crimes are all
too common on campuses across the nation, our
SA took the initiative to create an escort service
with the University police and a specially desig
nated van.
While drunk driving is killing college kids ev
erywhere, the SA struck a deal with local bars
to serve free Cokes to sober designated drivers.
Smoking, a hot issue being debated nation
ally, was a big concern to many students. Im
mediately the S.A. conducted a survey to
discover the opinions of students about the
smoking area in the lounge of the main library.
Since the survey was completed towards the
end of last year’s session, the newly elected SA
will soon act on these results.
Who could forget the strip searches at last
fall’s football games, in which spectators were
forced to undress in front of other people? Sen
ators quickly reminded University officials of
the U.S. Constitution, especially the prohibi
tion of unreasonable search and seizure. The
SA put a quick stop to the violations.
When an Atlanta legislator sponsored a bill
that would keep 18, 19, and 20 year-olds out of
Athens’ nightclubs, concerts, and dance halls,
the SA was there to stop it. When a potential
law that would ban organizations from campus
for alcohol violations was brought to the floor of
the state legislature, our SA stopped it. When
the Higher Education Act of 1965 was coming
up for reauthorization, the SA traveled to
Washington to lobby Georgia’s congressmen
with letters from concerned UGA students.
I think many of us have forgotten what it was
like here when we had no voice in University af
fairs. It was more than three years ago when
open parties were banned and students had no
way of responding. I honestly believe if the Uni
versity would have had a student government
at that time, today we could still participate in
those wonderful parties of yesteryear.
The plain fact of the matter is that we have
an active, energetic, effective Student Associa
tion at UGA. They are our only campus-wide
elected representative body and student sup-
ort is not only needed, but warranted. The SA
as proven that despite the past bad images of
former student governments, lack of student
support and ignorant complaints, it can
manage to be a viable and reliable organiza
tion. Instead of complaining, why not join the
general committees open to all students? In
stead of watching potential laws be killed or
passed, why not join the SA in the lobbying ef
forts? And instead of being content as an apa
thetic student, why not give your support to the
group that gives all of its support to you?
Phil Smith is the president of UGA Young Dem
ocrats.
remember their heritage
Delbert
Ellerton
meyority of America, we must appear as totally
ignorant and pitifully unresourceful. As a
group, we strive not to be individuals.
We wish to be emmulators, we wish to be im-
pressors and we wish to keep up with our
neighbor’s lot. In sum, we seemingly wish to be
slaves to our own follies. How, may I ask, can
any people of intellect, judgement and insight
allow injustices and self-inflicted persecutions
such as those which grip our unmotivated and
unbelieving masses, to exist?
The difficulties confronting black Americans
and Americans in general, are not simple in na
ture, nor are they static in dimension. As with
all virulent diseases, there exists a point in the
body in which the victim became inflicted.
Alas! To black Americans, that point is the
point in which the anesthetic of complacency
brought about the deadening of intellect, the
deadening of unitv and the deadening of ambi
tion. Consequently, this anesthetic brought
about an evil amnesia. An amnesia in which we
forgot our struggle in America, an amnesia in
which we forgot about our exclusion from the
inter-dynamics of America and an amnesia in
which we lost all sense and affinity for reality.
The virologists among us must perform their
best research and experiments on our children,
for they are America’s impending future. Not
only is it our responsibility to instill in our
young people, the grave realities of life, it is our
duty to nurture a sense of pride, a sense of am
bition, a sense of self and a sense of community.
In our doings, we must not ignore the fact
that our efforts exist not in a microcosm but in
a cyclorama of visions and a mural of universal
dreams. We must place our hopes and destinies
in the hands of God and have infinite trust.
A terrible dilemma is before us, and we must
work to gain that which is ours. Black Ameri
cans need to gain a new-found place beyond the
threshhold of this great land. Most impor
tantly, we must not only demand respect ver
bally but justify and command respect with
noble character and noble deeds.
In order to know what the future holds, you
must scrutinize the present, for it holds you.
Neither a person nor a group of people can ever
be substantial to others unless they are some
thing to themselves. How can black Americans
be an influencing factor to others if we do not
have respect for each other?
We are mere lost bodies floating in a still sea
of dead spirits. Until we come to life and trans
form this still and unproductive sea into an en
ergetic ocean of life and substance, we will
always be a negligible factor in mainstream
America.
Delbert Ellerton is a junior finance major.
Pro-choice means pro-Earth
FORUM
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and Black's offices at 123 N. Jackon St. Athens Be ^
Hope Morrison's article was a
clear, forceful statement of the
major issues in the abortion de
bate. Her focus on the interna
tional aspects of the problem
helped me realize that world over
population that comes (or will
come) in the absence of effective
birth control is also an environ
mental problem. The media is over
flowing with the dire consequences
of man’s misuse of the environ
ment, but surely too many people
is also a serious misuse of the
world and its resources, perhaps
the ultimate misuse. Changing our
lifestyle and recycling our wastes
are worthy goals, but even more
important in my mind is getting
the number of inhabitants in bal
ance with the resources of our
planet.
Milton H. Hodge
professor of psychology
Women need options
Janet Kinzey states that “posi
tive alternatives to abortion to
women in crisis pregnancies* must
be emphasized. Why start there?
Why not encourage more birth con
trol research so that these crisis
pregnancies never occur? “Right to
lifers” pay a lot of attention to preg
nant women after the fact, but
often ignore contraceptive research
as an issue or even seek to restrict
the birth control methods already
available. This leads one to believe
that the pro-lifers care less about
life than controlling the moral deci
sions that women and men make
concerning sex.
Pro-lifers would get a lot more
done toward preventing abortions
if they supported contraceptive re
search instead of inhibiting it.
Corey Anderson
Junior, political science